Lords Sitting of 3 February 1976

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

LORD ORAM
Albert Edward Oram, Esquire, having been created Baron Oram, of Brighton in the County of East Sussex, for Life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord Peddle and the Lord Jacques, and made the solemn Affirmation.

NEW ZEALAND IMPORTS SCHEME
2.47 p.m.
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 whether their attention has been drawn to the scheme proposed by the New Zealand Government, whereby one-third of the value of selected imports is deposited with the Reserve Bank for six months without interest.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: Yes, my Lords. I understand the scheme came into operation yesterday, 2nd February.
Lord PANNELL: My Lords, does my noble friend understand that I think he has given me a very dusty Answer, and that I expected him to reflect upon how far the scheme proposed in New Zealand is better than the scheme which we had in 1964 of import duty levy, which was not well received on the Continent? Does not this New Zealand scheme form a convenient method of getting over the claim that has arisen both in the Party and in the country, that something should be done to stop the rush into this country of imports which put people out of work—for instance, Thorne's at Skelmersdale—and to arrest the imports of Japanese motor cars?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I thought that my Answer was not dusty but was purely factual. Having said that, it is a device which we ourselves as a country have used but which, because of what is known as the OECD pledge, we are not now using.

UNIT TRUSTS: MANAGEMENT CHANGES
Lord CHAMPION: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to safeguard the interests of unit trust holders when unit trusts are subject to takeovers and their managements change hands.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, no unit trust scheme may be promoted to the public unless it has been authorised by the Department of Trade under Section 17 of the Prevention of Fraud (Investments) Act 1958. When any change of management of a trust is proposed, the Department must satisfy itself, in consultation with the Trustee, that the reputation of the prospective managers is sufficiently high to warrant continued authorisation if the transfer takes place. In reaching this decision, the Department pays due regard to the interests of the unitholders concerned.
Lord CHAMPION: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that reply which I do not regard as dusty. It goes some little way to meet my point; namely, that before any investor invests in a unit trust he will, if he is sensible, assess the character and ability of the management of that trust. But, understandably, if the trust changes hands, he will not be so satisfied, particularly if it falls into the hands of a firm like Slater Walker, which is not exactly a name that I should like very much if I were an investor in, say, the National group of trusts.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, about the second half of that supplementary question I can make no comment. But the Department of Trade takes very careful steps to ensure that if there is a change of management the new management is considered appropriate. Checks

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are made through the Stock Exchange and elsewhere to ensure that this is so. But what one cannot do as a Government or as a Department is to ensure that the new management has the flair of the old management. This can be proved only by events. But every care is taken to ensure that the new management is at least as acceptable as the one that it is replacing.
Lord CHAMPION: My Lords, if someone invests in a company which is about to change hands the investor has some say in the matter. Is it not possible to ensure that in the takeover of unit trusts investors have at least some little say before the change takes place? Can the Government do something about that?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I will bring the views of my noble friend to the attention of my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Trade.

CZECHOSLOVAKIA: CIVIL AND POLITICAL RIGHTS
2.52 p.m.
Lord CHELWOOD: 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 protests they have made on their own initiative or jointly with the EEC to the Czechoslovak Government about the further curtailment of the civil and political rights of the Czechoslovak people contrary to the Final Act of the Helsinki Agreement.
The MINISTER of STATE, FOREIGN and COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (Lord Goronwy-Roberts): My Lords, I am not aware that there has been any further curtailment of civil and political rights in Czechoslovakia since the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe was signed in Helsinki on 1st August, 1975. Her Majesty's Government have therefore made no protests of the kind described by the noble Lord.
Lord CHELWOOD: My Lords, the noble Lord will have seen very full reports in the newspapers, including The Times, about the changes in the penal codes in Czechoslovakia. Does not he
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feel that if attention is drawn too frequently to token and trivial acts by Warsaw bloc countries that are consistent with the Helsinki Agreement, there is a danger that far more serious matters such as this, about which there appears to be some disagreement between us, will have no attention drawn to them at all?
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, I follow the noble Lord to this extent, that we have noted with considerable interest reports of the treatment of dissidents in both Czechoslovakia and some other cognate countries. We have no standing formally to intervene on behalf of individuals so treated in another country. However, we have very much in mind, particularly in consultation with our partners in the Nine, that a much better focus in regard to the contents of Basket Three relating to humanitarian rights should by now be evident in the actions of all countries that are signatories to the Final Act.
Lord PANNELL: My Lords, how could the Czechoslovaks lose any civil or political rights, which they have not had since 1948?
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, as my noble friend reminds us, the Question related to further curtailment and I replied that, so far as I could see, there has been no further curtailment of rights in that country. As to whether the Final Act will serve to help to restore to people in Czechoslovakia and similar countries some of the rights that they lost in 1948, we must wait and see and try to help along that process.
Lord CHELWOOD: My Lords, when promises solemnly given in the Final Act at Helsinki are broken, is it the intention of Her Majesty's Government to draw attention to that and, together with out partners in the EEC, to protest?
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, as I have said, we and our partners are watching the process very carefully indeed. Naturally, we look to the Review Conference next year which will exercise a kind of audit over the performance of the 35 countries that are signatories to the Final Act. In most of these cases private suasion is preferable and more productive than public protest, and in the meantime, in the most effective

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way possible, we with our partners, and bilaterally, shall seek to do everything that we can. In fairness, I would point out, as my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary pointed out last week in another place, that we are within sight of agreement with a number of Eastern European countries in regard to improving the conditions of work of British journalists in those countries.
Lord SLATER: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend whether I am right in assuming that Her Majesty's Government are not guided by what appears in the Press, which seems to be implied in the noble Lord's Question, and that they determine their policy on the reports they receive from the Diplomatic Service?
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, my noble friend is quite right. We are, of course, bound to act almost exclusively on the information that comes to us from our own representatives. On the other hand, as my noble friend knows, we take note of what is written by responsible journalists in responsible newspapers, not only in this country but in other countries also.

WASTEPAPER DISPOSAL
2.58 p.m.
Lord SHINWELL: 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 progress has been achieved with the collection, recycling and disposal of wastepaper.
The PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE, DEPARTMENT of INDUSTRY (Lord Melchett): My Lords, the paper and board industry recycled about 1·7 million tonnes of wastepaper in 1975. That was about 20 per cent. less than in 1974. The reduction was caused by a fall in demand for the industry's products, which is in turn due to the economic recession. In the longer term, however, the industry foresees an increase in the amount of wastepaper it will be able to recycle.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that a year ago I put down a similar Question as a result of which the Government were stimulated to take the appropriate action? Can my noble friend say whether the fact of processing wastepaper has any beneficial effect in reducing the cost of newsprint imports?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am aware that my noble friend asked a Question a year ago and I have taken care to study what was said on that occasion. So far as reducing the cost of imports is concerned, my understanding is that at the moment the amount of paper which is made from recycled paper is, on the whole, of a different quality from the kind of paper that is made from pulp which is largely imported.
Viscount HANWORTH: My Lords, would the noble Lord agree that it is possible to recycle a far larger percentage than we are doing at the present time? Furthermore, would the noble Lord say whether the de-inking plant which is necessary for re-using newspaper print is adequate for the purpose, and, if not, what steps are being taken to increase this facility?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I agree that it would be possible to recycle more paper than is being recycled at the moment. As I said in my original Answer, the industry foresees a considerable increase in the amount of wastepaper that will be recycled in future years. There are various difficult technical problems to be overcome, and currently we are funding research into some of them.
Lord ORR-EWING: My Lords, has the Minister noticed that in Scandinavia, where they are not short of the raw material, they are now by law making it necessary for housewives to separate paper from other waste that they throw away each day? If that is necessary in Scandinavia, surely we in this country could do something to encourage people to separate their wastepaper and look at it as a valuable commodity, since this would save an immeasurable amount in foreign exchange if it could be done and if technical and scientific processes could be encouraged by the Government?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, as I said, we are encouraging the technical and

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scientific processes necessary before the wastepaper currently available can be used by the wastepaper industry. The problem arises not from a lack of wastepaper; there is more than enough of it in this country, even after it has been sorted by housewives, or by anyone else. At the present moment the industry has no capacity to use the wastepaper available to it.
Viscount HANWORTH: My Lords, is the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, aware that the percentage of wastepaper that we recycled during the war was far higher than the amount we recycle today? Is he also aware that in some other countries the percentage is greater than it is here? Does the noble Lord really think there are technical barriers to re-using a larger amount?—becausethis seems a very doubtful statement.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, there are technical barriers to re-using larger amounts in the British paper industry as currently constituted. We import paper of a type and quality made from pulp abroad much more cheaply than we are able to make it in this country, partly because the manufacturers have on their doorsteps supplies of raw materials necessary for making it. As far as the percentage of recycled waste paper used by the British industry is concerned, my understanding is that in fact we use a higher percentage than the paper industry of any other country.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, the supplementary questions seem to have removed some of the complacency which the Government exhibited. Can my noble friend Lord Melchett say whether it is possible to stimulate local authorities in the collection of wastepaper? Would he approach his right honourable friend responsible for this matter, to see what can be done?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I would not accept for a moment that the Government have shown any complacency at all in this matter. Nobody has yet mentioned the first report of the Waste Management Advisory Council, published two weeks ago, which the Government are urgently considering. This report contains a number of recommendations to get rid of the present overcapacity of wastepaper, and the inability
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of the industry to use it. That is the important thing, not to encourage people at the present moment to collect more wastepaper for which at present there is no demand.
Lord LEATHERLAND: My Lords, is my noble friend Lord Melchett aware that we spend £300 million a year in importing wood pulp for paper-making? Is he aware that if we were to save a further 1 million tons a year, we would benefit our balance of payments to the extent of £100 million a year? Is he further aware that paper-making and board-making are cyclical industries, and that at the moment the warehouses of the paper manufacturers are more than loaded with stocks of wastepaper? Is my noble friend further aware, therefore, that many local authorities have had to cancel their collections of wastepaper? Now I come to the main point, which has not so far been mentioned. The paper-manufacturing companies are asking the Government whether they will finance the holding of extra supplies of wastepaper at their mills. Does not my noble friend think it would be a good idea if the Government stepped in and compensated them for this capital that is lying idle, so that they can use more wastepaper, and the local authorities can collect more wastepaper?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am aware of my noble friend's long and detailed interest in the subject. I think I have dealt with his first supplement question about imports. I am aware of the cyclical nature of the industry, and, indeed, that is the main problem. That is what has caused the problem at the moment of excess stocks of wastepaper which the industry is unable to use. I am aware of the suggestion that the Government should finance an excess stock scheme. That is one of the suggestions put forward by the Waste Management Advisory Council, whose report I mentioned. This is something the Government are considering. I would add also that Her Majesty's Stationery Office, as a result of the report of the Waste Management Advisory Council, are now specifying that a certain percentage of paper they buy for certain purposes must contain recycled paper. If others followed their lead, it would help the industry to use more wastepaper.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, I am very grateful for the interest of my noble friend Lord Melchett in this matter. I shall watch what happens in the future. I might put down a similar Question during that period.
The Earl of KIMBERLEY: My Lords, is the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, aware that if we cannot recycle all the wastepaper that we have in this country at present, it could be used in agriculture for bedding and for feeding store cattle? Could that side of the question be investigated?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, along with others, I await with interest to see what happens when the yards are mucked out at the end of the winter season before making any definite decisions about how useful the paper is. The Waste Management Advisory Council will be undertaking research into other uses for wastepaper.

SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, with the leave of the House, I will make a Statement about Business this afternoon. As the House will be aware, Mr. Speaker Lloyd retires today and Members of another place at the moment are choosing his successor. The Business of the House will be interrupted at a convenient moment this afternoon by a Royal Commission, signifying Her Majesty's approbation of the Commons' choice.
BRITISH RAILWAYS ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL
Read 3a, and passed.
BROWNIES TAING PIER ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL
Read 3a, and passed.
EDUCATION (SCHOOL-LEAVING DATES) BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a, an Amendment (privilege) made; Bill passed, and sent to the Commons.

MAPLIN DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY (DISSOLUTION) BILL [H.L.]
3.8 p.m.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time. The Maplin Development Authority was constituted in accordance with the provisions of the Maplin Development Act 1973 specifically to reclaim land at Maplin and Foulness Sands for the establishment of an airport and seaport. When the project was abandoned, the Authority was directed to cease further activity and to discharge its remaining obligations, and my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment promised to seek powers for its dissolution as soon as was convenient.
My Lords, the Authority now consists of a caretaker board of three unpaid members. It has a capital debt of £2·3 million made up of an initial debt of £1·2 million, covering expenses incurred by the Secretary of State before the establishment of the Authority, and subsequent borrowing by the Authority amounting to a further £1·1 million. The 1973 Act requires that the Authority shall repay this debt to the National Loans Fund. But, without the Maplin project, it has no possible means of meeting this obligation, and unless something is done, further borrowing will have to continue indefinitely to meet interest charges on an ever-mounting debt. The Authority has to prepare annual accounts, which involves expenditure on auditors' fees, and the Secretary of State is required by the 1973 Act to continue each year to lay these accounts and an annual report before Parliament, in just the same way as if the Authority were carrying out the job it had originally been set up to do. This Bill, therefore, deals with these anomalies. I shall briefly outline its provisions.
Clause 1 is a normal form of provision which would enable the Secretary of State to dissolve the Maplin Development Authority by Order exercisable by Statutory Instrument which shall be laid before Parliament after having been made. Clause 2 provides for the necessary writing off of the Authority's total indebtedness. Other financial provisions define the Authority's final accounting

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period and enable the Secretary of State to meet any winding up expenses. Clause 3 provides for the consequential repeal of the enactments listed in the Schedule. These include the whole Maplin Development Act 1973.
I might add that the repeal of the 1973 Act removes from the Statute Book provisions for compensation or payments to those who might have been affected by the reclamation works or by the development of the reclaimed land. Lest it be assumed that this would remove any effective rights of protection, I should make it clear that the project was halted before the Authority had carried out any of the works authorised by the 1973 Act. Consequently, no claims for compensation under that Act could arise. Finally, the necessity for the present measure is in no way a reflection on the members and staff of the Maplin Development Authority. Under its first Chairman, Sir Frank Marshall, and his Board—all of whom resigned as soon as it was clear that their energies could no longer be effectively employed—the Authority discharged its duties vigorously and to the full. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Baroness Stedman.)
3.12 p.m.
Baroness YOUNG: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman, for introducing this Bill to us and for explaining its provisions so clearly. It is, as she has said, a short Bill of only three clauses. Nevertheless it is important, and, as is so often the case, has rather more to it than might at first be apparent. The Bill clearly follows from the Government's decision to abandon the Maplin project. But that decision has never been fully debated. One of the reasons for abandoning the project, as I understood it, was its cost and, indeed, in the serious economic situation in which we find ourselves today this must be a matter of major importance. But are not the proposals in the consultation document the Government have issued equally expensive? It is exceedingly difficult to find a correct comparison, but I hope that before this Bill completes its passage in the House we may have an answer to that question.
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As this is a Second Reading debate I would say that the implications of the siting of a new airport or the alternative policy of building up and increasing the use of present airports is important. As I have already indicated, we now have the consultation document, Airport Strategy for Great Britain, and the principles underlying the conclusions ought to be fully debated. What I fear is happening is that airports, like Topsy, are to be allowed to grow, because this is the easiest solution, perhaps even the most expedient, but without any consideration of the environment or those who have to live in the vicinity of airports. I was glad to see that noise, as an issue, has been included in the document. I wonder whether safety, which was once regarded as a matter of importance in view of the extensive build-up of Heathrow, is to be considered at all.
The planning problems following upon a large increase of employment at four airports seem to be dismissed in the consultation document almost as if there is nothing at all to worry about. Yet people require houses and a new community requires all the infrastructure necessary to support it. I hope the Government will give us an opportunity to debate these principles fully, and time to find out what the people living near Stansted think about their future. It is, after all, ironic that those who fought the battle to prevent the third London Airport being sited at Stansted, and imagined that they had won, now find that, almost by stealth, the Government are proposing a large build-up of air traffic in their neighbourhood. The same argument could be applied with equal force to the build-up at Luton. The final irony is that in the course of the very long debates that we had in this House on the Community Land Bill we were told over and over again that the reason for it was the need for positive planning. If ever anything illustrates planning by expediency, the sequence of proposals by the Government does just that.
My Lords, it is not enough to say what the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, said to me, in answer to a Question on 21st May, 1974, with regard to the abandonment of

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the Maplin project. I asked: is the decision simply concerned with aircraft traffic and movement and
"will the decision about Maplin be based exclusively on that and not on any environmental considerations at all?"—[Official Report; col. 1323.]
The noble Lord, Lord Beswick, replied:
"My Lords, the noble Baroness is absolutely right. The review now taking place is concerned with aviation matters; but of course if nothing is done at Maplin the environment will not be affected."
My Lords, that really is not good enough for an answer. Whatever happens in the future, the environment at Maplin will be affected, and the environment in a good many other places will be affected too, and we ought to know in what way. The only conclusion that can be drawn is that the Government consider that in the parlous economic state in which we find ourselves today we can no longer afford the luxury of considering the environment at all. When my Party was in office we made our policy on Maplin absolutely clear, and I think it would be helpful to the House today to say that we must reserve our right to reconsider the matter when we are returned to power.
To turn now quite specifically to the Bill, I would ask the noble Baroness six questions about it. I shall quite understand if she is not able to answer them all at the conclusion of this debate, and I shall be quite happy if she will write to me before we begin the Committee stage of the Bill. The first question is based on the decision to abandon the Maplin project and to put the Authority's powers into the hands of the Secretary of State for the Environment. I would ask what the Secretary of State proposes to do with those powers. If he has no plans for the future of Maplin what is their purpose and if he has some plans will the Government say what they are? Secondly, now that the Government have issued a consultation document and, at the end of it, given a very long list (which I was glad to see) of people and authorities to be consulted, will the Government explain why they have decided to wind up the Maplin Authority before anybody has had a chance for consultation and not after consultations have taken place, and what is the role of the Secretary of State for the Environment in this matter of consultation?
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Third, perhaps the noble Baroness will also let us have a full account of the assets the Authority has at the present time, in terms of both land and resources, so that we may see what is being vested in the Secretary of State. The fourth question is: what is the present state of the firing range? When last we heard anything about it at all it was being cleared up at quite considerable expense. If this operation has now been concluded, what do the Government propose to do with the firing range? If it has not been completed, will the Army be asked to use it again; and does it now fall under the Department of the Environment rather than the Ministry of Defence?
There are, I believe, two other matters of major importance arising from this small Bill. The first is what is the Government's attitude now towards the Seaport? After all, the Maplin Bill was concerned with reclamation of land for an airport and also for a seaport. Are we to understand that this, too, has been completely abandoned, and what consultations have the Government had with the Port of London Authority on this matter? What effect does this have on other British ports, because presumably the whole of the policy on seaports has now been altered?
My last question concerns what was the proposed new town. Of course, not only did the Maplin Bill propose a new airport and a new seaport, but they were to be serviced by a new town and all the infrastructure which went with that development. It is true that there is to be consultation with local authorities on future airports, but what about consultations with local authorities on the decision to abandon the new town proposals at Maplin? What are the implications of this decision for London and for the South-East? Has this decision been fully discussed with all the local authorities concerned and, in particular, the South-East Regional Economic Planning Council which must, of course, have a major interest in the outcome of any planning decisions for this area?
I have said as much as I have today in outline only because all the matters upon which I have touched are in themselves matters for extensive debate and major issues of policy. But I do not believe that it is right to have a small

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Bill like this—which purports simply to be something of relatively little importance but which in fact is a key part of a sequence of events—and let it go without proper debate on where we are going. I may have criticised the Community Land Act when the Government talked about positive planning, but I believe that those in positions of public responsibility ought to tell people what they are intending to do and what the consequences of their actions will be for those who will be directly affected by them.
3.22 p.m.
Lord BALFOUR of INCHRYE: My Lords, we conic today to bury Maplin. There are few mourners, and no pall bearers even among its most ardent fans, to whom I have listened in debates for many years. We have had a brief funeral oration from the Minister, without any tribute to the late lamented except perhaps one from the noble Baroness, Lady Young, who, it seemed to me, had hopes of some form of resurrection in the future. Maplin had its supporters. I have looked at Hansard from April 1971, and—as the costs escalated until a cost of £825 million was envisaged in 1973, and from that to some new totally unknown and unacceptable figure—Maplin supporters from all sections of this House have fallen one by one until, when I look at the speakers' list today, I can find no one who will speak up for that dead project.
Before the corpse of Maplin is interred, we ought to think for a moment what lessons we can learn from its history. It seems to me that the main lesson we can learn is how wrong all experts can be in their prophesies and their calculations, and how wrong these firm and brave Ministerial declarations can be as the time passes. I was a critic of Maplin from the very beginning and I have always doubted the need for a third London airport. I have had my share of being knocked about by Ministers over a period of years. More in sorrow than in anger, my fellow opponents of Maplin were often rebuked, as it were, "Oh ye of little faith; you ought to believe in this great project".
I cannot help recalling a call I made on 5th February 1973, supported by other noble Lords, for an urgent reconsideration of the project. I was put in my place very firmly by a pontifical Minis-
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terial declaration. This was the declaration:
"We"—
noble Lords will, of course, note the big "We" and all it stands for—
'are satisfied of the need for additional airport capacity to serve the London area at the end of the decade… Maplin will meet this need…".—[Official Report, 5/2/73; col. 829.]
Some of "we wicked infidels'' were still unconvinced, and on 26th June of that year we again challenged the project. The Minister again slapped me down rather sharply at column 1850 with this rhetorical question:
"What happens when our patched-up London airports finally burst at the seams?"
More capacity:
"…can only be sensibly provided at Maplin."
There was a junior Minister in the last Conservative Administration—I never knew him personally, and I have nothing against him personally—Mr. Eldon Griffiths. He was really the cabin boy who climbed up the mast to nail the Maplin flags on the Conservative Party mast. For a long time, in and out of Parliament he said that the Party was pledged to Maplin. Our political system has lots of battle honours, and when one comes to look at the battle honours of the various Parties since the war I think that two will stand out. One is groundnuts, and the other is Maplin. In almost the last debate we had in your Lordships' House, I had my final rebuke when I said that Maplin was a dead duck. Civil air transport has its airport problems, of course, but I would ask the Minister officiating at the final farewell to this project: is it buried for all time? Can she give an assurance that there is no similar project for a third London airport being hawked around within the Ministerial corridors of power? Let the ghosts of Maplin be laid at rest, and the lessons of Maplin learnt.
3.28 p.m.
The Earl of CORK and ORRERY: My Lords, I must write a small footnote to the most able speech of my noble friend Lord Balfour. I was a supporter of Maplin, and I mourn its demise. However, as he has said, we are here to bury Maplin and not to praise it. I had not in fact thought of it in terms of a funeral so much as the inking in of a full stop

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at the end of a chapter. This is a better simile to me because one chapter leads to another. This is not the end of civil aviation or of the airport problem, and the next chapter comes to us in the form of this orange coloured document, to which my noble friend Lady Young has referred, Airport strategy for Great Britain. I am interested to note that it has no date. It says very early on in its pages that about six months will be allowed for consultation. Anybody picking, it up might wonder when that period ends. There, is no date on the document itself or on the foreword by the Secretary of State. It is possible to discover when it was published by looking at the bottom of the last page where there is some small print saying that it was printed in England by Her Majesty's Stationery Office, and so on, on 11/75. This may give a clue to when it was published.
I rather suspect that this slap-happy attitude to publication is not altogether uncharacteristic of the whole document. These magic words appear on page 1:
"The Government have not reached any conclusions on the various possibilities for the existing London airports nor on possible measures for regional diversion."
This is some 20 years after it was said that we needed a coherent, long-term airport development, and nearly two years after the abandonment of the great Maplin project, which itself had been hailed three years earlier as one of the very greatest urgency.
My Lords, what comes next? I detect in this new plan, or rather non-plan, to which we are looking forward, a total incoherence, a lack of decision, or even thought, and a great deal of misleading talk, on the part of the Government. With your Lordships' permission, I should like to give one example which I think is germane to this debate. It is to do with Gatwick; and I speak on Gatwick because I live within its sound range, and I am the president of the Haslemere Aircraft Disturbance Action Group, which co-operates with the county councils concerned, and whose activities and professional technical reports on aircraft noise are well known to the Department. This Airport Strategy for Great Britain forecasts at Gatwick 25 million passengers a year by 1990, that is with the second passenger terminal built, and 168,000 air
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transport movements per year. That gives an average of 147 passengers per aircraft, which accords well enough with the 1990 forecast of 180 to 200 passengers per aircraft.
But the figure of 168,000 air transport movements includes an unspecified number of cargo-only movements, which do not involve the carriage of passengers. I cannot tell what this number is for Gatwick, because one is not told. But the proportion of all cargo movements to all air transport movements at all four London airports is given as over 8 per cent.; and such a proportion at Gatwick would reduce the air transport movements there to 106,000 passenger transport movements, which gives about 150 passengers per aeroplane. Now, 150 passengers per aeroplane is 75 per cent. of the passenger carrying capacity of a 200 seater, and 85 per cent. capacity of a180 seater. Those are the kind of aircraft that are forecast. Thus the forecast is supposing that in 1990 an aeroplane will carry on average between 75 and 83 per cent. of its total capacity, which is surely a liner operator's dream. Should we be a little less optimistic and a little more realistic, and suppose an average passenger load of 60 per cent? This will be found to produce between 208,000 and 231,000 passenger transport movements per annum, which is wildly in excess of the runway capacity at Gatwick as estimated; that is to say, 168,000 movements.
We have been assured that runway capacity is not the limiting factor again. But why is it supposed that the passenger carrying capacity of an aircraft would be as high as 180 to 200 by 1990? Taking the service life of an aeroplane as being 20 years, quite a lot of those now using Gatwick will be flying there still in 1990—such as BAC 111s, with a capacity of 89: and a larger number of Boeing 727s, which carry 130 to 160. Even if we add some Boeing707s, which can carry 189, these three types between them have an average capacity of between 136 and 142 which pushes the number of passenger transport movements higher still, in fact well above 100 per cent. of the declared maximum capacity of the single runway at Gatwick. Since I have no way of checking this figure, let us call it 100 and x per cent. Where is that extra x per cent. of runway capacity at Gawick to be

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found? By a resumption of night flying? By building a second runway? I see no third possibility.
What are we to expect my Lords, if all we have to go on is such misleading stuff as this? I have quoted this one example from the so-called consultative documents, solely to give an idea of why it is that many people most closely affected by the future development of London airports suspect that a good deal of wool is being pulled over their eyes.
3.35 p.m.
Lord LEATHERLAND: My Lords, I do not want to try to dot the i's and cross the t's of the valuable statistical dissertation we have had from the noble Earl, Lord Cork and Orrery. But for well over a quarter of a century I have been very deeply involved in public affairs in Essex, including at one time the chairmanship of the county council. One thing I know —and it has been pointed out by the South-East Strategic Study on more than one occasion—is that some considerable development is needed in that South-East corner of Essex. I believe that at one time it was suggested that an extra 60,000 or 70,000 was needed in the population, and that an industrial infrastructure capable of sustaining those people was also needed.
The Bill before us today, which I support, finally buries Maplin so far as Her Majesty's Government are concerned. This means that the industrial and the housing planning of that corner of South-East Essex can go ahead in the knowledge that the ghost of Maplin is no longer hovering over that part of the country. But, sad to say, the noble Baroness, Lady Young, has revived the uncertainty that was created a few years ago when Maplin was first thought of. She has suggested that if her Government come back into power, they may revive Maplin. That would prevent the authorities from getting down at this moment to the future planning of the area with any feeling of certainty.
I feel that it was right to kill Maplin at the time it was killed. At that time we were confronted with three major schemes, each costing well over £1,000 million. There was Maplin, there was the Channel Tunnel, and there was Concorde. In the state of our economy as it existed then, and as it was likely to
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continue to exist, I believe that this would have been a terrible strain on the economy of the country. Therefore I welcomed the cancelling of Maplin and the cancelling of the Channel Tunnel, but Concorde had gone too far ahead for any cancellation to be thought of in that case. At the time we were discussing Maplin, I supported it. I did not support it because of any intrinsic merits that it might have had, although it would have had some, but rather I supported it as a counterbalance to the suggestion that was then being made that a major third London airport might be built at Stansted.
I thought that was had. I thought it would ruin the peace and quietude, and the agricultural land of a very tine stretch of country in the Saffron Walden area; and I still feel the same. That leads me to say that I am rather disturbed at the suggestion made in the document quoted by the noble Baroness that there may be, as a result of the killing of Maplin, some expansion of a certain number of airports, one of which is Stansted. If there is any attempt to bring about any major expansion of Stansted, I can promise that there will he a feeling of outrage among the people in that corner of Essex, and I shall be among those who will be outraged. There will be a very strong agitation against any major expansion of Stansted Airport. I am not saying that a few little trimmings or a few little improvements here and there would not be acceptable. We have to face that fact, but to attempt to create a third major London Airport at Stansted would be a menace to that neighbourhood, and it would be a very bad thing which would be very widely opposed. Therefore when she replies, I hope that my noble friend can tell us exactly what is proposed in, perhaps, the next 10 years regarding the future of Stansted Airport.
The Maplin Development Authority achieved something during its short life. It gathered up thousands of shells that had been fired from the Shoeburyness Experimental Establishment and which had landed in the water and in the sand. Many of those shells had not exploded and from the point of view of public safety Maplin did something to earn the money that has been spent upon it.
There remains the question of the Maplin seaport. As my noble friend said,

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the original Bill provided not only for a Maplin airport but for a Maplin seaport as well. I understand that the Port of London Authority is now actively discussing this question. I do not know to what extent it has consulted the Government; I hope there will be close consultations. I do not agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Young, that the building of the new seaport at Maplin might have an undesirable effect upon other ports. This is merely another chapter in the moving of shipping on the Thames down from London to Tilbury and the outer reaches of the estuary. We have to face the fact that London docks as we knew them are out of date and that shipping does not require to use them. Shipping is increasingly using Tilbury, partly because of the fashionable introduction of containers and container ships, and it seems to me—although I do not speak with any expert knowledge—that perhaps it would be a good idea to build the seaport. Perhaps my noble friend will tell us how the seaport aspect of this Maplin Development now stands. I support the Bill.
Viscount AMORY: My Lords, I have only one subordinate question to ask the noble Baroness. The Bill refers to the properties of the Maplin Development Authority. Will she tell us whether any of the Authority's expenditure to date will have any residual value of any kind, apart from the elimination of the shells to which the noble Lord, Lord Leather-land, has referred?
Lord COLERAINE: My Lords, I should like to ask the noble Baroness one question and also to make one observation. First, I must apologise to the noble Baroness that I was not present for her opening speech, and she may have answered the question already. It is simply this. The Maplin Development Authority is to be dissolved. Why cannot the ashes be scattered in a decent way on the sea? Why do they have to return to the custody of the Secretary of State? Does that mean, as my noble friend Lord Balfour of Inchrye suggested, that at some time this grisly project may be revived? The observation I have to make is to my noble friend Lady Young. If it is true that my leaders are considering, on their return to office—which I expect in the fairly near future—reviving Maplin,
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I for my part hope very much that they will have second thoughts.
3.43 p.m.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I am grateful to those noble Lords who have taken part in the debate. The questions have been fairly wide ranging and gone somewhat beyond the context of the Bill. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Young, for giving me notice of her six questions and for her appreciation of the fact that I may not be able to answer at this time in such a detailed way as she would like, but any that I do not answer this afternoon, or do not answer in sufficient detail, I will read in Hansard tomorrow and will certainly write to the noble Baroness in further detail. Several noble Lords raised the question of the disposal of the Maplin Development Authority's assets. This Bill provides for the Maplin Development Authority's liabilities and rights and also for any property that is to be transferred to the Secretary of State. I would assure the noble Baroness that this is the usual practice. It is a conventional contingency provision and it is not expected that at the transfer date there will be any property to transfer.
On the question of finance and the need to write off the Authority's debt, the Maplin Development Authority have disposed of any realisable assets and these have been taken into account when calculating the present debt that your Lordships have been told about today. It was intended that the Authority should in due course recoup their expenditure on investigatory and design work, and the very much larger expenditure which they would have incurred on land regulation and development, from the proceeds of the sale of land to the Civil Aviation Authority and the Port of London Authority and other organisations, but without a Maplin Authority of course we have no such assets to sell off to help to pay the way.
The activities of the Authority were confined to surveys, to site investigations and to hydraulic, engineering and planning design studies. In May 1974 the Authority were directed to take steps to bring to a useful conclusion all the work that was then in progress and, as I have stated, in July they were directed to cease all further activities. This Bill automatically flows from that. However, the

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Secretary of State has directed that the Maplin Development Authority shall make all the technical findings available to him and comprehensive reports on the engineering studies have been deposited in the library of the Department of the Environment and with the Department's Directorate of Civil Enginering Development. So we may have something to look back on when perhaps some work is being done on another project.
On the question of the Maplin motorways, the rail links and the new town and the seaport, the London-Maplin motorway and the high-speed rail link with its town terminal at King's Cross and the local rail and road connections to Maplin and the new town in South East Essex were essential components of the Maplin project. But they were not the responsibility of the Maplin Development Authority and therefore they are not relevant to the present Bill. In fact, none of these proposals had reached the statutory stage by the time the reappraisal of the project was ordered by the Government. Statements that have been made since by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment have made it clear that none of these proposals remains extant or is being safeguarded.
On airports policy the noble Lord, Lord Balfour of Inchrye, asked whether Maplin was dead and buried and were we really attending a funeral this afternoon; and the noble Earl, Lord Cork and Orrery, also drew attention to the need for the details to be displayed and for people to know what was happening about our airports policy reviews. Following the decision to abandon the Maplin airport project the Government have carried out this wide-ranging review of airport policy and I apologise to the noble Lord if he could not find the date in it. We understood that it had been published in November 1975 and that was verified by his searching through the document. I will certainly draw the attention of my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment to the need for having dates on such important documents as this easily accessible to those who want to read them.
The detailed consultations on the basis of the document that has been referred
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to this afternoon are currently being undertaken with local authorities, with airport authorities, with airport employees, with amenity organisations, wild life conservation people and with all others who are affected by airport development. After the completion of these consultations the Government will put proposals before Parliament on future airport policy, so that there will be an opportunity for a further debate on these consultation documents, and I look forward to it in this House with interest because of the comments which it has aroused this afternoon.
We were also asked whether we had really closed our options on having an airport at Maplin. The present consultations have taken place in the light of a firm decision by the Govornment to abandon the Maplin project for a third London airport. That decision was generally accepted and from that flowed the Government's subsequent review of airport policy which is reflected in the first of the consultation documents which was published last November, and we believe, from a preliminary reading of that document, that it confirms the correstness of the decision to abandon Maplin.
Baroness YOUNG: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt the noble Baroness, but can she confirm that all the planning procedures that will be connected with the extension of the four London Airports will be subject to the statutory planning procedures as understood by local authorities and individuals?
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, to the best of my knowledge that is the case, but I shall check on it and shall confirm it with the noble Baroness. In view of the present economic circumstances, I believe that it is quite inconceivable that the Maplin decision could now be reversed. Of course, no one can predict the long-term future and far be it from me to say what will be done by a future Government. I can give an assurance at this point of time that there is no idea of resurrecting Maplin, but I cannot commit any future Government, whether of my own or another political hue.
On Question, Bill read 2a and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

DAMAGES (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
3.52 p.m.
The MINISTER of STATE, SCOTTISH OFFICE (Lord Kirkhill): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Kirkhill.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The Lord Derwent in the Chair.]
Clauses 1 and 2 agreed to.
Clause 3 [Certain rights arising on death of another not transmissible]:
On Question, Whether Clause 3 shall stand part of the Bill?
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: I think it convenient to draw your Lordships' attention to the fact that my noble friend Lord Mansfield said on Second Reading on 18th December that he presumed either that there would be no Committee stage on this Bill or that it would be brief. He therefore made the two or three main points which we wish to make concerning the Bill at that moment. The Bill follows closely proposals made by the Scottish Law Commission and we welcome it. The points raised were not ones requiring changes in the Bill or replies from the Government at this stage. I am therefore not proposing to repeat my noble friend's points on Clauses 1 to 8, though I take this opportunity of referring your Lordships' to the record of what my noble friend said on 18th December.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Clauses 4 to 8 agreed to.
Clause 9 [Damages due to injured person for patrimonial loss caused by personal injuries whereby expectation of life is diminished]:
Lord KIRKHILL Lord KIRKHILL moved the following Amendment:
Page 5, line 35, leave out ("For the avoidance of doubt it is hereby declared that").
The noble Lord said: This is essentially a drafting Amendment I should
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explain that, as at present drafted, Clause 9 is expressed as a declaratory provision. Subsection (2) is introduced by the words "For the avoidance of doubt", which suggest that the clause represents no more than a restatement of the existing law. It is, however, arguable that, in providing that an injured person whose expectation of life has been reduced may claim for his notional net financial losses during his "lost period", the clause is possibly not strictly declaratory of the existing Scots law on damages.
As the Scottish Law Commission pointed out in the report which has led to the introduction of the Bill (I refer your Lordships to Paragraphs 11–17 of the Report on the Law Relating to Damages for Injury Causing Death, Scottish Law Commission No. 31), there is an absence of direct authority on whether a pursuer can, under existing law, recover damages in respect of notional financial loss during his lost years. There are, however, certain decided cases which the Government feel may suggest that he cannot recover such damages. If the declaratory words which it is now proposed to delete are not removed there might be a risk that Clause 9 would be construed in accordance with existing law. The proposed Amendment, by simply removing the declaratory words from the beginning of subsection (2) of Clause 9, seeks to ensure that the interpretation and application of the clause is not unduly restricted by arguments based on the decided cases I have referred to.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: It seems to us that this is an improvement for the reason which the noble Lord has given. I am glad the Government have seen the possible danger of this being regarded as simply declaratory so that cases might arise in which the purpose of this clause would not be applied but rather some existing interpretation of the law would be successful instead.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
On Question, Whether Clause 9, as amended, shall stand part of the Bill?
Lord DRUMALBYN: I wonder whether it would be appropriate at this moment to raise a point which I raised on Second Reading on the taxation of damages and so on in comparison with what a man would have earned and been taxed on when he was alive. This is really a

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question of the taxation of the investment income from a capital sum received as damages. As I understand it, the income would fall to be taxed as investment income, whereas had the person in question been earning the same sum he would have been paying taxation at a much lower rate. I wonder whether it would he convenient for the noble Lord to comment on this point now.
Lord KIRKHILL: The noble Lord raised that point on Second Reading and I have today communicated with him in detail. In general terms, our tax system in this country has for many years now distinguished between earned income—consisting broadly of wages and salaries, pensions and other income derived directly from an office, employment or self-employment—and all forms of investment income. Before the unified tax system was introduced in 1973, earned income attracted the earned income relief but investment income was taxed at the full standard rate without abatement. Under present arrangements, this distinction is maintained by charging investment income above a certain amount to additional rates of tax under the investment income surcharge provisions. I realise that this distinction may seem a little harsh when the source of the investment income is, as in this case, some form of compensation. But this goes to the root of the justification for taxing investment income more heavily than earned income, which rests on a recognition that the former has the additional security of a capital sum underlying it. Given this fundamental difference from earned income, it would be invidious to seek to introduce distinctions into the taxation of investment income according to the source from which the underlying capital was derived in the first place.
Lord ROBBINS: I must say that the explanation given by the noble Lord seems to me to be almost entirely without justification. This seems to me to be an iniquitous anomaly in the system. Here is a man who is incapacitated from earning and who receives a sum in compensation. Under the existing law he is thereby subjected to a branch of taxation which, whether or not it is justified on broad principles, has relevance to circumstances quite other than the catastrophe from which he suffered. I am amazed
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that any Government can tolerate such an injustice.
Lord DRUMALBYN: I, too, should like to comment on what the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhill, has said. He indicated that it was not possible to distinguish the source of the capital. When we have legislation we all know that we start off on a broad basis and then find out where that legislation causes the shoe to pinch and adjust accordingly. I realise that this is not entirely germane to this Bill, but I thought it right to point out a consequence, and I quite realise that this is a matter for a future Finance Bill. I feel certain that sooner or later provisions will be made in a future Finance Bill, and all I am really asking the noble Lord to do, as I said on Second Reading, is to convey this point to his right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer and ask him to examine it with a view to easing the shoe a bit.
Lord HOY: I did not want to intervene at this time, and I am provoked only by the noble Lord, Lord Robbins. This is not a rule which has just been introduced. Indeed, this was laid down in the time of a previous Government. It may very well be that the noble Lord, Lord Robbins, neglected his duty to make his protest at that time, and perhaps he did not even come across it. All I am saying is that it has been going on for a little time. It may well be that this Government have now got to face up to it. I would not object to my noble friend saying, "I will have a look at it" when in fact there is a difficulty; but I do object to it being said to my noble friend that he is responsible for this decision. This decision was made a considerable time ago.
Indeed, I think the noble Lord, Lord Drumablyn, was a member of the Government which introduced this particular provision. It may be that, having done so, he has then come to the conclusion that he was wrong. It is not a bad thing, either in this House or in the other one, if in fact this is a view you take, though it takes a little courage, to get up and say, "I am not altogether sure, but I think I may have made a mistake". If the noble Lord is now saying so, I do not mind my noble friend looking at it again. I would have said

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to my noble friend, "If there is a mistake, or if there is something which is not fair, have another look at it to make sure that it is correct". All I would say to the noble Lord is that this is not something new. It has been going on for a year or two—and, indeed, under the previous Administration. It may be that they made a mistake. I will support the noble Lord if he is saying, "Yes, do not repeat the mistake; have a look at it and see if it can be put right".
Lord ROBBINS: May I have permission to say that nothing in my remarks was intended to cast personal aspersions on the noble Lord who is speaking for the Government? I think I can call noble Lords to witness that in the remarks which I occasionally make from this Bench I am indifferent as between Parties, in either praise or condemnation.
Lord KIRKHILL: I fully accept that no aspersion was cast against this particular noble Lord by the noble Lord, Lord Robbins. But I would point out to him that he should not be totally amazed at the Government view because we consider that to treat as earned income for tax purposes income arising on the investment of a lump sum received as compensation would be regarded as unfair by, for example, those who had saved and invested from their earnings, and whose total income and family commitments were otherwise the same; and I would rest on that point.
Clause 9, as amended, agreed to.
Remaining clauses and Schedules agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported with an Amendment.

LICENSING (AMENDMENT) BILL [H.L.]
Report received.

LAND DRAINAGE (AMENDMENT) BILL [H.L.]
4.5 p.m.
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Strabolgi.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The LORD DERWENT in the Chair.]
Clauses 1 to 10 agreed to.
Schedule 1 agreed to.
Schedule 2 [Minor amendments]:
Lord STRABOLGI Lord STRABOLGI moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 9, line 41, leave out from beginning to ("for") in line 42 and insert—
("11.— (1) In section 26(4) of the 1930 Act (incidence of drainage rates) omit "or is deemed to be" in each place where those words occur and omit "or is deemed to have been".
(2) In paragraph (c) of the said section 26(4) after "shall" insert "(subject to any agreement to the contrary)".
(3) In paragraph (e) of the said section 26(4)").
The noble Lord said: This is a technical, legal Amendment. All the subparagraphs are concerned with Section 26(4) of the Land Drainage Act 1930, which makes provisions with respect to the assessment of persons to a drainage rate for any hereditament, and their liability for the rate. Before I deal with the proposed Amendments, I should first explain that there are two classes of drainage rates: the owner's rate and the occupier's rate. Subsection (4) of Section 26 provides in paragraphs (a) and (b) that every rate shall be assessed upon the person who is, or is deemed to be, the occupier of the property, and that the drainage board may recover the full amount of any rate from the person who is, or is deemed to be, the occupier at any time during the period for which the rate is made. It is therefore the occupier who is the person primarily liable to pay both the occupier's drainage rate and the owner's drainage rate.
But as regards the owner's rate the occupier is entitled under paragraph (c) to recover the full amount from the owner, and may deduct the amount from any rent payable by him to the owner. Paragraph (d) makes provision for the case of a person who is, or is deemed to be, the occupier of the hereditament for part only of the period

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in respect of which an occupier's rate is made. He is chargeable with such part only of the total amount as is proportionate to his period of occupation. Finally, an occupier who has paid the full amount of the occupier's rate under paragraph (b) can, under paragraph (e) and subject to any agreement to the contrary, recover from any other person who was, or is deemed to have been, the occupier of the hereditament during any part of the period an appropriate proportion of the occupier's rate.
The point of the first proposed subparagraph to paragraph 11 of Schedule 2, in relation to Section 26(4) of the 1930 Act, is that Section 24(3) of that Act already provides that for the purposes of Part IV of that Act (which deals with drainage rates and includes Section 26(4)) the owner of any hereditament shall be deemed to be the occupier during any period during which it is unoccupied. There is therefore no need in paragraphs (a), (b), (d), and (e) of Section 26(4) to include references to persons who are deemed to be or to have been the occupier of the hereditament. Even without the words "or is deemed to be" and "or is deemed to have been" it is clear that one could recover from the deemed occupier under those provisions. The proviso to Section 24(3) contains no qualifications, and there is no reason, therefore, to treat it as any less applicable to Section 26(4) than any other reference to occupiers in Part IV of the 1930 Act.
The second proposed sub-paragraph relates to paragraph (c) of Section 26(4), which entitles a person who occupies a hereditament to recover from the owner, by deduction from the rent, any amount paid by him on account of the owner's drainage rate. The effect of the proposed Amendment will be to provide expressly that entitlement is "subject to any agreement to the contrary". This does no more than give effect to the decision of the High Court in the case of Smith v.Smith, decided in 1939 and reported in Volume 4 of All England Reports 1939 at page 312. That decision was based on the legal principle that a person is entitled to waive any right conferred upon him by Statute unless some other statutory provision expressly prevents him from doing so. It will also harmonise with a similar provision in paragraph (e) of Section 26(4) and with the amendment
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to Section 5(4) of the 1961 Act, in relation to drainage charges, provided for in paragraph 39 of Schedule 2 to the Bill and will facilitate consolidation of the above-mentioned related provisions.
The third of the proposed sub-paragraphs merely leads in the Amendments to paragraph (e) of Section 26(4) already provided for in paragraph 11 of Schedule 2 to the Bill. The point here is that paragraph (e) provides that where an occupier has been required to pay to the drainage board under paragraph (b):
"in respect of an occupier's drainage rate any sum in excess of the amount properly chargeable against him in accordance with the provisions of paragraph (d) of this subsection",
he shall be entitled to recover, subject to any agreement to the contrary, from any person who was the occupier during any other part of the period, an appropriate proportion of the amount. But it seems that the words I have quoted can only refer to the full amount of the occupier's rate because that is what the drainage board can demand of him to pay under paragraph (b).
The Amendment makes this clear by substituting the effective form of words set out in the Amendment for the lengthy form of words I have quoted and also makes some consequential amendments to other phrases. I beg to move.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Lord STRABOLGI Lord STRABOLGI moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 15, line 40, at end insert—
(" (2) Omit section 23(5) of the 1961 Act (power of internal drainage board to obtain information from tax authorities).")
The noble Lord said: I must apologise for the fact that these Amendments are rather complicated. I beg to move Amendment No. 2. This is another technical, legal Amendment. Agricultural land and buildings are not liable for general rates and do not therefore have a rateable value in the valuation list. They are assessed for drainage rates on the basis of the former Schedule A valuation of the property since no more up-to-date value is available. The boards can obtain information from the tax authorities for this purpose. The same information can also be used to calculate the "relative fraction'' which is the means by which the rateable values of urban property

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are adjusted to maintain parity with the annual values of agricultural land.
Subsection (5) of Section 23 of the Land Drainage Act 1961 gives an internal drainage board power to require the tax authorities for their district to provide them with particulars of annual value assessments for the former Schedule A tax for the year 1962–63 for the purpose of calculating this relative fraction. This subsection is however unnecessary because all the information an internal drainage board needs for that purpose can be obtained under subsection (4) of Section 29 of the Land Drainage Act 1930.
Under that subsection, as amended, an internal drainage board can require the inspectors of taxes for their district to furnish to them, on payment of such rate as the Treasury may determine, a copy of the annual values in force for the purpose of income tax under Schedule A for the year of assessment 1962–63 for all or any of the properties in their drainage district. The purpose of this Amendment is thus to remove subsection (5) of Section 23 of the 1961 Act prior to consolidation.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Schedule 2, as amended, agreed to.
Remaining Schedule agreed to.
House resumed; Bill reported with the Amendments.
The DEPUTY CHAIRMAN of COMMITTEES (Lord Derwent): My Lords, I beg to acquaint the House that a Commission has been issued under Her Majesty's Great Seal to several Lords therein named authorising the said Lords to declare in the name and on behalf of Her Majesty, Her Majesty's approbation of the choice of the Commons of the Right Honourable George Thomas to be their Speaker.
4.17 p.m.
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, I beg to move that this House do adjourn during pleasure.
Moved accordingly, and on Question, Motion agreed to.
House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.

SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS
4.30 p.m.
The LORDS COMMISSIONERS (The LORD CHANCELLOR (The Lord Elwyn-Jones), The LORD PRIVY SEAL (The Lord Shepherd),The Earl of Listowel, The Lord Byers and The Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone) being seated in front of the Throne, and the Commons, having been sent for, being at the Bar:
Mr. SPEAKER-ELECT (The Right Honourable George Thomas),addressing the Royal Commissioners, said: My Lords, I have to inform your Lordships that Her Majesty's faithful Commons, in obedience to the Royal Command and in the exercise of their undoubted rights and privileges, have proceeded to the election of a Speaker, and that their choice has fallen on me. I therefore present myself at your Lordships' Bar, and submit myself with all humility for Her Majesty's gracious Approbation.
The LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords and Members of the House of Commons, it not being convenient to Her Majesty to be personally present here at this time, a Commission has been issued under the Great Seal, commanding us and several other Lords therein named to notify and declare Her Majesty's Approbation of the choice of Her faithful Commons of the Right Honourable George Thomas to be their Speaker, which Commission you will now hear read.
The Commission having been read:
The LORD CHANCELLOR: Mr. Thomas, we have it in Command from Her Majesty to declare Her Majesty's entire confidence in your talents, diligence and sufficiency to fulfil the important duties of the high Office of Speaker of the House of Commons, to which you have been chosen by that House, and in obedience to the Commission which has been read and by virtue of the authority therein contained, we do declare Her Majesty's Royal Allowance and Confirmation of you, Sir, as Speaker of the House of Commons.
Mr. SPEAKER: My Lords, I submit myself with all humility to Her Majesty's Royal Will and Pleasure and if, in the

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discharge of my duties and in the maintenance of the rights and privileges of the Commons House of Parliament, I should inadvertently fall into error, I pray that the blame be imputed to me alone and not to Her Majesty's faithful Commons.
Mr. Speaker and the Commons then retired.
House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.

AIRLINES AND PASSENGER OVERBOOKING
4.45 p.m.
Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will take the interests of users fully into account before settling their future policy on overbooking by airlines operating in this country. The noble Baroness said: My Lords, overbooking on airlines is not new. Due to its operation, unsuspecting passengers have been off-loaded because their seats have been sold to someone else. I say "their" seats had been sold because that is what they had applied and paid for, and for which they had received confirmation by way of the relevant flight ticket. At this stage, perhaps I might repeat what I have said before in this House and elsewhere. I know of no other commodity which one buys, for which one receives a receipt—in this case a flight ticket—and which subsequently is sold to someone else. I should have thought such a course of action was indefensible on grounds of principle alone.
As the House is aware, the Civil Aviation Authority, in its report on overbooking published on 8th January, has made a recommendation that this practice, being too difficult, too costly, too widespread to stop, should continue, with the proviso that some financial compensation should be paid to the passengers offloaded. At this stage, I want to say merely that I do not accept such a viewpoint. I do not accept its reasoning, which is a matter of opinion; I do not accept that it is advantageous for passengers that it continues—they have not been consulted—and I do not accept that it is a solution. Passengers do not want compensation; they want their ticket, as was
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stated by my noble friend Lady Wootton of Abinger on 20th January last.
As an introduction, may I show how ridiculous the argument has become by taking what seems to be the main point of those who wish to retain overbooking, a point which they hope by constant repetition will come to be accepted? Air travellers, it is said, would prefer to take a chance of being off-loaded rather than have an increase in fares. First, my Lords, it has not been proved that any increase would arise. Secondly, the travellers have not been asked. Thirdly, anyone who has been off-loaded would take a very different view.
Fourthly, actual numbers are beside the point, although airlines prefer to give an apparent minimal percentage rather than an actual number, which can be considerable in terms of people. They are beside the point for the very reason that the Prime Minister gave the other day when speaking of unemployment. Mr. Wilson said that while the actual percentage of unemployment was 6 per cent., it was no use saying that to someone who had lost his job. To him it was 100 per cent. I am not, of course, equating unemployment with overbooking but the point made is valid in both cases. Fifthly, we had the most ridiculous argument of all: scheduled air fares in Europe are so high that we must continue overbooking for fear that these rise higher. I tried to get these high fares in Europe looked at as long ago as February 1971 by means of a debate in this House, but I was not successful.
Why has this whole matter suddenly surfaced? This brings us to the now famous case of British Airways Board (Respondents) v.Taylor (Inspector of Trading Standards, Manchester) (Appellant) on appeal from a Divisional Court of the Queen's Bench Division which was concluded on 5th November last and on which judgment was given on 10th December. Legal aspects are involved and it is with some apprehension that I offer the précis of a layman. The case concerned one of alleged overbooking by BOAC in 1973, and it was referred to the Appellate Committee of this House as being a matter of general public importance. The House of Lords (in its Appellate Committee) held unanimously that BOAC was guilty of an offence under Section 14(1) of the Trade Descriptions

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Act 1968 when, on 14th August 1973, while operating the international "overbooking" policy, they wrote to a passenger confirming his reservation on a return flight to Bermuda on a specified flight at a specified time. Their Lordships held that the statement was false to the knowledge of BOAC.
But whatever might be the merits of the case, there was no legal argument to support the British Airways Board being prosecuted for an offence committed by BOAC. The fact was that BOAC could have been proceeded against before 1st April 1974, but not after that date. Therefore, the appeal had to be dismissed. That I realise and understand. Stated very generally, in the hope of clearing up any confusion, this arose because BOAC, dissolved on 1st April 1974, became part of the British Airways Board. In layman's language, the judgment was that once an airline had confirmed a passenger's reservation on a specified flight, knowing its policy of overbooking might stop the passenger catching the 'plane, it was guilty of an offence under the Trade Descriptions Act 1968.
My Lords, this ruling has far-reaching consequences for airlines and, I hope, for travellers. What has happened since? Well, we have had the report on overbooking by the Civil Aviation Authority. We have had my contention that the Civil Aviation Authority is airline-orientated and that airline users are not considered adequately. The answer given in this House on 20th January last was provided by the Civil Aviation Authority. It seems impossible for the consumer, the actual user, to obtain a fair hearing. That is why I am grateful to the noble Lord the Leader of the House for giving us this debate today and, even more, for dealing with the reply himself. In our House we have agreed that no further remarks are permitted after a Minister has replied to an Unstarred Question. Therefore, I should just like to say this to the Lord Privy Seal because I shall not have the opportunity of saying anything after he has made his reply. I was glad that he did not wish to know in advance what arguments I intended to bring forward. I am hoping that this means he will be replying according to the case made and not by decision taken in advance. The latter would mean that
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the case for the user, or consumer, had indeed once more gone by default.
I have taken considerable trouble—as, of course, one should—to present the case for the airline user; to represent not only why a certain course of action should be taken but the procedure by which this could be done. Included in his reply I would ask the noble Lord the Leader of the House to comment on this suggested procedure and to answer the relatively few questions asked of the Government.
I propose to divide my remarks into three sections. (1) Why does overbooking take place: what are the reasons put forward by airlines for acting in this way? (2) What could be done to make such a practice unnecessary? (3) Are such suggestions feasible? That, I think, is the best way to proceed and I will do my best to be clear and unequivocal. I am, of course, dealing with scheduled flights only.
Why does overbooking take place and what are the alleged reasons for it? Quoting from the report of the Civil Aviation Authority,
"Airlines overbook as a matter of policy, and the reason for this is the problem of no shows', that is, passengers with reservations who fail to report for their flight".
Airlines say that they cannot afford to risk empty seats—hence the acceptance, knowingly, as a matter of policy, of more passengers than could be accommodated on the relevant 'plane. A contributory factor here is the number of people who book on several flights intending to take the one most convenient to them when the time comes and who do not cancel the other requested, but subsequently unwanted, reservations.
Coming to my second section—what could be done to make overbooking unnecessary?—I think the best way of dealing with this is to say, in narrative form, what I have been discussing in correspondence with the highest level in British airways. That keeps the matter impersonal and all the correspondence is available here if the noble Lord the Leader of the House would care to see it before making his reply.
Last July, British Airways told me that they were concerned to reduce, so far as they could, any inequity that might arise between one passenger and another. Virtually all their passengers paid in

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advance and it was not possible to discriminate in favour of those who have rather than those who have not. I was told that the system operating in the United States requires preference to be given according to the order of booking—a sort of "first in, last out"—and, although this might be difficult to operate on all their flights, they think it, or something like it, might be applied more widely.
On 30th July last I watched a discussion on Nationwide between Mr. Marking of British Airways and Mr. Laker of Laker Airways on the latter's proposed Skytrain service. Mr. Marking said that one of the advantages British Airways had over Skytrain was that their seats were guaranteed. This is correct. ABC (Advance Booking Charter) fares and APEX (Advance Purchase Excursion) fares carry guaranteed seats on British Airways scheduled flights. Why is it possible to guarantee these tickets and not others? I am told that it is part of the bargain that some or all of the fare is forfeited unless the travel is undertaken at a specified time; that on the whole people realise that these flights are analogous to charter flights and that if the flight leaves without them they suffer the consequences. Accordingly, so say British Airways, there are few "no-shows" for these flights and the need to overbook is correspondingly less. I am sure the House will take the point.
We all know that when we check in for a flight the computerised list is the actual check, and the airline receptionist uses it to make sure that all is in order. I find this talk of what computers can and cannot do rather confusing. The House will recollect that when we were discussing increases in rates for night storage heaters it was stated that while computers could progress the increases and add these to our bills, it was just not possible to progress the rebates due to consumers. I do not accept this. Computers will give answers to the questions asked of them. Indeed, if computers are programmed for consumers and not the other way round, I do not understand why it is deemed impossible to devise a programme showing (a) which customers have paid in advance and (b) as this is most of British Airways customers, why one showing the order of booking cannot be applied. Anyway,
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arising from this point, how does the system in the United States give preference to the order of booking?
Given a computer programme listing the travellers on flights, as used at present, I suggest this shows the order of booking and puts a mark against those who have paid in advance. When a flight is fully booked, and paid for, any further reservations should be on a stand-by basis. If we were dealing solely with those who had paid in advance and if there were to be a final date for cancellation, fares would either have to be forfeit for a "no-show" or a considerable proportion paid. Under such a system, I do not see how an airline could suffer a deficit. The last-minute allocation of stand-by passengers would take care of that. That is what I put forward to abolish the necessity of overbooking. It would, of course, end the practice of one person booking on several flights, unless all those were paid for in advance. But I do not see why such a practice should continue, with the result that passengers with only one reservation are turned away. A final date for cancellation would be fair to everyone.
And so to my third section: Are these suggestions feasible? Yes; they arc feasible if airlines are prepared to work out proposals. As a matter of fact, they do not wish to do so. The argument is that all airlines overbook; any that did not do so would suffer economically. In other words, the customer is to he treated unfairly because everyone does it, and because the customer cannot obtain an equally powerful hearing the customer loses every time. I think this is every bit as much a matter for the Secretary of State dealing with consumer protection as for the Secretary of State for Trade—that is, if the consumer really is to matter in 1976.
My Lords, I trust the Government will look every carefully at what is proposed by the Civil Aviation Authority and the airlines. I am sure that will be done. But even if we leave aside ethical matters and what is right, how does all this stand today? As I understand the position, the Civil Aviation Authority accepts the arguments of the airlines, does not see overbooking being abolished, and does not ask for this to be considered. Instead, it recommends some financial compensation for the passengers off-loaded. But

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the House of Lords ruled that airlines which knowingly issue more tickets than there are seats on an aircraft are guilty of an offence under the Trade Descriptions Act 1968. BOAC had been guilty of sending a letter to a passenger confirming his reservation, and subsequently having him off-loaded. A time-lag prevented BOAC from being prosecuted. But what do British Airways propose for the future? Will they say they will issue no more letters of confirmation? But surely we passengers have tickets made out for a specific flight. Does this not carry commitment? Is it proposed that some small print be added saying that any such imagined commitment is worthless? I am informed, reliably, that one leading counsel of experience suggests that this be done, or attempted. Are we, and are the Government, going to stand for this?
Additionally to the Government, because I assume that they intend to allow no such thing, we consumers have a further aid. In the judgment given by the House of Lords and reported in The Times on 11th December last, there was a statement by the chairman of the Appellate Committee, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wilberforce, who said:
"Indeed it was an essential feature of the Act that, when considering whether descriptions or statements were misleading, it was the meaning they were likely to bear to the persons to whom they were addressed that mattered—not the meaning which they might, on analysis, bear to a trained legal mind."
In other words, what counts in law is the meaning that conditions imposed by airlines bear to the average traveller.
My Lords, on 20th January this year the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hailsham, asked whether or not foreign airlines were covered by the Trade Descriptions Act. He was told—as indeed, I was on 24th June last—that a review of the Trade Descriptions Act is taking place, and that this is one of the questions that will be considered in the course of that review. Presumably, the Government are unlikely to pronounce finally on a matter under review until the interdepartmental Committee, under the Chairmanship of the Director General of Fair Trading, reports. Doubtless, the Lord Privy Seal in his reply will enlighten us on that aspect.
Finally, an international agreement between all the major international airlines is possible if the will is there. At the moment, it is not; not if the airlines can get away with their refusal to take action on the "no shows" problem. Yet, as the Financial Times said on 12th January last, compensation is not the answer to the airlines' predicament. Compensation does not avoid the statement of a firm booking being false and thus falling foul of the Trade Descriptions Act.
There has to be a change in policy. To bring this about requires size, influence and muscle. British Airways have all of these. As recently as 29th December they told me that, in looking at this matter of overbooking, they are bearing in mind the principle I underlined, that the passenger is entitled to have that for which he has paid. I hope that British Airways will decide to recommend that the policy of overbooking is subject to immediate review, with the aim of bringing it to an end, and that they will use their strength to demand such a review in the immediate future.
5.6 p.m.
Lord INGLEWOOD: My Lords, first of all, I should like to pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Burton of Coventry, for pressing so persistently for a change in the system of overbooking on airlines which, to me, has always seemed indefensible. I can never quite see why the Government as shown in Answers to recent Questions, appear all too ready to accept a principle which is so patently unjust. Some noble Lords, and some people in the country, may think that this really affects only a few people, and that it is so easy to exaggerate a case like this. They feel, "Well, it can't happen to me". I am quite sure that it does not happen to a Minister, so I hope that that will not mean that the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, will be less than sympathetic when he comes to reply.
But it is very difficult, when a person who has booked a place on an aircraft, arrives at the airport and finds that he or she has no place. The other day I came across a particularly bad case, of someone very close to me. It happened to he my sister, who has for a number of years been living and working in South Africa, and who was returning from leave. She was in our flat in

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London, and I was present in the room when she telephoned to the airline to confirm that her place on the aircraft on the following day was in order. She was told that it was. I am not mentioning the name of the airline, because one is just as bad as another. But I have mentioned it to the noble Baroness, Lady Burton of Coventry, and I have written to the airline concerned, and I am willing to tell the name to any noble Lord after the debate. On arrival at London Airport next day, in plenty of time, my sister was told there was no place. There were ten others in the same position, making eleven in all, and some had booked a long time ahead. I cannot see why we should go on tolerating this sort of thing.
There must be more than one solution. A solution I should like to suggest is that the Government and the airlines should have a look at the system employed by British Railways when sleeping car berths are booked. Many of us book sleeping berths nearly every weekend, and many times over in the year. Usually, there is no reservation until something is paid, very often the full fee, and there is a return of money on cancellation, which is a larger return if the cancellation is some days ahead, and a very small one if the cancellation is only in the last 24 hours. The whole sum is lost if the person does not in fact turn up. I cannot see why a system like that, or a variation of it, cannot be employed by the airlines; and I cannot see why we should continue to suffer this patent injustice just because it happens to be widespread and convenient.
5.9 p.m.
Baroness WOOTTON of ABINGER: My Lords, I have only a few words to say. I do not know whether I ought to declare an interest, because I have been overbooked, but it was not on a British airline; it was an East African airline. The problem was resolved in a simple way, although one which I do not really recommend to your Lordships. Two of the passengers already seated firmly in their places decided that one would sit upon the knee of the other, and a sufficient number of suitcases, to add up to the supposed weight of the extra passengers, were taken off the plane and were to be sent by the next aeroplane to follow. I suppose that is a possible solution, but it is not one, I would
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repeat, to be recommended to your Lordships.
I do not entirely follow the very elaborate calculations; I am not as conversant with the ways of computers as my noble friend Lady Burton is. I think what I would suggest is really the same thing in a rather more elementary way. That is that everybody who books should pay, not necessarily the full fare immediately, but should do what you do when you buy any package tour, when you invariably have to pay a deposit. The deposit may be fairly substantial; it is a percentage of the fare. If you cancel, you lose the deposit or part of the deposit, according to the period at which you cancel.
The other point I want to make is, what is the good of offering monetary compensation? You have a very important conference to attend in Geneva or Brussels or Rome; that conference is held at a particular time and the time is not altered because you cannot get there. If you are simply given a sum of money, that is very nice; if it is enough to buy your passage on another airline, that is also quite nice. But it is not by any means certain that another airline will have a plane going at the time to get you there for the conference. There is no solution except that a booking should be a booking, and when a plane is full it should be full and remain full. One could then have one's name on a waiting list, as I have my name on two waiting lists at the moment for package tours.
5.12 p.m.
Baroness SEEAR: My Lords, there is extremely little to add to the comprehensive and, I should have thought, totally convincing speech made by the noble Baroness, Lady Burton. I think before saying the very little I have to say I ought to declare an interest. As it happens, at the moment I have a small assignment for British Airways, but I assure your Lordships that it has nothing whatever to do with booking or non-booking of passengers. All I would say from these Benches in confirmation and support of what has already been said is that the airlines surely exist to serve the passengers, not the other way round; that this is an outstanding consumer interest and should be seen as such. I would very much like to support the

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point made by Lady Burton, that this is a matter for the Department for Consumer Protection as well as the Department of Trade.
It is quite plainly and basically the problem of the "no-shows", but what I think should be repudiated beyond any doubt is the idea, which was put forward in answer to a question when this matter was previously raised in your Lordships' House, that in some extraordinary way the faults of the "no-shows" should be compensated for by the people who are off-loaded. That was put forward as an argument, unbelievable though it may seem. It is one that one would not normally bother to repudiate, it is so poor an argument. Obviously, however the problem of the "no-shows'' is to be handled, it is totally wrong that it should be dealt with by other passengers having to pay what is in effect the price for the "no-shows".
Everyone, no doubt, has their own particular idea as to how the "no-show" problem can be dealt with. I can see certain difficulties, with sums as large as have to be paid for airline tickets, if people are to lose the amounts they pay for what may well in the first instance be bona fide reasons. People get caught in traffic jams and miss planes, or fall ill at the last moment. It would be a very considerable hardship if they had to pay a large sum because this had happened. I do not know the exact situation, but I understand that what is in fact the real cause of a great deal of the problem is that some organisations, or indeed individuals, habitually make excess numbers of bookings or book in advance on the off-chance that they may need to go. I wonder if it is possible to discover who the repeated offenders are; after all, the airlines have the names of all these people. There seems to me to be a very considerable difference between the person who for good reason fails to show up and the person who is a chronic "no-show" Could they not be identified? In those cases they should stand to lose very considerably. That practice is surely one that should be stopped—excess booking as a habit by certain groups of people and organisations to be sure that if by chance they happen to want a seat, a seat will be there. I think a distinction should be
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made between those two different kinds of passenger.
As to the people who have genuinely booked and been told that there is a seat for them, I am not as familiar as I ought to be with the working of computers but from what I do know of them I find it extremely difficult to believe that they cannot provide the kind of information which is needed. One wonders why we keep the things if they cannot provide information of this kind. When a plane is full, when all the bookings have been taken, it must be known that that moment has arrived. Why cannot people who book after that either be told quite plainly that the plane is full and that they run the risk of not being able to get on, or be offered a seat at a reduced price to take the risk that they may have to stand off? If the price reduction was a reasonable one, this is a risk that quite a lot of people might take. We have seen the figures. The "no-shows'' greatly exceed the people who are laid off. It may well be that if you are told in advance that the plane is full but that statistically the chances are that you will get a seat, and you could have a seat at slightly less expense than for a certain seat, this might be a way of dealing with the situation.
We are told that it needs international agreement to get this arrangement. I know the workings of IATA are quite complicated, but we are dealing with a very small number of people. Surely it is not beyond the wit of British Airways to find some way in which people who have been told that they have got a seat know either that it is a certainty or that it is very likely a seat will be there—they know the risk they are taking. Then one can turn up absolutely confident of flying on the plane that one has booked. As the noble Baroness, Lady Wootton, said, it really is not much compensation to be offered a seat on a plane several hours after the meeting you are to attend has taken place, and even monetary compensation, pleasant though it is, is no real satisfaction in those circumstances.
5.18 p.m.
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, with your Lordships' permission, I would intervene at this time. I am sorry I failed to put my name down at the right time, but I will keep my remarks as

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short as possible. The difficulties with which the airlines, and, of course, their passengers, are faced in this matter may not be so simple of solution as the noble Baroness and others have suggested. I think we accept from what has been said this evening, that it is impossible, or at least impracticable, effectively to eliminate the "no-show'' situation, and therefore we have to consider what alternative booking arrangements we can make to prevent this from happening. There are only two possibilities: either we prohibit the overbooking, or else we impose such penalties as effectively prohibit the overbooking by making airlines pay massive compensation. I suggest that both these proposals lead only to one result, which is an increase in an airline's costs. Thus, if we follow either of those courses, it will lead inevitably to higher fares.
The noble Baroness, Lady Burton, has frequently asked for lower fares, particularly in Europe. But if we follow her arguments today to the logical conclusion it is higher fares, not lower fares, that we shall achieve. If the Civil Aviation Authority have it in mind to eliminate overbooking by one method or another, how do they propose to do it? I understand that it is intended that the conditions attached to the licences of scheduled carriers will be varied so that they are either prohibited from overbooking or have to pay massive compensation. But I wonder whether in fact the Authority, if they decide to do that, have the power to do it under the existing provisions of the 1971 Act. While, of course, the Authority have power to grant a licence in any terms they choose, they do not, if my memory serves me rightly, have power to initiate the variation of a licence. I suppose, therefore, that they propose to wait for the expiry of all existing licences and to issue new licences as and when they are applied for in new terms to meet the new policy, but in some cases that will be five or ten years away. If I am wrong there will be a massive number of variations which will be initiated soon, and there will be a massive amount for the Authority to collect in new fees for variations.
There is another matter which I should like to touch on. It is, I understand, the present policy of Her Majesty's Government—and indeed. I believe it has been
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the policy of previous Governments—to use scheduled services for movement of Ministers and other important people, sometimes at short notice. Clearly the Government need to have that power. For example, it might be necessary for a Minister to travel to the United Nations to address them at short notice, and it is also clearly equally important that the Minister should travel on British Airways, and should do so on the flight of his choice. Is it the Government's intention that they should retain this power, and do they intend to pay, or to make provision for this to happen, and for the possible consequential non-carriage of another fare-paying passenger? I know of course that Ministers can sometimes travel in RAF aeroplanes, but naturally that is not always possible and not economic when only one or two people are involved. Do the Government propose to pay the compensation themselves, or propose to provide that no compensation will be payable to a passenger who is debarred from travelling because a Minister wanted to travel? Further, would the airline be guilty of a breach of its new licence condition if it carried a Minister at the expense of another passenger?
In short, I think that we ought to pause and consider carefully the results, and the likely results, of any significant change in the present arrangements. The only possible short-term solution that I can suggest would be to require the airlines to publish the number of passengers who, on the one hand, do not show up for their booking and, on the other hand, who are off-loaded because of an overbooking situation. I think that that in itself would b a substantial deterrent both to "no-show" passengers and to the airlines' booking arrangements, and I hope that idea may find some favour.
5.24 p.m.
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: My Lords, if I had to cite an illustration of the effectiveness of Parliament in general and of this House in particular, I believe that I should select the noble Baroness, Lady Burton of Coventry, as my prime example. Whether or not one agrees with her, she does a magnificent job in presenting the interests of the consumer as she sees them, and particularly when she suspects insensitive treatment from large organisations and

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the juggernauts of nationalised industry. I hope that she will not think it presumptuous of me if I congratulate her on the way she presented the case this afternoon. In particular, I shall be interested to hear what the Government have to say about her suggestion, based on these mysterious computers, of the "first in last off" principle, which is clearly attractive.
I am glad that my noble friend Lord Trefgarne intervened as he did, because I think the other point of view needs to be taken into account. It seems to me that we are here dealing to some extent with the sins of the many being visited on the few. This point was made by the noble Baroness, Lady Seear. The Civil Aviation Authority marshalls the arguments on the other side extremely well, and it makes the point that the airlines are anxious, as I think the consumer would wish them to be, to keep the system as flexible as possible. Certainly in the case of businessmen there is no doubt that there is a great advantage if you can make decisions at short notice.
I accept that this gives rise to multiple booking, and the first point I want to make is that this is an anti-social practice which imposes extra costs on other people, and certainly we want to stop it if we can. I remember an example in Canada at the time of Expo in 1967 when I was talking to one of the airline officials. He said that they had had the most remarkable example that day, in that a flight on which I travelled had been overbooked by exactly 100 per cent. and gone out with four empty seats. That is the kind of problem they are obviously up against, and it is incumbent on us to recognise this.
It is all very well for the noble Baroness to ask what other article one pays for which then gets sold to somebody else. But let us look at the other side for one moment. Are there many services which you book and then decide not to use, and yet do not expect to receive at least a rather cross letter from your dentist, for example, if you do not attend? Of, if you summon the doctor to your house and then decide that you have recovered, I do not think you can complain if you get a bill. I am not citing tremendously impressive examples,
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but there are many cases where, if you order something and you fail to take it up, you must expect to incur a penalty. So we are, as usual, looking at the balance of interest, and the interest, as set out in the CAA Bulletin, is the balance of probability against passenger convenience. It is put very well at the end of the first paragraph. It talks about seeking a way of protecting the best interests of airline users, and proposes a solution to the dilemma arising from a conflict between their short- and long-term interests.
Clearly everybody wants to see the airlines profitable in the interest of the fares not going up, as my noble friend Lord Trefgarne pointed out. This is underlined in the case of our own airlines, which are nationalised and which belong to the people of this country. Furthermore, there is the question of international competitiveness. It is clear that we do not wish to impose special obligations upon our own airlines which might put them at a disadvantage compared to the others. It is interesting to observe in this report that it points out that under the IATA regulations now there is in fact an option to impose a penalty of 25 per cent. of the single fare. But it is quite clear that in practice this is practically never invoked by the airlines.
We can all imagine the number of ways in which "no-show" passengers could be checked and could be penalised in some way. I suspect that most of those procedures would tend to cost money, and possibly more money than it would cost to pay the compensation which is being suggested. Furthermore, there is one point of fact where I think the report is slightly at variance with something said by the noble Baroness. I think she claimed that British Airways say that all the tickets are paid for in advance, but I notice that the report says:
"It was pointed out for some carriers between 32 and 51 per cent. of sales were by credit card, giving rise to billing and collection problems where 'no-show' penalties are applicable."
Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY: My Lords, may I just clear that up? I said that, in discussing this at the highest level with British Airways, they told me: "Virtually all our passengers pay in advance".
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness and I am not sure that these two statements are totally irreconcilable, but certainty to me they put a slightly different emphasis on the situation. Clearly the argument is between the BAA and the CAA rather than between the noble Baroness and myself. The only way of avoiding the possibility of seats being unavailable to those who have been told that they will be available has been mentioned this evening. Again may I disagree, and I think it was merely a slip of the tongue, but the noble Baroness said that what the passenger wants is a ticket, and not the money. With respect, it is not the ticket they want but their seat and the actual journey. I am sure that is what she intended to imply.
Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY: My Lords. I think the noble Lord will find I said that what they want is their seat and not compensation.
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: My Lords, I am sure we agree as to what the noble Baroness meant. If they are to maintain surplus capacity, we must accept that this will mean lower load factors and higher cost. There is really no alternative to that and I am not sure that the British Railways sleeper reservation system, with which most of us are familiar, is comparable. I think the problem there is of a completely different order and I suggest it is also of a rather different time-scale, attractive though it may be to resort to that.
I should like to repeat a question that was asked by the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne. I see the problem, and it is something I have often wondered about. What is the arrangement in the event that the Government, for some important Minister (perhaps the Lord Privy Seal), require a large number of bookings at very short notice? I presume the airline will put passengers off the aircraft for those people—no doubt without admitting why they are doing it—and, if we start this compensation obligation, this will be a question we shall need to answer; that is, who is to meet the cost of compensation in such cases? I should be interested to know what the procedure is and how often, in practice, it is thought to happen.
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I am not as bothered as is the noble Baroness about the Trade Descriptions Act. I have been bludgeoned for years now by the small print on the back of various tickets. I am sorry to say I am probably used to the fact that the guarantees are often meaningless, and made so by some little statement at the bottom, so I am not deeply shocked, although perhaps I should be.
Lord ROBBINS: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether he himself would be prepared to authorise in his name a guarantee which in certain circumstances he would not be able to honour? Supposing that he were, let us say, a distinguished surgeon and he made an arrangement with a patient that he should operate on a certain day, would he regard it as very moral if, because occasionally patients failed to turn up, the surgeon were to make a double booking in that respect?
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: No, my Lords; I certainly would not. I was going on to say that, although I have been bludgeoned in this way by guarantees and by overbooking, which most of us have experienced, it seems to me to be important that we should make it perfectly clear if we are getting out of these guarantees. If confirmation means "confirmation subject to certain doubts", I am all in favour of the ticket saying so, because that is not what is generally understood by the meaning of the word. If the word is going to mean "confirmation if in fact we can carry you", then we go back to the possibility of having this mysterious animal we used to have, a "bookable seat". This was a technical term used inside this country for what looked to me very much like a first-class seat before the days of the shuttle between London and Glasgow. I suppose we could reintroduce those bookable seats with a premium, which would then obviously impose a total obligation on the airline to supply a seat at that time.
I was impressed by the positive suggestions put forward by the noble Baroness. I should be interested to hear what the Government say in answer to those questions, but, having read the CAA Report, I came back to the feeling that the compensation road was probably

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the only one available to us. What exactly is meant by "full compensation" is a good question. It is not just a question of being refunded a fare for a ticket which one has not been able to use; it is the consequential loss of various kinds, and, in some cases, it is a financial consequential loss. So it seems to me that, particularly so long as the proportion of people who will be invoking this clause remains small, the compensation should be generous and I should have thought that this was not necessarily unacceptable to the airlines. It would impose a certain discipline upon them which would not do them any harm. Furthermore, let us remember that at the end of the day the airlines themselves have an interest in not creating a situation where they have to off-load people. I am perfectly certain that they are the first to recognise the enormous fury which this creates in any passenger who is subjected to this kind of treatment. They spend many millions of pounds in trying to burnish their image of being the people who look after you, and I cannot seriously believe that they would want to incur this kind of attitude among their passengers.
5.38 p.m.
Lord SHEPHERD: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, asked me to approach this matter with sympathy, and I can assure him that I have done so because on two occasions I have been very angry when I have sought to confirm my booking which I thought was firm, and which was certainly OK'd on my ticket, only to be told that I was wait-listed. I agree that nothing is more infuriating than that to any passenger. I also have to plead guilty that I have been a "no-show'' on one occasion, but that was solely as a consequence of heavy traffic congestion outside Bangkok which made me late to join the aircraft.
My noble friend Lady Burton of Coventry asked me to listen to the debate; not to give a prepared speech, but to seek to reply to the debate. I will try to do so. As I have said, I have looked into this matter with a good deal of sympathy. It seems to me that two matters have to be borne in mind. It is a question of judgment and of balancing the problems of the people who are "bumped" and the question of the profit-
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ability of the airlines. If there is anything to be done in this field on the lines suggested by my noble friend, I am quite convinced that it can be done only when all the major airlines are prepared to agree and then to be absolutely scrupulous in the way in which they operate. Airline business is very competitive. The noble Lord opposite mentioned the very large sums which airlines spend to attract passengers. They have all forms of gimmicks. So no airline—certainly not British Airways—would wish to adopt policies which would affect its image with its customers.
Why have we this problem of overbooking and the consequences that arise? The number of "no-shows" is fairly substantial. So far as British Airways Overseas Division is concerned, the percentage is about 13·5 per cent. of their bookings. That is a very substantial proportion if it is viewed in terms of an aircraft flying with that number of seats empty solely because passengers have failed to turn up. I believe that the percentage is even greater in the United States.
What is to be done about it? My noble friend and others have suggested that there should be some financial penalty to be imposed. Until 1963 such a penalty was compulsory under the IATA rules but it is now optional. The ruling was changed because the airlines were not fulfilling their undertakings under the IATA agreements. As I shall try to explain, they found great difficulty in carrying out their policy. As I said, this is a very competitive business and once one airline has broken ranks all the others will very quickly follow. We can only consider the position of British Airways, Supposing British Airways was required to impose a penalty on those who did not show up at the airport. I can tell your Lordships that one certainty would be that nearly every businessman would immediately fly Lufthansa or some other foreign airline because he would not be prepared to accept the penalties attaching to "no-show". I suspect that many other people, who neither deliberately overbook nor have a multiplicity of over-bookings, would say that it was too big a risk to book with BA. They would say to themselves, I could well be a 'no-show' because of the traffic getting to the airport or for other reasons; I am not prepared to run that risk and I shall

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fly in foreign aircraft." So, if this were to be adopted, it could only be done by general agreement. I repeat that there was such a rule up to 1963 and that it was not complied with.
I should also like to say to my noble Friend that this question of "no-shows" and of penalties was looked into with great care in the United States. There, they came to the conclusion that it was not administratively possible to impose penalties. One of the difficulties is that people fly on tickets which have been issued by different airlines. For instance, not long ago I flew on a ticket which had been issued by BOAC, but before I returned I had been on five different airlines. None of those airlines would have had my address, so how can an airline chase a "no-show"? I suppose that it could be done with the agreement of all the airlines but, as the United States inquiry showed, one would have to have a very large number of additional administrative staff in order to deal with it.
So there are major difficulties here. The matter is not as simple as some people believe it to be. If one were to forbid overbooking, aircraft would fly at about 13 per cent. to 15 per cent. short of a full load. That would be bound to bring an increase in air fares which I am certain everybody wishes to avoid. That is one problem. Let us now look at the other side. The number of people who were off-loaded by British Airways last year was 0·01 per cent. of all the passengers flown by the airline. The actual number of persons who were off-loaded as a consequence of the policy of overbooking was 148. It is true that others are off-loaded as a result of errors that may be made by the airline and the booking agent. There are some agents who may sell a ticket without telling the airline. So, when one is considering the problem, it is not only a question of the way in which the airline itself fulfils its responsibilities, but also of the way in which it can command and organise its multiplicity of ticket selling agencies.
So the number of people concerned is small, though, by saying that, I do not wish to imply that the consequences of this policy are not very severe. However, I have been advised that in the vast majority of cases the passengers are got away on an alternative airline or on a
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later aircraft, and that it is only on very rare occasions that passengers are delayed for any appreciable period.
What should one do about the problem? My noble friend has a solution. Should one set up a system which would no doubt require considerable administrative effort and cost in order to deal with a problem affecting 148 people? I have looked into this and I feel that the recommendation of the Civil Aviation Authority—which is very similar to the decision taken by the Civil Aviation Bureau in the United States—is the right one. I may say to my noble friend and to the House that this is a solution which has been endorsed by the Airline Users' Committee of which my noble friend is a most distinguished member. It is that some form of compensation should be paid to any of those affected. I have been informed that the Authority intends to exercise its powers, as the licensing authority, to include a mandatory condition to this effect in the licence granted to British airlines. The procedure in respect of air transport licensing involves consultation and the Authority is, as part of the process of consultation, putting certain proposals to the airlines. In view of the quasi-judicial way in which the Authority operates in respect of air transport licensing, it would be wrong for the Authority to finalise its plans until the consultation and the licensing procedures have been completed. However, the Authority informs me that it hopes that these procedures will be completed and the system of compensation in operation during the coming summer.
In regard to foreign airlines, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State will watch the situation closely, and it may well be the case that with British airlines operating a system of compensation, foreign airlines, in a competitive situation, will be forced to take similiar action. Although this procedure is within the responsibilities given by Parliament to the Civil Aviation Authority under the Civil Aviation Act 1971, I should like to say that I myself, as a regular air passenger, think that the Authority is dealing with this in the best possible way.
My Lords, a number of questions were asked me about Ministers; whether, in order for Ministers to get as urgently as

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possible from one place to another, passengers are off-loaded. The Prime Minister flies in the main with the Royal Air Force, for security reasons. With regard to Ministers going to (shall we say?) Washington or New York, in most cases, if not in almost every case, their flights would have been foreseen and bookings made well in advance. I can only say to both noble Lords that I, having travelled a good deal as a Minister, have never at any stage been aware of any passenger being off-loaded for a Minister.
In fact, the reality of this situation is that the number of passengers that are off-loaded is very small indeed. Therefore, I should have thought that what we should see, and what we should be pressing upon the Civil Aviation Authority, is that the compensation should be generous—certainly more than adequate—and that there should be a recognition of the hardship that has been created as a consequence of policy decisions taken by the airlines—
Lord ROBBINS: My Lords, the noble Lord drew the veil on the statistics of the matter and gave an extremely interesting figure relating to the number of people off-loaded by British Airways during a 12 month period. Could he follow that up by telling us by what fraction of 1 per cent. the costs of British Airways would have been raised if it had been forced to pay compensation for that number of people?
Lord SHEPHERD: It depends, my Lords, on what the compensation is, and this is still a matter which the Civil Aviation Authority will be negotiating. But the significant point that I wish to make to the noble Lord, Lord Robbins, is not what might be the cost to the airlines if they paid compensation, but the very significant costs if 13 to 15 per cent. of the seats are empty because passengers fail to arrive. These are matters which we all ought to take into account—
Lord PLATT: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord about another statistical point? He spoke about 13 per cent. of empty seats if the conditions were altered, but if the conditions were so altered that it no longer paid people to "no-show'' the percentage of empty seats would immediately be very much less.
Lord SHEPHERD: My Lords, I am not personally opposed to a penalty being charged of those who deliberately overbook and create difficulties. But "no-shows" are made up by very many people due to very many different circumstances, and there would have to be what was almost a judicial system in order to decide who was a justified "no-show'' and who was not; who failed to catch his aircraft flight because of genuine difficulties, such as illness, or many other reasons which one could give, as opposed to those who deliberately overbook or who, for that matter, double-book and sometimes treble-book. As I mentioned a few minutes ago, I undertook a flight on one ticket with five different foreign airlines. How could a passenger be traced in such circumstances, bearing in mind that the majority of such bookings are not done by correspondence, but on the telephone, or through a booking agency?
Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY: My Lords, I should like to ask my noble friend a question in case he ends his reply without mentioning the point I have in mind. He keeps mentioning this 13 to 15 per cent. of seats that might be empty. But he has not made any answer to the suggestion that I made, that the computer will know perfectly well when a plane is full and when it has been paid for; and that I would suggest there is a date of cancellation, and other bookings are on a standby basis. He has not mentioned the Trade Descriptions Act.
Lord SHEPHERD: My Lords, I must point out to my noble friend that not everyone pays cash for tickets. In fact, I was surprised that my noble friend said that in the case of British Airways it has received cash for the bulk of its tickets. I should be very surprised, because if one books through Thomas Cook that firm does not immediately transfer the money to British Airways; it runs an account. I have myself used American Express—and there are other credit cards—and this is normal practice in the United States. In fact one might say that in the United States it is more difficult to pay cash for anything than it is to use a credit card. Thus it is not an easy problem. In regard to the question of the Trade Descriptions Act —
Lord INGLEWOOD: My Lords, will the noble Lord forgive me for interrupting? I should like to ask him a question before he leaves that point. Will he make some comment on my suggestion that some variation of the railways system of booking sleeper berths might be found applicable? Unless one books through some privileged office, such as Thomas Cook or this building, cash has to pass before the berth is booked.
Lord SHEPHERD: Yes, my Lords; but may I come back to that? This is a very complicated matter. Here am I with BOAC tickets. One of the tickets (shall we say?) allows me to fly from Singapore to Hong Kong.
Lord INGLEWOOD: My Lords, that is another point.
Lord SHEPHERD: Yes, my Lords, but the point is that I may have a reservation for that flight. It may be reserved on my air ticket. But it could well be that the information has not been transmitted to (shall we say?) the Singapore Airlines, who may not run a computer. This is a difficulty of communications. So, my Lords, the idea of the railway line is an easy one, because one needs only to put on an extra coach to deal with the numbers. I would certainly say, as to the matter that was raised by, I think it was, my noble friend Lady Wootton, about someone being allowed to sit with somebody else on their lap, that if I were to see that, that would be the first airline with which I would never fly again, because that is a definite breach of air safety regulations.
Now, my noble friend asked about the Act.
Baroness SEEAR: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord again, but there was the point that I was trying to raise. What is needed, surely, is that the airline has the right to charge these people. It does not mean that they have got to do this on every occasion; and it may well be that people like the noble Lord, with tickets for five airlines, would escape a charge. But is it not the case that the airline knows that there are these organisations which habitually multi-book? They must know who they are; and, if they do this, they reserve the right to charge them for doing it. You do not then have to be able to track down every
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single person; but you have got the weapon. That is what is required, surely.
Lord SHEPHERD: My Lords, the airlines have got the weapon. As I said earlier in reply to the debate, under the IATA rules—it is optional at the moment, although in the past it was mandatory—the airlines have the power to impose a penalty. Again, if my memory serves me aright, it is up to 25 per cent. of the ticket or £29·20, whichever may be the less; but the power does exist. It is a question of whether the airlines are willing to exercise it. At the present moment they are not because they cannot do it on a basis of equity.
My Lords, may I now try to answer my noble friend in regard to the Act? I cannot disagree with the way my noble friend described the judgment of your Lordships' House. It was not a judgment on the question of whether overbooking was illegal: it was whether the letter which was sent to the customer was an infringement of the Act. I have no doubt that the airlines, both British and foreign—because the law of this land applies not only to British companies but also to foreign companies operating in this country—will be seeking to change their terms. I would hope that the Civil Aviation Authority will see that if these terms are changed the small print will not be one of the accusations lodged against the airlines, and that any changes or conditions that might apply to the tickets in future, on the basis of which tickets are issued, will be fully drawn to the attention of the customer.
My Lords, I have done my best on a difficult wicket. It is a very involved subject. I would hope that my noble friend, as a member of the Airline Users' Council, will keep a very careful watch on what the Civil Aviation Authority eventually negotiates with the airlines. I also hope that what has been said in this debate today will show that, while it is a difficult problem, and while it may be very hard on a very small number of people, the fact that they are small in number does not mean that Parliament is not interested in them, nor that the airlines and the Authority are not interested; but I have no doubt that if the Civil Aviation Authority is not able to deal with this matter adequately we shall very quickly be hearing from my noble friend.