Lords Sitting of 4 March 1975

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

LORD ARMSTRONG OF SANDERSTEAD
The Right Honourable Sir William Armstrong, G.C.B., M.V.O., having been created Baron Armstrong of Sanderstead, of the City of Westminster, for life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord O'Brien of Lothbury and the Lord Trend.
The Duke of Grafton—Took the Oath.

CONTROL OF GAMING
2.47 p.m.
Lord NEWALL: 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 why foreigners are permitted to own gaming operations in the United Kingdom so that the benefits accrue abroad rather than to this country.
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, Her Majesty's Government do not think it practicable to impose such restrictions on gaming as are implied in this Question. It is, however, important that effective control of gaming remains firmly in the country, and the Gaming Board for Great Britain exercises its responsibilities under the Gaming Act 1968 to this end.
Lord NEWALL: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that Answer. May I further ask whether he is aware that in many cases licences have been withdrawn from clubs with foreign interests, particularly American ones, and is he therefore sure that the Gaming Board has adequate powers to deal with situations like this?
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, my information is that the Gaming Board does have sufficient powers to deal with the situation.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that some of these gaming operations are part of one of the most unscrupulous multi-national rackets in the whole of the world, exploiting tourist resorts in many parts? Will the Board look carefully at its finances to be sure that we are securing the correct revenue from them?
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, the Government's view is that the gaming industry must be treated on a par with the rest of industry, which increasingly operates on an international basis. We shall take into account what the noble Lord has said, and if it is necessary to pursue inquiries along the lines he suggests, no doubt they will be pursued.
Earl COWLEY: My Lords, would the noble Lord say what criteria the Gaming Board uses in deciding whether foreign money is acceptable in our gaming clubs?
Several Noble Lords: Answer!
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, I am sorry but I did not follow the noble Earl's question.
Earl COWLEY: My Lords, I asked whether the criteria used by the Gaming Board are laid down by Statute when deciding whether foreign money is acceptable in our gaming clubs.
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, my understanding of the situation is that the authority is set out in the Gaming Act 1968. I cannot give the noble Earl details for the simple reason that I do not have them, but I understand that this is where the authority is to be found.
The Earl of KIMBERLEY: My Lords, can Her Majesty's Government state categorically that British applicants for gaming licences are given priority, and if not, why not?
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, I have no information at all with regard to that, but if this is so, it is a matter that ought to be looked into and the Gaming Board will, I am sure, do so.

RICHMOND TERRACE, WHITEHALL
Lord PANNELL: 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 future plans they have for Richmond Buildings in Richmond Terrace, Whitehall; whether they intend to develop or demolish them; and what future use they propose for the site in view of Sir Leslie Martin's scheme.
The PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE, DEPARTMENT of the ENVIRONMENT (Baroness Birk): My Lords, in his plan for Whitehall Sir Leslie Martin proposed that Richmond Terrace should be demolished. Later, following a public inquiry, the Willis Report recommended that the Terrace should not be demolished and that a satisfactory scheme for the re-development of this particular area of Whitehall could be achieved by preserving the facades. The Government endorse this recommendation. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment hopes to commission shortly a study designed to examine and cost redevelopment options consistent with the preservation of the facades.
Lord PANNELL: My Lords, is the Minister aware that when I was the Minister concerned in the reception of Sir Leslie's scheme ten years ago, certain decisions were taken, but that all that seems to have happened since has been the Willis Inquiry and a tedious degree of procrastination? Is my noble friend aware that I visited these premises last week, that they are an inglorious slum and that there is nothing to be done about them except to go back to the original wise decision, taken under my Ministry, to have them demolished?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, while not for a moment questioning my noble friend's wisdom, which I know to be very great, I should point out that nowadays it is recognised that a policy of conservation coupled with sensitive, gradual and small-scale renewal is much more fitting for an area of such historic importance as Whitehall, which is now a conservation area. In reply to my noble friend's
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second point, Richmond Terrace was used as offices until 1973, when it was considered unsafe. It has been empty since then and it is in order to carry on the scheme proposed in the Willis Report that the Secretary of State for the Environment is setting up a study.
Lord PANNELL: My Lords, is my noble friend firmly of the opinion—which I am not—that the Minister for the Environment knows the difference between conservation and preservation?
Viscount ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that I am very unhappy to know that I was bom in a slum—the building in question—but that I am very glad to hear that at least the facade is to be preserved?

EEC: EGG IMPORTS
2.56 p.m.
Earl FERRERS: 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 action they intend to take to prevent the import of subsidised eggs from the Continent.
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, the Government could justify seeking to control the import of eggs from other member-States of the Community only if there were clear evidence that such imports were at the heart of our industry's problems.
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the French egg producers are receiving an interest-free loan from their Government so that they are able to export eggs to this country below the cost of production, and that this is therefore affecting our egg producers? Does this not contravene Article 46 of the Treaty of Rome, and is it not possible to take action under Article 136 of the Treaty of Accession?
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords with regard to the first part of the noble Earl's supplementary question, the French Government loan—in the form of launching aid for a producer funded and organised price equalisation fund—is one of a number of national aids being considered by the Commission under Article 93 of the

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Treaty of Rome. With regard to the question which the noble Earl asked about Article 136 of the Treaty of Accession, before one could consider invoking the protection clauses of either the Treaty of Rome or the Treaty of Accession, it would be necessary to produce hard evidence that imports were at the heart of the United Kingdom's industry's problems. There is at present no conclusive evidence, but if the industry could produce such evidence the Government would, of course, examine it.
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARYLEBONE: My Lords, has the noble Lord considered the evidence in the Press that some of these French eggs are marked with the British stamp and a date later than that on which they are imported? Whether or not that is at the heart of our industry's problems, can it not be stopped as a Common Law cheat?
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, we certainly did find on 19th February the first case of wrong date stamping on a consignment of French eggs. The boxes in question were returned to France for restamping and the French authorities have been asked to take action to try to avoid a recurrence. Otherwise, we have found only minor infringements. Any irregularities will be followed up promptly and firmly.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the importing of these eggs from the Continent is not a matter for ribaldry, but is a very serious matter indeed? Could he say whether, under the Treaty of Rome and its various provisions, we are bound to accept these eggs whether they are good or bad? Would he also be good enough to say whether the observations which recently came from another quarter of your Lordships' House, mean that there is some fading away from the proposition of remaining in the Treaty of Rome because of this matter of eggs?
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, the Treaty of Rome does not allow us to accept eggs with wrong date stamps, even from France.
Lord SANDYS: My Lords, while recognising the complexity of this issue, have the Government considered the necessity of taking into account the
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recently published Swan Report on toxicity of foodstuffs, and should the import of French and other eggs be considered in the light of that Report?
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, I assume that the noble Lord is referring to antibiotics in egg production. The Community rules are similar to our own, and it is therefore unlikely that imported eggs will have been produced with the aid of antibiotics not permitted here.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, would my noble friend make a submission to his right honourable friend the Prime Minister that, in making up his mind about the question associated with the Referendum, instead of all the palaver and fine words the Referendum question should consist of whether or not we should accept these eggs?
Baroness SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, could my noble friend say whether the price of the eggs was reduced after they were redated, or whether they were sold to the unsuspecting housewife?
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, I am afraid I do not know what happened once they got back to France.
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, am I to understand the noble Lord seriously to say that the eggs were sent back to be restamped and, if so, did they come back to this country again?
Lord STRABOLGI: No, my Lords, what I said was that they were sent back so that we could get a consignment with a correct stamp on it.
Lord WIGG: My Lords, would my noble friend be good enough to say whether there is a special branch of the Foreign Office dealing with the question of eggs, good or bad?
Lord STRABOLGI: No, my Lords, not yet.
Lord HOY: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend what is the total number and total value of these eggs coming in, and what proportion they represent of the total egg consumption in this country?
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, I think we must put this matter into perspective. Imports are estimated to have

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been only 70,000 boxes, which is 2 per cent. of our supply, and this is more than 30,000 fewer boxes than in January 1974, when noble Lords opposite were in Government.
Lord SLATER: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that there is no complexity attached to the supplementary question asked from the other side on this issue? Is it not correct to state that the time is fast approaching when this island will be covered with foreigners coming from the EEC countries and taking up forms of labour which have not been overtaken by the unemployment situation?
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, I suggest that that is quite a different question concerning a different Government Department.
Viscount ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, if we may set aside the question of bad eggs, may I ask what rights of complaint we would have, if we left the Common Market organisation, against the breaches of price and other troubles that have been pointed out?
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, I suggest that that question goes rather wider than the original Question.
The LORD PRIVY SEAL (Lord Shepherd): My Lords, may I rather plaintively suggest that we bring Question Time to an end and move to the next Business?

HOUSE OF COMMONS DISQUALIFICATION BILL [H.L.]
3.1 p.m.
The LORD CHANCELLOR (Lord Elwyn-Jones): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. Like the three Bills which follow, it is a pure consolidation Bill and, subject to your Lordships' approval, it will, in the usual way, be referred to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills for consideration. It consolidates the House of Commons Disqualification Act 1957 and certain other relevant enactments relating to disqualification for the House of Commons. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.— (The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills.

NORTHERN IRELAND ASSEMBLY DISQUALIFICATION BILL [H.L.]
The LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. It consolidates that part of the House of Commons Disqualification Act 1957 which deals with disqualification for the Northern Ireland Assembly and certain other relevent enactments. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a. — (The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills.

MINISTERS OF THE CROWN BILL [H.L.]
The LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. It consolidates the Ministers of the Crown (Transfer of Functions) Act 1946, the Ministers of the Crown Act 1974, and certain other relevant enactments. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a. —(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills.

MINISTERIAL AND OTHER SALARIES BILL [H.L.]
The LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. It consolidates the Ministerial and Other Salaries Act 1972 and the Ministers of the Crown Act 1974. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a. —(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills.

OFFSHORE PETROLEUM DEVELOPMENT (SCOTLAND) BILL
3.3 p.m.
The MINISTER of STATE, SCOTTISH OFFICE (Lord Hughes): My Lords, I beg to move that the Commons' Reasons for disagreeing to certain of the Lords Amendments be now considered.
Moved, That the Commons' Reasons for disagreeing to certain of the Lords Amendments be now considered.—(Lord Hughes.)
Lord CRAIGTON: My Lords, I should like to make one brief comment on the second of the Amendments—
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARYLEBONE: My Lords, perhaps my noble friend would wait until the Amendments are considered. What we are now considering, I believe, is whether they should be considered.
The LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, perhaps I had better put the Question again. The Question is, That the Commons' Reasons for disagreeing to certain of the Lords Amendments be now considered?
On Question, Motion agreed to.
Lord HENLEY: My Lords, the noble and learned Lord is proceeding too quickly. The noble Lord, Lord Craigton, wished to make an interjection on the Question, Whether they should be considered?
Several Noble Lords: Did he?
Lord HENLEY: My Lords, he attempted to do so and was stopped in his tracks. I hope that the noble and learned Lord will put this Question again, because I think that the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, has something useful to say.
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARYLEBONE: My Lords, my noble friend will correct me if I am wrong, but I thought he wanted to make a comment on the Commons' Reasons. If that is the case the appropriate moment to do it would be when we consider whether we should assent to the Reasons or dissent from them. If he wished to discuss the Question, whether the Commons' Amendments should be considered now,
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he would have been in order, and in that case I can only apologise for interrupting him.
Lord CRAIGTON: My Lords, my noble and learned friend is quite right; I just wanted to say something about the Amendments.
COMMONS' REASONS FOR DISAGREEING TO CERTAIN OF THE LORDS AMENDMENTS
[References are to Bill (50) as first printed by the Lords. Commons Reasons are printed in italics.]

LORDS AMENDMENT
[Nos. 1 and 2]
Clause 1, page 1, line 8, leave out from "for" to "the" in line 11 and insert "purposes relating to exploration for or exploitation of offshore petroleum in".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:—
Because the Amendment would restrict excessively the purposes for which land may be acquired under the Bill.
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I hesitate to enter into what appears to be a family quarrel. I beg to move that the House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 1 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason No. 2,
"Because the Amendment would restrict excessively the purposes for which land may be acquired under the Bill."
I do not wish to go into too much detail on this Amendment, since the point it raises has been very fully debated on a number of occasions both in your Lordships' House and in another place. The effect of the Amendment would be to restrict the purposes for which land may be acquired under the Bill to those specified in Clause 1(2); that is, platform sites, pipelines, terminals and infrastructure. It would similarly restrict the application of other provisions of the Bill relating to the carrying out of works, the making of loans or guarantees and reinstatement. Such a definition of purposes would be too limiting. As I explained to your Lordships on Report stage when this Amendment was debated, there may well be occasions in the future when the Government would wish to facilitate oil operations by acquiring land and making it available for other purposes relating to the exploration for or the exploitation of offshore petroleum, but to which no particular degree of urgency of acquisition attaches.

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At Report stage in the House on 18th February I was asked why the wording of paragraphs (a), (b), (c) and (d) of Clause 1(2) do not cover the examples I gave. Let us take, for example, an off-shore oil service or supply base to be located at a port or harbour in Scotland. The purposes of such a facility would be to keep offshore drilling operations, whether for exploration or production, supplied with their material needs. Clause 1(2)(a) covers only a site or facilities for the construction or assembly of platforms or installation. A supply base does not carry out that function, and therefore the powers of land acquisition would not be available under the terms of the Amendment. Similarly, testing or research facilities for underwater equipment are not comprehended within Clause 1(2)(a) because they are not construction or assembly. It was suggested in one of our earlier debates that the wording of Clause 1(2)(d) with its reference to:
"… services or facilities … for … development … of land …"
might cover a service base. What Clause 1(2)(d) is meant to cover in this sense is services by way of roads, sewers, et cetera, for the development or use of land. It would not cover the provision of a base whose function is to give service not in relation to land but in relation to offshore operations.
It is worth emphasising also that the Amendment would prevent the acquisition of land by the Secretary of State for these purposes even with the agreement of the owner. The effect of the Amendment is therefore to make the Bill a less versatile tool for the Government's task in helping to ensure development of, and securing lasting benefit from, our offshore oil. The Government therefore remain convinced that it is necessary to give the general power of land acquisition in Clause 1(1) to give a degree of flexibility to meet land requirements arising from future offshore technology; and for the reasons I have outlined, I ask your Lordships not to insist on this Amendment.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 1.—(Lord Hughes.)
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, the Amendment in question would restrict the powers in the Bill to
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what, in our opinion, are necessary to deal with the urgent situations that can be foreseen. We were told during the discussions on the Bill in this House that the outstanding virtue of the additional very wide power which would be dropped under your Lordships' Amendment was that it was most unlikely ever to be used. That was stated as a reassurance to Parliament but it is hardly an argument in favour of that power. We believe that neither this part of the clause, if restored, nor the rest of the clause is likely to be needed. The whole concept is concerned with compulsory acquisition of land to avoid delays in the oil programme, but so far no delay to our oil programme has been caused by any difficulties over the acquisition of land; the delays have occurred for other reasons, as I and my noble friends have explained to the House. It will be interesting to see, if this Amendment is not pursued, whether the Government will use these powers and, if so, in what circumstances.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDENTS
[Nos. 3 to 6]
Clause 1, page 2, line 34, at end insert—
"( ) An expedited acquisition order shall not be made in respect of any land or part thereof which has been declared to be inalienable by virtue of any enactment."
The Commons disagreed with this Amendment for the following Reason:—
Because the possibility cannot be excluded that land which is inalienable might have ta be acquired urgently under the Bill.
Clause 12, page 10, line 41, leave out sub-section (3).
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:—
Because the possibility cannot be excluded that land which is inalienable might have ta be acquired urgently under the Bill.
3.11 p.m.
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, with permission I should like to speak to Amendments Nos. 3 and 5. I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 3, to which the Commons have disagreed for Reason No. 4, and that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 5, to which the Commons have disagreed for Reason No. 6; in both cases because the possibility cannot be excluded that land which is inalienable might have to be acquired urgently under the Bill. In the proceedings on the Bill the substance of these

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Amendments has now been fully debated on four separate occasions; once in this House at Committee stage, and in another place at both Committee and Report stages and on consideration of Lords Amendments.
In asking your Lordships not to insist on these Amendments in the face of disagreement in another place, the Government's position is as follows. Although the Government have no plans at present to acquire for the purposes of the Bill any land held inalienably by the National Trust for Scotland, we cannot rule out the possibility that such land might be required urgently in the future. Acceptance of the Amendments would rule out the use of an expedited acquisition order and, although a compulsory purchase order could be used, it would be subject to special Parliamentary procedure which would cause an unacceptable delay. Failure to provide for the compulsory acquisition of inalienable land by expedited acquisition order could prove to be a serious handicap at some time in the future. There could arise a case where the national interest, in terms of acquiring land quickly for a crucial oil development, had to be weighed against the benefit to the nation as represented by the National Trust's tenure of inalienable land. Through the Affirmative Resolution procedure, Parliament will be able to look at the merits of each case and resolve any such conflict.
Any expedited acquisition order dealing with inalienable land will be subject to the hybridity procedures of this House, as they are applied by the Amendment which your Lordships made on Third Reading. This will afford additional protection to the Trust and I hope will go a long way to meet the fears which they have expressed. The Amendment seeks a blanket exemption for all National Trust inalienable land, present and future. To agree would be to prejudge the national interest issue now, and would apply acceptance of the fact that whatever unforeseen situations may arise in future the inalienability of National Trust land must, in respect of urgent oil-related developments, remain forever inviolate. In these uncertain times that concept is one which the Government would find it difficult to justify.
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The Bill does not strike at the concept of inalienability of land in general; it aims to apply a special procedure with appropriate planning, and Parliamentary safeguards to any areas of land which are urgently needed for a narrow range of special purposes. The Bill has no effect whatever on land which is not touched by oil-related developments. The Executive Council of the National Trust for Scotland have offered to consult with the Government on future declarations of inalienability. We have taken up that offer and will be getting in touch with the Trust very soon to work out the details of such an exercise. As I indicated at Report stage, such consultations could at the very least identify areas which are unlikely to be needed for oil development and which the Trust could confidently declare inalienable, if they so wished. The Government have tried to be as helpful as possible in this matter and have thought long and hard about it, as I know your Lordships also have done.
I should particularly like to pay tribute to the wholly constructive approach to this important provision, which moved your Lordships to give the other place an opportunity to examine it again in the light of your Lordships' own views and of the many strongly held beliefs voiced in both Houses and outwith Parliament. But I know that in these circumstances your Lordships will be very conscious of the implications for this legislation of any decision of your Lordships' House to overturn a provision on which the will of the other place has twice been expressed. I therefore ask your Lordships not to insist on the Amendments. I beg to move.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on their Amendments Nos. 3 and 5 to which the Commons have disagreed.— (Lord Hughes.)
3.17 p.m.
Lord CRAIGTON: My Lords, I and my noble friends believe that in asking your Lordships to agree to overturn a decision which they have previously made the Government are breaching for the first time the legal method by which your Lordships can already overturn inalienability. I believe that that is a fundamental error, and the only gain is the saving of perhaps a few short weeks. In so doing the Government undermine the

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confidence in the National Trust of those who were considering donating land and properly, and that may not now be given because donors will feel that what can be done once may be done again. As the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, said, both he and Mr. Bruce Millan in another place have been most co-operative in seeking a solution. The delay of 28 days before the expedited acquisition order procedure can be applied is an additional safeguard provided by the Government at Third Reading in your Lordships' House. So I and those for whom I speak accept the position, and will do all in our power to prove that our fears are groundless. We hope that from now on closer co-operation with St. Andrew's House may prevent those acquisition crises, which we feared might happen with such disastrous results to Scotland and indeed to England, before they arise.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, on these two Amendments, also, we regret that the other place has not agreed with our views, though there has been some amelioration in another Amendment which the other place accepted, as the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has reminded us, over the hybridity arrangements. That was a great improvement on the previous subsection in the Bill, which we dropped. But we regret that the procedure for considering inalienable land, including a Joint Committee of both Houses, has not been retained and I join my noble friend Lord Craigton in being disappointed. Both National Trusts for England and Wales and for Scotland have made it clear that they do not regard inalienable land as exempt from compulsory purchase, provided that decisions are taken by Parliament in accordance with the previously stipulated procedure. We do not think that that procedure need have been discarded for the purposes of the Bill, and we are sorry that the other place has not agreed.
Lord WTONE-JONES: My Lords, this is a matter which is of considerable importance to all of us and I find myself in some sympathy with what has been said by the noble Lords, Lord Craigton and Lord Campbell of Croy. I think that there is little doubt that one wants to see that land is kept inalienable; but, at the same time, there is the highly important question of the development
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for a specific purpose. I do not know whether my noble friend Lord Hughes can enlighten me on this, but I understood from the Bill that where land is taken it is not taken permanently; it is taken for a specific purpose and when that purpose is achieved the land returns to its original state. It seems to me—and I hope that I am right in this—that although the land is called inalienable and although it is taken for a specific purpose, it returns to its inalienable state after that purpose has been fulfilled. If I am right on this, then the position is fully defended; but, at the same time, I can fully understand the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, and others being a little anxious about it. I hope that we can say that the present state of the Bill clarifies the matter for those of us who can be worried about the situation.
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I am grateful for the way in which the noble Lords, Lord Craigton and Lord Campbell of Croy, have spoken. What they have said is very much in line with what the National Trust for Scotland have done. My honourable friend the Minister of State kept the National Trust very much in touch with what was taking place in the later stages. If I may quote extracts from the last letter from the Trust to Mr. Millan, it shows exactly how the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, was echoing his position. They say in the third paragraph:
"The Trust in accepting the situation as it stands today "—
that is, after the Commons voted not to agree with the Lords Amendments—
"must of course express its deep regret that the Government did not feel convinced in accepting the arguments advanced both in the Commons at an earlier stage and throughout the three debates in the House of Lords ".
Further on, they say:
"Indeed, support for the Trust has been reinforced in recent months thanks to the decision made by the Secretary of State over Drambuie over which issue the Trust was joined by Ross and Cromarty County Council and local opinion including the crofting township most directly concerned."
The letter goes on:
"The contingency of extreme urgency over some site in the future should, it is very much hoped, be remote but in any event it should be capable of solution as a result of the prior consultations to which you refer in the penultimate paragraph of your letter. On this point I am glad to be able to report to you that

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the undertaking given by the Trust's President, Lord Wemyss, in the House of Lords during the Report stage on Tuesday, February 18th, was fully endorsed by the Council meeting yesterday. The Council was anxious to ensure that the maximum degree of mutual confidence existed between the Government and the Trust in the pursuit of its many aims and objectives. Thank you for undertaking to ask officials of the SDD to get in touch with us in order to work out appropriate machinery."
My Lords, in regard to the point made by my noble friend, obviously I cannot refer to any precedent because it has rarely happened in Scotland that this position has arisen; but I must point out that he is not totally correct. It will not follow that all land will be returned to its original state; there could well be circumstances in which it would be in the national interest that the land should continue in (shall we say?) industrial use. Obviously, however, in a case where inalienable land was no longer required for the purposes and was to be returned to its original state, I do not think that there is the slightest doubt that it will be returned to the National Trust in, I hope, as near as may be the state in which it was originally taken over. I hope that that partial point will satisfy my noble friend Lord Wynne-Jones.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

HOUSING RENTS AND SUBSIDIES (SCOTLAND) BILL
3.26 p.m.
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. I should like first of all to set this comparatively short Bill in perspective. As your Lordships are aware, the reform of housing finance is one of the Government's major political commitments. This task is being tackled in two stages. We are embarking on a longer-term review of housing policies and finance, which will no doubt lead to further housing legislation. Meanwhile, we have introduced this Bill, which has immediate significance for housing in Scotland, since it repeals the parts of the Housing (Financial Provision) (Scotland) Act 1972 which aroused widespread objection and makes a number of improvements in existing subsidy arrangements. The Bill deals with both the public sector and the private rented sector.
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In the public sector Clause 1 of the Bill restores freedom to local authorities to determine for themselves what rents should be charged for the houses built and managed by them. It does so by restoring the well tried principle of reasonable rents which allows authorities to have regard to local circumstances in determining rent levels. The Bill also requires authorities to review their rents from time to time; they may do this when they are preparing their annual budgets or at such other intervals as they think appropriate.
Authorities are required in fixing rents to disregard the personal circumstances of their tenants; so the rents charged continue to reflect the value of houses rather than the means of the tenants, who —to the extent that they require assistance—are protected by the rebate scheme. Authorities are permitted to maintain a working balance in their Housing Revenue Account, so that they may take account of fluctuations in expenditure from year to year, but they are not permitted to make a surplus on their Housing Revenue Account. This is an especially apt time for these changes—when the new district authorities will be taking over responsibility for housing for the first time.
From the meetings which the Under-secretary of State and I have been having with the new district authorities, we know how keen they are to get on with their task, and how they welcome the freedom the Bill provides for them to reach their own decisions—decisions for which, let us remember, they are answerable to the tenants and rate-payers affected by them.
So far as Clause 2 is concerned, as a Government we are naturally concerned about the effects of very steep rent increases. We have therefore subjected the rent freedom to a counter-inflation safeguard: a maximum limit of £39, which may be variable by order, on the rent increases which may be imposed on any individual house in any period of 12 months. This is not a prescribed average increase, comparable to the £26 under the 1972 Act. This limit also applies to development corporation and Scottish Special Housing Association houses. Clause 3 and Schedule 1 strengthen Exchequer support for housing.

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The Bill provides for an increase of some £5 million in the payment of housing expenditure subsidy for 1975–76, with cumulative increases thereafter. This means that Central Government will be paying in subsidy 75 per cent. of all the increases in expenditure per house over the previous year, without any contribution from rents. The Bill also continues the payment of rent income subsidy under the Housing (Scotland) Act 1974 for the year 1975–76. We estimate that together these additional subsidy payments of some £16 million should serve to contain the growth in rate fund contributions to the bottom end of the range quoted in the Financial Memorandum to the Bill; that is £7 million to £9 million.
Clause 4 makes some minor adjustments to facilitate the closing of Housing Revenue Accounts at the end of the current year. Clause 5 inserts into the New Towns (Scotland) Act 1968 a provision, already present in English New Towns legislation, which allows the Secretary of State to recover all or part of any surplus which may be made by a New Town development corporation, after he has consulted the corporation and the Treasury. This is purely an enabling provision which we do not expect to use in the near future. Schedule 1 to the Bill also repeals the Secretary of State's special powers in relation to housing default. This is part of our approach towards creating the right climate of co-operation between Central Government and local authorities. The Secretary of State will retain the same general default powers as he has in relation to all other local authority functions, but authorities will no longer feel that their housing functions are singled out for special attention.
To turn to the private sector, we have provided a logical extension of the principles recognised in existing legislation. Within the fair rents system we have ensured that where rent increases take place, they take place at a gradual rate for all tenants. As to Clause 6 and Schedule 2, the main private sector provisions extend the phasing of rent increases to all cases where the tenant has had a fair rent registered. This means that, generally speaking, rent increases which are due after a fair rent has been registered by a rent officer will be made in three equal stages, normally over a
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two-year period, subject to a minimum increase in any one year of 40p per week and a maximum of £1·50 per week. Special arrangements have been made in the Bill for adjusting phasing for rents registered during the freeze and for rents which were caught at stages of phasing by the freeze. The purpose of these arrangements is to ensure that the benefits of the standstill will not be wiped away by steep increases immediately it ends on 15th May. We think that where rents must rise they should do so in a steady progression enabling tenants to adjust their budgets.
Section 34 of the 1972 Act provided that all controlled tenancies should be brought out of rent control in bands related to the rateable value of the houses concerned without any reference to their condition. Clause 8 stops this automatic process of decontrol in the case of the remaining controlled tenancies; namely, those with a rateable value of £25 or less. Though their numbers have been shrinking recently, in the main because of redevelopment, it is estimated that there are still some 5,000 such houses in Scotland. In order to convert a controlled tenancy into a regulated one, a landlord will now require to obtain a qualification certificate by satisfying the local authority that the house contains all the standard amenities, meets the tolerable standard, and is in a good state of repair.
We are concerned to ensure that continuing rent control on properties under £25 rateable value does not result in their falling into hopeless disrepair, with distressing consequences for the people who rely on them to provide hearth and home. For the first time landlords are to be allowed, under Clause 9 of the Bill, to make rent increases directly related to the cost of any repairs which they carry out. They may increase rents by 12½ per cent. of the cost of any repairs carried out to a house which is let on a controlled tenancy. By tying rent increases to land-lords' performance in this way we hope to exert a direct influence to prevent these houses from sliding into irremediable disrepair.
My Lords, this Bill marks the first stage in a review of housing and finance to which we in the Government are committed. But it is no ephemeral piece of legislation. It unmistakably conveys the Government's faith in the responsibility

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of local authorities who have traditionally taken their housing functions very seriously. Central Government is being taken out of essentially local decisions on rents and rate fund contributions. At the same time, the Bill shows the Government's realism in providing in the private sector for a steady adjustment towards fair rents from a comparatively low historic rent base. While the logic of upward rent movements cannot be ignored, it would be irresponsible not to provide a framework to prevent the serious social and individual consequences of steep rent increases, to which tenants cannot readily adjust. I confidently recommend this Bill to your Lordships. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2. —(Lord Hughes.)
3.36 p.m.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, housing legislation is needed from time to time to adjust the system to changing circumstances, in Scotland as elsewhere in the United Kingdom. But much of this Bill is unnecessary, and the effects of Clause 1 are likely, we believe, to be harmful in Scotland. The Bill is turning the clock back on housing progress in Scotland. Having fabricated a false mythology about the Housing (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Act 1972, the Labour Party are now apparently left with no alternative to changing the provisions of the Act on council rents, although they accept the principle of balancing housing accounts and accept that that principle is right. The 1972 Act required housing accounts to be balanced in due course—as distinct from the English Act which provided for surpluses—but any increases in rent in the Scottish Act were limited to an average of only £26 a year. This should be compared with the limit of £39 a year for any house in this Government's present Bill. Our arrangement was that the increases in rent would be more gradual.
The 1972 Act also prescribed generous and comprehensive rebate and rent allowance schemes for private housing as well as public. As a result, no family needed to pay more rent than they could afford. Indeed, many families then started paying less rent than they had been paying before. Over much of Scotland councils have behaved responsibly, both before
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the 1972 Act and after it, and have balanced, or been within reach of balancing, their housing accounts. But in other areas —and the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will be well aware of this—there have unfortunately been councils which have kept rents ridiculously low, have refused to operate proper rebate schemes to eliminate any hardship, and have heaped an intolerable burden upon their ratepayers.
In 1969 about 34 per cent. of council housing costs in Scotland were being met by the Scottish ratepayers; the equivalent in England was about 8 per cent.—the difference being between 34 per cent. and 8 per cent. That was the measure of the distortion to the detriment of Scotland. One result was that the building of private houses was running at less than one-third of building in the public sector—sometimes much less than that. But with the distortion coming to an end a welcome transformation took place in the private house building sector in Scotland. There was a fourfold increase between 1970 and 1973. Moreover, housing societies and associations—which had understandably been little interested in Scotland before that—were starting schemes for co-ownership. Such private building was badly needed because—as a few years ago the Cullingworth Report stated—there was less home ownership in Scotland than in any other European country West of the Soviet bloc. That was one reflection of the sad state of housing in Scotland which the 1972 Act was starting to change.
Regrettably, this Bill will be a charter for certain councils, which are often dominated by extremists of different kinds, to act irresponsibly. Despite the rebate scheme, their interpretation of what is a reasonable rent would be nil, or as near to nothing as is possible. This is grossly unfair to their local ratepayers who have to foot the bill. The 1972 Act was reducing the housing contribution from ratepayers. At a time when the Government ought to be doing everything possible to slow down increases in the rates, it is shocking that through this Bill they are adding in the coming year at least £7 million to the rates in Scotland; that is according to their own estimates in the Financial Memorandum which is attached to the Bill. In fact, the sum is likely to be much larger because of the irresponsible, but predictable, action by certain councils.

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The Government are relinquishing any means of protecting ratepayers. The only apparent sanction will be the public inquiry into whether a council has properly reviewed its rents. In the past in Scotland, this has proved to be a clumsy, vague and thoroughly ineffective method which all who are concerned with good housing conditions had hoped was buried in the past. Since there is nothing in the Bill to indicate when reviews should take place, or what is a reasonable rent, the stage is being set for understandable repercussions from ratepayers—probably, and regrettably, including refusal to pay identifiable amounts related to housing. Very often ratepayers can see that they are paying for people who are a good deal better off then they are.
All this should be considered against the background that the average weekly council house rent in Scotland is about £1·30 less than in England and Wales. There is no particular reason why this should be so. According to the latest statistics, the average Scottish council house rent is about £2·40. Therefore the average rent South of the Border is over half as much again as it is in Scotland. Certainly there is no question of Scottish tenants being faced with higher rents than tenants in England and Wales.
The Government have been unable to give any respectable reason for replacing the Scottish rent system for the public sector in the 1972 Act. That is a system, known as the "pooled historic cost system", which has been accepted by virtually everybody working in housing in Scotland, including the Labour Party who have also accepted it for England and Wales. At the risk of being immodest, I myself claim some credit for having introduced this system which is especially suited to conditions in Scotland. The Government's attitude in dropping the fair rents system in England and Wales, which allows for surpluses, is just comprehensible to me, although they themselves introduced the fair rent concept in the private sector in the 1960s. But it is incomprehensible to me that they should seek to change the Scottish system, except to try to give some substance to the bogus legends about the 1972 Act which an unscrupulous political campaign invented at the time. People whose rents were, in the event, reduced as a result of the rebate scheme had first been scared by
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a campaign into thinking that they were going to have to pay a large increase. That is what happened in 1971–72.
While retaining the main principles of balancing the housing accounts and the universal rebate scheme, all that this Bill is doing is giving carte blanche to certain councils not to comply. The result will be to create unfairness between different areas, which the 1972 Act was removing. Above all, it will create unfairness for the ratepayers. Some councils will observe the principle which is still enshrined in this Bill, as it was enshrined in our 1972 Act. They will aim to balance their housing accounts, increasing rents by easy annual stages, as we prescribed. But other councils will do nothing; and so far as we can see, they will not effectively be brought to book for failing to carry out what both this Bill and the 1972 Act set out as the best system for Scotland.
Also, most councillors will find that the 1972 Act helped them by providing a limit for average rent increases—the limit of 50p a year. That was a modest increase. It meant that while they were approaching the balancing of their accounts, rents went up by no more than a modest amount. Most councillors in Scotland knew that this was right, but under this Bill many councillors will be faced with invidious comparisons with what other councils are doing. Rents are usually delicate matters for decision. Councillors will not thank this Government for having moved from an orderly progression to an uncharted "free-for-all."
Before 1970, when I was moving among social workers and both voluntary and professional bodies working in housing, I constantly heard this plea from all shades of political opinion, and none: "In future, please change the system to steer the help which is coming from the taxpayers and the ratepayers to those who need it; relate that help to the circumstances of the tenants and get away from the system of subsidies being attached to the houses—to the bricks and mortar or to the stone—depending in amount upon the historical coincidence of when those houses were built and in what circumstances". That was their plea, and the major change which we succeeded in carrying out in 1972, with the rebate system and subsidies to meet the rebate payments, did meet that

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request. It would be tragic to throw away that system, which this Bill still confirms in principle, simply because there is no way of ensuring that it is carried out. Therefore, during the later stages of this Bill we shall examine what is meant by "a reasonable rent" and also what is meant by "reviewing rents from time to time".
The first part of the Bill upon which I have dwelt so far deals with the public sector. It is of main significance to Scotland, because about one-half of the population are tenants of public authorities—a much larger proportion than in England and Wales. What happens in the public sector affects considerably housing in Scotland as a whole. In the 1960s there were some vast and seemingly soulless council housing estates and tower blocks built by local authorities; both were lacking in amenities for tenants and their families. Apparently, it was then the purpose to produce large numbers of units at highly subsidised rents. However, that policy is now being widely condemned, even by Scottish Labour Members of Parliament, as indicated by the Committee debates in another place on this Bill.
There is also the problem of empty council houses in Scotland. Usually, of course, these are the older ones. I understand that at the moment there are well over 1,000 empty council houses in Glasgow. For some time there has been the problem of hundreds of empty council houses in Dundee, Paisley and elsewhere, and unfortunately that situation has been aggravated by vandalism. However, this state of affairs can be assisted if there are more opportunities for home ownership in Scotland. I hope that the Government will not again adopt a doctrinaire attitude towards that idea. It has become acceptable to Socialists in England and Wales, and more and more Labour supporters in Scotland are seeing the benefits of enabling tenants to buy their council houses, although inflation and economic troubles at the moment may make this difficult. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, would not be risking a public rebuke from the Prime Minister if he were to concede this point.
Clause 5 deals with the New Town corporations and provides for payments of surpluses from them to the Secretary
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of State for Scotland. These New Towns in Scotland have set a good example in selling their houses; the oldest Scottish New Town, East Kilbride, has sold a great many. This is a credit to the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Campsie, the chairman of East Kilbride, because I understand many hundreds of houses have been sold while he has been chairman, and I trust the Government will not discourage such sales by New Town Corporations or local authorities in appropriate circumstances where everyone— including applicants on the housing list— is likely to benefit. The second part of the Bill proposes some changes in the private rented sector. This is a comparatively small part of the Scottish housing scene, but it is important that this housing stock should be maintained in good repair and not be allowed to sink into slumdom because of lack of money to mend roofs or carry out other essential work. I was glad to hear the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, draw attention to this in his speech.
We are also concerned that the system should be fair as between tenants and owners, and we know that a considerable number of amendments were made by the Government in the other place in order, it seems, to avoid anomalies which the Bill in its original form would have caused. We shall examine those clauses in the Bill, with all this in mind, during its passage through the House. It is a pity, my Lords, that when valuable Parliamentary time might be occupied with other measures more urgent and relevant, much of this Bill is unnecessary and is likely to confuse and upset a system introduced into Scotland by us and accepted in principle by the Government.
3.52 p.m.
Lord FERRIER: My Lords, although my name appears on the list after that of my noble friend Lord Lyell, I understand that if I speak now it will be more convenient to your Lordships. In any case I shall be brief. I have little to say, although I feel strongly about this Bill, the purpose of which is to reverse the policy of the last Government. That is clear from the opening phrases of the preamble. As I have said before in your Lordships' House, that policy of the late Government was revolutionary. What we now see is part of a counter-revolution. We are back to the old, outdated,

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disreputable Socialist system, detrimental to the most deserving of house owners or occupiers—a system which, in the view of some people, may be regarded as putting temptation in the way of the potentially corrupt, and as such I oppose the whole principle of the Bill, which is what we are here to discuss. If, when the Question is put I express myself as being Not Content, I assure your Lordships that I have no intention of dividing the House, but I can do no less than so express myself.
3.54 p.m.
Lord LYELL: My Lords, we on these Benches have to consider this Bill as a measure which enables the Government to fulfil their Election pledges. As such I do not think we would seek to destroy it, or indeed to alter it too drastically, while we still reserve the right to consider that there are various aspects of it which we hope the Government can see their way to amend or alter. We accept that the Government wish to repeal the Housing (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Act 1972, but we believe it must be a cause of regret that so many council and private tenants are no longer eligible for the fairly substantial rent rebates paid towards the economic rents charged all over Scotland on a nation-wide basis. Nevertheless, we hope that the Bill, which enables local authorities to charge reasonable rents, will continue the trend towards local authorities' Housing Revenue Accounts being paid from rents charged. As we have already heard from my noble friend Lord Campbell of Croy, in 1969 there was a shortfall in Housing Revenue Accounts in Scotland of around 34 or 35 per cent. which was not covered by rents, but by 1974 it had been cut to about 13 per cent. As noble Lords are aware, shortfalls in Housing Revenue. Accounts in Scotland are normally met from local authority rates, so that over those years the substantial burden which had rested on the shoulders of ratepayers was progressively lifted, which we believe was a useful and helpful movement.
The Bill admits that £27 million is currently paid (in the year 1974–75) from local authority rates to Housing Revenue Accounts, but under the financial provisions of the Bill that figure will increase by £7 million to £9 million during the year 1975–76 and, as has been said that is a
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matter of regret. Further, the rents paid by council tenants all over Scotland will vary quite alarmingly, depending on the geographical situation of the tenant and not necessarily on his financial situation or the region. We understand that in 1974 about 30 per cent. of council tenants were enabled to receive a rent rebate and these averaged about £75 per annum. So there were fairly substantial rebates available under the old Act which is now to be repealed. Nevertheless, the Government have said that they intend to take adequate substitute steps. Of course there is nothing to prevent local authorities from operating their own rebate schemes; however it appears that the cost will be borne by the rates.
There is also one point on Clause 5, which enables the Secretary of State to require any surplus from New Towns' Housing Revenue Accounts to be paid direct to him. There is no indication that any such payments would be used to benefit a New Town in any way; for example, by reducing the capital debt incurred by a New Town Corporation. This is a point which concerns the New Town Corporations very much and we should be grateful to the noble Lord and to the Government for any observations on it. There is one further point which I think the Government could explain. It concerns the qualifications which the noble Lord mentioned—
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, will the noble Lord forgive me for interrupting. I must apologise, because I was seeking information on one of his earlier points, and I am not absolutely certain what he asked me in relation to the New Town Development Corporations. Perhaps he would be kind enough to repeat it.
Lord LYELL: My Lords, the point that I was requesting an answer about was whether any surplus on a New Town's Housing Revenue Account would be used to the benefit of that New Town rather than being completely at the discretion of the Secretary of State. As we understand Clause 5, there is no indication that the Secretary of State is under any obligation to see that the surplus accrued by the New Town shall go to the benefit of that New Town. We seek some clarification of this point, and wonder whether the noble Lord can give us any further information.

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The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, mentioned the qualification certificate in respect of a controlled house in the private sector. He gave the figure of 12½ per cent. of the cost of repairs, which is the maximum rent increase which can be charged by a landlord. Perhaps the noble Lord can explain where the finance for such repairs—let alone any improvements—could be obtained at a rate of 12½ per cent. It does not cover the cost, even of financing the repairs or the borrowing for any improvements. If this rate could be raised slightly to 15 per cent., this would cover the cost of bank borrowing. This is a situation which will affect many landlords in this particular sector.
My Lords, we are pleased to see that any rent increases which are to be introduced are to be graduated over three years. Nevertheless, there is the point that the liberty granted to local authorities under the Bill we believe too often slides into licence. Reasonable rents will mean different things and different amounts to different councils. We are gravely concerned about the prospective burdens liable to end up on the shoulders of the ratepayers.
In conclusion, there is one small point that the noble Lord might be kind enough to explain to the House. Precisely what is meant in Clause 1(5) by, reasonable working balance, while forbidding the local authorities to budget for any form of surplus. Can the Government say whether local authorities are in dereliction of their duty if they make a small, or perhaps fairly large, unexpected surplus on their Housing Revenue Account? I can understand that local authorities will wish to make provision for a reasonable working balance, but if this balance has to be a deficit balance, perhaps the Bill should lay down that there should be a deficit balance. This is perhaps merely a matter of drafting, but may we have the point clarified?
4.2 p.m.
Baroness ELLIOT of HARWOOD: My Lords, I have listened to my noble colleagues speaking on this Bill. There is no doubt that one of the most difficult things one has to face when in local government—the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has been in local government for a great many years, and I have been in local
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government now for almost thirty years —is being an elected councillor sitting for an industrial area, where possibly the houses are in poor condition and where to raise rents is a near impossibility because the electors are prejudiced against one when one stands for re-election in that area. That is a very well-known phenomenon in being elected to represent a city. It does not happen quite so much in rural areas, because there the shortage of houses is not at all great. In rural areas there is bad housing; housing that is not up to standard, and so on. That is the biggest bugbear, but in agricultural and rural areas the number of houses is on the whole, somewhat surplus to the number required, because there are fewer people living on the land. A shortage of housing has existed in the City of Glasgow ever since I can remember—and that is a great many years. I do not know what the latest figures are.
Under the 1972 Act, there was a progession towards a reasonable rent, or having rents which made the Housing Revenue Account a progression which did not depend so much upon the elected members, but was built into the system. I thought this was a very good idea indeed, because it meant that the Housing Revenue Account was balanced in a proper way and other ratepayers were not being charged for the failure to balance that account, which is what has been done in many areas over many years. In this way, one achieved a properly balanced Housing Revenue Account. In many areas, this meant that assistance had to be given to those who, through circumstances possibly over which they had no control, were not able to meet the rent which was the proper rent for their house, and who were able to get supplementary assistance. Again, I thought that was a very good idea. It meant that one was not charging people on the general rate sums of money to meet the failure properly to balance the Housing Revenue Account.
My Lords, I know that this Bill requires that local authorities should balance their accounts, but not provide for a surplus. If local authorities balance the Housing Revenue Account, shall we be quite sure that those councils, particularly in big industrial areas where there is the problem of less good housing, will be

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able to charge reasonable rents to cover the Housing Revenue Account? It would be a tragedy if we went back to the bad old days when, in certain parts of the country, particularly in Scotland, in the days before the money changed, there were rents of something like 7s. 6d. and 9s. 6d. a week for a house, which would not cover the costs. Yet nobody would put up the rents. On occasions, I remember that we had to take special powers from local authorities to make them put up their rents. Those were the bad old days. I do not think such things happen at the moment, and I should hate to see those days come back.
My Lords, I have been serving on a council now for a great many years. I have served on every single committee, including the housing committee. To put up rents is a very difficult thing to do. You are extremely unpopular; people resent it very much indeed. Yet something has to be done, particularly if you are building good standard housing. The rent must be an economic one unless you are going to run into debt, or ask the ordinary ratepayer to meet the difference. I always thought that to do that was unfair, because the ordinary ratepayer may be living in a lower standard house than the council house tenant, yet paying more rent. His house is not subsidised by the rates. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, can assure us that this will not happen, because if it does it will be a step backwards.
My Lords, I hope too that this Bill will not in any way discourage expansion in the building of houses where they are badly needed. I ask the noble Lord whether this Bill will have a discouraging effect. My hope is that it will encourage rather than discourage house-building. That point is most important, because there are still parts of the country where housing is in very short supply indeed.
My other question to the noble Lord is this: What are the Government going to do about those councils, which, for want of a better description, I call the bad councils, namely those who will not balance their Housing Revenue Account? Of course, there are good councils who do balance their Housing Revenue Account. Our council in Roxburghshire is a good council. We do not run into debt in our Housing Revenue Account, but we are a small council and our task
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is easier than for those in a large area. There are a number of good councils who are prepared to do this, but a number of bad ones will not. What sanctions have the Government in this Bill to make the bad councils balance their Housing Revenue Accounts? This is an extremely important matter. The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, is a great expert on all these matters of local government, and I am sure he will give us the answers. It is a pity that when one has got into a good system—and a system of rent rebates when the rents were too high, and of rents based on costs, was a good system—one should change it to something which I only hope will not revert to what I call the bad old days. We still have good housing accounts that do not run into debt. I hope that we shall continue to enlarge our house-building programme in areas where it is still badly needed.
4.10 p.m.
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I think I can say that the response which has been given to this Bill is as favourable as I could expect in the circumstances. I am not surprised that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, as a former Secretary of State for Scotland and the one responsible for putting the 1972 Act on the Statute Book, sees virtues in it of which very many people in Scotland found themselves totally unaware. I do not expect him to change his view because he has proved to be in a minority in holding that view. After all, he can probably tell me that there have been occasions when it has been the minority that has been right. But I do not think that he is entitled to refer to false mythology and bogus legends. We consider that what we are doing in this Bill is taking account of the facts which have emerged since the passing of the 1972 Act.
If there is any question of bogus legend, the noble Lord is on the way to perpetrating one himself when he compares the £39 maximum laid down in the Bill to the £26 mandatory average increase for which he was responsible. I would remind him that there is one sense in which his Act and our Bill are identical; that is, in laying down a maximum increase of £39 for any one house. The difference between the Act of 1972 and this Bill is that we do not lay down any mandatory increase. We agree with the

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noble Lord that the figure of £39 is a reasonable maximum, but we do not say that authorities should be compelled to have an average increase.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, would the noble Lord give way? That is exactly what I sought to say, too. In the Bill, any house can have its rent put up by as much as £39, so in theory the rent for every house could be so put up. I was comparing not like with like, but the average; I said, "average" in the case which we had in 1972.
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I think that if the noble Lord looks tomorrow at what he said, it at least gives the impression that he was comparing an average of £26 under his Act with a possible average of £39 under this one. I am emphasising the fact that we, like him, have felt that, in these inflationary days, it is reasonable to have a maximum laid down, and we have accepted his own maximum figure of £39. I seem to remember that, between the years 1964 and 1970, the constant theme of noble Lords opposite was that the town hall knows better than Whitehall; it was even interpreted that the town house knew better than St. Andrew's House. He forgot about that in 1972. Generally speaking, we think that the argument is right on matters where local interest is a factor to be taken into account; local circumstances should be considered, and the people best in a position to know them are the local authorities.
The noble Lord gave away part of the case of the Government when he said that most councils in Scotland behaved responsibly, even before and after the passing of the 1972 Act, but that there was a minority which did not so act, and then he went on to say that the action of certain councils is predictable. At the present time there are some 200 housing authorities in Scotland. It has surely escaped the notice of the noble Lord that as from 16th May these authorities are swept away and we have approximately 60 new housing authorities. How, therefore, can the noble Lord predict what any of these new authorities will do in relation to housing in respect of the Bill? I do not see how he can, because not one of the authorities that he criticised remains unchanged as a result of the new
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Act. I have no doubt, for instance, that he has Clydebank in mind. It is not a single new authority in terms of reorganisation. I think we must wait and see. If the noble Lord will permit me, I have been having meetings—and so has my honourable friend the Under-Secretary of State—with the new district councils.
The noble Baroness, Lady Elliot of Harwood, will be interested to know that last Thursday I spent a very pleasant day in Hawick meeting the chairmen and the housing conveners of the four district councils into which the Borders are divided. I have no doubt whatever that she will have no occasion to describe any of these new councils as bad councils. I also met the council in Dundee and various others, and I have so far met two regional councils. I am quite certain that the Government are not making any mistake in trusting these new bodies to exercise their responsibilities in a reasonable way. I shall give way to the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde.
Lord STRATHCLYDE: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord. I wanted only to ask him, in view of what he said a moment ago, whether he really anticipates any change in housing policy, in regard to the rents of the Glasgow district, from what has existed in theory' for the last 30 or 40 years?
Lord HUGHES: Yes, my Lords. I may be optimistic, but, in this set-up, I think it is reasonable that we should assume that the new authorities will act in a reasonable way. The best way of guaranteeing that they do not act in a reasonable way is to go about telling them that we expect them to do the opposite. I certainly have not done that in meetings with any of them. On the question of increases in rents—and what is meant by regular reviews of rents—I have been asked that question and I have said, as I said in my speech, that it would, perhaps, be reasonable for the authorities, when they are considering their annual budget, to consider as part of that budget what the rent level should be in the ensuing year. So far none of them has dissented from that point of view, so I think I am justified, so far, in being optimistic. I must mention the division which has taken place between my honourable friend and myself; I

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have taken the East and South and he has taken the West and the North. So I do not know whether any differences will emerge on a geographical basis when we compare notes at the end of the day about the response of the district councils.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Lord for giving way again. He did. quite unwittingly I am sure, misquote my words, which I have in front of me. Just to remind the House of what I said— because this makes a great deal of difference to the sense—I said that over much of Scotland councils have behaved responsibly. But I went on to say that in other areas there have, unfortunately, been councillors who have kept rents ridiculously low. My point was not that it was the individual councils of the future but that it was very much a matter of areas. My noble friend Lady Elliot confirmed this from her own experience in her speech. This is the point. It has been a matter of different areas. While I, naturally, hope that councils will behave responsibly, we have, unfortunately, memories of what has happened in the past in these different areas.
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I am sorry if I misunderstood what the noble Lord said. We are dealing with what councils do. It is not pieces of land which take action; it is the councils which exist in these areas, and I have emphasised the fact that they are new councils. The councils which are taking power are the councils for which the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, was responsible. It was he who chose, not all of but almost all of, the councils. Your Lordships made certain improvements, and if the noble Lord had been as reasonable on this as he has been on other matters, there would have been even more changes made, provided another place had accepted them. However, that is water under the bridge. In this connection, the indications are—and I am glad to be able to say this—that the relationship between the Strathclyde authority and the district councils in the West seems to be developing into a very good one indeed. From that point of view, therefore, the noble Lord's faith in Strathclyde may yet be justified. That is slightly away from the question of housing.
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On the question of the empty houses, the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, is out of touch. He spoke of figures of a thousand in Glasgow and some hundreds in Edinburgh—I do not remember whether it was three or four hundred, but it was something of that order. I should like to give the more up-to-date figures. I cannot give them completely up-to-date; the last set we have is as at November 1974, and at the end of that month 263 houses in Glasgow were available for letting but had been unlet for more than eight weeks. At the same time Edinburgh Corporation had 631 houses which had been empty for more than six weeks, but most of these houses were not in fact available for letting because they were being improved and repaired. At the end of December 1974 Dundee Corporation had 149 houses which had been empty for more than eight weeks. Of these only 13 were available for letting, the remainder having been withdrawn from the letting pool for modernisation and repair. So the situation has completely changed in the interval, but, I would emphasise, not for a good reason. It has changed because of the inability of many people who would have wished to purchase their houses being unable either to afford to borrow from the building societies, or other borrowers, at current rates, or being unable to get mortgage finance, and many of these people then turn to local authorities to rent a house instead. So although the situation has improved it has, I would suggest, improved for the wrong reason.
The noble Lord referred to improved private building as a result of the 1972 Act. I do not think he is entitled to say that this position was due entirely to the Act of 1972, and, in fairness, I do not think that he said "entirely", but one could imply that he was saying the position was improved because of the 1972 Act. If that were the case, how does one attribute to the 1972 Act the dreadful slump which has taken place in private building? The fact is that over a period of years (and I myself in 1968, 1969 and 1970 went up and down Scotland encouraging the local authorities to do everything they could to make land available for houses for owner occupation, and I was not without success in that direction) if we look at the statistics we will see that we go back to the middle of the

1223
'sixties, when the figures of owneroccupation in Scotland started to improve. I would emphasise that during my visits I have told local authorities, first—and this meets the point of the noble Baroness —there is no financial restriction on the number of new houses which a local authority may build to meet their ascertained needs. Secondly, I have emphasised to the authorities, as has the Under-secretary, the desirability of using the "housing action area" principles to improve the existing houses, and that where possible they should take steps to build in gap sites in the centre of cities and that they should use demolition in the central areas only as a policy of last resort.
Obviously if a house is totally unfit and incapable of being brought into a reasonable state of repair, then demolition is the proper course; but it should be regarded as the last course to be considered, and I am glad to say that each of the authorities we have met is happy to fit in with these views. So far as the encouragement of private development is concerned the attention of the new housing authorities has been drawn to the improved lending facilities which are available to them. Instead of lending at their most recent public works loan board rate of borrowing, plus the quarter per cent. which is mandatory, we have encouraged them to lend at the pooled rate, which means, for instance, that in Glasgow the rate at which they are lending for private house-purchase is about 9 or 9½ per cent. We are encouraging them in that way, and we are encouraging them to make use of the deferred mortgage system, and of lending for a fixed period of years during which only interest would be payable, with the bond falling to be repaid or renewed at the end of that period.
So in all of these steps we are taking to encourage the build up of owner-occupation, and in reference to what has been said about the selling of houses in East Kilbride, we accept that both in the New Towns and in the local authority housing stock, it should be possible to sell houses, but, in the words of the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, "where the circumstances are appropriate". I must say clearly that possibly his and
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my view of what are "appropriate circumstances" can be very different. But as between the local authorities and the New Towns there is at least one difference which we are keeping in mind; that is, that unless attempts are made to provide owner-occupation you could have a situation that a New Town would be totally artificial in that all houses were rented. So there is a greater encouragement given to the selling of houses in New Towns, but not at the expense of depriving people of the opportunity to rent if their need exists and renting is the only thing which is possible for them.
I come to the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Ferrier. He at least made my task easy. All I have written down against his name is the word "against". That is a fair summary of his speech. It is a simple position to take up. Unfortunately, or fortunately, it is not a position which the traditions of your Lordships' House encourage people to carry to its logical conclusion. The noble Lord has accepted this and he does not propose to divide the House against the Bill.
I come now to the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, I must say right away that he is under a total misapprehension when he talks about the Bill annulling the rent rebate system. We did not believe that it was possible, even for the last Government, to produce a Bill which was totally bad. That requires a degree of genius which is seldom given to human beings and even less to normal politicians. The rebate system is one which we are continuing. We do not say that it is perfect and it may well be that in the review of the housing finance, which we are undertaking, that there will be changes in the system. But the rebate system is sufficiently workable, and sufficiently reasonable in its results, to be maintained as it is. So under this Bill no one will be deprived of the benefits of the rebate system in the 1972 Act.
The noble Lord went on to ask about the surpluses on New Towns. I said that we did not expect this surplus to be used in the near future; I am not certain, but I may have even said, "In the foreseeable future". But the position, so far, is that the only New Town in Scotland which has had a surplus has been

1225
East Kilbride. But it is not a surplus that would be annexed in these terms, because it was applied by them instead of borrowing for new purposes. There will not be a surplus of this kind until a New Town has completed both its housing and industrial operations and has no further need to borrow.
In these circumstances, the likelihood is that the surplus would go to the Ex-chequer for general use, since it would not be required for use in the New Town. But so long as there was need for further borrowing to carry on the purposes of the New Town there would be no annexable surplus in terms of the Bill. The noble Lord then asked a question about repairs. I expected this because I am certain that it is a perfectly fair question, and it would have been just as fair if the figure in the Bill, instead of being 12½ per cent., had been 15 per cent., 20 per cent., or 10 per cent.; and the noble Lord would obviously be entitled to ask, "Why that figure?" Quite frankly, I do not know why, except that it does not seem unreasonable given at least the theory— and it may be very much theory nowadays—that the rent is expected to provide some money towards repairs. Whether that is a reasonable expectation when the rent is as low as £25, I should not like to argue. It is the figure which is in the Bill. I think that there are precedents for a figure of 12£ per cent. on repairs and that may be its origin. Does the noble Lord wish to come back on this?
Lord LYELL: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for the speed with which he has replied. The only point which I was worried about was that the figure of 12½ per cent. may have appeared reasonable in the "foreseeable future"—and I take the noble Lord's words—but it does not repay any of the repairs. I sought to point out that the landlord was financing the repairs at a loss and that, with a rent increase of 12½ per cent., he will not even cover the cost of financing the repairs, let alone: the cost of the repairs themselves. It is that point which I was worried about. It would be a very small increase—perhaps 13 or 14 per cent.— to cover the cost of finance, but I was seeking to point out that, in these days, 12½ per cent. does not cover the cost of financing.
Lord HUGHES: Yes, my Lords, but there are hopeful signs. One of the big banks will be reducing its base lending rate tomorrow, so we may be moving into a more hopeful position in that respect.
My Lords, the noble Lord asked what was meant by the "reasonable balance" on local authority accounts. The position is quite simple: the Bill accepts the principle that a prudent authority will want to have a balance of some kind to make certain that it does not at the end of a year find itself with an unexpected deficit so that it has to rate for that the following year. Authorities ought not to be aiming at making a deliberate profit on the Housing Revenue Account. That is forbidden. However, they will be allowed to take reasonable balances and I think that this must depend entirely on the size of the Housing Revenue Account. A reasonable balance in the case of an authority with 200,000 houses will be a very different figure from a reasonable balance for an authority which has 2,000 houses.
Lord LYELL: My Lords, if the noble Lord will give way briefly, I am sure that he is aware, as I and, I hope, the House are aware, that the term "balance" can imply a deficit as well as a surplus. So far as I understand it, the Bill and everything that the noble Lord has been saying assume that the term "working balance" means a surplus. If it means a surplus balance, I think that it should say so. I am sure that the noble Lord is aware that a balance may be a surplus balance or a deficit, and if the Bill seeks to prohibit a surplus balance I think that it should say so. The word "balance" cover both surplus and deficit and it is just this woolliness of phraseology of which I was seeking some clarification.
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I take the noble Lord's point and I will look into it. I must say that, in my simple, non-chartered accountant way, I should have regarded a deficit as a not very workable balance, though most of us with overdrafts seem to manage on what is probably a deficit balance. I think that the intention was that the local authorities, while being forbidden to make a profit on the revenue account, are not being forbidden to have a workable surplus on that account. It may be that the noble

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Lord has put forward a point which should be made clear in the Bill and I shall certainly have it looked at to see whether the words should be put in, provided that we do not create a situation in which a local authority is breaking the law if it ends the year with a deficit. We cannot proceed from one anomaly to another.
My Lords, I think that I have dealt with most of the points raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Elliot. The only thing is, as I said to the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, that we approach these things from a different standpoint altogether. The noble Baroness spoke of what had taken place as a good system. I suggest that it was like the curate's egg—good in parts. I believe that we are seeking in the Bill to preserve the parts which are good and to improve the parts which we think are bad. To refer to something which happened a little earlier and not accepting the parallel of sending the eggs back to be restamped, we think we are doing something a little better than that in relation to housing.
My Lords, I believe that eventually your Lordships will find that the Bill can go through without radical amendment, but I look forward to what will in due course emerge from the further close scrutiny which the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, and his colleagues will give to the Bill when we reach the next stage.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

NOISE INSULATION (SCOTLAND) REGULATIONS 1975
4.38 p.m.
Lord HUGHES Lord HUGHES rose to move, That the Draft Noise Insulation (Scotland) Regulations 1975, laid before the House on 21st January, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, Section 18 of the Land Compensation (Scotland) Act 1973 enables the Secretary of State to make regulations imposing a duty or conferring a power on authorities to insulate buildings against noise caused by the construction or the use of certain public works.
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The problems associated with noise from new roads are perhaps more widespread than any other form of nuisance. Serious loss of amenity can very frequently be avoided by judicious planning and design of roads, but this is not always-able, especially in densely populated urban areas. The Government are therefore providing a scheme of sound insulation to cover those cases where, without insulation, peoples' homes would suffer unduly from noise from roads.
The Draft Regulations before the House today provide for the insulation of dwellings and other residential accommodation against noise caused by new and certain altered roads where this noise exceeds a specified level. The draft has already been approved in another place. Comparable Regulations for England and Wales were made in September 1973. Every attempt has been made to ensure that right to noise insulation from new roadworks will be the same throughout Great Britain. The Scottish and English regulations provide for the same qualifying noise level, the same specifications of work to be done and the same procedure for claiming. However, the method and timing of calculation of noise levels which is proposed for the Scottish scheme is different from that presently operating in England. The English method is based on a calculation at a single point in time, from which the prevailing noise levels for up to 15 years ahead are predicted. This approach is not considered appropriate to Scottish conditions, since traffic flows in Scotland are generally much lower than in England and therefore any attempt at long-term prediction of traffic volumes would be open to a much greater margin of error in Scotland than in England. We have opted for a calculation of noise levels based on measurement of existing traffic densities. Measurements will be taken again periodically, and new calculations made in the light of them.
My Lords, the Regulations impose a duty on highway authorities to carry out sound insulation, or to make grants in respect of the cost of insulating those buildings which are subjected to excessive noise from new roads, and roads to which a carriageway has been added, opened to public traffic after 16th October 1972 (Regulation 3). They confer a power to do so in the case of roads opened or

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altered after 16th October 1969 (Regulation 4). This is the same period of retrospection applied by the English Regulations, and discharges an undertaking on the part of Government given in the White Paper (Cmnd. 5124) which preceded the 1973 Compensation Act.
Regulations 3 and 4 will operate when the calculated noise level is at or above 68 decibels, "A" weighting, on the L–10 (18 hour) scale. For noble Lords who do not understand these technicalities, this means, approximately, that the average of the levels of noise for one-tenth of the time during each hour between 6 a.m. and midnight must exceed 68 decibels. This is lower than the threshold of 70 decibels recommended by the Noise Advisory Council and supported by the Urban Motorways Committee. The Regulations also allow an authority to insulate dwellings subjected to noise below this qualifying level, if they are part of a building of which some other part is exposed to this level of noise. This provision should allow some flexibility on the part of highway authorities.
Assessment of noise levels in Scotland will normally be based on traffic counts made within a year of the opening of a new road or additional carriageway. Calculations of noise levels will then be made on the basis of these counts, and, under Regulation 6, a map or list of all houses which quality for insulation will be prepared and made available for inspection. Offers of insulation, or grants in lieu thereof, will be made within three months thereafter. Prevailing noise levels will be reassessed five, 10 and 15 years after a road is opened. A new map or list will then be prepared and offers of insulation made for those houses which have subsequently become subject to excessive noise. Thus, if there is a substantial increase in noise from a road during the period up to 15 years after it has been opened, insulation can be provided to alleviate its effects.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, the Wilson Report suggested that the bearable noise level was 35 decibels. Am I to understand that if the noise is 68 decibels for one-tenth of an hour it is acceptable, but if it is more than one-tenth of an hour in continuity of noise it has to drop down to 35 decibels if the Wilson level is accepted?
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I am more knowledgeable when I am dealing with matters of housing finance than with this subject. Perhaps the noble Lord will allow me to continue with the excellent brief that has been presented to me, and he may find that an answer will emerge before I finish.
A memorandum describing in detail the method and prescribing the timing of assessment of noise levels will be published separately. Copies of this memorandum have been made available for inspection in the Library. The enabling Act specifically empowers the Secretary of State to specify these elements of the scheme in a document not incorporated in the Regulations. The device has been adopted, because a highly technical document of this nature may require frequent amendment in the light of future experience and technical innovation. I am sure your Lordships will agree that Parliament need not be approached every time a technical alteration to the assessment method is found to be necessary. Steps will be taken to ensure that the memorandum is always available wherever the Regulations are on sale and that Its existence is well publicised. By arrangement with the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, addition is to be made to the Explanatory Note, before publication, pointing out the existence of the memorandum.
There may be some houses which are severely affected by construction noise during the building of a road, but which are not likely to be subjected to excessive noise once a road comes into use. A further power has been provided in Regulation 5 to allow authorities to make offers in such cases. The Schedule describes in detail the specifications for the work to be carried out. This package has been shown to be capable of reducing internal noise levels by about 35 decibels from the prevailing external levels. This represents a reduction of about 80 per cent. in noise as experienced. The specifications will apply to all insulation work under these Regulations whether carried out by the highway authority or by a person in receipt of a grant.
There should be no need for people to make claims for sound insulation, under normal circumstances, since authorities will take all the necessary steps to

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identify those buildings which are eligible, and offers of insulation will be made to the owners or occupiers who qualify under the scheme. The procedures to be followed in making and accepting offers of grant or work, and the time limits for the making and accepting of offers are set out in Regulation 8. However, a resident who is not offered insulation and claims to be entitled to such an offer, may appeal to the highway authority under Regulation 13, and that authority will then be required to review its calculations and to give a full explanation if the appeal is rejected.
I have been handed a note which I am having difficulty in deciphering. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, will be able to say exactly how we have followed what was done by the previous Government. If he does that at sufficient length to enable a legible answer to appear, I may be able to give it at the end of the debate. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Draft Noise Insulation (Scotland) Regulations 1975, laid before the House on 21st January, be approved. —(Lord Hughes.)
4.48 p.m.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, I had not intended to speak at length but we are grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, for his explanation of these Regulations and we sympathise with him about the technical nature of some of it. He will not be surprised to hear that my noble friends and I are, in general, in favour of what is proposed, since it arises from our 1973 Act and the policy of assisting those whose homes are near to road traffic. I have two queries, and let me say straight away that we will understand if in the course of this short debate it is not possible for the Minister to reply to them now, or perhaps to decipher any note which he may receive.
My first query is about the conditions of grant in Regulation 10. From paragraph (c), it appears to be stipulated that the work must be completed within 12 months and there does not appear to be any discretion about this. What will happen if, for some reason beyond the fault of the person concerned, it is not possible to complete the work in that time? We found from experience of
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the Housing Improvement Scheme during the last four years that there was a time of acute shortage of labour and building materials, when it was difficult for people whose applications had been approved to get the work completed before the final date; and, consequently, as your Lordships will know, that date was considerably postponed. However, in this case it appears that they simply have 12 months in which to get the work finished. At present, the construction industry is unfortunately suffering a recession, but these periods come in cycles and it was only two or three years ago that the industry was fully extended, so there could come a time in the future when, with the best will in the world, it would be impossible to get approved work finished in the stipulated time.
My second query, which is a small but interesting one, arises from paragraph 4 of the Schedule. Where double windows are being created, it appears that a Venetian blind is insisted on, and I presume that the purpose of this is to prevent direct heat from the sun where sunlight falls directly on a double window which it is not possible to open. It could be that it is a matter of light as well, but I presume that it is heat because the occupier would no doubt be expected to provide internal curtains against light—for example, headlamps at night, as well as daylight. But if the windows are not in the direct line of the sun, and if the owner does not wish to have this additional work done, is it still obligatory? With all the complicated paraphernalia described in paragraph 4 of the Schedule, it looks as though the job of installing a Venetian blind will be more complicated and expensive than the double glazing job which is the main object. Therefore it seemed to me odd that there was no discretionary element there, because the final sentence of paragraph 4 of the Schedule gives a certain amount of latitude, but not to dispense altogether—as I interpret it—with a Venetian blind which, in the circumstances I have described, would not be necessary and might be an extra which the owner would not wish.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, a further point which my noble friend has not asked about, and about which I am curious, concerns Regulation 10. Supposing the occupants of a house were an old couple who were

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deaf and so did not mind about noise. They may not want the trouble of having the work done. Would not the noble Lord the Minister agree that it might be a wise addition to the Order to add "and owner", since the occupant may be a person who willingly refuses to have the work done because it is not in his or her own personal interest, whereas to any normal person in good health it would be very useful?
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, in reply to the noble Lord, Lord Harmar-Nicholls, the position is that the 35 decibels is the figure for inside a house and 68 decibels, to which I have referred, is for outside. With regard to the Venetian bind, the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, is correct in his assumption that the purpose here was to reduce the possibility of overheating in the case of a window which could not be opened to provide ventilation, which would be the position with double glazing. As the noble Lord suspected, I am not in a position to give an answer on this, but I certainly see the point. There is hardly any need to install a Venetian blind in a North-facing window, which will never get any sun anyway. I do not visualise the circumstances in which this could apply, but I should certainly like to look into the matter and write to the noble Lord.
With reference to the matter of flexibility and the 12 months period, I suspect that the answer is that there is not any flexibility because, as one knows, if there is not a period fixed at some time, then it becomes regarded as a door which is permanently open. If one took away the 12 month period, we would have to say "provided it did not exceed it by so' much", and we could be in exactly the same position as in the difficult situation which arose regarding improvement grants, because of a strike. Apart from everything else, there was a shortage of materials and people could not get on with the work because they had to wait a long time for plasterboard. The delay in delivery of plasterboard rose to eight or nine months, compared with a normal delivery period of two or three weeks. We cannot make provision for that sort of situation in an Order of this kind.
I think the probability is that as people will be wanting work done, because they
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are being faced with an intolerable situation there will be a very definite urge on them to get it done as quickly as possible. I do not think this is the sort of work which involves structural alterations, and so should not take long. Many of us who now have double glazing know that it is comparatively simple to install, and it is certainly not time consuming. I am not certain that I can do anything other than inquire about the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Mowbray and Stourton. If there was a change of house and the new people wanted to do something which had not been done by their predecessors, we would suddenly find that—
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: A change of occupier.
Lord HUGHES: If there was something which had not been done by the previous occupier, we might find that there had been a sudden unaccountable increase in deafness among the departing tenants. I am not certain whether this point could be, or is, covered by the noble Lord's other point about applying it to the owner. I recollect that there was a reference in my remarks to the owner-occupier. I should like to look at this and write to the noble Lord to explain the position.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, may I ask the Minister, with reference to the question raised by my noble friend Lord Campbell of Croy, whether, if he had a bedroom facing North and there was a sudden great increase of traffic at night, he would not be very glad of double glazing so that he would not be kept awake at night by headlights, especially if there was a curve in the road at that point?
Lord HUGHES: My Lords, I do not think that the noble Lord's point was in connection with double glazing; it was in connection with Venetian blinds. In order to keep out light it is not necessary to have a Venetian blind fitted on windows with double glazing. It is sufficient to have an ordinary blind which can be pulled down. I do not know whether that is the answer, but I will query the situation. My notes specifically relate the provision of the Venetian blind to a possible overheating of the house, which

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the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, assumed was the point intended.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

UNSOLICITED GOODS AND SERVICES (AMENDMENT) BILL
4.58 p.m.
Lord DRUMALBYN: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. This is a short Bill, limited in scope, and it is the ideal sort of Bill for a Back Bencher. It was introduced in another place by my honourable friend and erstwhile colleague at the Department of Trade and Industry, Mr. Anthony Grant. The 1971 Act, which it amends, was introduced by my honourable friend Mr. Philip Goodhart, and that Act was an improved version of a Bill presented and carried through in another place by Mr. Arthur Davidson and which was a casualty in the 1970 General Election. There is no doubt, therefore, that legislation on these lines has the support of all Parties in the other place, and I trust that it will have the support of all Parties in your Lordships' House as well. I should add that the Government have given all possible assistance in preparing this Bill and in consulting representatives of interests— that is. legitimate interests—mainly concerned.
The purpose of the Bill is to amend the provisions of the Unsolicited Goods and Services Act 1971 which deal with directory entries. Those provisions were intended to stop the practice of sending by post, or otherwise, what appeared to be invoices in respect of entries in directories, with the object of deceiving the recipients into paying for such entries in the belief that an obligation to pay had already been incurred, although no order for such an entry had been given. Unfortunately, the provisions have not succeeded in stamping out this abuse and there is a good deal of evidence that it continues to be widely practised. It worries the police and it damages the good name of honest publishers.
There are several ways in which the deception is practised. The most common are these. What appears to be an extract from a directory which has already been published may be sent—a voucher
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copy, as it were—together with a demand for payment. Sometimes the entry has been included, unordered and unwanted; sometimes no such entry has appeared, or indeed it may never appear; or an entry may be sent, apparently for verification, together with an invoice. In any such case the seeming invoice may be passed for payment without checking whether the entry was ever ordered. Some of your Lordships may think that if a firm's control system is as lax as that, it has only itself to blame if it pays bills for services which have not been rendered or even ordered, and which are practically worthless anyhow when they are rendered The fact remains, however, that those who play these tricks are wily and get away with substantial sums of money. More-over, it is small businesses which are most vulnerable to this kind of deception.
For these reasons, the 1971 Act pro-vides that no one need pay for an entry which has been included, or is to be included, in a directory unless he, or someone on his behalf, signed an order for it on his own regular order form or business stationery, or signed a note of agreement complying with certain requirements laid down in Section 3 of the Act. That states that any person who demands payment or asserts a right to payment, without having complied with the requirements of the Act, commits an offence and is liable to a fine not exceeding £400.
A person is regarded as asserting a right to payment if he sends an invoice or similar document which shows the amount payable for the service, and does not state as least as prominently as the amount that no claim is made to payment. But these provisions have proved inadequate for two reasons. First, this concept of prominence of the statement that no claim is made for payment is not precise. The people who run these bogus directories still send out documents in the form of invoices in which the statements required by the Act are deliberately printed in such a way that they are likely to be overlooked by a proportion of the recipients. I am informed that there have been over 900 of these complaints received by the Department since the Act came into effect. Secondly, the penalties which have been imposed where prosecutions have proceeded have tended to be quite small and seriously out of proportion to the proceeds of the fraud.

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This Bill has two main objects. The first is to ensure that disclaimers are so conspicuous that they cannot be overlooked, and to tighten up the note of agreement provision which must be complied with before a demand for payment can legally be made. It is proposed to do this by amending that part of Section 3(3) of the Act which lays down the requirement, and substituting a power to make regulations about the content and form of notices, agreements, invoices and similar documents. In addition, it is proposed in Clause 2(2) to replace Section 6(2) of the Act, which relates 10 the prominence of the disclaimer, with the requirement that any invoice or the like must comply with the regulations. Clauses 1 and 2 will enable the Secretary of State not only to lay down precise requirements with which documents must comply, but also to differentiate between various classes of documents and various circumstances so as to reduce to a minimum any inconvenience to reputable bodies. They will also enable him to change the regulations should an artful dodger find a loophole through which to extract money from the unwary.
The second main objective is to provide a stronger deterrent. The police have told us that the director of one firm, not a United Kingdom citizen, I may add, got away with about £250,000. In such cases a fine of £400 is plainly derisory—I call it piffling. So Clause 3. while retaining the maximum fine of £400 on summary conviction, provides no limit to the amount of the fine for a person convicted on indictment. If your Lordships pass this Bill this clause will come into operation immediately it receives the Royal Assent, although it will apply only to offences committed after the Bill becomes law. Clause 1, which gives the power to make regulations, will also come into operation on the passing of the Bill.
It is not expected that the regulations will take long to draft. Clause 2, which amends Section 3(3) and Section 6(2) of the 1971 Act, will come into effect on such date, or dates, as the Secretary of State may appoint by order. The regulations made under Clause 1 can then be brought into force. Meantime, until those regulations are brought into force, the existing provisions of the 1971 Act will continue to have effect. My Lords,
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I hope that this Bill will receive your Lordships' assent and that it will be proved successful in putting a stop to what is a very unpleasant form of fraud. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.— (Lord Drumalbyn.)
5.5 p.m.
Viscount HANWORTH: My Lords, we have had a very clear and complete exposition of this Bill by the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn. Therefore it only remains for me to say that I support it and that I feel it is an intolerable situation if we have brought in legislation which is being flouted by deceitful people to the extent which is apparent. I hope that this Bill will be given a very rapid passage through this House and that the provision for increasing the penalties will not be altered during its stages. We must remember today that, in many cases, penalties—and this, I think, is a good example—are quite inadequate to act as a deterrent.
5.6 p.m.
Lord JACQUES: My Lords, I have pleasure in supporting the noble Lord in his quest to remove the mischief which is being caused by unethical directory publishers in sending out invoices which firms can so easily be deceived into paying. The sponsor of this Bill in another place announced that the Department had received over 800 complaints since the Act was passed in 1971. This figure has now increased to 950–100 from the beginning of the present year. A matter which has caused a great deal of concern is the practice of sending invoices from overseas, usually without even a small print disclaimer. Even though this may constitute an offence in the United Kingdom, our legislation is no deterrent unless prosecutions can be brought. This is impossible, unless the operators come to the United Kingdom. The only effective solution is to persuade other countries to introduce similar legislation to our own, and this the Government will seek to do. It will, of course, take time to achieve this and, in the meantime, firms in this country must be increasingly vigilant in checking any overseas invoices.
The House will wish me to say something about the Government's intentions regarding regulations. The object of the regulations laying down the requirements

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for invoices and similar documents will be to ensure that in future any invoice for an unordered entry will bear a disclaimer so conspicuous that the recipient cannot overlook it and be deceived into paying. The intention, therefore, is to lay down a detailed specification for the form of disclaimer which must appear. We have it in mind that this would be along these lines: first, in the top left-hand corner of the document the following words would appear in a specified colour and type-size: "This is not a demand for payment. There is no obligation to pay the charge shown." In addition, the words, "This is not an invoice" will have to be printed diagonally across the face of the document, also in a specified colour and in a type-size larger than any other type appearing on the invoice. These requirements will, of course, not apply to invoices sent out by reputable publishers demanding payment for an entry which has been properly ordered.
The main purpose of the regulations relating to notes of agreement will be to ensure that the firm is not deceived into signing a valid order and so becomes liable to pay for an unwanted entry. We intend to achieve this by requiring that a specified warning is printed on the face of the note of agreement to alert the reader to the consequences of signing the document. We shall also require specified information about the directory to appear, broadly along the lines of the requirements of the 1971 Act. We shall draw up these regulations in the light of consultations already under way with interested parties, including reputable directory publishers and the Post Office. We do not want to cause legitimate publishers unnecessary difficulties in the conduct of their business. To meet their needs we shall do everything possible, consistent with the objective of preventing practices which deceive the public. It is in the interests of reputable publishers that those who are disreputable should be eliminated from the market.

Public Corporation

Relative Consumer Body

When Established

National Coal Board

Domestic Coal Consumers' Council.

First chairman appointed in July 1947 under the Coal Industry Nationalisation Act 1946.

5.11 p.m.
Lord DRUMALBYN: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, for his support and also, in particular, the noble Lord, Lord Jacques, for his response to this Bill. It must be plain to your Lordships that I was not exaggerating when I said that Mr. Anthony Grant who introduced this Bill had all possible support and assistance from the Department Your Lordships will have noted that the Department have already taken many steps to bring this Bill into operation, to get regulations prepared and to consult with various parties. I think that the extent to which the Department have assisted must be almost unprecedented. All I can say is that this is an excellent augury for the Bill and for its success, and I hope very much that your Lordships will give it a very speedy passage. I should again like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Jacques, and the Department for their courtesy.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS BILL
Report received.