Lords Sitting of 30 June 1976

Preamble
The House met at a quarter-past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Southwell.

LORD WEIDENFELD
Sir Arthur George Weidenfeld, Knight, having been created Baron Weidenfeld, of Chelsea in Greater London, for life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord Melchett and the Lord Pakenham.

WORLD FOOD COUNCIL: ROME MEETING
2.31 p.m.
Lord BROCKWAY: 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 were the conclusions of the discussions of the World Food Council at Rome and what proposals were made or supported by the British delegation.
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, the Council endorsed the report of its May preparatory meeting and referred the recommendations to the United Nations and Member States for consideration. Her Majesty's Government will co-operate fully with the Secretary-General of the United Nations and the President of the World Food Council who are charged with closing the gap between the target for the International Fund for Agricultural Development and the already pledged total contribution, which of course includes our own.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, while thanking the Minister for that reply, may I ask her whether she can say something about these recommendations? For example, did the Council consider proposals for increasing the food supplies of the world, such as fertilising the
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deserts—which is now possible—and farming the oceans? Did it consider practical proposals of that kind ?
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: Yes, indeed, my Lords. The Council considered practical measures. On fertilisers, we consider that their effective use is one of the key factors in increasing food production. Some of the resolutions from the Group of 77 came up rather too late for acceptance, but they have been passed to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations. Note was taken of them and they have been passed on for consideration.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, is it the case that the Group of 77 proposed that reserve stocks should be created not merely to stabilise prizes but to meet droughts and the danger of famines? If so, what view was taken with regard to that proposal?
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, as always, my noble friend has asked me the most difficult question of the lot. The whole question of food stocks, though absolutely vital, is complicated because different views are taken about how it should be done. Stabilisation of prices is of enormous importance and Her Majesty's Government played a very constructive part in all this. The Council urged an annual food aid target of 10 million tons, but we believe that food stocks are more important, and not only to cover emergencies. Quite how this will be done will need to be worked out in the different international bodies.
Baroness EMMET of AMBERLEY: My Lords, may I ask the noble Baroness whether the importance of fish farming was brought forward at the Conference?
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: Yes, my Lords; the noble Baroness will be delighted to know that it was considered and approved of.

BRISTOL: CITY WARD REVISIONS
2.35 p.m.
Baroness YOUNG: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.

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The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what progress the Local Government Boundary Commission is making in revising the wards of the City of Bristol; and why there has been no such revision since 1951.
The MINISTER of STATE, HOME OFFICE (Lord Harris of Greenwich): My Lords, I understand that, at the request of the Bristol City Council, the Local Government Boundary Commission for England extended the timetable for the review of the City's electoral arrangements. The Council published yesterday a revised draft scheme inviting representations on it from local interests. In the past, under the provisions of the Local Government Act 1933, the procedure for boroughs wishing to alter their wards was by Petition to Her Majesty. The wards of Bristol were altered by an Order in Council of 1953 using this procedure; a further minor change was made by an Order in Council of 1964.
Baroness YOUNG: My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for that reply, but can he say when he expects the Boundary Commission to report on this matter? Would he not agree that the ward boundaries within the city are now totally unrepresentative and produced some very extraordinary voting figures last May, and that this situation would be most unfair in the event of a by-election in any of the wards?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, without commenting on the latter point, because this is really a matter between the Commission on the one hand and the Council on the other, as I understand it, the Council have invited representations to reach them by 10th August and they will meet on 2nd September to consider those representations. The Commission has not yet been informed of all the details of this scheme but the position, I am sure, is that it will push ahead with this as soon as possible thereafter.
Baroness YOUNG: My Lords, in view of the letter written to the Bristol City Council, can the Minister say in what circumstances the Home Secretary has power to intervene in a matter like this?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, the position is really that this is a matter between the Commission and the Council. The Council can put up a scheme and, in certain circumstances, there can be some form of local inquiry presided over by an Assistant Commissioner. The Commission may ultimately put up a scheme to the Home Secretary. For these reasons, I am obviously anxious to avoid going into greater detail.
The Earl of SELKIRK: My Lords, do I understand from the noble Lord that any district council can put up a scheme to the Commission if it thinks its ward boundaries are unsatisfactory ?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, a general review is taking place as a result of the reorganisation of local government in England and Wales. As a result of that, a series of boundary reviews are taking place at the present moment.
Lord PANNELL: My Lords, is the final solution of all this likely to come by an order presented in either House?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: No, my Lords ; this is not a matter for an order presented in either House. It is a matter for the Home Secretary to pronounce upon once he has received the recommendations of the Boundary Commission.
Baroness ELLIOT of HARWOOD: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether the same review is going on in Scotland?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: Not without notice, I fear, my Lords.

THE ATTACK ON INFLATION
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, with the leave of the House, at a convenient moment after 3.30 my noble friend Lord Jacques will repeat a Statement on the attack on inflation.
GREAT NORTHERN LONDON CEMETERY BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.
GREATER LONDON COUNCIL (GENERAL POWERS) BILL
Read 2a, and committed to a Select Committee.
ROYAL COUNTY OF BERKSHIRE (PUBLIC ENTERTAINMENT) PROVISIONAL ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL
Read 2a, and committed to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.

POLICE BILL
2.40 p.m.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: 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 Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The Baroness TWEEDSMUIR Of BELHELVIE in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [The Police Complaints Board]:
Viscount AMORY Viscount AMORY moved Amendment No. 1 :
Page 1, line 9, leave out ("Prime Minister ") and insert ("Lord Chancellor")
The noble Viscount said: This very simple Amendment proposes that the members to be appointed to the Police Complaints Board should he appointed by the Lord Chancellor instead of by the Prime Minister. I believe that most people will consider this suggestion to be appropriate. The Lord Chancellor appoints most magistrates and makes recommendations for most, or many, judicial appointments. He acts as a sensitive link between the Legislature the Executive and the Judiciary. His independence inspires confidence with the public, and I have reason to believe that what I am proposing would be a more acceptable suggestion in terms of the Police Service in general than the present proposal which involves the Prime Minister of the day.
In recent years there has been a growing tendency to allocate to Secretaries of State, as Departmental Ministers, responsibility for a vast number of new appointments, and the increase in patronage there has been enormous. This has also happened to some extent in the case of Prime Ministers. It is not desirable in itself that the Prime Minister's time should be taken up with a host of miscellaneous appointments about which he cannot himself possibly be informed. His office should not be a repository for such a mass of miscellaneous functions if such can be avoided. In the case of the Police Complaints Board we are dealing with a quasi-judicial function, and it seems to me to be in every way preferable that the appointments should be the responsibility of the Lord Chancellor.
I believe that in another place the Minister objected that the Lord Chancellor would not be a Member of that House. Fortunately, it is true that that is so and that he is a Member of our House. It will be the unanimous hope of this House that that position will always obtain. But the fact that the Lord Chancellor cannot be a Member of the other place I should have thought would be of no possible disadvantage or drawback in the case we are considering. It was also said, I think, that the Lord Chancellor did not want the job. Well, I do not know the answer to that one. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor is certainly not, in our view, one who goes rushing out to seek new appointments, but he is known to all your Lordships as an example to us all in his devotion to the public service, and I am sure he would not reject any responsibility that might be laid on him by Parliament.
So it seems to me as, I understand, it seems to the police authorities and to the Police Service as a whole (so far as one can gather the opinion of the Police Service) that the Lord Chancellor would be the best choice for this role. I hope that when the noble and learned Lord replies he will tell me that on consideration he agrees with my proposal. I beg to move.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: My noble friend Lord Amory has just said that the Lord Chancellor was reported in another place as having said that he did not want this job. In fact I do not think that he went quite so far as that;

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he said that he was less than enthusiastic about it. Could we now prevail upon the noble and learned Lord to increase the degree of enthusiasm which the other place was told about ? I do not think that this is altogether fanciful, and I know that it has been the subject of considerable discussion both in another place and behind the scenes. But the history of it is that a great number of people in another place considered that, from the constitutional point of view rather than from any personal point of view (which applies throughout this discussion) the Home Secretary was not the right person to make the appointments because he was already so tremendously bound up with the police in many different functions, including his role as the police authority for the Metropolis. There is also the point that the Prime Minister, too, has a great connection with the police in that he is, after all, the chief of the security service, and that is distinctly bound up with police operations. Although I do not suppose that disciplinary complaints so often arise out of the security aspect of the matter, nevertheless it must be a possibility.
Therefore, I wonder whether the noble and learned Lord, who, so far as I know, has no connection at all with the police in his official capacity, might be able to carry out these appointments. But if not, then I, and I think other noble Lords as well, should like to know why it is that he has this reluctance, because we think that he would do the task very well.
Lord PARGITER: Before my noble and learned friend replies, I should like to say that I support the proposal and I hope that the Lord Chancellor will withdraw any objections which he might have. I think that the further this function is removed from what might be termed the administrative part of the Government—which would be the Home Office and the Prime Minister—the better. There is considerable suspicion about how the Board will work, and it would get off to a much better start if the Lord Chancellor were to he responsible for the appointments. I do not say this in any derogatory sense concerning what the Prime Minister might do or, for that matter, what the Home Secretary might do: they might appoint the same kind of people. But the important thing is what appears to
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be done. I think it highly important that the appointments to the Board, particularly the appointment of the chairman, should be made by someone who stands outside any question of police control.
Viscount BARRINGTON: Before the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, replies, I should like to support the Amendment on the grounds that the only two Lord Chancellors I have heard of in history who were both executed and canonised did not want the job. I do not know of any Prime Minister who has been either executed or canonised, but that is a point to be taken into consideration in deciding who is to take on this job.
2.49 p.m.
The LORD CHANCELLOR (Lord Elwyn-Jones): I shall refrain from the temptation of entering into the untimely death stakes with which the noble Viscount has just so cheerfully confronted me. I feel greatly flattered by the confidence which has been expressed in my Office by all noble Lords who have spoken. I should like to make it clear to the noble Viscount, Lord Amory, that in opposing this Amendment— as, I fear, I shall do—I am not seeking to evade any work or responsibility which I should properly undertake and which it would be competent for my Office adequately and properly to perform. But the Government, and indeed I myself, think that the Prime Minister is a more appropriate person than the Lord Chancellor to appoint the members of the Board. The Board are to consist of lay members. It is not an appointment for which legal qualifications are required, although they would not be a disqualification.
As the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, indicated, the original proposal was that the Home Secretary would make these appointments, and there was much discussion of this matter in another place. It is true that there was some support for the proposal that the Lord Chancellor should make these appointments, but I think I am right in saying that in the end it was agreed generally that the Prime Minister should do so, and the Bill was amended accordingly.
The truth of the matter is that, while the Lord Chancellor is responsible for making or recommending a wide variety

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of appointments of legally qualified persons to judicial or quasi-judicial positions, his Office does not really keep the sort of records which would be necessary for the appointment of lay persons of the kind needed for the membership of this Board; and certainly the Office has not, I think, the resources to do so. In regard to the appointment of justices of the peace, I think that the responsibility of the Lord Chancellor is a quite separate matter. It is an exceptional class of appointment where, for a very long time now, the Lord Chancellor has been assisted in the making of the appointments to the bench by an elaborate structure of advisory committees up and down the country, and I do not think that it is really a precedent for the appointment of the members of this Board.
On the other hand, the Prime Minister and his Office have a great many comparable powers of appointment, and in my view the Prime Minister would be able to exercise an independent judgment based on broader sources of information than would be available, either now or hereafter, to the Lord Chancellor. In the particular case of the present Prime Minister, of course, he was at one time in his career the adviser to the Police Federation, and is singularly well qualified, therefore, to have a view about the sort of laymen who should man this important Board. Therefore, it is not out of any desire to avoid further additions to the interesting variety of tasks which fall upon the Lord Chancellor that I resist this suggestion. I think that the better Office for fulfilling the power of appointment is that of the Prime Minister, and I hope that the Committee will feel able to accept that view.
Viscount AMORY: I am disappointed. I had hoped that as soon as I had sat down, or as soon as the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor had sat down, at least two former Lords Chancellor would have leapt to their feet and said that they thought this attitude was very poor-spirited and that they for their part would have taken it on most willingly. But that has not happened. I feel that if I press the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor much further he will say nolo episcopari, or something in English.
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The original idea of the Home Secretary, which at first sight looked attractive in some ways, was abandoned for perhaps the reasons which have been hinted at and because the Home Secretary is in one capacity a police authority on his own ; so perhaps this suggestion of the Prime Minister is in all the circumstances more appropriate than the Home Secretary. But I myself still feel that the better office would be that of the Lord Chancellor, and not that of the Prime Minister. I am horrified at the growth of miscellaneous duties which seem to be descending upon and added to the Office of the Prime Minister of the day. I have never found that it has been a great success to press a function or a new job on somebody unless he is enthusiastic to take it. Sometimes it does not work out too well, and despite great abilities the person concerned falls down on his job. I should hate that to happen in these circumstances. Therefore, although it goes against the grain with me because I still feel that the suggestion I have made would be the better one, I feel that in all the circumstances, with great reluctance and sorrow, I shall beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
On Question, Whether Clause I shall stand part of the Bill ?
2.56 p.m.
Lord INGLEWOOD: I understand that there is no need for me to move my Amendment to leave out Clause I since it has been put in another form ; but, if I may, I will still, as I explained to the noble Lord, Lord Harris, before the debate, state what was in my mind. This was not a wrecking Amendment; it was intended to open the way for a simpler scheme based on the lines of the scheme in the Bill, which is to introduce an independent element into the procedure for dealing with complaints against the police and, at the same time, to avoid any policeman being put into double jeopardy. I have the authority of the noble Lord, Lord Maybray-King, to say that had he not been abroad he would have added his name to the Amendment.
Some noble Lords may think it is rather late in the day for me to have put down this Amendment, but first thoughts on a subject like this are not necessarily the best, and many men and women who know

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more of the detail and more about this case than I do have spent not months but, think, rather, years considering this problem and have still at the end of the day arrived at only a very small measure of agreement. Since what I am going to propose is so much simpler than what is in the Bill, I feel it is not impossible to draft something which covers those points for the Report stage.
Like all noble Lords, I have seen a few unwanted Bills in my day, but I do not think I have ever seen a Bill which had quite so few friends as this one. I understand there have been very long discussions, as I have said, and a very small measure of agreement among interested organisations. The Association of Chief Constables, for instance, said, as reported in the Press only recently:
" Members of the Association are unanimous in finding the Bill objectionable in principle, likely to be both costly and harmful, and without any discernible merit ".
That is fairly clear. The association representing superintendents have also expressed their objections; and so, I understand, have the Police Federation.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: With great respect, I do not want to interrupt the noble Lord, but there is a clear point here to which I am sure he would wish to address himself, and it is this. On Second Reading your Lordships' House decided, I think without a single exception, that it was in favour of an independent element. The position of the Police Federation and the superintendents' association has been stated quite clearly. Both, to a greater or lesser degree, were doubtful about the need for an independent element, but if there should be an independent element they are in favour, broadly speaking, of the Government's proposals.
Lord INGLEWOOD: I do not want to make any point which the noble Lord would think unfair. The only group of policemen who I believe have not expressed a view are the special constables, and they do not happen to have an organisation. Then, the Association of County Councils have again expressed their misgivings, shall I say, about the proposals in the Bill. One of the consequences is to spend a lot of money and to add to the number of officials and paper in circulation, without adding one single policeman to our overworked and
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understrength national police forces. And I feel that it is hardly responsible for us to have taken up so much time here—and perhaps the same applies to another place—in trying to turn this generally unwanted Bill into law.
Of the many alternatives put forward, I expect we have all noticed the alternative put forward by the Association of County Councils. That was the first one, which I think most of us will agree was unacceptable. They then put forward an alternative which came nearer to what the ordinary citizen might like to see. I am going to claim that my proposal, if somewhat similar to their second alternative, is better, cheaper, simpler and presents no great drafting problems and might well be put into the Bill before the Report stage if—and this is a possibility—it is not discovered that it may be brought into operation by administrative means and so enable the Bill to be dropped and achieve a very large part of our object without actual legislation.
My plan would be this. The Home Secretary should set up a panel in the area of every police authority. The men and women on it would he of the same calibre as those who are nominated as JPs. There are numerous people of that standing in most areas who have retired early, returned from abroad but are too old, owing to the present regulations, to be nominated to the Bench. They would elect their own chairman. On receipt of a complaint at headquarters of any police force, the procedures would be exactly the same as under the existing law except that either the accused policeman or the chief constable may elect for two members of the panel to sit and take part in any investigation.
I am inclined to favour two members rather than one, but I think it is suggested in a later Amendment that one member of the panel, as set out in the Bill, might in fact achieve the same result. I am inclined to favour two members and that they should share the responsibility for the decision, but that only the chief constable would be responsible for any punishment that followed. For the rest. the proceedings would be the same as at present. I believe it is the duty of a police authority today to be informed about complaints, which means that they could call for information as before about any

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individual complaint and the way it has been handled. In addition, I should like to see it understood that the lay members on any inquiry might communicate on their own initiative with the relevant police authority.
Under this scheme the additional costs to the public would be negligible—mainly subsistence and travelling for the panel members—and I cannot see a reason for one single new official to be appointed.
This plan does not go so far as the plan in the Bill. I do not want to disguise that. It does not provide a central office where general intelligence and the coordination of complaints could take place. But surely a good deal could he done, if it were really needed, by the existing Home Office resources.
Since it has proved impossible to get general agreement between all the bodies concerned, I submit that it is better to try something simple on the lines of my suggestion now and review the position again in two or three years' time in the light of experience when it might be discovered that something more elaborate should be put in its place. The plan I offer today—that is, that the Government should insert in the Bill, in lieu of the unwanted Complaints Board therein described—something simpler but on the same lines. Some might think all this too good to be true; but T offer it in all humility. I beg to move.
3.4 p.m.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I am bound to say, having been involved in this matter for the past two years, that it is an attractive thought that we could move towards a simpler scheme. If the noble Lord had put down a detailed Amendment incorporating the proposals that he has made to the House, I suspect that he would have found his proposals were faced with a very substantial degree of opposition from one or other—or indeed many—of the police or local authority bodies involved in this matter. Perhaps I may repeat the point I made—and I apologise to the noble Lord—when, with characteristic courtesy, he gave way to me. I should make clear the position of some of the police organisations. There has been, with great respect, a certain amount of over-statement about the unanimity of the police opposition to this Bill.
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It is perfectly true, as I indicated to the Committee when I intervened in the course of the noble Lord's speech, that many people in the Police Service think that the present arrangements are perfectly satisfactory. That is the view of many people in the Police Federation, the Super-intendants' Association and Association of Chief Police Officers. It is not the view of Parliament; it is not the view of the other place; it is not the view of this House as expressed on Second Reading. It is not the view of the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley, who, when Home Secretary, made it clear that he was in favour of an independent element so far as the investigation of complaints against the police were concerned.
If we accept that there is to be a change—and the noble Lord has advocated Change—I should like to clarify the position of the Federation and the Police Superintendents' Association. It is right that their views should be taken into account. Their views have tended to be rather ignored in the course of the past few days. Both organisations have made their position absolutely clear that, broadly speaking, they are satisfied with the 1964 Act. As a result of the debate in the last Parliament, the Working Party was set up by the then Home Secretary, now the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley. From his view about a particular type of independent review of which he was in favour and the view of another place and this House on Second Reading, it is clear that a change of some sort is required. I should like to quote from a letter from the Secretary of the Police Federation to my honourable friend the Parliamentary Secretary in the Law Officers Department. This makes the position of the Federation clear:
" It appears to us that many of the safeguards we talked about have now been included in the Bill and, for this reason, we now clearly support the Government in the presentation of the Bill in its original form ".
We now come to the position of the Police Superintendents' Association. They make the same qualification about their general position and the satisfactory situation, as they see it, of the existing law. If there is to be a change, they make their position clear:
" This Association has since the adjournment "—
that is, the adjournment of the Standing Committee of another place—

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" considered the matter in some depth and has had consultations with a number of the interested parties. In consequence of these considerations and consultations, I have to inform you that it is our desire that the Police Bill continues on its Parliamentary course largely in its present form subject to the necessary safeguards being provided as set out by the Police staff associations ".
I might add that those safeguards have been met. That, therefore, is the situation so far as two of the major police organisations are concerned. Their views have not been quoted as often as others in the past few days.
The noble Lord then touched on the proposals of the Association of County Councils. I always listen with great interest to his views on the police, because I know of his close personal interest in these matters. He said that the first position of the Association as expressed publicly on the Bill was unsatisfactory. I agree. They met overwhelming opposition from every police organisation and, quite apart from that, there were grounds, so far as the general public interest was concerned, why their recommendations were wrong. The noble Lord seemed to be rather more attracted by the second round of recommendations that they made. I am not clear whether the noble Lord would have gone right down the road with them
Lord INGLEWOOD: No, not right down the road.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: In that case, he is in very good company, because the Association of Metropolitan Authorities agree with him. They were strongly opposed to those proposals. I in no sense want to appear critical, because I was interested in what the noble Lord said, but it is difficult to deal with another scheme which is presented orally and which we do not have in front of us. I should like to make a few comments.
First, with great respect, though I followed with great care what the noble Lord said, I suspect that the proposals he made will meet with a fairly significant degree of opposition from within the Police Service. That is not an unimportant criterion. Apart from that, he seemed to take the view that a series of panels, which presumably would have to be serviced by staff, would be less costly than the present proposals. I doubt whether that would be so. He seemed
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to be as enthusiastic as the noble Viscount, Lord Amory, in putting a responsibility, not, in this case, on the Lord Chancellor's Department, but on the Home Office who apparently would be prepared to staff what would be 43 local committees dealing with a series of local complaints which would be adjudicated upon by panels of justices of the peace.
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARYLEBONE: I do not think that my noble friend said justices of the peace ". He said persons of the same calibre as justices of the peace.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I am much obliged. I take note of the correction by the noble and learned Lord.
Lord PANNELL: I understood the noble Lord to say that they would be justices of the peace and beyond the age of normal judicial service. In fact, he wanted to recruit people over 75 years of age.
Lord INGLEWOOD: May I make this clear ? I said persons of the same calibre and that there were many in many districts who, through early retirement or coming back from abroad, were too old to be considered under existing rules for appointment to the Bench; and they were often under-employed.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: With respect, already two of us have misunderstood the character of the noble Lord's proposal, which indicates that it is difficult to deal with proposals made orally and not in writing. If the noble Lord would like to put down Amendments, while I would not suggest that they would meet with warm enthusiasm and support from these Benches, it would give us the opportunity of a far more serious discussion, which I am sure the noble Lord would favour. We have had an expression of the noble Lord's view; but, with great respect, at this stage of the Bill I do not think it is possible to comment with the degree of thoroughness which the noble Lord's speech justifies, if one is simply given an oral indication of the noble Lord's proposals.
There is one other comment that I would make to the noble Lord. He said—and here I did get it right—that only the chief

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constable would be responsible for punishment. That is certainly the Government's proposal in this Bill: that only chief constables would be dealing with punishment. In most cases the matter will be dealt with as at the moment: where there are tribunals only the chief constable will decide the punishment. Therefore, what the noble Lord is recommending is what the Government are proposing. I am in agreement. The position is this. If the noble Lord would like to put forward an alternative scheme, it would be sensible to do so before Report and we can then have a more informed debate than at the moment.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: When my noble friend is considering whether or not to pursue that invitation, I wonder whether he would bear in mind this point. There have been nearly as many schemes as there have been people to invent them but, at any rate, running commonly through a large number of them—including one from Justice, for which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, was responsible and which he presented at one stage—has been that there should be a central body rather than a large number of individual local bodies. I can see that there may be economies of scale or staff of one sort or another; but one of the things that impresses me most about the desirability of having a central body rather than a number of different ones—43 spread around the country—is the question of uniformity.
The job of the Board under this Bill, and under most of the other suggestions put forward, is not solely that of sitting as a disciplinary tribunal. I would anticipate that that would be a comparatively small part of what the membership would turn out to be doing. Of far more prevalence will be the inspection of all the complaints that come in against policemen all over England and Wales. There will, I have no doubt, be a certain amount of discussion about the sort of complaints that are coming in; the sort of things that are happening and the sort of things that are worrying the public—possibly, for all I know, some types of activities in which the police are engaging on which they may wish to comment adversely.
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If this is going to be done, the admirable local people who would sit and perform some function under my noble friend's scheme would be looking only at what is happening in their own police authority area. There is no machinery under his proposal for them to pool their thoughts and their experiences and suggestions in any way, so that they would be of benefit to anyone else. One can think immediately of the advantages of doing that; but one suggestion that I would make is that it may be that there is a particular sort of thing happening, perhaps in relation to demonstrations and so on, which tends to happen whenever there is a demonstration. If there happened to be one in Birmingham, one in Manchester and one in London and very much the same sort of conflict of some type between the police and the public occurring in each case, the local West Midlands board would not necessarily know about the Greater Manchester occasion or the one in Greater London. They would certainly not necessarily have a uniformity of approach about how to deal with the matter, and there would be no machinery whereby they can put their heads together and decide whether this had some elements of a national problem which ought to be tackled on a national scale.
I do not see any lines of communication under my noble friend's proposal for this sort of thing. There may be other objections to it as well, but this one I think to be of extreme importance. It is the all-embracing nature of the inspection of complaints against the police by some central board which is the best guarantee that complaints will be put into a proper perspective from the point of view of the complainant and of the policemen concerned and the police force as a whole. I doubt whether the best way to do it would be the sort of local ad hoc body suggested by my noble friend.
Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNE-SIDE: I know what a controversial Bill this is because everybody has said so. Did I understand the noble Lord aright—because I support in very large measure my noble friend's proposals—that no decision should be taken today, but that we should wait until the Report stage, when my noble friend can then put forward a proposal in detail ? I think this is very important. Could the noble Lord answer that ?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: As I said to the noble Lord, although I could not in any way hold out hope of warmhearted approval from the Government of his proposals, because they carry with them a number of inherently unsatisfactory features, not least the one identified by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, I suggest to the noble Lord that if he wished to put down an Amendment at the Report stage we could have a more informed debate on his proposal than would be possible today, when we have had the advantage of hearing him express his view orally but have not seen his proposal in writing.
I would in no way underestimate the difficulties involved. So many schemes have been put up by wholly well-intentioned Members of another place, and elsewhere, that I do not believe the noble Lord will find it as easy to do so as he might have imagined in the first instance. If the noble Lord would like to have a go at it we can have a more informed debate on his proposal at the Report stage.
Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNE-SIDE: I am grateful for that; but as a magistrate of long standing, having now lived a great number of years, I should like to put one or two points. I wonder whether it has ever been regarded as possible that, instead of having the Lord Chancellor or the Prime Minister or whoever it may be, we might have the Privy Council. There will be many people in the Privy Council with wide experience over a wide field and this would give confidence to the general public. The general public regard the Prime Minister as much more " political " than the Lord Chancellor. As the Lord Chancellor does not think it is a good idea, perhaps we might try the Privy Council.
It is terribly difficult to have a scheme, because in certain parts of this country there are people who are much more against the police, since in those areas the police have more difficult things to do than in other areas—and of course there are other areas where the police arc highly respected and looked on as friends of the people. This point has not been mentioned so far, but it is tremendously important. If one takes one or two of the areas where there have been outbreaks of
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rioting and so on, there are many people there who take part in those riots who could very easily put forward a large number of complaints against the police which would be entirely unjustified. Again, if one takes an area where rioting is not quite so popular as it is in other parts of the country, one would naturally find there people less inclined to make frivolous complaints about the police. If I may say so with great respect, I think this is tremendously important and we have hardly taken into account the differences of view among people in different parts of the country in respect of the police.
Since this Bill is intended to help the police more than anybody else, it seems to me important to look at the matter over a wide field. I cannot say any more than that because I am not in the position to offer a great deal of useful advice, but I should have thought it would be much better if the noble Lord would say that we could all have another look at the matter before proceeding with these very controversial and, in many cases, unacceptable clauses that are already in the Bill.
Lord PARGITER: Is it not a fact that we are at the moment discussing a Motion on whether this clause shall stand part of the Bill ? It seems to me we are not discussing anything else.
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARYLEBONE: I do not know that that is very fair. My noble friend made it clear that he had a scheme which was consistent with the omission of Clause 1. I intervene only to say two or three sentences. I thought I detected a faint note of reproach in the voice of my noble friend Lord Amory regarding the previous Amendment, and perhaps there might also be a faint note of reproach coming from my noble friend Lord Inglewood over this clause. I should like to explain to the Committee that I am being neither curmudgeonly nor sulking in any way but believe I may have put myself in baulk on Second Reading. I made it plain then that I did not like this Bill at all and that I should have preferred a scheme of a totally different character. Therefore I do not think I can help the Committee very much on various proposals for improving it. I wish it were not there.
Lord CLITHEROE: May I ask one question. May I be told whether the words beginning at line 10:
" The members of the Board shall not include any person who is or has been a constable in any part of the United Kingdom "—
include a special constable ?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I am not as well equipped to answer that question as I should be. I suspect the answer is that it does not include a special constable. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hailsham, thinks that it does and it is almost certain that he is right and I am wrong. I will let the noble Lord have the answer. It was taken to be a matter of great importance by the police organisations, and in particular by the Federation, that there should be an exclusion of people who have served in the Police Service. However, I will gladly look into the point so far as special constables are concerned and will reply to the noble Lord.
Lord CLITHEROE: There are different sorts of special constables: for example, I was a special constable for a fortnight in 1926.
Clause I agreed to.
Clause 2 [Reference to Board of complaint reports]:
3.26 p.m.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS moved Amendment No. 3:
Page 2, line 14, leave out (" and ").
The noble Viscount said: It will be plain to those who have studied the words that I have put down that Amendments Nos. 3 and 4 go together. Therefore, with your Lordships' permission, I propose to speak to them together. I am sure I should do an injustice to the Committee if I suggested that anybody found a certain amount of difficulty in following the machinery of this Bill, but I must confess that at first sight I was not altogether certain how it was going to work and have greatly benefited from reading the prodigious discussions in another place, which taught me a great deal. However, despite literally volumes of words that were spoken there, I am still not entirely certain that full justice has been done to one of the most important people involved in this machinery: that is, the complainant.
When my noble friend Lord Carr of Hadley started the process which has led to this Bill, it was done because there was a widespread feeling that complainants were not being satisfied with the way the police were investigating their complaints under the Police Act. I do not know whether that is right or not, but that was the genesis of the whole thing and it must underline the whole of the Bill, because that is what we are trying to put right.
If one looks at the legislation itself, l am not sure that the complainant will find he has carried away very many trophies—that is, if one simply looks at the text. After all, we have now set up the Board under Clause 1, and we then find that it is starting to play a role under Clause 2, when a complaint is made. It does not get into the act at all to start with, because the police carry out the investigation of the complaint in the first place. That is sensible, because they are the best people to investigate that sort of thing, and no one complains about that. But in the process of investigation, and very much as part of it, there comes into it the Board. They may come into it simply as onlookers if they are not involved in any sort of disciplinary tribunal. They may also be onlookers if there is any criminal prosecution brought on the advice of the Director of Public Prosecutions, or they may be involved indirectly later on the occasion of the disciplinary tribunal.
Of course, if there is an ordinary tribunal hearing whereby the police themselves investigate the matter, the Board will not play any direct part. I can envisage the complainant saying, " What good to me is this Board ? How do I get at it? How do I impress upon them my point of view? They are hidden away in the interstices of the police investigation and in a rare number of cases they may actually take part in a hearing, but usually they will simply look at the papers and learn and inwardly digest, but they will do nothing for me."
I would invite the noble Lord, Lord Harris—and this is really why I put down these Amendments—to try to explain to the Committee and to anyone who wishes to read our debates in the official pages of Hansard (and perhaps somebody will) how it is that complainants are actually going to benefit.
What I have suggested in this Amendment is that when the chief officer of police—I think the deputy chief constable, as a rule—has finished his investigation of the complaint, he has then under the provisions of Clause 2 to send certain things to the Board, which are set out—a copy of the complaint, a memorandum by him saying what he thinks are the merits of the complaint and whether he has preferred disciplinary charges, and, if not, why not, and then there is the question of any exceptional circumstances. Exceptional circumstances are important, because where they exist the Board themselves may become involved in any disciplinary hearing under Clause 4.
I suggest to the Committee that we might give a bonus to the complainant at this stage by allowing him, either when he first makes his complaint, or later, if he did it orally and would like to back it up in writing, the opportunity to make certain that the Board, even if they will not take any active part in the proceedings subsequently, or even if there is to be a criminal prosecution, are directly aware of his views and, in particular, of any reason that he has to suggest why the Board themselves should be involved in any disciplinary hearing as a special tribunal under Clause 4.
I suppose that anybody who makes a complaint is liable to think that his case is rather a special one, and the Board are not bound to act upon it. But, at least, I think the complainant would like to have a direct channel whereby he can place his attitude and his representation before the Board for them to consider, on his side of it, whether there are exceptional circumstances. All I am suggesting, therefore, is that in addition to the things that the Bill requires the police to send to the Board, they should also have to send any representation by the complainant which suggests that the Board themselves, if there is to be a disciplinary hearing, should take part in it.
I have no doubt that there are many other ways in which complainants will be able to get in touch with the Board. I am sure that they can write to them direct. I am also sure that they can make representations through the police, and the police will faithfully pass them on. But I believe that this is something worth
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discussing, and it is something on which the Committee and people outside would like to have their lines clear. They would like to know exactly how it is done. What would be the effect of writing to the police? Would the Board hear about it and would the police really pass it on, or would it become submerged, hidden and kept away from sight ? Can complainants write direct to the Board and, if so, what will happen to their representations? Who will see it ? Will it go to a member, or will it simply go to an official and disappear from view ? These are the kind of things which I believe the independent element is set up to do, and if we do not get the public's confidence in their ability to do it then, very largely, the point of this legislation will be lost. So I invite a discussion on this point and, at the very least, the noble Lord, Lord Harris, should tell us how it will work. I beg to move.
3.34 p.m.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: This is an appropriate week in which to say that I believe the score at the moment is fifteen love in favour of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hailsham. He was quite right about special constables. So I in no way complain about any possible curmudgeonary behaviour on his part. I regard him as a notable ally in this matter, or at least as extremely helpful, in that he was right on this matter; and I regret that, so far as the noble Lord, Lord Clitheroe, is concerned special constables are excluded.
The noble Viscount has raised an important question on the situation of a complainant. How will he be advantaged by this system ? I think he goes to the heart of this matter, and it is right that I should try to specify what his position will be. First, there will be one highly satisfactory part of the scheme so far as the complainant is concerned. No longer will he be able to believe that the police are judges in their own cause. The fact is that where a deputy chief constable—because he is the officer in a particular force who makes a decision of this kind—decides not to proceed, the matter will he reviewed by at least one member of the Board, and there is that degree of certainty that somebody outside the Police Service will he seeing the papers on the case. That is an important safeguard so far as

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any well-intentioned complainant is concerned. I think we all recognise that there are quite a large number of not particularly well-intentioned complainants, but what we are concerned about here is the man of good will who believes that he has been unjustly treated. We want to give him reassurance on this point, and some guarantee that his complaint will be most seriously considered both within the Police Service—as in the overwhelming majority of cases is the position today—and by an independent member of the Board.
Secondly, he will have a further guarantee that where the deputy chief constable takes the view that disciplinary charges should be preferred, and a case is contested, the Board will consider whether there are such exceptional features in the case that there should be a tribunal consisting of the chief constable of the force concerned and two independent members of the Board. But I repeat—and this is a point which I made earlier—that if the tribunal decides that the officer complained of is guilty, though that will be decided by the three members of the tribunal, the only person who will make any determination of punishment is the chief constable, who will make the decision on his own, though taking account of any views expressed to him by the two members of the tribunal who sit with him.
On this Amendment I hope to satisfy the noble Viscount. I do not attempt to summarise his argument because he has put it very clearly this afternoon. Where a complainant makes a request that there should be a tribunal, it is certainly better that this should be drawn to the attention of the Board. Many complainants may well want to have a tribunal, but I must emphasise that, in our view, a tribunal will sit in only a minority of cases where there are special features which justify that. I do not believe it is necessary to put this in the Bill. Certainly, if the complainant makes a request, it is not unreasonable that the Board's attention should be drawn to it; but we believe that the best way of dealing with this matter is by administrative guidance and that is what we hope to persuade the Committee to agree to.
Lord GARDINER: I hope that before the next stage of the Bill the Government may give further consideration to what the
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noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, has said. It is a very extraordinary feature of this Bill that, being designed to create a greater feeling of fairness among those who have complaints to make against the police, the complainant does not really appear in the Bill. My noble friend Lord Harris said on Second Reading that he will be able to complain directly to the Complaints Board, but the Bill does not say so. There is no legal right in the Bill to do this. But, as my noble friend quite rightly said, you cannot stop anybody from writing a letter and therefore there is nothing in the Bill to stop him.
It seems to me curious that the whole object of the Bill is to create a greater feeling among the public that they will obtain greater fairness it' they make a complaint against the police, but it does not start out by saying, " If in future you have a complaint to make against the police, there will be a Police Complaints Board and that is the place to which to make it." Indeed, as the noble Viscount has pointed out, and as I understand the position, the Board do not really come into the picture at all until the police have carried out their investigation.
An Amendment that I have put down, which will be dealt with at a later stage, goes rather further than this. However, what so many of us, particularly Justice, are concerned about is the small number of cases where a man is not just making any old complaint against the police; he is complaining of their misconduct of proceedings against him, as a result of which he, an innocent man, has been convicted; he is going to appeal; and he is hoping that if there is a police inquiry it will establish facts which will be available to the appeal court and which may lead that court to say that the conviction is not safe or satisfactory. If I have understood it rightly, under the Bill as drafted, nothing reaches the Board until the investigation has taken place, and that is a long time ahead.
Many of us had hoped that all the complaints would go to the Board. From what my noble friend said at Second Reading, I gathered that that would happen if all complainants sent their complaints to the Board. If the Board then go through them, they may be able to spot these cases. However,

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I think I am right in saying—I said it at Second Reading and it was not challenged—that at the moment the complainant is referred to in the Bill only in a provision which deals with what the effect on the policeman will be if the complainant withdraws the complaint. Although my noble friend assured us that if there was a hearing or tribunal the complainant would appear, I have not seen any specific provision in the Bill that gives the complainant any legal right to appear. May I respectfully suggest to the Government that there is a great deal in the contention of the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, that it is not really made plain anywhere what the complainant's rights are going to be. Although I do not know what course the noble Viscount will take, I hope that the Government will give further consideration to the points which have been made.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: When Statements are about to be made I am always very nervous that I am taking up the Box when somebody else wants it, but perhaps I may respond to what has been said. I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, for his support. Perhaps I may refrain from embarking upon the somewhat specialised case of the noble and learned Lord's new clause in this context; I should prefer to deal with the matter more generally.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, said that at least any complainant can be satisfied that now the police will not be judge in their own cause; but this is exactly what I am afraid they will not be satisfied about unless we have a little more information than has so far been divulged to this Committee. As I understand it, apart from two cases—one where there is a criminal prosecution, in which case the courts will deal with it in public and everybody will know exactly where they are, and the other where there is an exceptional disciplinary tribunal under Clause 4 of the Bill—the matter will never emerge into the light of day. Whether the Board have taken any significant part in the proceedings, or whether they have merely had the papers sitting on their table and done absolutely nothing about the matter, will, in the vast majority of cases of disciplinary hearings, never be clear to anybody. Although it is perfectly true that the Bill implies that a member of
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the Board shall see the papers, he does not do anything about it; in the vast majority of disciplinary cases it is the police who do something about it. I am not complaining about this; it is probably right that it should be so. But how does the complainant know that the independent element has taken part in the process? This is why I want to have a little more information from the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, about how complainants are to set about approaching the Board.
Could the noble Lord tell us this. Apart from, if I may be forgiven for saying so, the somewhat throw-away approach that the noble Lord adopted at Second Reading, when he suggested that of course anybody could write to anybody, will it be welcomed if complainants write to the Board, in addition to making complaints to the police? Will it help the Board and give them extra material to go on if they have the complainant's own view ? If not, what is to be the channel of communication ? Will there automatically be a full reporting by the police of the complaint—verbatim if it is made orally'? Or if it is made in writing will the complaint go through untouched, a complete copy of it being sent to the Board ? How will the Board deal with the ordinary run of disciplinary cases so that the complainant may know that somebody other than the police force concerned has taken a part in it, even if not a formal or decisive part? This is what I should like to know. If the noble Lord could say a little more about it, I should be much more content.
3.46 p.m.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: The noble Viscount asked me in particular whether we should welcome an individual citizen going direct to the Board. So far as we are concerned, the position is that we are wholly content that individual citizens should go either to the Board or to the local police station, which is where they go at the moment. We wish to give to complainants considerable confidence in the new system. It was argued in another place and by my noble and learned friend in this House on Second Reading that there are some complainants who would prefer not to go to a police station. In that case they can go to the Board. Their rights will be made

795
perfectly clear in the publicity material which will be made available when this Bill reaches the Statute Book.
However, the fundamental question is: who is going to investigate the complaint? The answer is that whoever receives it in the first instance, be it the local police station or the Board, the investigation must be carried out by the police force itself. Suggestions were made in another place that there should be some form of second police force. In my view, this is not a very sensible idea. In fact, I rather understate the argument. The only people with the expertise to investigate a complaint are the police and it is right that they should do so.
My noble and learned friend raised the question this afternoon which he asked at Second Reading, when in reply I pointed out that in the Bill there is a requirement that the Complaints Board should pass on to the police complaints which are made to them by members of the public. Clearly, if the Board receive a complaint there must be a requirement on the Board to pass it on for investigation, and that will be done. However, the noble Viscount's Amendment raises a different issue, which is by no means an unimportant one: if a citizen who has made a complaint against the police says, " I want this complaint to be investigated by a tribunal " should that request be passed on to the Board? What I have said to the noble Viscount will, I hope, reassure him. My noble and learned friend raised rather wider issues. However, in terms of the noble Viscount's Amendment, what I have said is that we shall gladly deal with this matter, which is not an unimportant one in any way. However, we think that it is better to deal with it by an administrative process rather than by putting it in the language of the Bill. We have no intention of making the position other than clear and we shall certainly direct our energies towards making sure that it is clear.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I think that this is a good deal better an answer than the noble Lord gave us at Second Reading. I am not being hostile, but the noble Lord's answer is fuller and I hope that it will be more reassuring. The publicity that is to accompany this Bill will, I suppose, be distributed to local law centres, citizens' advice bureaux and
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so on. It is clear from the speech which the noble Lord made that it is no use having the publicity available only at the police station. There is a case for providing a most careful description of how the system is going to work. With the greatest respect, I do not think that it ought to produce one single sentence which will be wholly incomprehensible to anybody. Indeed, it would be much better if the description were written by somebody else.
I am not criticising the draftsmanship of this measure, but it is not one which is guaranteed to bring great enlightenment to the ordinary citizen who wishes to pursue a complaint against the police. That is an important matter that the noble Lord has made clear and I shall look forward to seeing implemented in the publicity material that eventually comes forward the promise that he has made, that people may indeed make their proposition to the Board if there is something special about their case, even if, in the end, the Board may in some cases not agree with them. On that basis I am happy to leave it for the moment, and I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: I beg to move that the House do now resume, in order that my noble friend Lord Jacques may repeat the Statement that is being made in another place.
House resumed.

THE ATTACK ON INFLATION
3.50 p.m.
Lord JACQUES: My Lords, with the leave of the House, I propose to repeat a Statement which is being made in the other place by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Prices and Consumer Protection. The Statement is as follows :
" My right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has today laid before the House a White Paper which sets out the Government's general strategy for the second year of the attack on inflation. The White Paper reflects the Government's recent agreement with the Trades Union Congress

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on a further period of strict voluntary pay restraint for the 12 months from 1st August. The details were announced by my right honourable friend in the House on 5th May; and the agreement has since been approved by an overwhelming majority at the TUC Special Congress on 16th June. There will be an opportunity to debate the White Paper fully in the House next week.
" The White Paper stresses the importance of building up British industry. It goes on to explain that certain changes in the Price Code are essential.
" I have today laid before the House a Consultative Document setting out in detail the Price Code modifications which the Government propose.
" I have already consulted widely on both sides of industry about the modifications proposed to the Code. There is general agreement that the overriding objective to be borne in mind should be to encourage new investment, higher output and more jobs. It is common ground that if firms are to raise the funds they need to favour high investment and output, some changes in the existing Price Code are necessary. It is with that objective in mind that the Government have formulated the prices package.
" The new Code will continue to be based upon the control of proposed price increases, and upon the control of the profit margins of enterprises. The Government have been pressed to abandon these controls, but have refused to do so.
" The main changes are:

a) an increase from 20 per cent. to 35 per cent. in the rate of investment relief;

(b) new provisions relating to the depreciation of assets and to the appreciation of stocks, which go some way to offset the damaging effects of inflation ;

(c) a redefinition of the categories into which firms fall, so as to take account of inflation;

798

(d) measures to moderate the present disincentive effect of the Code on saving costs and increasing output, including the abolition of the productivity deduction, which has little impact now owing to pay restraint; and

(e) other measures to reduce the administrative burden on companies operating the Code.

" I have asked the Price Commission to monitor carefully the reliefs in respect of investment, depreciation and stocks to ensure that they are not abused. Price Commission monitoring ensures that investment relief applies only to investment in domestic manufacturing and service industry and in distribution, not to property and overseas investment.
" The Code will affect different firms in different ways. Which changes in the Code are used depends on each firm's pricing and marketing situation. Allowing for the slow recovery of the domestic market which makes it difficult and in some cases impossible to increase prices even when such increases are allowed by the Code, the Government estimate that the effect of the proposed changes will be to add about 1 per cent. to the Retail Price Index over the coming 12 months.
" I am inviting the interests concerned to make their comments on the proposals by 16th July.
" Two orders have today been laid before the House in draft. That laid by my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer extends until 31st July 1977 the operation of the Remuneration, Charges and Grants Act 1975 and of certain sections of Part II of the Counter-Inflation Act 1973. That laid by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Employment adds the new counter-inflation White Paper to Cmnd. 6151 for the purposes of the Remuneration, Charges and Grants Act. When the former order has been affirmed in both Houses and made by the Privy Council, and after the completion of my consultations on the Price Code, I will lay before the House an Order made under the Counter-Inflation Act and containing the new Code, effective from 1st August."
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
3.56 p.m.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, all Members of this House will wish to thank the noble Lord, Lord Jacques, for repeating the Statement which has been made in another place. I think there is another thing which we should welcome and that is the slight evidence that the Government are at least beginning to understand the nature of the problem facing us in this field, but it is most alarming that they still do not appear to have any grasp of the size of the problem. The measures summarised in the Statement seem to us to be inadequate in the extreme to deal with the task which is laid upon the Government. Would the noble Lord not agree that the real return on investment last year was 2.2 per cent., which was only one-fifth of the return ten years ago; and will he tell us what he supposes the real return on investment will be this year as a result of his new policy? Would he agree that the real return figure which I have quoted is a gross return from which tax and interest charges both have to be removed before the position of a company is actually made clear? And will he not therefore agree that last year very many firms in fact operated at an actual loss under the policy upon which this is supposed to be an improvement, although this was sometimes hidden by the effects of inflation upon stock values ?
Of course we welcome the trade unions' promise of a co-operative approach in this field, and although perhaps anything less would be regarded as irresponsible, we welcome what is a genuine attempt to meet the problems which we in this nation share. But it would be interesting to know whether it was necessary to promise any reduction in the cuts in public expenditure planned in order to secure this co-operation, and whether indeed the Government are aware of the extent to which living standards may be expected to fall as a result. We should also like to know whether this policy leaves us on target to get inflation down in 1977 to the level of our international competitors, as has been announced by the Government. If not, will there be a new policy to succeed this one, and, if so, when ?
It seems to us that the results of this modest change in policy will themselves be modest. It must be apparent to all your Lordships, and to almost everybody outside this House, that a company needs
800
to have money not merely to buy raw materials, pay wages and so on, but also for two other vital needs: one is to create a reserve so that they do not have to lay off workers at the first draught of a bad balance sheet, and the other is that they may install new machinery so that they may keep the present workforce and, hopefully, expand it in the future. We are speaking about jobs, not just profits.
Finally, one other comment one must make at this stage is that to work the code was complex before, but it is now a great deal more complex. There are loud cries of alarm from industry at the cost, frustration and near impossibility of operating parts of it accurately. The picture one has is of a Government waving us forward to the dawn, not realising that on our backs we have a knapsack with diminishing supplies and that we are wading through paper up to our armpits to get there. If the Government would allow a more generous term for profits to allow more investment and more jobs to be created—if they would make it easier for industry to do this, and to co-operate willingly—we should be very pleased.
4.1 p.m.
Baroness SEEAR: My Lords, from these Benches we too would like to thank the noble Lord the Minister for repeating the Statement made in another place. We give a somewhat tepid welcome, but still a welcome, to the changes that are envisaged in the Statement. It is certainly a good thing that some flexibility is allowed to people who are trying to make a success of industry and, by so doing, to counter inflation. At the same time, in our view it does not go far enough. Some of the clauses are interesting in themselves as a comment on the effect that previous Government policy has had.
For instance, it is remarkable that the Government now admit the disincentive effect of their existing policies on saving costs and increasing output. Surely, any policy over recent years should have been aimed at saving costs and increasing output if we are attempting to make a success of the running of the economy. The object given at the heading of the Statement is, after all, The Attack on Inflation. Surely it is time that we recognised that we will not attack inflation unless we have a successful industry able to invest. A successful

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industry able to invest requires a far higher level of profit than the Government have been prepared to permit up till now. Indeed, we are up against the long-established prejudice against the whole idea of profit, and the misconception of what profit is all about. This bedevils economic development at the present time. Therefore, we should have liked to see a more generous approach towards profit than is reflected in this Statement.
My Lords, I should also like to raise the issue that control over prices and profits is an inevitable concomitant of any attempt to control pay. It seems to be an article of faith that these two propositions must go hand in hand. In our view, they are not so related. Least of all is there a relationship between a voluntary pay policy and a statutory profit and prices policy. Until it is recognised that what is necessary in regard to profits, and therefore to prices, is a different kind of approach from what is necessary with regard to pay, I do not think that the Government's intention of an attack on inflation is likely to be successful.
4.5 p.m.
Lord JACQUES: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Elton, and the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, for their reception of this Statement, despite some of the things they have said. I find it difficult sometimes to guess which of the two alternative arguments the Opposition will use. They have two arguments. One has been that the Price Code is completely ineffective, that prices are now determined by the market, and that the Price Code as a piece of apparatus is a waste of public money. An alternative argument is that they think that the Price Code is far too severe. I suppose, in practice, there is a little of both. Of course there are many cases where, because of market conditions, profits are well below the ceilings permitted by the Code; but there are other cases where the Code rather than the market has kept prices in check. There is a mixture.
The noble Lord, Lord Elton, said that the provisions are inadequate. May I point out that when this Code was introduced by the last Government there was no provision at all for investment. We have gradually built up the provision, until now we propose that it be 35 per cent. of the investment. Since November 1974,
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almost £600 million has been allowed in the Price Code for investment allowances.
I can confirm the profitability figure used by the noble Lord, Lord Elton. A figure of 2.2 per cent. is being spoken of at the present time, as against 10 per cent. a few years ago. But that 2.2 per cent. must be qualified ; it is 2.2 per cent. after allowing for the replacement of assets at their current value, not at historic value.
I think that without that qualification the figure is meaningless. One must add that qualification. The noble Lord said that that was before tax and interest. It is fair to say that it is before tax. If the profit has been properly calculated there should be very little tax. However, I do not think it is right to say that it is before interest. Interest on money which is borrowed, up to the present time anyway, has been allowed in the ascertainment of prices.
It is also suggested that the new Code is more complex. In some ways I think that that is so, but in other ways we have simplified it. We have certainly reduced the burden of work. For example, in cases where the price of a commodity will be increased by no more than 2 per cent, over a period of a year, there is no need for any notification at all. That is something new, and rids firms of the need to make applications for relatively small increases in prices.
To the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, I would say that the Code was not wholly causing a disincentive in regard to saving costs. It was not wholly causing a disincentive for increasing output. It was marginally doing that. We are seeking to eliminate the marginal points where the Code was doing that, which is something quite different from what was implied in the remarks of the noble Baroness. She said that she did not think that the control of wages and similar income must go hand in hand with the control of profits. I would suggest to the noble Baroness that in a democracy politics is the art of the possible. It is quite impracticable to get working people to agree to the kind of wage control to which they have agreed unless the Government show—and no matter what Party is in office they would have to show this—that some steps are being taken to restrict price increases and restrain profits.

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It would be quite impossible to do all this—
Baroness SEEAR: My Lords, has the noble Lord noticed a recent study which shows a high percentage of understanding on the factory floor of the need for profits?
Lord JACQUES: My Lords, there is an understanding of the need for profits; particularly the need for profits to invest in British industry. That is why we have increased the investment allowance to 35 per cent. We are encouraging profits to be made for the purpose for which we think they ought to be made in the present circumstances.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, is the noble Lord the Minister aware that, however generously one views the Statement he has just made, it does not remove one of the shackles hampering industry in making the profits to bring about investment of the kind that the noble Lord wants? It may be loosening one or two of the shackles, but only slightly. Not one has actually been removed. Is the noble Lord aware that what the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, has said reflects the view of people who really understand business, that the only way to increase wage levels and make things better for the wage-earner is to remove these shackles? This is the only way in which to produce the profits that we want. I urge the noble Lord the Minister to use whatever influence he has, even at this late stage, to see whether one or two of the shackles relating to price control can be removed, rather than just loosened.
Lord SLATER: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the observations that come from Lord Harmar-Nicholls and the Conservative Party, and even the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, on behalf of the Liberal Party, seem to be based on one specific object, and that is profits? The people who arc responsible and who are to blame for what has happened in this country in regard to inflation are the people in charge of industry here. I am not saying in this Chamber something that I have not said to some of the top industrialists in the country. Those who are responsible for industry in this country have not taken the interest; they have not even put into operation certain schemes
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whereby profits would occur. Because of their lack of interest they depend upon No. 1 and No. 2 down the ladder to report back to the managing director of a company as to what is really happening on the floor.
I should like to see some of these top industrialists controlled. I should like to see that happen in my lifetime. I should like there to be introduced and carried into effect Acts of Parliament based on the principle that operates inside the mining industry, where the manager of a coal mine must at least go down below to see for himself what is happening in the various seams of operation, where production is taking place. This Statement from my noble friend, which has been read in another place, and the action of Her Majesty's Government—
Several noble Lords: Speech!
Lord SLATER: When some of you people begin to understand and learn what manners are, the better for yourselves! Noble Lords are now trying to interrupt an old Parliamentarian who knows more about these things than some noble Lords opposite have ever known, or ever will know. I sincerely hope that my noble friend will take back my observations in regard to what I should like to see; that is Acts of Parliament being introduced to control these people. They are talking down Her Majesty's Government because of the action they are taking against inflation. Then we shall see the progress that the people of this country want to see. The situation is most serious, more serious than some noble Peers on that side of the House think. They can only see one thing, and that is profit for the owner of an industrial undertaking.
Lord ROBBINS: My Lords, perhaps I may make one observation on the remarks just made. Since the year 1970, which covers two kinds of Government, the value of money in this country has, roughly speaking, slightly more than halved. Would the noble Lord who has just sat down suggest that that is the fault of management ?
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, I am afraid at this point I ought perhaps to remind your

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Lordships that it is not really correct for noble Lords to address other noble Lords personally. It is the correct thing to address the noble Lord who has made the Statement. I think I may be taking the right feeling of the House if I say that we ought perhaps now to resume our deliberations on the Police Bill.

POLICE BILL
4.15 p.m.
House again in Committee.
Viscount MONCK Viscount MONCK moved Amendment No. 5:
Page 2, line 30, after (" above ") insert (" chief ").
The noble Viscount said: I hope the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, will accept this as a purely technical drafting Amendment. As the subsection stands now, it puts chief superintendents in the same category as chief constables or assistant chief constables, whereas they are in fact amenable to the ordinary discipline of the police, as are superintendents. Therefore, I submit that this should read:
" where the complaint is against an officer holding a rank above chief superintendent ".
I beg to move.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: The noble Viscount is quite right ; this is to some extent a drafting point, but not for that reason to he disregarded. Let me reassure him straight away that the paragraph is not in any way intended to exclude chief superintendents from the scheme. We cannot, unhappily, refer specifically to a rank above chief superintendent, as this Amendment proposes, because the rank of chief superintendent is not a statutory rank. The statutory ranks, I am sure the Committee will be intrigued to hear, are superintendent, inspector, sergeant and constable, and they are specifically laid down in the 1964 Police Act.
To understand why chief superintendents are not excluded from this scheme, I think Clause 2(2)(c) must be taken as a whole. The first part of the paragraph, referring to an officer holding a rank above superintendent, has to be read in conjunction with the second part, which refers to the procedures for disciplinary matters in relation to the senior ranks in
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question. It is only in respect of officers of chief officer rank that disciplinary charges are drawn up by a solicitor and heard by a person selected from a list of persons nominated by the Lord Chancellor. Those ranks are assistant chief constable, deputy chief constable and chief constable. In other words, the point which the noble Viscount raises is in fact included in the Bill as drafted, and the only reason why it is drafted in this rather curious fashion is because of the point I made earlier, that the rank of chief superintendent is not a statutory rank. But they are in fact covered by the scheme.
Viscount MONCK: I am obliged to the noble Lord for his usual courteous reply. It seems very curious. I shall ring up my friend the chief superintendent at Basingstoke tonight and tell him that he is bogus. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. Clause 2 agreed to.
Clause 3 [Powers of Board as to disciplinary charges]:
On Question, Whether Clause 3 shall stand part of the Bill ?
4.20 p.m.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I do not think we ought to allow Clause 3 to go by without any comment, and I would be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris, if he could answer one question about how it is going to work, or, in particular, how subsections (2) and (3) are going to work. One of the main independent functions of the Board is to intervene, because they have seen the papers, in a disciplinary case where the deputy chief constable has provisionally decided that he does not want to bring a disciplinary charge. Under this provision in Clause 3, the member of the Board who is in charge of that particular complaint will be able to ask the deputy chief constable to have another look at this, because that member, bringing to bear his independent outside judgment, thinks that the case is perhaps rather more serious or more substantial than has so far appeared to the deputy chief constable. He will then be able to request the deputy chief constable to have another look and bring a disciplinary charge. If the deputy chief

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constable refuses, the Board can require that this shall be done. It is at this stage that I believe a word of explanation would be welcome.
One would think from reading the Bill—I am sure it is not the case, but it looks like it—that the practical result of this is likely to he nugatory. After all, the member of the Board who has insisted that the disciplinary charge should be brought is in no way further concerned with it under these proceedings; it goes back and is dealt with entirely under the Police Act machinery and under the police discipline regulations. I should have thought that if you had got to a situation where you had reached loggerheads as between the member of the Board and the deputy chief constable and the latter was then required to bring disciplinary charges, his heart would not be in them, and he would go through some charade and nothing would be achieved. I know that more than one person can be involved in this; there is the chief constable as well. I suppose it is also conceivable, because I believe this can be done under the Police Act (I have forgotten the section), that the chief constable can ask another chief constable from a different force to deal with the disciplinary hearing.
Therefore, I wonder whether that is really what is intended under this provision. If it is not, I cannot help thinking that we are again tending to set up something which suggests that it is an independent authority who will be able to take a real part in seeing that justice is really done, but in fact it will only be able to produce something which is a very superficial and rather unsatisfactory result. If the noble Lord can tell me how this is proposed to work, then I should be grateful and I believe again it would go some way to reinforcing what we are all trying to set forth, which is that there will be a real change under this Bill and people will get protection that they do not have at the moment, albeit that they do not usually need it.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I am obliged to the noble Viscount. He raises an important question, and that is where there is a disagreement between the Board and the deputy chief constable. There is an important qualification here. The words " chief officer of police " very often
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appear whereas we are talking almost invariably about deputy chief constables in police forces. A decision whether to prefer a disciplinary charge is taken by the deputy chief constable. This is the situation at the moment, and the case is tried by the chief constable, though in fact, in the language of the Statute, the term " chief officer tends to be used whereas in fact it includes both of these officers.
The noble Viscount raises the question of what would be the procedure, and perhaps I can just sketch this in. When the Board took the view that the deputy chief constable was wrong in deciding not to prefer disciplinary charges there would, in my view, almost clearly be some informal contacts, or perhaps more than informal contacts between the Board and the deputy chief constable. They would say, " We have read the papers and frankly we think that there is a prima facie case under the police disciplinary regulations in this particular case ". It may well be that as a result of that the deputy chief constable formed a different view. But what we are talking about here is the reserve power which the Board has. The deputy chief constable is adamant, and so are the Board; they simply disagree. I am sure the noble Viscount will agree with me that we are talking about a very minute number of cases, and hopefully a non-existent number of cases. But be that as it may, it is right to consider what would happen in a situation of that sort.
If the Board directed that disciplinary charges should be brought, the case would not be taken by the chief constable sitting on his own; it would be taken by a tribunal. If the chief constable took the view that he was fatally disqualified, or should disqualify himself from presiding at that tribunal for any special reasons, he could ask a chief officer of another force to preside at that particular hearing, and he might choose to do so. But it would really be a matter for him. I think that is reasonable. I think that is the fair way of doing it.
In most tribunals when they take place, I am quite sure that the chief officer of the force concerned would preside, but in certain cases he might choose not to do so. Indeed, as I have indicated, this is the situation at the moment. Every now and again the chief constable trying a case under the disciplinary regulations comes to the

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conclusion that he arguably knows so much about a particular officer, or chain of circumstances, that it would be wrong for him to preside and to try the officer who is being confronted with the charges. In a situation of that sort it is not unknown for him to ask another chief constable to preside, and that would continue to be the situation.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I am very much obliged. I think that is clear, and it seems to me to be entirely satisfactory. Again I do not believe that without tremendous researches in Standing Committee in another place it would necessarily be very easy for a member of the public to lay his hands on that information, and I am grateful to the noble Lord.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Clause 4 [Disciplinary tribunals]:
4.27 p.m.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS moved Amendment No. 6:
Page 4, line 30, leave out sub-paragraph (ii) and insert—

(" (ii) one member of the Police Complaints Board nominated by the Board, being a member who was not concerned with the case under section 3 above; and

(iii) one member of the police authority for the police area concerned nominated by that authority; and ").

The noble Viscount said: We now come to the disciplinary tribunals, and we have already discovered that they are going to be the exception rather than the rule when it comes to disciplinary charges against the police. Of course, I would remind the Committee that they have no place whatever where there are criminal proceedings in the ordinary courts against any policeman for something that has arisen out of the complaint. In all the attempts that have been made to find a proper formula whereby the many and disparate interests who have wished to put in their representations on this matter shall be satisfied, I think here we have got one of the areas where there is the greatest degree of dissatisfaction, at any rate in some quarters.
I believe that the functioning of these tribunals is of especial concern to the police, and not least do the police think—
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or some of the police—that it would be a mistake that anyone other than the chief officer should actually take part in the full sense at the hearing. The clause, as it is drafted, provides for a tribunal with the chief officer in the chair but with two members of the Board as full members for the purposes of the hearing—that is to say, the determination whether the policeman against whom the complaint is made is, or is not, guilty of the disciplinary charge made against him. It is not the function of the two members of the Board to sentence him ; that is done by the chief officer under Clause 4(1)(b)—though he does consult the other two members of the tribunal first he remains firmly in charge of the punishment of any member of his force. That is the solution that at the moment has been suggested.
I wonder whether there are not other ideas—I am afraid I do not think that I can claim any novelty value in this Amendment, or indeed in Amendment No. 7 which follows—that would be worth canvassing once more, and canvassing in a way that I think is novel in that it has not been put in this particular fashion anywhere in another place. I think that the police authorities have the feeling that they are not sufficiently participating in the independent element, or in the procedure of the Board. The first suggestion that I have put forward is that one of the two persons who will assist, and indeed take part in the disciplinary hearing—at the moment both of them are members of the Board—should instead be a member of the police authority.
The Committee will know that the police authority is not just the councillors of the area concerned ; it is a joint committee made up of two-thirds of councillors and one-third of magistrates who are appointed by the courts in the area. Therefore we are not necessarily just talking about councillors, although I would not have any objection to doing that; it is a slightly broader based authority than simply an ordinary local authority.
It seems to me that if a member of the authority were to sit on the disciplinary tribunal there would be a number of advantages. It would give a special insight when—as they are in law, under Section 50 of the Police Act, bound to do—looking into the whole question of

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complaints and what becomes of them. I appreciate that it would not be possible for a member of any particular authority necessarily to participate—it might be wrong that he should—in the investigation of a complaint before a tribunal against a policeman from his authority's area. Nevertheless, as a generality, the inclusion of a member of a police authority on a board would enable him better to understand the process and how it is being carried out and would, I suggest, assist the fulfilment of the functions under Section 50.
I suggest also that it would have a restricting effect on too great an interference by the members of the Board—who, after all, are sent there for the sake of their independence and for the sake of their being seen to be independent—in overruling the chief officer, because the other difficulty about the tribunal is that under Clause 4(3) it can come to a majority decision as to guilt or innocence. Perhaps this, above all, is worrying chief officers and I suggest that we may have a system here by which we could bring about a compromise.
If the Committee considers not only my Amendment No. 6 but also my Amendment No. 7 with it, we have this situation: there must he a majority decision, which means that no one of the three elements I am suggesting should be on the Board could be overridden or could override in conjunction with anybody else; the chief officer could not be overruled by a majority of the other two. By the same token, nobody could gang up with the chief officer to produce a result which was not agreed with by, for example, one of the independent members of the Board. Thus, some balance is possible if the two are taken together.
To stray for a moment further on to Amendment No. 7, because it is relevant here, supposing that one has a situation like this where it is impossible for two people to overrule the third on one of these Boards, because one must have a unanimous decision ? The obvious question is: what happens then ? What happens then is what happens in a criminal trail. There must be another tribunal and, if there must be more than two tribunals, then what usually
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happens in a criminal trial is that the matter is dropped, because if one cannot get a sensible verdict out of two different juries—even in that case, with a majority of 10 to 2—it is usually thought in practice that it is better not to go on with the matter at all. I therefore suggest to the Committee—and I do so with great hesitation because I know that this is a very difficult field—that those who are interested in trying to get a balance, and the greatest degree of agreement between all the somewhat disagreeing organisations which have been involved with the Bill, might like to look once more at this suggestion.
The history of my Amendment No. 6 is that it was put forward in another place where the honourable lady the Parliamentary Under-Secretary said she would look at it. It was then put down and discussed rather briefly on Report; the other place were going rather faster at that stage. I am not sure that the matter has been entirely explored as yet and I have a feeling that your Lordships might like to consider it. That is the background to the suggestion, which I do not suppose will please everyone. Nothing in the Bill pleases everyone, but my suggestion is put forward as a genuine attempt to be helpful and to bring a ray of light and agreement into the situation. I hope that other noble Lords may feel moved to take part in this discussion.
Viscount AMORY: I support the proposal in Amendment No. 6 which my noble friend has moved so effectively. The police authorities feel that the Bill diminishes in some way their responsibilities. They are probably correct in that, although I do not think that that was the declared intention of the Bill. I think, therefore, that what my noble friend has suggested is a good plan, not only because that is their feeling and because they would welcome coming more into the complaints procedure than is at present proposed in the Bill, but even more because I think they would be useful members of a tribunal like this.
I was glad that my noble friend reminded your Lordships of the joint nature of these authorities, because it is sometimes thought that because chief constables are often forceful personalities and very decisive types, the police authorities are rather subservient to them. That

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may be so in individual cases, but in general I do not think it is so. The police authorities understand their statutory position very well and, on the whole, carry it out very satisfactorily. I should have thought that having one member of these tribunals as a layman, or a layman who has an understanding of how the police service works and how the system generally works, would make the tribunals more rather than less effective. I hope therefore that the Minister will take a sympathetic view of the aim of my noble friend in putting forward Amendment No. 6.
Lord WIGG: I do not pretend to have any special knowledge of the discipline of the police force, though in another field I have seen the effects of weak discipline and weak authority and I know that any signs of removing powers from where responsibility seems to lie always leads to trouble. I would never do anything to weaken the authority of chief constables. They are appointed and if they are to do their job they must enjoy the confidence of the force they command and the confidence of the public, and the responsibility which they bear must be equalled by the powers which they possess. If therefore the Government's proposals are brought into operation, the authority of chief constables will be diminished ; the mere putting on the board of another couple of chaps as assessors is a sign either that the Government do not accept—
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: May I interrupt the noble Lord to remind him that it goes further than that? They are not just assessors, but full judges as to guilt or innocence.
Lord WIGG: I stand corrected; my error was due to my loose use of English. They are two chaps, outside the authority vested in the chief constable, who are put on to the tribunal as full members. That the Government are doing this will be seen as meaning that they believe, or have been pressured into accepting the view, that the authority of the chief constable needs in some way to be corrected. I take exactly the opposite view. I would much sooner serve in a regiment in which, as a private soldier, I got 28 days for something I did not do, in spite of the honest belief of the chap who gave it to
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me, than I would serve in a unit in which there was a lot of shilly-shallying and so on.
If I may put it in a personal way, which may commend itself to some Members of the Committee who were in the House of Commons with me, I always thought that the best Speaker I ever met was the first one I met, Mr. Speaker Clifton Brown, later Lord Ruffside. I always thought of him in terms of what he would have been like as a C.O. I felt that, as a Speaker, he sometimes made mistakes in the same way as, as a C.O., he would have made mistakes, but he always sought to be fair. Sometimes he would live up to his name and be rough, but fairness was his second name. That is exactly the basis of good, firm discipline, because those who are tempted to try it on are less likely to do so if they know that they will be met with absolute fairness and that the other chap knows as much as they do about all the tricks. This is the administration of discipline inside a force, which, by its very nature, must have effective discipline.
For that reason, though I am not necessarily committed to these words because I do not know enough about the matter, if the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, divides the Committee, he will take me into the Lobby with him, because I believe that this is indicative of the age in which we live. It is another example of leaving the responsibility where it must remain, whatever happens. We are weakening the power and authority of he who bears the ultimate responsibility to carry the provision into effect.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: May I say to the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, that, if the noble Viscount were to divide the Committee, he might well go with the noble Viscount into the Lobby, but that I am afraid that he would not do so for the reasons he appears to imagine? What the noble Viscount is saying is that, where a tribunal sits and there are two lay members, one should be a member of a police authority. He is not saying that there should not he two independent members. What I shall address myself to is the question of whether it is right that one of those two non-police representatives on the tribunal should be a member of a police authority. As I understood it, the noble Viscount was speaking to Amendments Nos. 6 and 7 at the same time.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: Not really. I was saying that, if it wanted to, the Committee could take account of the provisions of Amendment No. 7 because it has a bearing upon this question.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: In that case, I shall gladly deal with Amendment No. 7 separately. Let me begin with a cautionary note, which will not surprise the noble Viscount because I know that he has gone through the report of the Committee stage in another place with his customary assiduity. One of the problems of this measure is that there are all sorts of alternative schemes and that it is very difficult to assemble a substantial number of people behind any scheme. A problem so far as the present Amendment is concerned is that, though it will carry with it the plaudits of the police authorities—and it certainly will—it will not carry with it those of the police organisations. The one thing which has been absolutely consistent so far as the police organisations are concerned as regards all the various alternative proposals which have been put forward, is that very nearly all the police organisations—and I speak with caution because I have not consulted all of them about the noble Viscount's Amendment and am speaking only about their general philosophical position so far as the Bill is concerned—have displayed strong opposition to involving police authorities in the working of this scheme.
This is for a good reason. It is the view not only of the Federation but of a very large number of chief constables also. They are very apprehensive about involving police authorities in the detailed case of an individual disciplinary hearing. The noble Viscount referred to Section 50 of the 1964 Act, which sets out the powers of a police authority in dealing with this question. It is right to come back to that because it is a fundamental question. I had the opportunity of meeting the police authorities on this point. We have done the best we can to reassure them that they are in no way being undercut. The noble Viscount, Lord Amory, raised this point. In no way is their position reduced by the Bill. However, the one thing that we take a very clear view about is that we should not use the present Bill to expand substantially the powers of police authorities so far as an individual disciplinary case is concerned.
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The issue is really as follows: at the moment, it is a matter of long standing that police authorities have no powers to intervene in an individual discipline case, apart from the case of senior officers which we were talking about earlier when the noble Viscount had put down an Amendment concerning Chief Superintendents. This is of very long standing. It was stated by the Desborough Committee as long ago as 1919, confirmed by the Oaksey Committee in 1949 and, more recently, by the Royal Commission in 1962. All have taken the view that members of a police authority should not become involved in individual discipline cases. Under the Amendment, however, a member or members of the police authority would do so.
So that it is absolutely clear in the minds of the Committee, I feel that I must say that, in so far as there is a police consensus view, it would be strongly opposed to getting police authorities involved in detailed disciplinary cases. There is also a second issue; namely, that certain people might say, " Well, that is all very well ; you say that the police are not very enthusiastic about it, but there is a wider public interest involved. Is not the Amendment justified so far as that is concerned '?" I believe that the answer is, No, it is not. The whole purpose of the Bill is to introduce an independent element into the complaints machinery. I do not believe that an individual complainant would take the view that a member of a police authority was wholly independent. He would know that he had regular contacts— and quite properly so—as a member of a police authority with the chief constable, and that he was a member of an authority which had a statutory responsibility for providing a police force. So I do not believe that the complainant would take the view that the member of the police authority sitting on the tribunal was as independent a person as he would expect to find. It seems to me that this is a very strong argument against the proposal of the noble Viscount.
As I have indicated, I believe that—and I do not want to overstate the argument—in so far as there is a police attitude, it is against the idea and, in so far as the position of the individual complainant is concerned I feel that there would be apprehensions in the minds of many about whether a member of a police

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authority trying a case was genuinely independent.
The noble Lord, Lord Wigg, raised a number of other questions concerning the general issue of tribunals but, as I endeavoured to explain, that is rather wider than the discussion which we are having at the moment.
Lord PITT of HAMPSTEAD: There is one matter which worries me about the Amendment, and I was expecting the Minister to deal with it. That is how it would be applied to London. The police authority for London is the Home Secretary. Therefore, while the Amendment might be appropriate for authorities outside London, it would not be at all so for the Metropolitan Police.
Lord MORRIS of BORTH-Y-GEST: I have had the advantage of hearing, I believe, most of the debate on the Second Reading of this Bill in your Lordships' House and the advantage of hearing your Lordships' deliberations this afternoon. I fully understand that there are many who take the view that it is undesirable to have any scheme at all, that the present proposal should not be accepted. But if there is to be a scheme, I feel very strongly that the points recently put by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, should command acceptance by your Lordships.
I understand that the point of having this new Board is to allay any possible feelings in the minds of the public that there is not full, free and independent treatment brought to bear. If the Board are to be set up there are to be nine members appointed by the Prime Minister. This afternoon we had a very interesting discussion, initiated by the noble Viscount, Lord Amory, as to whether the nine should be nominated by the Lord Chancellor or by the Prime Minister. But inherent in all that discussion, as I followed it, was the thought that we must have appointed nine people who are completely independent. The line taken by the noble Viscount was that the Lord Chancellor has great experience in nominating those who will have judicial capacities. The whole purpose of the setting up of the Board, as I follow it, is that there should be nine people chosen by the Prime Minister. Presumably, they will be men of experience and of standing in the community, men of good sense and
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of fairness, but above all nine men who are judicial. Therefore, I should have thought that, once the scheme is adopted, one would take away from its advantage if, instead of having two out of the three completely independent, there is only one out of the nine and the other is somebody nominated by the police authority.
I have no doubt that from the police authority one will get someone of great experience and knowledge, who is entirely fair and of judicial approach. But would one satisfy the public? I thought that the way in which the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, dealt with the matter carried complete conviction. If one wants to create public confidence and allay such fears as there are now, surely there should be two members from the nine, not merely one. The noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, in a very interesting intervention earlier this afternoon, developed the point that the nine appointed would gradually accumulate experience in regard to the whole country ; they would not have merely a local approach. They would gradually get more and more knowledge and perhaps be able to build up among themselves an area of experience that would be of very great advantage. I thought that what the noble Viscount said was most persuasive and most powerful. Are we to lose that under the suggestion we are now considering? I very much hope that your Lordships will take the view that if we are to have this tribunal, it is far better that the two independent members should be chosen from the nine selected by the Prime Minister.
4.57 p.m.
Lord WIGG: I am becoming more and more worried, and I am particularly worried by the speech of the noble and learned Lord who has just spoken. I quite agree that if there is to be a tribunal one should see the purpose of it; it is to allay public opinion. That is what it is about. But at what price ? The noble and learned Lord wants nine men, judicially minded, independently minded, wise men, good men. I might put my target at a much lower level. I want the man who is to exercise a disciplinary function to know something about the minds of those who may be subjected to temptation. I want a man, who because

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of his life's work and his life's experience, will be able to get to the heart of the matter; a man who will not, as it were, always be weighing on the niceties of evidence. I do not know whether the noble and learned Lord who has just spoken has shared my experience of long service in the barrack room, but a commanding officer does not necessarily have to be judicially minded. What he has to know is the function of discipline; how the life of the regiment goes on; what are the temptations to which men are exposed.
Independence, goodness, and judicial mindedness are of course worthy attributes and, if they can be found, so much the better. But basically, a man who is discharging a disciplinary function has not to be only legally minded; he has to realise that he is handling circumstances that are part of the whole way of life. He has to be a man who understands temptation and who, through his life's work, can instinctively go to the heart of a problem and be able to make up his mind about what are the temptations to which the man whose case he is considering has been subjected, and what is the truth of the matter. That is what is required.
If the price of allaying public opinion is to undermine or weaken the discipline of the chief constable in relation to the operation of a police force, which affects the whole body politic, the whole social fabric from top to bottom, then I should tell the public to go and jump in the Thames. It is far better not to seek to allay public opinion if the price is not only to undermine the authority of the chief constable in the discharge of his specific duty in relation to the disciplinary function as a member of the tribunal, but also eventually to affect every act and to permeate the whole of the force which the chief constable has to operate. If one tampers, for whatever reason, with the discipline of a quasi-discipline force like the police, or the discipline of the Armed Forces, one is playing with something which one is never able to put right.
Therefore, as I said earlier, it may be that it is in accordance with the spirit of our time that in order to allay public opinion we are quite prepared to do what we are now setting out to do. But if we do it, we may wake up and find that we
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have paid a very high price indeed for allaying public opinion.
Lord MORRIS of BORTH-Y-GEST: As the noble Lord has turned to me, I should like to add that I can quite understand his objection to the scheme altogether. But I should like to remind your Lordships that all we are discussing at the moment is whether, assuming there is to be a tribunal, it is to be presided over by the chief officer of police and with two members of the nine appointed by the Prime Minister, or whether it is to be presided over by the chief of police with one of the nine and one member of a police authority. I fully understand the noble Lord's opposition to the scheme, but we are not discussing that at the moment; we are discussing whether we have the scheme as proposed in the Bill, or the modified scheme as proposed by the noble Viscount.
Lord NUNBURNHOLME: I ;should like to agree with everything the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, said. It would appear to me that policemen are under two laws. One is the law of the land, by which they are under the same laws as any other citizen, and the second law is the police regulations or the police law. If they break the first law (the law of the land), they are brought before the civil courts and the Bill would not apply. If they break a police regulation, which is like an Army regulation or a law under the Army Act, they should be brought before their own kind ; and if this Bill (which has met with certain opposition from many parts of the country) goes through, I would agree wholeheartedly with Amendment No. 6, that one member of the tribunal should be a chief officer of police, one member should be from a police authority and one member should be from the Police Complaints Board. If this Amendment No. 6 were to be carried, then I think that Amendment No. 7 should not be.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I think I agree with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Borth-y-Gest, that I shall be seeking to draw upon the sympathy of the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, more on the next Amendment, perhaps, than on this one. Nevertheless, I am delighted to have him with me; it is not always thus.

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If I may say so to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Borth-y-Gest, and indeed to the noble Lord, Lord Harris, I would hope that the Committee will get this point into perspective. The trouble about this Bill is that it puts the disciplinary tribunals in the shop window. We have already discussed earlier on this afternoon the real weight of work that is going to fall upon members of the Board in relation to disciplinary tribunals. They will not be involved in them if the charge is withdrawn or the complaint is dropped ; they will not be concerned with them if it is a criminal charge; they will not be concerned with them in at any rate more than the bare majority of disciplinary charges. It may be the fairly small minority, or the exceptional case ; I know not. The weight of work and this, I think, is the answer to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Borth-y-Gest—will be the inspection by the members of the Board of the whole gamut of complaints.
Now there are thousands of these. They will not actually have to do anything about most of them in terms of a formal tribunal, but they will look at every one of them. Among other things, they will be looking for occasions, perhaps, on a disciplinary charge, on which they do not agree with the deputy chief constable deciding not to prefer a charge. But when one looks at the figures—and there will have to be, I think, more than nine people because some of them will be part-time—one sees that they will have a very heavy workload in going through all the cases; and that is the bulwark of independence with which I believe we should really be concerned. It is true that the disciplinary tribunal looks very much more impressive in the legislation, but consider this. It is not going to sit in public. The general public are not going to know what happened. They are not going to know, for instance, whether there was or was not a majority decision. They are not going to know, if there was a majority decision, who it was who disagreed. This is all going to be done, as I understand it, in private—and in a moment we shall come to another Amendment I have down to discuss the extent to which that is so.
What I am seeking is to try to find something which will assuage the anxieties, frankly, of the police authorities. I am not surprised that the police say that they
822
do not agree with this particular Amendment. Goodness! there are plenty of things that the police do not agree with. There are plenty of things that everybody does not agree with. That is the one thing that runs right through this Bill. No more can I invent, nor can anybody else, something that everybody agrees with. I am not in the least surprised at what the noble Lord says about this. But I do not believe that the trouble really is that they will be getting themselves involved as a police authority in the disciplinary side. They will be there as an adjunct to the other two on the comparatively rare occasions on which it will be necessary for there to be a tribunal.
I take the point of the noble Lord, Lord Pitt. Of course my Amendment is defective, and for that reason I plainly cannot press it. But I take his point that you cannot have somebody from the police authority in London unless you have a Deputy Home Secretary, or something like that, and there is not any such thing. But suppose one takes a slightly broader view. I have drafted this Amendment in terms of a member of " the " police authority for that constable; but it might very well be that one could have a member of " a " police authority. It need not necessarily be the one concerned ; but a person who, as the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, said, has been for some time involved in the provision of an efficient police force as a member of a police authority and who will then have the sort of feeling within his own experience of how the thing should properly be run and what is the feel of the discipline in the force. That is all I am suggesting.
I am not going to press this Amendment. It seems to me that we have had a useful discussion about it, and there are some who are in favour of it; but I shall leave this for the moment in case there are people outside who would like further to consider the debate. There is just one last thing—and this is the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Harris. If it is thought that there will be complaints by members of the public that the independent element is lacking, then that is one of the reasons why I suggest that you would bring in the unanimity rule, because at least the members of the public would be able to trust, ex hypothesi, the member of the Board sitting there. If the member of the Board had a veto, as he would if there

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was a unanimity rule, then there would be no possibility of the independent element being overridden. That, I think, is my answer to that last point. I should like to think about what everybody has said in this short debate and, if necessary, pursue it, possibly in another way and at another stage. But I am very grateful to those who have given their views on this particular Amendment, which I now beg leave to withdraw.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.7 p.m.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS moved Amendment No. 7:
Page 5, line 8, leave out (" may be a majority ") and insert (" must be a unanimous ").
The noble Viscount said: This, of course, I have touched on, and it is the question of unanimity. There is no doubt—and the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, will be the first to appreciate this and see its significance—that under the Bill as it is now drawn the chief constable, the chairman of the disciplinary tribunal, can be overridden as to a decision on guilt or innocence; and, as I understand it, chief officers of police are frankly worried about this. I do not think there is any getting away from it. They have put forward a number of schemes, which I have looked at, in which the members of the Board perhaps do indeed sit, as the noble Lord suggested, as assessors, without being full members of the Board at all. They have put forward a number of different schemes; but the thing to which they all object, as I understand it, is that they are not absolutely in control of the discipline of their force.
I can see that there is a great deal to be said against the idea of the members of the Board who sit on the tribunal sitting other than as full members. I do not believe that if they sat other than as full members they would be doing the independent job that I quite agree with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Borth-y-Gest, if they are going to be there, they must do; and as assessors I do not think they can do it. But we have, have we not, two possible situations, and we have to weigh these. We have the situation where, at the present moment, the chief officer of police, the chairman,
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can be overruled. For all his experience, and for all the position that he holds in his force—and it may very well be his own force in connection with which the disciplinary tribunal is being held—it may be that he is overruled. That would, say some, be a severe blow to discipline. That can he dealt with by this Amendment, because if there has to be unanimity then he can never be overruled; he can simply succeed in arriving at a situation where there has to be another tribunal. That is not an unusual thing. It is no use supposing that a policeman is in any different situation from any other person who is at the receiving end of a charge. Any criminal offence may result in a trial where the jury cannot reach the necessary degree of consensus and where, therefore, there has to be another trial. So there is nothing unusual in this.
I understand, of course, that there is the other side of the coin. I believe that there is also the possibility—and I must be fair to the Committee about this—that if you had unanimity it might be, for instance, that one of the members of the Board and the chief constable wished to acquit and the other member of the Board did not agree. Then, equally, you would have to have another tribunal. But are not both those situations the sort of occasion when it would be better to allow the thing to go back and be tried again by three new people rather than to put at jeopardy what I believe to be an absolutely fundamental provision of the police discipline which is the result of the present Bill as it stands? I would seriously suggest that of the balance of advantages and disadvantages, unanimity here just carries the day.
There is one last thing. It will be said possibly against this Amendment that we have got away from the unanimous decision in ordinary juries. But there are 12 people on a jury and there is much more room for disagreement and much more safety when you have to have 10 out of 12 in agreement than when you merely have to have two out of three. This is so sensitive and difficult an area that we should go back, I believe, to the old, long-tried English unanimity rule.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: The noble Viscount has put his case with some persuasiveness, but I am bound to say that I come to a rather different

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conclusion. Let me start by saying—and I do not want to keep hammering this point home—that I do not want to misrepresent anybody's position. I do not believe, first of all, that this would be greatly welcomed by some people in the Police Service who are worried about the present arrangements so far as tribunals are concerned. In some ways, I think, some chief officers would be more disturbed by this arrangement than by the Bill as it stands. I do not pretend to speak for all of them necessarily or any of them; but having had the benefit of hearing their views over the last two years, I think that this Amendment would cause some anxiety in their minds for one reason.
It is all very well to say that the unanimity rule would be a great help because it would at least ensure that the chief constable is not overruled by the two lay members of the tribunal, but what happens if the chief officer and one member of the tribunal are in favour of conviction and they are then faced with a veto by the third member of the tribunal? There could then be, as I understand it from the noble Viscount's proposal, a rehearing. I do not know whether the same chief officer of police would sit to judge the man himself or whether presumably he would have to ask a brother chief officer to come and sit. Then the case is reheard and the chief officer and another member of the tribunal say that the man should be convicted and the third member says he should be acquitted.
This procedure can be described in many ways—and I am now addressing myself to the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, rather than to the noble Viscount—but I should have thought it would not give a great deal of reassurance to chief officers who are worried about controlling their own men from the point of view of police discipline. Here you would have a situation with the unanimity rule where the chief officer, who on both occasions voted for conviction, was overruled by the third member who took a contrary view. I must say that I take the noble Viscount's point, because he put his case with great moderation; but I am worried about this. As he rightly said—and it is only right to say this in view of the presence of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hailsham, who played a major part in the matter of unanimity in juries—we have got away
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from the unanimous decision by juries; but that is not a happy parallel to the adoption in this case of a requirement of unanimity. It is not the rule so far as a bench of magistrates are concerned, in so far as that is parallel. A majority of magistrates can convict or, more obviously, acquit, as the case may be. Certainly there is no suggestion that a third magistrate should, by voting for one particular course of action, secure a rehearing of the case. I think it is also the position of your Lordships' House in a judicial capacity that a majority is a majority and there is not, as it were, one blocking member.
For the reasons I have given, I think we should hesitate long about insisting on a unanimity rule. Let us consider the case in which there will be a tribunal. The noble Viscount is right. There will be a tribunal in only a minority of cases, and arguably a small minority. There will be a tribunal in one of two sets of circumstances. The first is that there is a serious public interest question involved. I wonder whether the sort of procedure I have outlined would be very attractive so far as that is concerned : it is agreed by the Police Complaints Board that there is a serious public interest issue, and yet you could have this highly unsatisfactory situation of one member of the tribunal, when the case is heard, blocking the majority decision on both occasions, leading, on the third occasion, presumably to the policeman against whom the charges were preferred, the policeman whom a majority of the members of the tribunal believe to have been guilty, walking out a free man. And not only a free man but remaining a member of the Police Service, even in the most exceptional circumstances where, if he had been found guilty, the chief officer—sitting alone so far as this particular element is concerned on the issue of punishment—would have required him to have resigned from the force.
The second set of circumstances in which there will be a tribunal is a point that we came to a few moments ago, where the Board has directed that disciplinary action should be taken. This will happen only in a small minority of cases, but I do not believe that in either of these two sets of circumstances the public interest would be safeguarded by insisting on unanimity. I think that arguably it could have the reverse effect. it could lead to more anxiety rather than to less; it could cause

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a great deal of concern to members of the public who are in a position of making complaints and, secondly, to the chief officers who are responsible in future, as at the moment, for the discipline of their forces.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: The judgment that we have to apply to this really seems to me to depend on which of the examples one takes. The noble Lord, Lord Harris, has suggested a situation where the unanimity rule would be inimical to police discipline. I have suggested an example where the majority rule would be inimical to police discipline. So far as I can see, the arguments that underlie what both of us have said are exactly the same: that there would be concern if police discipline was in any way harmed.
Let us analyse for a moment what the noble Lord has said. He has said that my suggestion is unfortunate and, perhaps, undesirable, because it would be possible when a policeman was charged for there to be on the first occasion a lack of unanimity so that he had to be tried again; on both occasions the chief constables—probably two different chief constables—thought he should be convicted; but on both occasions the third member (from the argument, necessarily a member of the Board) disagreed and was in favour of acquittal. Then, said the noble Lord, Lord Harris, that policeman goes out not only a free man but continuing to he a member of the police force, although his own chief constable on, at any rate, one of the occasions, would have liked to have convicted him. That, says the noble Lord, is an undesirable situation and the police might dislike it. But consider what would happen if there was not a majority; there would be the same police officer tried and there would he a situation where the chief constable would like to convict him but the two members of the Board disagree. What happens? That policeman walks out not only a free man but continuing to be a member of the police force despite the fact that the chief constable would have liked to convict him. What is the advantage one way or the other from the policeman's point of view? I cannot see where the noble Lord's argument gets us on this matter.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: To deal with the one point which the noble Viscount has made, he makes a more than good debating point, but the substance of the matter is a little different. The view of a number of chief officers of police is this: the evidence before a tribunal would be of such a degree of complexity, and there would be certain features to the evidence which would make it apparent only to an experienced police officer that in fact a man had behaved improperly, that a lay member of the tribunal would not in fact realise that the man was guilty, but the chief officer would. The anxieties of the chief officers are that they are fearful that in some cases the members of the tribunal would not recognise the possible guilt of the police officer concerned. This is the point to which I was seeking to address myself. The noble Viscount is quite right, there are disadvantages on either side of this argument. I accept that point immediately. We have to strike a fair balance. We do not require unanimity anywhere else, and I am not clear why we take the view that unanimity is essential in the police disciplinary hearings.
Viscount MONCKTON of BRENCHLEY: Are we to understand that in certain cases only the chief constable is going to know whether or not a policeman is guilty ? if so, can he not explain that to the lay members ? If not, why are we having tribunals at all?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I should not embark on too many interruptions in the noble Viscount's speech, I was attempting to put as fairly as I could some anxieties which have been expressed by some chief officers. I do not share all those views, but I thought it right to indicate what they were.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: We are still in the difficulty that if we have a very technical case under the police regulations, where it is not easy for the layman to follow what is the element of guilt that is being brought forward in the charge, as the Bill now stands we are just as likely to have two non-comprehending members of the Board as with my suggestion there would be one non-comprehending member of the Board. I do not want to continue with this. I have not been supported by anybody else

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in this Committee, not even this time by the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, though perhaps it may be said he supported me in advance. Now we have fined down the area of disagreement—certainly from the point of view of the police—I should like to ask their views upon this directly to see which of the two situations they would prefer if they have to have one or the other. Therefore, for the moment I beg leave to withdraw my Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.24 p.m.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS moved Amendment No. 8:
Page 5, line 24, at end insert—
(" (6) Proceedings under this section shall be heard by the Tribunal sitting in public unless in the opinion of the Tribunal interests of national security are involved.")
The noble Viscount said: I suppose that in a moment I will be accused of attempting to be a friend of everybody and ending up a friend of none. This Amendment goes back to the reassurance of the public. I am grateful to those in the Committee who have taken part in our discussions. We have been discussing what is going to happen at a disciplinary tribunal and whether it is better that there should be this membership or that, a majority or unanimity. Underlying all this was what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Borth-y-Gest, said, and what I said earlier on, which is an attempt to bring by whatever means an independent element into the whole question of police complaints.
I understand that, normally speaking—and perhaps universally because this is only going to be an extended arm of police disciplinary machinery as it now exists—the disciplinary tribunal will sit in private. I suppose the complainant has to attend as he is a witness. Whether he is allowed to attend throughout the hearing, and whether or not he is allowed to discover whether there is a majority in the case of the adjudication, I do not know. Otherwise, there will be no member of the public there and T suspect that the only source of information anybody will have about the disciplinary tribunal set up under Clause 4 will be when the Police Complaints Board reports to Parliament, as they have to do under the Bill, and when people read that. How full those reports
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will be, and what will be told about individual cases, I do not know. If the proceedings are to be in private I suspect that it will not be entirely proper to make too many details public in the report sent to Parliament.
So I am asking the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, by this Amendment how the tribunal is going to reassure the public that any independent element has had an effective part in this proceedings at all. How is anybody going to know anything of what is happening? Incidentally, why cannot the proceedings be in public? I entirely understand that it may not be suitable for every police disciplinary charge to be heard in public any more than any Service charge is necessarily heard in public. If we are concerned with the cases to which the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, referred us—that is to say, the one where grave public misgiving or a basic public interest is at stake—or if we are concerned with a case where there has been a disagreement between the police force concerned and the Board, I should have thought those were the cases where the public is particularly concerned to know what has happened. I do not know what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, would think about this. But the public will not be able to know what has happened.
Why cannot a comparatively rare tribunal of this kind sit in public? I have never seen it argued why they should not. It has simply been asserted that this has been grafted on to the police disciplinary machinery, and as they at the moment do not sit in public then neither should these tribunals. Can the noble Lord explain what is the rooted objection to this, particularly in view of the whole purpose of this legislation? If he rejects the whole aspect of sitting in public, can the noble Lord throw any light on how members of the public can find out what happens on these occasions? I beg to move.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: Perhaps I might begin by detailing the present arrangements and then come on to the new ones. The situation at the moment is that disciplinary hearings arising as a result of complaint from a lay member of the public are heard by the chief officer sitting alone and are not open to the

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public; however where charges have arisen out of a complaint by a member of the public, the complainant is normally entitled to be present during the examination of witnesses and may be allowed to put questions to the accused officer. He may of course be a witness himself. That will continue to be the situation under the regulations which we make under this scheme. Therefore the complainant can be there. There is an exception where a member of the public can be asked to withdraw when evidence is being given, the disclosure of which would be contrary to the public interest. That is the situation at the moment which obviously will continue. That is manifestly sensible. The noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, says where you have a tribunal why should you not have a rather different procedure? That sounds, if I may say so, not at all unreasonable. I suggest it is more difficult than that because a tribunal is in essence an ordinary disciplinary hearing writ large. It certainly is in one of the two cases which we are considering. Where there has been a disagreement between the Board and a deputy chief constable and there is a tribunal, it does not seem to me that that in itself justifies a public hearing, because the only reason why there is a tribunal is that there has been a disagreement.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: Not quite, with respect, because it is a case where the policeman otherwise would have got away with it; there would have been no hearing at all because no charge would have been brought. But the independent element which has been injected by this Bill was not satisfied with that and, on behalf of the public, has insisted upon it.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: Yes; in that case the complainant's rights — which are of course central to this matter —are safeguarded by the fact that there is going to be a disciplinary hearing by a tribunal. But one has to consider the fact that publicity, apart from the other aspects, can be very damaging, as we all know on the basis of what happens in the criminal courts, apart from anything else. It seems to be unreasonable, even if a policeman is acquitted by the tribunal, that in the case where the only reason for the tribunal's sitting —I keep coming back
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to this point —is that there has been a disagreement between the deputy chief constable and the Board, the case would be publicised. It would not be publicised if it was a case which was heard solely before the chief constable and, with respect, that does not seem to me to be fair or just to the officer concerned.
The noble Viscount asks: "What is the safeguard to the complainant ? " I have endeavoured to answer that. The safeguard is that the tribunal hearing is taking place and the complainant has the right to he there, just as he has if there is a hearing before the chief officer of police. Therefore, I do not consider it is right to insist on a public hearing, for the reasons I have indicated, in a case of this sort. I think the public interest has been safeguarded by the scheme and that it would be wrong to introduce a system of this kind, which would be viewed with grave misgivings by many people in the police service. Although the noble Viscount can fairly say, as he did over the last Amendment, "Many parts of this scheme will be viewed with grave misgivings by different groups of people", I think in this particular case they would be justified in feeling anxious that there was to be a public hearing, with the Press present and so on, whereas if there had not been a disagreement there would not have been publicity. I think that would be harsh and unjust to the officer concerned.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: But that is only half the story. I take the noble Lord's point about that; but what about the other sort of tribunal which is going to occur just because it is a case of major concern ? That is a very different matter. The whole raison d'etre for the tribunal is that it is a matter of much wider concern and one in which not only the complainant is interested. Would it not be possible to give in the regulations some opportunity, perhaps, for the chairman of the Board to consider whether some of these cases should not be held in public?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: The noble Viscount is quite right. That is the second leg of the argument concerning the need for a tribunal hearing because there is a public interest element. But let me just come back to the point of publicity in cases of this sort, which can be exceptionally damaging to the career of the

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officer concerned. We have to take this into account. This is a highly sensitive area, obviously, and one wants to be just to the complainant and to the individual officer. One also has to take into account the need to maintain proper discipline in a disciplined service. The fact that a tribunal hearing is to take place because of public interest in the case does not necessarily mean that the case is of a particularly grave character, in terms of the specific charge laid against the individual officer. There may be circumstances, of a kind which one would not wish to specify, where the surrounding circumstances were disturbing but the charge against the officer was far less serious than charges against officers who appear only before the chief constable and where the chief constable, sitting alone, disposes of the case in private.
Therefore, one would have a rather quixotic element introduced into the scheme where, as a result of the view taken by the Police Complaints Board that there was a public interest in having a tribunal hearing, the matter is held in public. I think one has to ensure justice for the officer who is complained against, and I do not believe that his interests would be safeguarded by this scheme; nor do I believe that the public interest would be safeguarded either necessarily.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: Once again, in this case rather to my surprise, no other member of the Committee has seen fit to intervene and express a view. Therefore I am only in a position to set my arguments against those of the noble Lord and I can assume that this aspect has been very fully considered by the Home Office, by the noble Lord, and by the Home Secretary and his advisers. I would ask the noble Lord (though of course I do not expect an answer today) how one is to deal with what I genuinely believe to be a valid criticism : that although it is on their behalf —this is the second leg of the argument —that the occasion is seen as being such that real and wide public interest demands a tribunal hearing rather than an ordinary disciplinary hearing, they are never really going to find out what part is played by anybody, or indeed anything more, I suppose, than the bare outcome of the hearing, if that. Because, if it is really only a matter of discipline, the only way of discovering what happened
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is by happening to see whether the policeman concerned is walking his beat or driving his panda car. There will be no further evidence at all other than the report. If the noble Lord will be so kind as to say that he will consider this, I will certainly think very carefully about what he has to say concerning the effect on the officer, which I fully understand. However, I do think there is still a point here which might be overcome by administrative means, and I shall welcome any further thoughts that he has.
Lord FOOT: Before the noble Viscount withdraws the Amendment, might I say to him that I think the views he has expressed will be shared in other parts of the Committee, and certainly by me. I should not like him to suppose that he is receiving no support at all for this Amendment. All those who are concerned with the protection of the public and with the public feeling that the complaints they make have been independently investigated, will feel they wish to give some support to what the noble Viscount has said. I would urge, if I may, that the noble Viscount should not withdraw his Amendment without seeking an assurance from the Government that they will give this matter further consideration.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Foot. I rather detected from the way in which Lord Harris's head was going up and down that he was agreeing to have another look at this question to see whether he can put something into the Bill. There may be a method of bringing about some publicity of the results of these things in another way. Perhaps he would indicate whether that is so, either formally or in some other way.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: It always gives me pleasure to consider anything that the noble Viscount suggests on almost any subject and I will certainly do so in this case, although there is a gulf of principle between us in terms of these hearings. On the point made by the noble Viscount, I will gladly look into this, but would not wish to suggest that we are going to move towards public hearings, because that raises formidable problems.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I was not asking the noble Lord to make any breach of that principle, but to see whether we could get somewhere near the same sort of thing by a different route. Upon the assurance he has just given, and with my grateful thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Foot, I now ask permission to withdraw this Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
On Question, Whether Clause 4 shall stand part of the Bill?
5.40 p.m.
Lord GARDINER: I should like to raise a short point which I raised at Second Reading. At column 1471 of the Official Report for 17th June, I said:
"…there are no provisions giving any right " —
by which, of course, I meant legal right —
"to the complainant to appear before the Board or their tribunal, or to say what his complaint is, or to call his evidence ".
In reply to that, my noble friend Lord Harris said, at column 1494, that I had asked,
"…whether the complainant could put his case before the tribunal. If a tribunal sits, or if a disciplinary hearing takes place, the complainant will almost certainly be one of the witnesses before it. I hope that that deals with that point ".
With the greatest respect, it does not quite. That is because I am rather old-fashioned and I like laws which provide for the liberties of our citizens to be in Acts of Parliament, rather than in regulations drafted by departmental civil servants after the Acts have been passed.
A man may be innocent, but in prison. Of course, if he is in custody I suppose that the police can take him anywhere, but he obviously has no ability to go anywhere unless the police agree. I respectfully ask again: where in the Bill do I find any legal right given to the complainant to attend the tribunal and give evidence about his grievance? If I have understood correctly what my noble friend has just said, there is no such legal right. It is not intended to give him any such legal right in the Bill but the Home Secretary, after the Act has been passed, will make some regulations. Then it becomes of somewhat vital importance for us to be clearly told, in terms from which there can be no later departure, what arc to be the contents of the regulations, because this is obviously
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very important to the complainant. For example, will he have the right to representation, and so on?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: What I endeavoured to say on the earlier Amendment was that the situation will remain largely as it is at present. At the moment, a complainant can go to a disciplinary hearing presided over by a chief officer of police, and that situation will continue. I must emphasise that we are talking about a very tiny number of cases when we speak about the tribunal. The overwhelming majority of police disciplinary cases will continue to be dealt with by chief officers sitting alone. The distinction in the system is that there will be an independent review of complaints made by members of the public. But the situation will remain in future exactly as it is at the moment.
My noble and learned friend Lord Gardiner is quite right; the matter will be dealt with by regulations laid under Clause 6 of the Bill. I cannot pretend to him that these regulations are yet prepared: clearly, they have to be drafted. But I give him the guarantee that there is no intention at all of withdrawing any of a complainant's rights, and they will remain exactly as they are now. As I said, under this scheme nobody wishes to withdraw any of the rights that have been conferred.
Clause 4 agreed to.
Clause 5 [Complaints that may involve criminal proceedings]:
5.43 p.m.
Viscount MONCK Viscount MONCK moved Amendment No. 9:
Page 6, line 4, at end insert —
("(4) Where any complaint alleges that a police officer has committed an offence and notwithstanding any decision of the Director of Public Prosecutions not to institute proceedings against the officer, the complainant decides to institute such proceedings on his own account, no action shall be taken by the Police Complaints Board or the chief officer of police to finalise the complaints investigation and the hearing of any disciplinary charges arising therefrom until such proceedings by the complainant have been finalised.
(5) Where during an investigation of a complaint it appears that an allegation against a police officer is such that the matter is one that is capable of being resolved by civil proceedings against the officer (or against the chief officer of police by virtue of section 48 of the Police Act 1964) the

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Board may, upon application being made by the chief officer of police, direct that the investigation of the complaint be suspended until such time as the civil proceedings are disposed of ").
The noble Viscount said: This Amendment proposes the insertion of two new subsections, and unless the noble Lord, Lord Harris, has any objection I propose to speak to them —to use the beautiful French employed in my village — en bloc. My proposed subsection (4) would make certain that court proceedings took precedence over disciplinary proceedings. If a complainant decides to institute proceedings on his own account, even though the Director of Public Prosecutions has not decided to do the same, and a police officer is found guilty of an offence, then it is quite simple to institute disciplinary proceedings under the existing disciplinary code against the officer concerned.
Subsection (5) is designed to ensure that complainants do not use the complaints and disciplinary procedure in serious cases as an alternative to civil proceedings. There are many cases where civil proceedings are open to a complainant, but which are so trivial that they would not justify such proceedings being taken. On the other hand, cases occur where a complaints investigation is launched at the instance of a complainant and are, in effect, used either as a dummy run for future civil proceedings, or as a means of putting the police authority in a position where it is difficult to resist a claim for damages. The two subsections that I am suggesting would dispose of those possibilities. I beg to move.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I should like to support my noble friend on this Amendment. There is a gap here which he has most wisely detected, and it seems to me, in the ordinary case of possible criminal proceedings, that if there will be disciplinary action it should be postponed or interrupted if a private prosecution is brought, or if it looks as if there will be a civil action. I am particularly concerned with the civil action, because if a disciplinary charge continues and it produces a result, I am not sure what the evidential situation may be. I have not looked too carefully at the Civil Evidence Act in regard to this point, but I should have thought that Section 13 would probably enable a plaintiff to bring in the result of the disciplinary charge if he
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could find it, and, at any rate, he would be able to use the facts that had emerged in the course of the investigation of the complaint. So there may well be something to be said for putting these matters into the same form as occurs under Clause 5(1), and I shall be very interested in what the noble Lord, Lord Harris, has to say about that.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I hope to satisfy both noble Viscounts on this Amendment and, if I may, I will deal with each of these issues separately. The proposed new subsection (4) deals with a complaint which raises possible criminal and disciplinary offences. It apparently seeks to lay down that where the Director of Public Prosecutions has decided against a prosecution, and the complainant then decides to prosecute on his own account, the completion of any disciplinary investigation and the hearing of any disciplinary charges should be left in abeyance pending the completion of the criminal proceedings.
Subsection (5) seeks to lay down that where the complaint is one for which the complainant may seek his redress by way of a civil action against the officer concerned, or, I suppose, the chief constable, the Complaints Board may give approval to the chief constable's application that investigation of the complaint should be left in abeyance pending hearing of the civil action. As I indicated, I hope to persuade the noble Viscount, Lord Monck, that the Amendment is unnecessary to achieve his objective.
It is already the normal practice to defer altogether any investigation of a complaint which concerns matters which are also the subject of pending court proceedings. This would apply whether the criminal proceedings were conducted by the Director, or the police or by the complainant himself, which I think is the issue which the noble Viscount, Lord Monck, has in mind. Any separate disciplinary investigation or any disciplinary hearing would also be deferred on its becoming known that a complainant, after hearing from the Director of Public Prosecutions, proposed to institute criminal proceedings on his own account. This is also the normal procedure where it becomes known that a complainant is bringing a civil action, which deals with

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the noble Viscount's point. These procedures would continue to be observed following the establishment of the Complaints Board. It is intended that the subject should be covered in the guidance which will be given by the Home Office to chief officers on the handling of investigation and related proceedings.
If I may, I will deal with the question of civil proceedings, because the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, referred to these. In the present situation, which we intend shall continue, paragraph 19 of Home Office Circular No. 21 of 1967, reads as follows:
" Where a complainant indicates that he is proposing to take civil action against the officer he complains of, it would be right to make it clear to him that his complaint will not normally be the subject of a disciplinary hearing until the proceedings in the civil courts have been finished. On the other hand, it would not be right to refrain from a thorough investigation of a complaint, or from bringing disciplinary charges, if that seems appropriate, merely because a complainant might decide to pursue a civil action. The chief constable is not relieved of his disciplinary responsibility simply because of the possibility that a complainant might decide to pursue the matter in a civil court. Disciplinary action should be deferred only if it is reasonably clear that a complainant is resorting to the courts ".
I think that is a fair position in relation to the complainant and the police officer against whom the complaint is made, and it will continue to be the situation.
Viscount MONCK: I caught the first few words of the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich —that it is the practice —and I remember the words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, a short time ago: that it is all very well to say that it is the practice or habit to do this but can one not have it in the Bill. I am not yet convinced as to why subsections cannot be included in the Bill to make this point absolutely clear. Would the noble Lord be prepared to go a little further and say why we cannot have them?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: If I may say so with respect to the noble Viscount, although I will always consider any point he puts before the Committee, I do not see great advantage in putting on the Statute Book provisions which are the practice at the moment. There is no intention of departing from the existing situation. The noble Viscount has asked me to look at the matter, and of course
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I will do so. I do not know whether he has in mind a recent case which may have troubled him??
Viscount MONCK: No.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I understand he does not. I thought that the noble Viscount might have had at the back of his mind a recent case, and I am reassured to find that apparently this is not so. Certainly I will look at the matter —and I hope that the noble Viscount also will reflect upon it —but I feel that the situation at the moment is satisfactory. I do not want to advocate putting unnecessary requirements on the Statute Book when there is a clear practice about which nobody has a great deal of doubt. However, as the noble Viscount has asked me to look at the matter, I will do so.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: There is just the point that under Circular 21/67 the existing practice relates to ordinary police disciplinary machinery. Here we are legislating for the Board. In Clause 5(1) we are telling the Board to hold their hand —or, rather, we are telling the Board to ask the chief officer not to embroil the Board under Clause 2(1): not to send material to the Board until the Director of Public Prosecutions has made up his mind. We are legislating for the Board, or for things which go to the Board —or it may be that we are legislating for both. If the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, considers this point, might it not be right to consider what the Board ought to do, because that is what the Bill is about? We do not need to tinker with the existing practice, so perhaps that is the right line to take. Incidentally, I should not be unduly worried if the new subsection (5) were not included. It is subsection (4) which is more important.
Viscount MONCK: I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for saying that he will have another look at this point. Therefore, I beg leave to withdraw my Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.54 p.m.
Lord GARDINER Lord GARDINER moved Amendment No. 10:
After Clause 5, insert the following new clause:
"Complaints made in relation to prosecution or trial.
(—(1) Where a complaint is made by or on behalf of a person about the conduct of a member of a police force in relation to the prosecution or trial of that person, the chief officer of police to whom the complaint is made shall, if so requested by or on behalf of the complainant, send to the Police Complaints Board a copy of the complaint if made in writing or of the record of the complaint if made orally.
(2)The Board shall thereupon consider whether the complaint contains any allegation which, if it were made out in whole or in part, would in the opinion of the Board cast serious doubt on the validity of any conviction of the complainant.
(3)If the Board is of the aforesaid opinion it shall so inform the chief officer of police and the complainant and shall require the complaint to be investigated after the conclusion of the complainant's trial and regardless of whether any appeal therefrom is pending, and the Board may, if it thinks fit, require the investigation to be carried out by an officer of another police force of such rank as the Board shall direct.
(4)The report of the investigation shall be rendered direct to the Board and if the Board is of the opinion that it is necessary or expedient in the interests of justice that further investigations should be made the Board shall require such further investigations to be carried out as it thinks fit and the report thereof (hereinafter called the supplementary report) shall be rendered direct to the Board.
(5)Any such investigation shall be completed and the report thereof rendered to the Board regardless of any pending disciplinary proceedings against or prosecution of any member of the police force concerned or any other person or any appeal therefrom.
(6)On receipt of the report (including any supplementary report) the Board shall send to the complainant, to any court before which any appeal by the complainant may then be pending, and to any prosecutor acting in such an appeal, a statement of the facts disclosed by the investigation and copies of the statements of any witnesses interviewed in the course of the investigation, with the exception only of such facts and statements as, in the opinion of the Board, should be excluded in the interests of national security or the prevention or detection of crime.")
The noble and learned Lord said: I beg to move the Amendment standing in my name. This is a point which I adumbrated at Second Reading, and as there are many noble Lords present today who were not here on that occasion I will shortly explain the point of the Amendment. The United Kingdom is exceptional in that our police are not subject to central Government. In most Western democracies the police are subject to a Minister who is responsible to Parliament. In London we have the Metro-
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politan Police and in England and Wales there are 42 chief constables who are very much a law unto themselves.
Our police are peculiar in a second way. Everywhere else in Western Europe they do not prosecute. In criminal cases, our police investigate crimes reported to them, interrogate suspects and decide whether or not there is to be a prosecution —and, if so, who is to be prosecuted, what the charge is to be and what evidence is to be called. And the police prosecute. This does not happen anywhere else in democratic Western Europe. The police have never been allowed to prosecute in Scotland and, on the recommendation of the Hunt Committee, prosecutions in Northern Ireland, except for trivial cases, are now in the hands of the Director. In most Western democracies there is an independent prosecuting authority which stands between the police and the citizen.
It is now six years since Justice published a long report on this point, strongly advocating that we should go over to this system. Justice has been worried about a small group of cases in which a man complains that his conviction has resulted from his being framed by the police —either they have given deliberately false evidence against him, they have planted things on him, or they have suborned witnesses for the defence — and he is subsequently proved to have been telling the truth. It is a difficult situation for anybody on trial to cope with, but naturally the man hopes that the truth will come out at the appeal.
What has disturbed Justice has been the increasing number of cases like the Confait case where three young adolescents, at least one of whom was mentally retarded, were convicted of murder and arson and it was a matter of years before it was proved that they could not possibly have committed any of the offences. The number of cases in which the truth does not come out during the appeal is disturbing; it is only when the Home Secretary refers back the case to the Court of Appeal that the truth comes out. I feel that this must be embarrassing to the Court of Appeal because, quite wrongly, it may look as though there is something unhappy about the way in which they do their work, or as if they are not concerned with ascertaining the truth. Nothing, of course, could be more wrong than that.

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What happens here? There is a difference between police authorities. In a case like this, A.10 and the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police very often get on right away with their inquiry, and if they find out something which is in favour of the defence and which ought to be put before the Court of Appeal, of course they can deal with it. But when a complaint of this kind is made against the police most, if not all, of the 42 independent chief constables will not even start the inquiry until the appeal is over. That makes it absolutely impossible for the Court of Appeal to ascertain those facts.
I believe that I suggested at Second Reading that one may have the fact —it is only the facts which are relevant —that a station book is found containing an entry which is the complete opposite of the evidence that the police gave at the trial, and when one looks at the book one can see that somebody has altered it. The question is, ought not that fact to be before the Court of Appeal at the hearing of the appeal? In this country we prosecute fairly. The prosecution have a statement from a witness whom they do not intend to call because clearly his evidence is in favour of the defence. The prosecution know that the defence do not know about the witness. Their duty is to ensure that his name and address are given to the defence, and in general it is not the business of the prosecution in this country to withhold from courts evidence which they believe to be in favour of the defence.
This has nothing whatever to do with what police do in every other country of the world. That is to say, they keep order on the streets, interrogate suspects, ascertain crime and so on. This has to do with what the police do only in England. They act as prosecutors. I am simply dealing with the duty of a prosecution in a criminal trial. If by the time a case gets to the Court of Appeal the prosecution know that there is evidence which clearly shows that somebody is innocent, or even if they know that there are circumstances in which the Court of Appeal would be likely to say that this conviction was not safe or satisfactory, then it is not their duty to conceal those facts from the court.
As I said last time, I have no intention of carrying this Amendment to a Division
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because I know the Government are very sympathetic. All through the 21 days of the Committee stage and the four days of the Report stage in the other place they went on saying, "Yes, this is a problem. We recognise that it is a difficulty. We ought to meet it if we can. There are many difficulties. We should like to help. We are doing our best. We are thinking about it. We are consulting. We shall have to see how we get on."
I asked my noble friend Lord Harris of Greenwich two questions at the end of the Second Reading debate. Through no fault of his he was unable to answer, because I had not thought of giving him notice of them. The first was whether the Government now intend, if not next year then in 1978 or 1979, to introduce an independent prosecuting authority, and the second was how they are getting on with their negotiations. They said: "We are negotiating with the police about this point "; and they also said: "We are negotiating with the Court of Appeal ". If he could tell us how these negotiations are going, I should be very much obliged. I beg to move.
6.2 p.m.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I am afraid I have nothing more to say about whether the Government would be able to proceed to set up an independent prosecuting agency. There has been no decision on a matter of that sort. As I said briefly at the end of the Second Reading debate, quite apart from any other consideration, this would involve major financial considerations and, in the present financial situation, it is quite impossible to contemplate significant new additions to public expenditure. I know that my noble and learned friend will not be happy with that reply, but I am afraid I cannot go further than I did on that occasion.
The point which the noble and learned Lord has put before the Committee today is obviously an important one. My right honourable friend the Home Secretary met a delegation from Justice to discuss this matter some significant time ago, and I am well aware that there is some considerable amount of anxiety about the situation, because my noble and learned friend is quite right in saying that there is a difference in practice, comparing the procedure in London and the procedure

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outside London. On the other hand —and I must make it quite clear before I go into the merits of what he said —we do not believe that this is really a matter for the Police Complaints Board. In general the Board have no role to play in the consideration of criminal charges against police officers, and we do not think they should have.
The Board will also not be equipped to take an informed view about whether, if a complaint against a police officer were made out in whole or in part, this would cast serious doubts on the validity of any conviction. Also the Board will not be equipped to select from the report of an investigation, material which is relevant to an appeal. In short, the Board will have neither the expertise nor the staff to attempt to intervene in criminal proceedings. To make a change of this kind would in fact mean making a structural change in the proposed role of the Board, and that frankly would be unacceptable to the Government.
On the central question —because I know that my noble and learned friend is really primarily concerned about the issue of principle —I will merely say this: what I think we are trying to achieve here is increased flexibility between trial and appeal to the Court of Appeal. The problem before us is to devise some means of isolating the minority of cases where there is a genuine possibility that the investigation of a Section 49 complaint may bring forward evidence relevant to the accused's guilt or innocence of the criminal charge, from the many cases where that clearly is not so. It should be recognised that if there is greater flexibility a great many people will be tempted to make a Section 49 complaint against a police officer as a means of getting a second look at their conviction, even if that complaint has no merit. If it becomes the general practice to have a second look at everything, any arrangement we may devise will become increasingly unworkable. The people who will suffer from this are those concerned in cases such as my noble and learned friend touched on this afternoon, where there is a real grievance and a genuine cause for disquiet.
If we may assume that ways can be found of isolating the genuine cases from the rest —and undoubtedly that is a formidable task —there will be a need to
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identify and put forward relevant information arising in the course of the investigation in a form which the Court of Appeal can handle, and to limit what is put to the court only that material which is relevant to the question of the guilt or innocence of the accused. This will require some time and a considerable amount of expertise.
Coming now to the point which the noble and learned Lord touched on particularly in the Second Reading debate; namely, the difference in practice, our inquiries confirm that there is indeed a difference in practice —or perhaps a more accurate way of putting it is that there is some difference. In London, the Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis informs us that investigations, not necessarily arising only out of a Section 49 complaint, have on occasions taken place between trial and appeal in the following circumstances. First, when information about police documents or the examination of exhibits has been requested by the appellant, either direct or through the registrar of the Court of Criminal Appeal; secondly, at the request of the trial judge; and, thirdly, because matters came to the attention of the police, quite outside the context of any complaint or request by the appellant, which threw doubt on the validity of the conviction. The Commissioner has told me that in some cases where the Metropolitan Police have had doubts about whether it was proper to continue with an investigation prior to the hearing of an appeal, they have written to the registrar of the Court of Appeal explaining why they considered that the investigation should take place forthwith and stating that unless the court objected it would go ahead. This is certainly no automatic investigation at the option of the defendant, and I think I must make that very clear indeed.
I am bound to say that there does not seem to me to be quite the same flexibility in all other parts of the country. I think there is a fear in some police forces that confusion and complication could easily arise if they were to move in this direction. However, we are continuing our discussions with those concerned, with the intention of exploring whether the practice at present adopted in the Metropolitan Police District might be more generally adopted. It may be that there

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will be other cases which could be added to the list of those which I have cited in terms of dealing with the Commissioner's present practice. We have written to the organisations concerned and envisage that there will he further talks with them when they have had time to consider our proposals.
Certainly we are aware of the noble and learned Lord's views in this matter and I know from my experience in connection with the question of computers that the noble and learned Lord will press me diligently to ensure that we make haste with these consultations. As I have endeavoured to point out to the Committee, there are real problems here. It is a highly complex matter and we are trying to achieve some common approach in the Police Service. I would not want to give a firm pledge about time. All I want to say is that my right honourable friend the Home Secretary attaches considerable importance to this issue, as I think my noble and learned friend knows, and certainly we will push on with these discussions as diligently as we can and I will report on the outcome as soon as I possibly can.
6.10 p.m.
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARYLEBONE: I do not want to delay the Committee on this Amendment, but perhaps it would be appropriate if something was said from these Benches. The view that the prosecutions in England should follow what is a frequent, and possibly even an almost universal, practice elsewhere is obviously an arguable one. I personally would welcome a debate, perhaps to be initiated by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, in which the views of the society known as Justice could be ventilated, perhaps in this House. I do not think that this Bill is the appropriate occasion for it.
Of course, I recognise that in the present financial situation, it would not be appropriate for anyone speaking from these Benches to press the Government to embark on what would obviously involve an increase in expenditure. Moreover, I venture to express doubts as to whether, in the present state of under-manning of both branches of the legal profession, an adequate district attorney's
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system could be worked out, or a sheriff substitute or a procurator fiscal —I beg his pardon —or whatever they are called in Scotland, could be worked out. It is obviously a matter which we shall have to consider at some time, and the fact that the financial stringency of the present situation prevents us taking immediate action would perhaps provide a useful period in which we could ventilate this subject in public, because so far as I know it has not been fully ventilated in either House. I would prefer to hold my own hand on it here, because I do not think I could do so without transgressing the rules of order.
On the other matter raised by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, I think there is a very serious question which must be dealt with, irrespective of the financial situation, though I venture to share the doubts of the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, as to whether this Bill is necessarily the right vehicle for doing it. There have been too many cases of one sort and another —and I agree with the noble Lord that they have been of more than one kind —in which persons who have quite properly been convicted by force of evidence and then had their appeals dismissed —so far as one can judge quite properly —on existing procedures by the Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, have subsequently turned out to be entirely innocent. Nobody could rest happy with that situation, and in point of fact nobody could allow the present financial stringency to prevent immediate action.
My own conviction is that the Home Office would be well advised to devise some means whereby material not now available to the Court of Appeal should become available before the appeal is heard, in quite a wide range of cases. I doubt whether the Complaints Board is quite the vehicle to do it, but cases can occur either because the police have not properly investigated an alleged alibi —which happened, I think, in the case of Dougherty—or in cases where there has been some impropriety on the part of the police in interrogating witnesses and in giving evidence, or it can also happen where there is no kind of complaint against the police at all, but there may be some new material.
One is happy to think that this probably sorts itself out in oneway or another, sooner

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or later. But it is not good enough to leave it to chance, and it is not good enough to leave it to the later rather than the sooner. Although I accept his figure, and that he is right in what he has said with regard to the present Amendment, I hope the noble Lord will take back to his colleague the view that this is something which disturbs many of us in relation to criminal appeals. Since I have taken in this House a more precise interest in the working of the Court of Appeal, which I have had to do since 1970, I have felt more and more that there is a chink in our armour. I am borrowing a phrase from the Lord Chief Justice in using that phrase, but there is a chink in our armour, and possibly more than one.
Lord GARDINER: I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for what he has been good enough to say. I think we are agreed that the kernel of the matter is the difference in practice in London and by most of the chief constables outside London. It is desirable that the latter should be brought to conform with the former. I am glad to hear that the noble Lord will continue his consultations. No doubt his right honourable friend the Home Secretary will bear in mind that a Home Office advisory circular is a very fine affair to which everybody, and, no doubt, even chief constables, pays attention, and which in the last resort perhaps could be used. If I may say so, I am grateful for what has been said by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone, about the problems of an independent prosecuting authority. I welcome his suggestion that we might at some time, but I apprehend not this summer or autumn, have a debate on the subject.
In order that it may not be thought that I have agreed to something I have not, may I just say in a word that I do not accept the suggestion that there are vast resource implications, for the simple reason that nearly every county now has its own prosecuting solicitors. There are 450 prosecuting solicitors all over the country doing nothing else. The staff is there to attach to the director; the State already pays the cost, as I understand it, of the Crown Court prosecutions; local authorities pay those for the magistrates' courts, and they are reimbursed 80 per cent., so we are only talking about a transfer from
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central to local government. I am not going into that in detail, but there is a case to be made for saying that there is no real reason to suppose that this will cost anything at all.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 6 [Complaints regulations]:
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH moved Amendment No. 11:
Page 6, line 37, leave out (" or 4(5) ") and insert (", 4(5) or 5(2) and (3) ").
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 6, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 7 [Constabularies maintained by authorities other than police authorities]:
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH moved Amendment No. 12:
Page 7, line 22, leave out (" twelve ") and insert (" six ").
The noble Lord said: I beg to move Amendment No. 12. This is an issue which was debated in another place. It fulfils an undertaking given to the noble Viscount's honourable friends. It deals with the question of the time limit so far as employers', if I may so describe them, police forces are concerned. It might well be pressed in another place, but it was found more convenient to make the Amendment here.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I welcome this Amendment, and remember the circumstances in which it was discussed. It seems to me that the sooner one has power to insist that the employers' police forces are brought in to the same general relationship with the Board, the better. Therefore, as this has that effect, I welcome the Amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 7 agreed to.
Clauses 8 to 10 agreed to.
Clause 11 [Disciplinary charges in criminal cases]:
6.19 p.m.
Viscount MONCK Viscount MONCK moved Amendment No. 13:
Page 10, line 28, at end insert (" or of an offence against discipline which taken alone would not constitute a criminal offence.")
The noble Viscount said: The number 13 has always been my lucky number. This is my last intervention tonight — Custer's last stand, which is not to imply that the Front Bench of the Government look like Red Indians!
In my view, this small insertion will mean that we can get over something which is wrong. If a police officer is accused of a criminal act and is acquitted of that criminal act, evidence may come out that in some way he has offended against the discipline of the force. For example, suppose he has been acquitted of a bribery and corruption charge, but the evidence discloses that he has been an associate of criminals, or has handled money or property by methods which contravene the orders of the force, or has failed to report matters it was his duty to report, he cannot be proceeded against by the police, or by the tribunal or what have you. Take an analogy from another profession. Supposing a soldier has deserted from his regiment, and a short time afterwards his wife is found murdered. He is accused of the murder, but is acquitted. In this sense he could not then be proceeded against by his regiment for desertion. I consider that is all wrong, and I think that these few words I am proposing to add to this subsection would make things right. I beg to move.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I am very concerned about Clause 11, and I confess that until I discovered what was the full point of the Amendment my noble friend had in mind I was not aware of what seems to me to be a very real danger. I understand that all that has been done, or all that purports to have been done, is to put into the Statute provisions which have always been applied by the police force, and there is intended to be absolutely no change at all. My reading of this provision is that what it is trying to say is this, that if an officer has been dealt with on a criminal charge, regardless of whether he is convicted or acquitted, he shall not be put in jeopardy again, and the analogy is being drawn with the special plea in criminal proceedings of autrefois acquit or convict. I hesitate to talk about this in the presence of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Borth-yGest, because he it is who has delivered the definitive opinion, in your Lordships'
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House sitting judicially, on this subject. I hope that I shall make some attempt to get the thing right, because it is an extremely difficult matter and a very complex one. Indeed, as I understand it, in the case of Connolly, the noble and learned Lord laid down nine principles on this subject.
We are concerned with the sort of case my noble friend was talking about. The policeman, regrettably, has been prosecuted for corruption, for receiving bribes, let us say, and he has been acquitted. Nevertheless, there are certain offences against police disciplinary regulations upon which the chief constable would dearly like to have a go at him. The sort of thing, as I understand it, that is done is that he is then dealt with on a disciplinary charge of having failed to report the receipt of money or the disposal of money, something of that sort, which is an internal disciplinary offence. I can very well see that in a disciplined force, a chief constable would be very anxious to retain this sort of power, so that if there is somebody who despite being innocent, found innocent, of a serious crime of this sort, nevertheless in the course of the activities that have been investigated by the criminal court can be demonstrated to have done something which constitutes a disciplinary offence, the chief constable would still be able to deal with it.
I look at what the test is in the ordinary criminal law which is now being imported as a matter of Statute into disciplinary proceedings, and I think the right passage is this:
"The test as to whether the new charge is the same as or substantially the same as or in effect the same as the charge contained in the earlier indictment …"
—in this case, the earlier conviction or acquittal —
"… is whether the evidence necessary to support the second indictment would have been sufficient to procure a legal conviction upon the first ".
That, I think, is what really matters here.
I can entirely understand that one would wish, as this clause does, to preclude a policeman, like anyone else, from having to face disciplinary proceedings upon the same type of charge as he has already had to stand trial for in the court. But what I am worried about is whether we are wise to put the whole of this matter into the Statute and to attract what is at the present moment a very substantial body —and

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there are pages of it in this book —of common case law into the hearing, and indeed the institution, of disciplinary proceedings. The noble Lord will appreciate that this sort of thing develops as time goes by, and once the Statute Book has Clause 10 upon it it will be necessary for every chief constable to consider carefully what is the state of the common law every time he decides to bring one of these charges.
I do not know whether it is right or not, but reading the passage I have just looked at, the evidence that would be necessary in the case of the disciplinary charge is presumably the receipt of money without entering it in some register. I would have thought that it was at any rate arguable that that same evidence would have been part of the evidence that was necessary to show for the purposes of corruption. It may not be so, but I only take an instance. I can envisage that there may well turn out to be cases where, if you apply the whole body of autrefois acquit law, you will get into a situation where the police are genuinely deprived, because of a technicality, of the ability to deal with a rotten apple in the barrel. That, I think, would be a great mistake.
The trouble is that whereas under the present machinery I am sure they pay the greatest possible regard to the rules of common law as they apply in this kind of way, the moment you put something in the Statute it can be dealt with by taking it up to the courts, taking it up on certiorari to the Divisional Court, and the whole apparatus of the prerogative orders is brought in against it. Therefore, I very seriously wonder, having looked into this again at the instigation of my noble friend, whether it might not be better, since, after all, this has apparently survived quite happily without any statutory basis for a long time, to take this clause out and leave the matter where it was before.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I would never dream of using a debating point against the noble Viscount, but I am in a slight difficulty, and I am sure he will feel for me. Only a few moments ago, the noble Viscount, Lord Monck, complained that we should be writing something into a Statute which was currently common police practice. The contrary
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argument is now being deployed by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, and indeed by the noble Viscount, Lord Monck. So the Government are, once again, in the rather unenviable position of trying to please both noble Viscounts at the same time. I will, of course, look at the point that both noble Viscounts have raised. It is the view of nobody in the Police Service —certainly not the Police Federation, who have been most exercised about this question of double jeopardy —that they wish to shield a guilty officer; quite the reverse. On the other hand, it was urged with great vigour in Standing Committee, as the noble Viscount will know, that there should be an explicit statement on double jeopardy, and the Government feel strongly that this is right.
We will certainly look at the point because, as the noble Viscount rightly says, what we are doing is incorporating in a Statute the existing practice. The position at the moment is that double jeopardy does not arise because a chief officer does not charge a man who has been acquitted in a criminal court with precisely the same charge. The only circumstances where a criminal matter is tried before a chief constable is where a police officer has been convicted in a criminal court. If it is a particularly serious matter, the chief constable then has a hearing to determine whether he is going to maintain that man in the Police Service. We should be very loath to go back on this, because there was very strong opinion on both sides of another place that it was in fact necessary to have the no double jeopardy situation spelled out in the most explicit language. Nevertheless, the noble Viscount has raised this point, as has his noble friend, and I shall look at the points they have raised this afternoon.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: I again recall very clearly the tremendous arguments about double jeopardy, and I am fully aware of the importance of this matter both from the police point of view, and indeed from any common sense point of view, that it would be intolerable that this should he so. I think what I am really asking is that the drafting should be looked at. This is being tied explicitly to the practice of the criminal courts in such terms that there cannot be any divergence

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from them at all without the possibility of legal proceedings to put the matter right, and T am not sure that that is necessarily the only way of doing it. Therefore, it is not the principle but the method of applying it that I am asking the noble Lord to look at.
Viscount MONCK: I think my noble friend on the Front Bench will agree with me that, as the noble Lord has said that he will have a look at this — and I am not a legal luminary, as everybody knows; I will have my prompter to look at it again having read Hansard tomorrow —meanwhile I should beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 11 agreed to.
Clause 12 agreed to.
6.33 p.m.
Viscount AMORY Viscount AMORY moved Amendment No. 14:
After Clause 12, insert the following new clause:
"Amendment of section 50 of Police Act 1964.
( . For section 50 of the Police Act 1964, there shall be substituted the following section:
"(1) Every police authority in carrying out duties with respect of the maintenance of an adequate and efficient police force, and inspectors of constabulary in carrying out their duties with respect to the efficiency of any police force, shall take all necessary steps to keep themselves informed as to the manner in which complaints from members of the public against members of the force are dealt with by the Police Complaints Board and by the Chief Officer of Police.
(2) It shall be the duty of the Police Complaints Board and any Chief Officer of Police to furnish on request to the Secretary of State or any police authority any information or documentation required by them in the exercise of their duties under this Act." ").
The noble Viscount said: My noble friend Lord Monck, who is just withdrawing from the Chamber, claimed that his intervention was "Custer's last stand ". With deep respect, I want to suggest to him that it was "Custer's last stand but one ", and that this is now "Custer's last stand ". The Home Secretary has frequently reiterated that there is no intention of repealing Section 50 of the Police Act 1964, which places a statutory duty on the police authorities to keep themselves informed as to the manner in which complaints against the
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police are dealt with by chief constables. Under the provisions of the Bill, however, some of the functions of the chief constable will be shared by the new Board. It seems logical, therefore, that the police authorities should have the same right of contact and of information with the Board and the chief constables as they have had heretofore with the chief constables, but the Bill is silent on this matter. Section 50 of the Police Act 1964 does not spell out the obligation of chief constables to carry out these duties. The Home Secretary has recently informed the associations that in his view the police authorities have the right to this information. There should, therefore, be no objection to it being spelled out in the new Bill, as I should have thought it ought to be.
The Working Group, in Command No. 5582, stressed that supervision of handling of complaints represented an important part of the police authorities' function, and the introduction of any new, independent element in the future should not have the effect of reducing it. In the Bill, as at present drafted, there is indeed some danger of the police officer's function in these matters being diminished as a result of the new Complaints Boards' procedures. Every chief police officer's decision will, in future, in a sort of way, be provisional only. His powers will in future be shared with the Complaints Board. If indeed the police authorities' responsibilities are to remain undiminished, it seems essential that they should be put into the same position in regard to chief officers and the Complaints Boards as, in the past, they have been in relation to chief officers.
In another place the Minister felt that it was an objection that a national body, such as the new Complaints Board, should have to supply information to the various police authorities. There may be room for discussion, I agree, as to the kind of information to be supplied. It may be that in the case of some specific designations it would not be reasonable to expect information to be so supplied. It may be that this clause could be better drafted. The Minister, in another place, indicated that she would think further about the various points which had been raised in the debate there, and I do not know what the results of her further considerations were.
In brief, the object of this new clause is to re-enact in the Bill the police authorities' continuing right to such information as is necessary to enable them to fulfil their statutory responsibilities, both from chief police officers and from the Complaints Board, so far as that is necessary, to provide them with the information that they have received before. Without that information, it seems difficult to expect them to fulfil these statutory responsibilities. I submit that the Complaints Board and the new procedures change the situation from the point of view of police authorities in obtaining information.
If the Government do not like this new clause I should be grateful if the noble Lord would tell us how provision is going to be made in the Bill, as I think it ought to be made, to ensure that the information that the police authorities require to fulfil their statutory responsibilities is going to be available to them in the future exactly as it has in the past. I beg to move.
6.38 p.m.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: The noble Viscount has rightly said that this point occupied a substantial amount of time in another place. He is quite right in saying that we have spent a great deal of time in considering the role of the police authorities. As he knows, and indeed has said, it is quite right that police authorities would like to have a much more significant role in these arrangements than are conferred upon them in the Bill. He knows why it has not been possible to agree with them on this course of action which they have advocated with such diligence.
The noble Viscount says —and he puts this forward as the central argument for his Amendment —that there is going to be a significant change in the decision making power of a chief officer of police so far as the discipline of his force is concerned once this Board is set up. Clearly, there is some truth in that. But I would put to him that there is no significant change in the position of the police authorities. I have already indicated that all cases will be referred to the Board where it is decided by the deputy chief constable that it is not found desirable, or necessary, to bring disciplinary proceedings against a particular officer. There will also be cases
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which go to the Board, where the deputy chief constable decides that he is going to take disciplinary action against a particular police officer, where the Board will have to determine whether it is appropriate to set up a tribunal.
In these two matters the Board will have a clear position and I would not want to minimise that in any way. However, that does not, with respect, change the position of the police authority. The police authority have never been responsible for dealing with individual cases affecting individual officers. As I indicated when we were discussing an earlier Amendment, it has been made clear on a number of occasions that it is undesirable that police authorities should have that power. As the noble Viscount will be aware, they have a special position in terms of dealing with assistant chief constables, deputies and chief constables but not, so far as individual cases are concerned, with any other officer, although the chief constable is of course under some obligation to keep his authority informed as to what is happening in the force, and that will of course continue to be the situation.
I must emphasise that there is no change at all so far as Section 50 of the 1964 Act is concerned. Indeed, I would add that we have, as a result of the representations which have been made to us by police authorities, increased the role of police authorities in a number of respects and will, with permission, itemise those.
Viscount AMORY: It would be very helpful if the noble Lord would itemise those respects. Might there not be instances in the future where the police authority would like some information, would get in touch with, say, the chief constable, and the chief constable might say, "I cannot tell you now because it is not only for me; the Complaints Board now come into it, so perhaps you had better get in touch with them "? I cannot quite see whether the police authorities would have any right under the Bill to get in touch with the Complaints Board. That is the kind of uncertainty that I have in mind.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: I am obliged to the noble Viscount for making that point. Following his invitation, I will go through the particular

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details that I was about to give, and then I will return to the point that he has just made. As a result of the discussions which we have had with the police authorities, we have introduced a number of Amendments to the Bill. Clause 8(2) was introduced as a Government Amendment and it enables the Board to report to the Secretary of State — this is a very important requirement — on any grave issue coming to their notice in the course of their work and a copy of any such report will be sent to the police authority and the chief officer concerned. This point arose at a meeting which I had with the representatives of the local authority associations, and I said to them that we would agree to that because they took the view, I think rightly, that a matter of that sort should be drawn to their attention, and it will be.
There is then Clause 8(5), which requires the Board to send to each police authority a copy of their annual report, together with any statistical or other general information relating to the relevant police area for the year in question which the Board consider should be brought to the authority's attention in connection with their functions under Section 50 of the 1964 Act. Thirdly, current Home Office advice to chief officers —this is primarily paragraphs 18 and 19 of Circular 108/72 —on the information to be supplied to police authorities in connection with their responsibilities under Section 50, will be revised in consultation with police authority representatives to take account of the activities of the Board. That is obviously necessary. Fourthly, and highly important, no regulations will be made under the Bill —we were talking about a regulation on an earlier Amendment —relating to complaints and the activities of the Board without full consultation with the Police Advisory Board, on which of course the local authority associations are represented. Thus, there is absolutely no desire on our part to minimise the role of the police authorities, and indeed in these particular respects we have done our best to enhance their role.
Where I probably part company most sharply with the noble Viscount is in connection with the power which he proposes to confer under subsection (2) of the new clause, which says:
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"It shall be the duty of the Police Complaints Board and any Chief Officer of Police to furnish on request to the Secretary of State or any police authority any information or documentation required by them in the exercise of their duties under this Act."
As I have sought to point out, we have a clear situation at the moment. Police authorities are not involved in individual complaints. ff one had a power of that sort, an authority could require the Board to give information on an individual case and I am bound to say that I think that that would, first of all, create a great deal of unnecessary bureaucracy, which we are all anxious to avoid, and, secondly, would very substantially confuse the relationship between the chief officer of police and his police authority.
As I indicated earlier —and this is becoming something of a cliché in this debate —although it is clear that nearly everybody disagrees with everybody else on this Bill, the one thing that has been quite constant has been the anxiety of the police organisations to maintain the existing relationship of police authorities with chief constables and not to broaden the base of that, and I think that there would be some degree of anxiety if we were to move in that direction. For the reasons I have indicated, I hope that the noble Viscount will not push the new clause, and certainly I think there is no risk, if he does not push it, that the same fate will befall him as befell General Custer.
Viscount AMORY: I cannot remember what that fate was, and my noble friend Viscount Monck has left the Chamber. I was not expecting the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, to take issue with subsection (2) of the proposed new clause and I would remind him that when it refers to " any information or documentation ", it goes on to say "required by them in the exercise of their duties ". When moving the new clause, I said that there was some information that obviously would not be needed by them to carry out their functions under the Bill. I agree with what the noble Lord said about police authorities not falling into the responsibility of dealing with a single individual case but with general information.
The noble Lord said that the Government had agreed that certain things should be done. That will be helpful and if I do

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not press the Amendment I suppose I must accept the noble Lord's absolutely categorical statement that in his opinion and that of the Government the provisions of the Bill will not diminish the statutory responsibilities which fall on police authorities. I moved my new clause because the advice I had received was that the provisions were likely to diminish those responsibilities, but of course it is difficult for me to say to the noble Lord that he and his advisers are completely wrong over this.
If it is their intention that the powers will not be diminished, then those powers need not be diminished. However, we should still have preferred to have had this spelled out in the Bill. I attach importance to what the noble Lord says. I know that he does not make these statements lightheartedly. In view of the fact that he has stated that the statutory responsibilities of the police authorities will not be diminished by the provisions of the Bill, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 13 agreed to.
Remaining clause agreed to.
Schedule agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported with the Amendments.

RESALE PRICES BILL [H.L.]
Reported from the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bill, with Amendments, and recommitted to a Committee of the Whole House.

HEROIN ADDICTS REGISTER
Baroness WOOTTON of ABINGER Baroness WOOTTON of ABINGER asked Her Majesty's Government:
What has been the maximum and the minimum number of persons on the register of heroin addicts in the past three years.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: It is not possible to give the maximum and minimum number of notified heroin addicts during any particular period because no running total of the number of addicts is kept. The number of addicts known to the Home Office to be receiving heroin either alone or in combination with other drugs at 31st December 1975 was 316; the figures at the end of 1973 and 1974 were 378 and 392 respectively.
House adjourned at nine minutes before seven o'clock.