Lords Sitting of 16 November 1976

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

AIRLINE OVERBOOKING COMPENSATION SCHEME
Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are now in a position to make a statement upon the result of the discussions between the Civil Aviation Authority and British Airlines concerning the application of the overbooking compensation scheme to return flights resulting from an original booking made in the United Kingdom on British arilines.
Lord ORAM: My Lords, I understand from the Civil Aviation Authority that the airlines see difficulties in extending the scheme as suggested. The Authority is, however, continuing to explore the possibilities with the British airlines, including that of persuading airlines generally to provide compensation for denied carriage, on a worldwide basis. Naturally the Government hope that these further efforts will be successful.
Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY: My Lords, is the Minister aware that I left the Question on the Order Paper because I hoped that even he—and I am not being offensive—might think that four months was rather a long time to wait for a satisfactory answer? Does the Minister recall that it was 14th July when this matter was first raised? Further, may I ask the Minister whether he is aware that there are two points of view on this, and that the point of view which some of us have been pursuing is that this compensation on airline tickets should extend to the whole of the ticket and
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should first of all be covered by those airlines which have adopted the British airlines scheme?
Lord ORAM: My Lords, I understand the differing approaches to the Question, but I should like to assure my noble friend that she has allies in important places. I understand that the Civil Aviation Authority would like the airlines to go further than has been suggested by the Airlines Users' Committee of which she is a member and would wish the compensation to cover all passengers on inward flights, irrespective of where they happen to have bought their tickets. Therefore, I can assure my noble friend that there are many who think with her, but it is a question by which route we can best make progress and at what speed.
Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY: My Lords, is the Minister aware that being told that I have allies and that a lot of people agree with me is the best bit of news that I have had for a long time?
Baroness EMMET of AMBERLEY: My Lords, is the Minister aware that the last time that I put a supplementary to this Question I received a very courteous letter from the Civil Aviation Authority, saying that the delay was not their fault? However, could we trace where the fault lies regarding this delay? The journey of exploration seems to have gone on for rather a long time.
Lord ORAM: My Lords, we should not underestimate what has been achieved. The voluntary compensation scheme was a very important step forward, covering a considerable range, and my noble friend Lady Burton of Coventry deserves a good deal of credit for moving that far. What has been achieved up to this point is indeed a major achievement. We are now talking about extensions of that scheme.

PHILIPPINE AIRLINES' LANDING RIGHTS
2.40 p.m.
The Earl of KIMBERLEY: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To Her Majesty's Government

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what the present situation is with regard to Philippine Airlines obtaining landing rights at London Airport.
Lord ORAM: My Lords, Philippine Airlines' request for permission to operate air services into London Airport was first discussed in London last May during air services negotiations between officials of the United Kingdom and Philippine Governments. Those discussions were adjourned and no date has yet been agreed for their resumption.
The Earl of KIMBERLEY: My Lords, while thanking the Minister for that Answer may I ask him whether he is aware that the Philippines have bought British aeroplanes for 20 years against American competition and, secondly, that they are a very hot prospect for buying or leasing a Concorde? Would not the Minister agree that this is not the way to treat a prospective customer who may well buy a £35 million aircraft?
Lord ORAM: My Lords, I am aware of the importance of the Philippines as a potential customer, but the noble Earl's Question relates to landing rights. It is the policy of Her Majesty's Government, in common with most other foreign Governments, to adhere to the principle that we exchange air traffic rights only for air traffic rights. It is not a question of linking it with commercial negotiations.
The Earl of KIMBERLEY: My Lords, does not the Minister think, therefore, that in future it might be a good idea in this instance to make an exception and to go into the matter in greater detail?
Lord ORAM: My Lords, I am not sure that the situation in relation to the Philippines is so exceptional as to call this policy into question.

HYDROGRAPHIC STUDY GROUP RECOMMENDATIONS
2.42 p.m.
Lord SHACKLETON: 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 further decisions have been taken by the Government in regard to the recommendations of the Hydrographic Study Group, debated in the House of Lords on 17th December 1975.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, since the debate on 17th December 1975 in your Lordships' House about the Hydrographic Study Group Report, considerable progress has been made on implementing its recommendations. The staff of the Hydrographic Department at Taunton is being increased to improve the standard of maintenance of the Admiralty Chart series; publications are being increased in price by 50 per cent.; and a Hydrographic Strategic Review Body has been formed to review the national programme of surveying on a regular basis.
In addition, as my honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence for the Royal Navy announced on 12th October in another place, it has recently been decided that the Royal Navy's hydrographic fleet should be retained at its present size for the time being. During 1977/78 the Department of Energy and the Ministry of Overseas Development, as well as the Ministry of Defence, will contribute towards the running costs of the ships identified in the defence review as surplus to strict minimum defence requirements. The basis of the operation of the Hydrographic Service thereafter is being reviewed with the aim of ensuring that in the long term, and paying particular attention to its commercial potential, the fleet will continue to be able to carry out a full programme of surveying in support of all national requirements. This programme would include work in United Kingdom waters and overseas, the priorities for which would be considered by the Hydrographic Strategic Review Body.
Lord SHACKLETON: My Lords, is my noble friend Lord Winterbottom aware that the Answer he just gave will give great satisfaction to many of your Lordships who took part in this debate? Is the noble Lord also aware that it is very pleasant to find the Government actually doing something that the House did not suggest that they should do? May I further ask him why in fact no

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more publicity has been given to this other than by Written Answer in the other place? Are the Government unwilling to give good news on subjects of this kind? May I ask my noble friend in the furtherance of the annual review, the review that will now take place, whether the Government will keep Parliament aware of what is happening in this important area, which calls for an increase in effort?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I am most grateful to my noble friend Lord Shackleton for his bouquet. He has given a very welcome fillip to the publicity about this welcome development.
Lord BALERNO: My Lords, are the Government aware that this news will be gratefully received in Scotland, which has a rather larger problem than the adjacent kingdom to the South? Is it possible to obtain an assurance from the Government that on no account will the hydrographic survey be devolved in any future Bill?
Viscount ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, while adding my congratulations to the Government, may I ask, in view of the great load of additional work which has come on to the Hydrographic Department through the North Sea oil programme, whether it is not possible for the programme to be increased? Is it possible that other facilities might be provided and additional revenue found for this purpose from the oil revenues which we expect to receive?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, there is no doubt that the need for scientific surveying of waters around the United Kingdom is of increasing importance in view of our oil prospecting activities. Only approximately 25 per cent. of the waters around this country have been surveyed other than by lead and line, and for this reason a highly scientific fleet is required.
Lord MOTTISTONE: My Lords, while adding my congratulations to the Government, may I ask whether they are aware that the commercial selling of hydro-graphic publications still leaves much to be desired? Welcome though it is that the Government are increasing the price of the publications by 50 per cent., have they
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considered employing commercial marketing advice in arriving at this sort of decision? Are the Government aware that it appears that an important publication, Ocean Passages of the World, is out of print pending re-issue, and that this is very much in demand overseas?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I do not know the exact number, but the staff is being increased in order to maintain the high standards and good service that the Hydrographer has supplied until now. I shall draw to the attention of my right honourable friend that a certain important set of charts is out of print for the time being.
The Earl of LAUDERDALE: My Lords, will the noble Lord say whether the terms of reference of the Hydro-graphic Strategic Review Body, in considering national requirements, will enable that body to look at considerations in international waters where British surveying is still much in demand, although it may not be required strictly by the United Kingdom present needs? Can the noble Lord also say what the phrase "for the time being" means? Does it mean two years, five years, ten years?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I cannot give a timescale, but in point of fact the Hydrographer and the Hydro-graphic Strategic Review Body are taking a world view of the use of this fleet.
Baroness WOOTTON of ABINGER: My Lords, why is it a matter for congratulation that the price of publications has been raised by 50 per cent.? How is this reconciled with the alleged anti-inflation policy of the Government?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, it is the policy of Her Majesty's Government that commercial undertakings—and this is a commercial undertaking—should pay their way on a commercial basis. I do not think it is the wish of this House to sell these important charts, which are in world-wide demand from here to Japan, at prices below the cost of production.
Lord SHACKLETON: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that my congratulations did not extend to the increase in price? Will he take careful note of the

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dangers which now threaten the Ordnance Survey? Will he convey to his right honourable friend the desirability of pursuing a sensible policy with regard to the Ordnance Survey?

POLITICAL HONOURS SCRUTINY COMMITTEE
2.49 p.m.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what are the functions of the Political Honours Scrutiny Committee; whether they have authority to recommend or reject any nomination for membership of the House of Lords; and what are the qualifications considered for such membership.
The LORD PRIVY SEAL (Lord Peart): My Lords the function of the Political Honours Scrutiny Committee is to report to the Prime Minister whether the persons whose names he submits to them are fit and proper persons to be recommended for appointment to any dignity or honour on account of political services. Their function is one of scrutiny and scrutiny only—to report if the past history or general character of a person render him unsuitable to be recommended. The Committee have no duties of initiation or recommendation, nor are they asked to adjudicate on the nature of the honour submitted, whether it be for Life Peerage or for any other appointment, The criteria for the selection of Life Peers are not, therefore, a matter for the Committee. They are for the Prime Minister to decide.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for that reply. In the matter of the rejection, the non-acceptance of nomination, can he say what criteria would justify action of that kind? At the same time, can my noble friend also say whether, in a matter of qualifications, the nominees are ever asked if they propose to attend your Lordships' House and take part in the normal activities?
Lord PEART: My Lords, if the Committee reports against the name put
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forward to them, I am being asked whether that is decisive against the appointment being made. I would say, not necessarily. I cannot reveal the details of any particular case. On the other matter that my noble friend Lord Shinwell raised, I have great sympathy with him, because I know he is an assiduous attender of this House, and is an example to many younger Peers. I hope I shall live up to his reputation. All I would say is that this is really a matter for the Prime Minister; there are a large number of considerations in mind in making the selection.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, setting aside the somewhat belated congratulations on my activities, may I repeat the question about qualifications. We want to know whether, when a nominee is suggested to the Scrutiny Committee, they are asked the question, "Have you got the time to attend their Lordships' House or do you merely accept the Peerage and leave it at that?"
Lord PEART: My Lords, I am afraid I cannot say what questions are asked in the Scrutiny Committee. I understand the noble Lord's concern about having Peers attend the House of Lords and I think he is right to press this; I make no complaint. But there are other factors apart from attendance here in this Chamber.
Lord BYERS: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether it is a fact that a Life Peerage is regarded as a political honour which has to go to the Political Honours Scrutiny Committee? I have always assumed, and so has my Party, that it is a political appointment to attend this House and to take part in the discussions.
Lord PEART: My Lords, I think the noble Lord, Lord Byers, is quite right. I am new to this; probably he is more expert about it than I am. But I think he is right.
Lord BYERS: My Lords, if I may ask the noble Lord one further question, is it not a fact that a Life Peerage is an appointment, whereas, for example, a Privy Counsellorship is regarded, oddly enough, as a political honour and has to go to the Political Honours Scrutiny Committee?
Lord PEART: Well, my Lords, I understand that.
Lord PAGET of NORTHAMPTON: My Lords, can the noble Lord confirm or deny the rumour that the Committee were on holiday when the last list was presented?
Lord SEGAL: My Lords, would not this somewhat thorny question be a little clarified if my noble friend would venture—and I would fully understand it if he is reluctant—to give some of the disqualifications rather than the qualifications?
Lord PEART: My Lords, I think that would be inappropriate.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that I am far from indulging in criticism of those who are unable to attend, for business or other reasons? There is no criticism in my Question so far as that is concerned. But would it not be in the public interest, if I can use that somewhat ragged cliché if there was less secrecy about this matter, and no mystification?
Lord PEART: My Lords, I think my noble friend must understand that there has to be some secrecy about this matter. We are talking here about confidential matters which I cannot reveal. But I am glad that he has said what he has; there are noble Lords who have high business appointments and are not able to attend, but they are very fine Peers.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that many people who follow the working of our Constitution may be disturbed at the form of questioning to which he has just been subjected? One would have thought that a Life Peerage or any other honour of that kind was partly an honour and partly given in anticipation of the part that person could play in the interests of the country in the future. I would have thought that the recipient of such an honour ought himself to judge the occasions when he could make a contribution to the country. To make regular attendance an essential requirement would, I think, cut across the true value of this particular honour.
Lord PEART: My Lords, I do not think that the noble Lord disagrees with what my noble friend said in his supplementary Question.
Lord WADE: My Lords, could we have one point clarified, although I think the noble Lord has referred to it. Is it not correct that the creation of Life Peers is not the concern of the Scrutiny Committee?
Lord PEART: My Lords, I agree that the Scrutiny Committee cannot create Life Peers; I have stated that.
Lord HAWKE: My Lords, is the noble Lord the Leader of the House aware that we on this side of the House would greatly welcome his mobilising his full voting strength of 150 and giving our Whips the fright of their lives?
Lord PEART: And me, too, my Lords.

ANGLIAN WATER AUTHORITY BILL [H.L.]
The CHAIRMAN of COMMITTEES (Lord Aberdare): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper. Its purpose is to enable the Anglian Water Authority Bill, which is now being considered in another place, to resume its progress through Parliament next Session. It is in no way the fault of the Promoters that the Bill will not have received Royal Assent by the end of this Session. The corresponding procedural Motion was agreed in another place last Thursday. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Promoters of the Bill have leave to suspend any further proceedings thereon in this Session, in order to proceed with the Bill, if they shall think fit, in the next Session of Parliament, provided that notice of their intention to do so be lodged in the Office of the Clerk of the Parliaments not later than Five o'clock on the day before the close of the present Session;
That such Bill shall be deposited in the Office of the Clerk of the Parliaments not later than Three o'clock on or before the third day on which the House shall sit after the commencement of the next Session of Parliament, with a declaration

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annexed thereto, signed by the Agent, stating that the Bill is the same in every respect as the Bill at the last stage of the proceedings thereon in this House in the present Session;
That the proceedings on such Bill shall, in the next Session of Parliament, be pro forma only in regard to every stage through which the same shall have passed in the present Session, and that no new fees be charged in regard to such stages;
That the Standing Orders by which the proceedings on Bills are regulated shall not apply, in the next Session of Parliament, to such Bill in regard to any of the stages through which the same shall have passed during the present Session.—(Lord Aberdare.)
On Question, Motion agreed to; and a Message ordered to be sent to the Commons accordingly in reply to their Message of Thursday last.

INDUSTRY (AMENDMENT) BILL
Read 3a, and passed.

AIRCRAFT AND SHIPBUILDING INDUSTRIES BILL
2.57 p.m.
The MINISTER of STATE, NORTHERN IRELAND OFFICE (Lord Melchett): My Lords, I beg to move that the Commons Amendments and Reasons be now considered.
Moved, That the Commons Amendments and Reasons be now considered.—(Lord Melchett.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
COMMONS REASONS FOR DISAGREEING TO CERTAIN OF THE LORDS AMENDMENTS, A COMMONS AMENDMENT TO ONE OF THE LORDS AMENDMENTS AND COMMONS AMENDMENTS IN LIEU OF CERTAIN OF THE LORDS AMENDMENTS AND MOTIONS PROPOSED ON CONSIDERATION OF CERTAIN OF THE COMMONS REASONS
[References are to Bill (314) as first printed for the Lords. Commons Reasons are printed in italics.]

LORDS AMENDMENTS
1 Clause 1, page 2, line 6, leave out paragraphs (a) to (c).
2 Clause 1, page 2, line 21, leave out paragraph (e).
The Commons disagreed to these Amendments for the following Reason:
3 Because the Amendments would prevent the effective constitution of either Corporation.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendments Nos. 1 and 2, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 3. The Government cannot accept that the Secretary of State's regulation-making power under Clause 1(3) should be restricted solely to the disclosure during Board deliberation of Board Member's interests in contracts. Your Lordships argued against most of subsections (3) on the ground that it gave excessive power to the Secretary of State. But, apart from two parts which I shall come to in a moment, the subjects which your Lordships removed from the scope of the regulation-making powers are matters which have been covered in previous nationalisation Statutes; namely, provision for the appointment and tenure of offices, quorum, Board proceedings and related questions. In most cases these are covered in detail in a Schedule. In the Gas Act 1972, a Conservative measure, these same questions were covered in precisely the same way, by regulations, as we seek to deal with them in this Bill.
The Government consider that the Secretary of State should have the power to determine not only these questions but other matters covered in Clause 1(3). These are the power to determine the size of the Board and the power to appoint members of the Corporations to particular offices.
We are departing in a small way from precedent here in that the Bill allows these questions to be settled by regulations. In previous legislation, the size of the Board and the particular offices to which the Secretary of State may nominate Board members have been specified in the Statute. Your Lordships ascribed unjustifiable significance to this change. We conceived of it as a logical extension of the regulation-making powers introduced under the Gas Act 1972 which would provide a small but useful element of flexibility. This is particularly useful in the context of this Bill which covers two industries likely to develop in very different ways

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and therefore whose board size and nature may well need to change one way or the other. We have provided a sensible means of covering this contingency by doing no more than extending a principle which has already been accepted.
I should add that as the Bill is left by your Lordships' Amendments the Secretary of State is not empowered to appoint even Deputy Chairmen (which he appoints in all other similar legislation) and there is even doubt as to whether he could specify terms and conditions to his appointment of Chairman and Members—whom, in consequence, we might have to appoint for life. It is essential that the legislation should provide for all these subjects and for these reasons I recommend that your Lordships' House should not insist on Amendments 1 and 2.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on the said Amendments, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 3.—(Lord Winterbottom.)
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: My Lords, I think the House will be very disappointed at this reaction on the part of the Government. Later we are going to deal with the question of Parliamentary control and I have no doubt the Government will say that they do not believe that certain extra Parliamentary control provisions are needed. Yet here is the noble Lord saying that he needs what he calls a "logical extension". Indeed it is an extension. I do not think he has answered at all the issue of what we called "swamping" when we discussed this at earlier stages, which seems to me to be an entirely appropriate matter to bring up at this moment when there is some suggestion that the same techniques might be applied to certain other bodies that I could think of.
Furthermore, the noble Lord has not mentioned once the issue which I think worried us most of all and which was raised by my noble friend Lord Carr; namely, the power of the Secretary of State to appoint executive directors in these Corporations. One has to ask the noble Lord what it is that makes him think that the Secretary of State is the proper person to appoint the directors in these enterprises, and is it not entirely at variance with the Mackintosh report (of which, I confess, I have only read
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Press reports)? Is it not entirely at variance with what we understand is to be recommended and the worry which is being expressed at the undermining of the powers of the chairmen of these Corporations?
With regard to the noble Lord's last point, I believe it ill behoves him at this juncture to start making detailed criticisms about the way in which the Amendment is worded, saying that possibly it takes away certain powers which would be needed. It could quite easily have been corrected if only the Government had seen the wisdom of the principle which underlies the thoughts behind the Amendment. Surely at this juncture we cannot discuss nit-picking details like the fact that the length of the appointment of the chairmen could be affected by the way this Amendment has been phrased.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I am rather surprised that we should be asked to wait for the Mackintosh report when time is running so short. What we have done is to take a provision in a previous Conservative measure, modified it in a minor way and used it for the purpose of this Bill. I honestly do not see who on earth is going to decide about appointments other than the Secretary of State. He is ultimately responsible to your Lordships' House as he is to Parliament as a whole, and for that reason I see no other person who could be charged with those responsibilities. I do not think we are nit-picking; we are just building on precedents created by noble Lords opposite to a small degree. I cannot see the reason for the dislike of the present situation.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
3.4 p.m.

LORDS AMENDMENT
4 Clause 2, page 4, line 6, after "weapons" insert "and of space vehicles and systems".
The Commons agreed to this Amendment and proposed the following Amendment thereto:
5 Line 2, leave out "and systems".
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 5 to the Lords Amendment No. 4. Your Lordships' Amendments would add space activities to the activities which British Aerospace is under a duty to carry on under Clause 2(1). The

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Amendment to the Amendment extends the duty only to space vehicles. This is to make it clear that there is no intention of altering the present arrangements which cover the space industry. This consists of two firms which will come within British Aerospace—the British Aircraft Corporation and Hawker Siddeley Dynamics—and a number of electronics firms in the private sector, Plessey and Redifon being among them. They operate in the context of a close relationship with Government and with European institutions. To impose a positive duty on the Corporation to operate in the field of space systems could upset this delicate balance, which reflects technological capabilities in particular areas of space activities. This could compel British Aerospace to enter areas, for example, on the systems and payload side where it has limited current capability, where it would be competing with other British firms to the possible detriment of their employment, and from an inferior technological starting-point. This was the case I argued at an earlier stage of the Bill.
But time has passed, and it was largely because of fears of upsetting this delicate balance that the Government did not originally agree to include space among the duties of British Aerospace. Now that the Government are satisfied that the amended Amendment will not in any way affect existing arrangements, we are glad to add this important high-technology activity to the duties of British Aerospace. I therefore urge noble Lords to accept the amended Amendment.
Moved, That the House doth agree to the Common's Amendment No. 5 to the Lords Amendment No. 4—(Lord Winterbottom.)
Lord KINGS NORTON: My Lords, I only wish to say, as I was the person responsible for getting these words into the Bill, that I am perfectly satisfied with what the Government propose and I am delighted to find that my Amendment is the only one to which the Commons have agreed.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
6 Page 4, line 7, at end insert:
"(1A) Nothing in this Act shall preclude British Airways Corporation or any other
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British Airline registered in this country from seeking supplies of civil aircraft including engines and ancillary equipment from any source should British Aerospace be unable or refuse for any reason to meet the specifications for civil aircraft including engines and ancillary equipment asked for by such airline."
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
7 Because it is unnecessary, since there is nothing in the Bill that would restrict the powers of British Airways or any other British airline in the manner implied by the Amendment.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 6 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 7. Our real opposition to this Amendment is that it is simply unnecessary. It requires that
"nothing in this Act shall preclude …"
Nothing in this Act does preclude what the Amendment states. There is no provision in the Bill which implicitly or explicitly enables the Secretary of State to apply pressure on a British airline. The Amendment was intended as an "avoidance of doubt" provision to make it clear that British airlines were free to order from any source if British Aerospace cannot or will not meet their requirements. But it would be absurd to leave in the Bill Amendments which seek to clarify a position which no one has any doubt about. If I may nit-pick, I will point out that the Amendment refers to "British Airways" by the wrong name—"Corporation" instead of "Board". However, for the non-nit-picking reasons, I beg your Lordships not to insist on Amendment No. 6.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 7.
Earl AMHERST: My Lords, while noting that there is no obligation in the Bill, and that this provision is considered unnecessary, is it not better to put it in the Bill in order to make quite certain that it is unnecessary?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, British Airways is a very powerful body world-wide and within the private sector of the British air industry we have some rather strong minded people like Mr. Laker, if I may mention a name. I do not see any organisation being forced to

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buy equipment against their will. I think it is unnecessary.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
8 Clause 2, page 4, line 24, leave out subsections (5) to (7).
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
9 Because it is desirable that the Secretary of State should be able, subject to Parliamentary control, to provide for adjustments to the duties of the Corporations as envisaged by the subsections which the Amendment leaves out.
3.10 p.m.
The SOLICITOR-GENERAL for SCOTLAND (Lord McCluskey): My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 8 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 9. I would wish, with the leave of the House, to speak to the same purpose to Lords Amendment No. 17 which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 18. In this Bill we have attempted to introduce a modest element of flexibility. Experience with existing nationalised industries has shown that in some cases the statutory framework has proved unduly rigid and has hampered their ability to operate successfully. We have therefore attempted to avoid this danger in the present Bill.
Turning first to Amendment No. 8, this removes the power of the Secretary of State under Clause 2 to adjust the duties of the Corporations in line with changing needs, subject to Affirmative Resolution in each House. As has been explained on numerous occasions, we wish to introduce a procedure whose purpose is to allow the duties of these Corporations to be adjusted more expeditiously than has been the case in the past. In the past when the duties of nationalised industries have had to be changed, it has been necessary to introduce a Bill containing the proposals for change. The delay involved in this procedure can be very damaging. Therefore, we aim to make the procedure swifter, but still subject to the approval of Parliament.
There has been at least some misunderstanding about the purpose and effect of these new procedures, and I should like to reiterate in some detail the effect of
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the subsections which the Amendment would remove. Clause 2(5) allows the duties of either Corporation to be changed in three ways. First of all, new or alternative activities may be prescribed, which the Corporation will be required to carry on. We envisage that this would normally happen where an activity already being carried on by the Corporation under the clause becomes sufficiently central to its business for this to be recognised by being written into its duties. Conversely, an activity prescribed under Clause 2(1) or Clause 2(2)—an activity which seems central now—might in the course of time cease to be so substantial that the Corporation should actually be required to carry it on (I emphasise the word "required") and so under Clause 2(5) the Secretary of State will be able to substitute a new activity. I would emphasise that in this respect the Secretary of State can for good cause reduce the duties without need for amending legislation.
Secondly, the Secretary of State may prescribe objectives to be pursued. I emphasise that this is not a power to interfere on detailed affairs—the objectives must be, as the clause says, of a general character. Thirdly, he may lay down conditions of a general character subject to which any activities are to be carried on or objectives pursued.
These provisions are not, and are not intended to be, a means of providing for the extension of public ownership by Statutory Instrument, as has been suggested both in this House and in another place. These provisions were said by noble Lords opposite to provide a way for the Government to undertake some form of back-door nationalisation, perhaps of some unrelated sectors. I see the noble Lord, Lord Carr, smiling, because he knows I am about to refer to the paper bag industry which played an important part in his thinking in the matter. But these provisions could not be used for this because they provide no means of compulsory acquisition. They would simply allow the Secretary of State to alter the duties of the Corporations.
Let me say what I hope will be a final word on the subject of paper bags and set the noble Lord's mind at rest. Even if an eccentric Secretary of State decided to make it a duty of the Aerospace Corporation to manufacture paper bags and both Houses of Parliament were

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persuaded to agree to that course, we would have no means of bringing a reluctant paper bag manufacturer into public ownership. There is simply no means of doing it under the Bill. These provisions are nothing more than an attempt to allow a greater degree of flexibility in order to respond to changing circumstances. Indeed, we believe that they are a means of increasing Parliamentary control because they provide an opportunity to formalise smaller changes and to keep the practical and statutory position more closely in line.
With your Lordships' leave, may I say something about. Amendment No. 17. Amendment No. 17 would restrict the Corporations' ability to respond to rapidly changing commercial situations. We are concerned here of course with powers. Originally we were concerned with duties, a distinction which the noble Lord, Lord Carr, made very forcefully. But this Amendment would restrict the capacity to respond rapidly to changing commercial situations and to make the most of suitable opportunities because they would require the specific approval of both Houses before the Corporations could undertake any new activities. To impose Parliamentary control in this way would entail delays which, in the context of commercial operations could effectively prevent the activities being undertaken.
Public corporations, if they are to have any chance of commercial success need a scope for exploiting market opportunties. At the same time, because of their role in the economy and their source of finance, they must be properly accountable. The Government believe that these objectives, which are potentially in conflict, are best achieved and that the right balance is struck between them by the arrangement in nationalised industry legislation of Governments of both Parties. Clause 3(1)(b) follows broadly the similar provision in the Iron and Steel Act. These well precedented provisions combine Ministerial control at the strategic level with accountability by Ministers and Parliament for their responsibilities. This leaves the Corporations a reasonable degree of freedom while ensuring Parliamentary control. For these reasons I would urge noble Lords not to insist on Amendment No. 8, and in due course, when we reach it, also Amendment No. 17.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 9.—(Lord McCluskey.)
3.18 p.m.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, before I refer to what the noble and learned Lord, Lord McCluskey, has said, may I be allowed to make two general points. I think your Lordships' House should be aware that of all the Amendments which have been disagreed to by the Commons, 53 in all, and which we shall be discussing today, no fewer than 26—in other words, half of them—were rejected by the other place without any discussion at all. I think that that brings home to your Lordships' House the farce to which our democratic Parliamentary procedures have been brought by the use of the guillotine in another place. Of course there was precedent set in guillotining Lords Amendments. I cannot help recalling, however, that when in a previous Parliament we were providing for a guillotine of Lords Amendments on the Industrial Relations Bill we provided not six hours but five days for discussion of Lords Amendments.
There is one other point I should like to make briefly, because Ministers may perhaps wish to consider the matter. I am sure that I am not alone in your Lordships' House in being concerned by the reports which appeared in today's Guardian, "Labour threat to stop cash on shipyards". If one reads the text it includes the aircraft industry as well. Apart from the question of cash, it is suggesting that in certain circumstances the Government would see to it that the new British Shipbuilders Corporation would deny orders to Messrs. Yarrows, Vickers, and Vosper Thornycroft, the naval shipbuilders, and as punishment would see that the orders were sent elsewhere if Parliament were to remove those firms from the Bill.
I am quite sure that these reports cannot be true. If they were true, it would be blackmail of the most despicable kind. I suspect that it might really amount to a breach of Parliamentary privilege. I repeat that I cannot believe that there is any truth in these reports but I hope that Ministers will take an early opportunity today of denying that

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there is any truth in these reports. When reports like this appear in a newspaper like the Guardian I feel that the Government should formally deny the truth of them. Although I want to stress to your Lordships that I am not giving them any credence, I thought it was right to bring the matter to the attention of the House.
Coming to Amendment No. 8, the noble and learned Lord, Lord McCluskey, said that the Government in these sub-sections, which the other place are seeking to reinsert in the Bill, are taking a modest element of flexibility. I have not got my Oxford Dictionary with me but I cannot believe that the powers the Government are taking could possibly be covered by the word, "modest". I accept that it may be the Government's genuine intention to use these powers in a modest way. That is probably true. However, as we said at the Committee stage, we have to consider what is in the Bill, not the intentions of the present Secretary of State. As I pointed out and as the Government have admitted, these powers would in fact enable the Government, simply by Statutory Instrument procedure, to place a duty on either of these Corporations to enter into any sort of manufacture or activity they choose to think of, including paper bags. As I said, I deliberately chose an absurd example in order to spotlight the limitless breadth of the powers which are included in the clause. I saw the noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury, smiling when the noble and learned Lord, Lord McCluskey, mentioned paper bags. I am sorry he has left the Chamber because it could equally encompass food retailing and distribution simply by Statutory Instrument. I do not know whether we all realise the literally limitless power inherent in these subsections.
Of course the noble Lord made the point℄and I deny and have never ceased to deny it℄that the Bill does not give them power actually to acquire against their will paper bag manufacturers or food retailing establishments. It simply gives the Secretary of State power to order these Corporations to undertake these activities as a matter of duty, and to do so without any fair trading provisions in the Bill to safeguard the way in which they should carry out the undertaking. I repeat that I am not suggesting for one moment that the present Secretary of
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State or the present Cabinet or the new Corporations when set up have any idea of doing those things. I just beg your Lordships to take note of the fact that these are the powers we are putting on the Statute Book for future Secretaries of State of whatever Party. I only hope that one day your Lordships do not look back and say that it was an unwise thing to do.
However, we are not going to fight this matter to the last ditch. We think it is a silly degree of power. We would not have opposed a modest element of flexibility. But it is not a modest element of flexibility; it is an unlimited element of flexibility for which power is being taken. Finally, we wish to register the protest, but having said that I think we must leave it and hope that nobody ever abuses these powers; but that there is scope to abuse them let your Lordships be in no doubt at all.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley, said that many of these Amendments were not discussed. But Amendment No. 8 was discussed and voted upon, and the majority against the Lords Amendment was 31. In relation to my use of the word "modest", I would hesitate to cross swords with a former Home Secretary on the matter of modesty, but the modesty of the provision here surely derives from the requirement in Clause 2(6) that the order be brought before both Houses of Parliament for Affirmative Resolution.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
10 Clause 2, page 5, line 11, after "form" insert "in which all employees have the right to participate.".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
11 Because it is undesirable further to qualify the concept of industrial democracy the Deputy Speaker having cast his vote to retain the Bill in the form in which it left the Commons.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 10, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 11. This Amendment assigns rights in industrial democracy to all employees with no effective means of exercising them. This approach is contrary to our general policy on proper

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employee representation. I have made it clear repeatedly in your Lordships' House that the Government regard independent and recognised unions as the organisations best suited to represent the interests of all employees. It is for this reason that we expect them to play a special part in consultations and the development of industrial democracy. We believe that we should build on their strength. Of course I have also repeatedly made clear that all employees have the right to participate in consultations and in industrial democracy, but the Government believe that the trade union movement provides a means of participation, whereas this Amendment confers rights but without any practical means of exercising them. I hope that for those reasons noble Lords will not insist on their Amendment.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 11.℄(Lord Melchett.)
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I noted with interest that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, said that he repeatedly expressed the view that all employees have a right℄and I think he used the word "right"℄to participate in consultation. But, of course, under this Bill they do not have a right to participate in consultation. That is exactly what we are complaining about. I only wonder whether the Government know what they are doing. As I said, the noble Lord specifically said just now that employees have a right to participate in consultation, not in collective bargaining℄we always draw this distinction. The fact remains that, as the Government wish to see it passed, the Bill specifically excludes a large number of employees from this right. We are told that they may enjoy it as a favour. In other words, by taking the line they have taken the Government are doing exactly what I said the other day; that is, deliberately creating within industry first-and second-class citizens.
This is a Statute quite deliberately setting up social apartheid in industry. I repeat that all of us, or at least many of us, understand the difficulty about collective bargaining. We are not in any way attempting to force rights of collective bargaining on everybody because,
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whatever might be the theory of it, that would result in chaos in industry. In trying to widen industrial democracy, we are limiting our approach entirely to the question of consultation. I am afraid that a lot of talk which comes from the Government of the desire to promote industrial democracy is nothing but cant. It has no meaning of any kind.
What I, and I am sure many noble Lords, find distressing is that the Labour Party and the trade unions for generations have been among those foremost in this country in the fight for universal political suffrage, for extending our political democracy. We now have a situation where every man and woman over the age of 18 has a vote, yet when the Government come to promote industrial democracy they are deliberately putting on the Statute Book a form of selective limited suffrage. The only people who are to have suffrage are those approved of by certain dukes of the trade union movement. They are no longer the rotten boroughs of the Dukes of Omnium; we are having in industry the rotten boroughs of the dukes of the TUC. I do not believe that that is what the TUC set out to achieve or what the vast majority of trade union members want, and I trust that before long there will be a Conservative Government who can introduce proper industrial democracy into this country.
Lord ROCHESTER: My Lords, I wish briefly from these Benches to support the general principle enunciated by the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley, in saying that it is the extension of a statutory right in this matter to develop a trade union which we deplore and the absence of that right in the case of other employees.
3.30 p.m.
Lord ORR-EWING: My Lords, I plead with the Government not to build into new legislation a further division in our industrial base. There are already too many divisions; there are too many trade unions, there is a division between management and men, between white collar and blue collar workers and between salaried staff and wage earners. One cannot help but feel that our problems, both in terms of growth and productivity, would be solved more quickly if these divisions did not exist. The Government are taking a retrograde step, particularly

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by incorporating aerospace, in which two-thirds of the people are not in organised unions℄recognised by the dukes of the trade unions, as my noble friend Lord Carr of Hadley put it℄and in this contest I would refer the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, to the October 1974 Manifesto which clearly did not say that there should be a division. It said specifically under the heading, "Industrial Relations":
"… to develop joint control and action by management and workers across the whole range of industry".
That is what we are seeking; that is, that all workers should have the right to be consulted and to participate.
Lord HANKEY: My Lords, before we leave this point I appeal for a commonsense approach to this problem. It is impossible for the industrial leaders of the shipbuilding industry, whether nationalised or private, to have the sort of relations of confidence with the workers which are essential for successful industry nowadays if there are something like 46 trade unions engaged in the industry. I hope that when the shipbuilding industry is nationalised the Government will make it their business to do what the Germans, Swedes and other successful shipbuilders have done and form a single trade union for the shipbuilding industry. It would then be possible for management to co-operate in a really productive way. I am absolutely convinced that that must be done and while this may not be relevant to our discussion, I want to leave that thought in your Lordships' minds.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, I should have thought that this was one Amendment which your Lordships would have insisted on retaining in the Bill. If we want industrial democracy℄I am not quite certain what is meant by that; all sorts of definitions are given of what it is supposed to mean but I define it in the most generous way℄we must have co-operation with all the workers. If somebody has to be consulted on what we call the workers' side, then all workers should be eligible to be consulted. We know that in practical terms there are many workers who would have a contribution to make but who cannot be consulted and who will not be consulted if the Amendment which we sent to the other place is removed.
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This is just another way of whipping everybody into trade unions. As a general proposition, trade unions are good and play a great part and should be supported, but if we get to the stage when people are conscripted into unions then we shall have reached the point when the effectiveness of trade unions will have been weakened, and it is to avoid that weakening that in my view the Amendment should be retained. However, it does not look as though it will be, although the arguments for it are strong. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, is having to contradict what he truly believes because he said that everybody should have a right, yet he is here sponsoring part of a Bill which removes that right from many people who should have it.
Lord LEE of NEWTON: My Lords, I agree that we should like to see a smaller number of trade unions in most industries and indeed the TUC is doing a great job of work now in trying to concentrate the number. However, as noble Lords opposite know as well as I do, we suffer from the fact that we pioneered the whole basis of trade unionism; others can take advantage of the fact that we failed in some respects. But there are now far and away less trade unions in existence than there were a few years ago. In the days when I negotiated in engineering we had 38 unions in that industry. That number has been concertinaed to a great degree.
As for the problem which the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley, raised, the House cannot have it both ways. A great number of employers who negotiate with their trade unions do so in the hope and belief that those negotiations will result in agreements which will be honoured. I used to negotiate for 30,000 people and never asked for a closed shop, although I had a 90 per cent. membership; but had there been a large number of non-unionists, I should have failed to honour the agreements which I made. If one says that people who are not organised within our trade union movement shall have some right to negotiate, one must face what that means in terms of the agreements which we make with employers and which we desire ardently to honour. No man negotiating for a trade union can hope to get agreement with people over whom he has no control in accepting the agreement he has made. While it may sound

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theoretically very nice to say that we must have 100 per cent. of employees able to discuss℄for my part I do not refute that℄when it comes to the "nitty-gritty" of agreements being made and ardently wanting to be honoured by my side, I cannot guarantee that unless they are members of my trade union.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, we have been over this ground at considerable length during many days and nights and I do not want to prolong the debate at this stage. I particularly do not want to follow the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley, in using rather harsh words and thereby disrupt the calm waters through which the Bill has always sailed in this House. However, I will reiterate a point I have made on many occasions; that is, that the Government are committed to industrial democracy. We are committed to effective industrial democracy and I have drawn attention repeatedly to the experience of other countries where, if industrial democracy and consultation of this sort has not been organised through recognised and independent trade unions, it has simply not been effective in practice. We are dealing with very highly organised and powerful groups and we are talking about the management and structures of companies. I have repeatedly said that if we want industrial democracy and consultation of this sort to be effective, we believe that it must be based on the existing strength of the trade union movement, and that is what the provisions in the Bill seek to achieve.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, as the noble Lord referred to other countries, may I ask if he is saying that it is not effective in, for example, West Germany or Holland where, as he knows, consultation is through the medium of works councils on which all have a vote; universal suffrage as opposed to partial suffrage and as distinct from collective bargaining, which is of course done through the unions?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I think if the noble Lord will study℄as I have had the time to do during my summer holiday℄some of the research published by the Buller Committee, he will find that, as I have said, where consultation and representation is not organised through
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independent trade unions it is not as effective. The people who, with very good intentions, which we share on both sides of the House, originally set up procedures and wished to see these things, have not seen them occur in practice.
On Question, Motion agreed to

LORDS AMENDMENTS
12 Clause 2, page 5, line 14, after "with" insert "(a)".
13 Clause 2, page 5, line 15, after "unions" insert "and
(b) other persons or organisations appearing to the Corporation to be representative of those of its employees or the employees of its wholly owned subsidiaries who are not members of a relevant trade union".
The Commons disagreed to these Amendments for the following Reasons:
14 Because the Amendments unduly extend the duty to consult.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendments Nos. 12 and 13, to which the Commons hve disagreed for the Reason numbered 14. These Amendments cover very much the same point as℄I am sorry, is there something wrong? The noble Lord, Lord Carr, is looking concerned. May I give way.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: I thought that we were dealing with Amendment No. 12 and that when it came to Amendment No. 13, it was for me to move it. It is not that I am so keen to move it, but I think I am right in interpreting your Lordships' custom in saying that whoever moves has the right of reply at the end, and nobody else. I was anxious to retain that right to move Amendment No. 13.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I stand corrected by the noble Lord and I shall certainly confine myself to Amendment No. 12 and the Commons Reason numbered 14 to disagree with that, and wait with eager anticipation to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Carr, has to say on Amendment No. 13.
This Amendment covers grounds very similar to those which we have just discussed on Amendment No. 10 and in the Government's view the Amendment would undermine the position of independent and recognised trade unions by

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giving to organisations appearing for the Corporation to be representative the same right to be consulted on industrial democracy, which we believe should be confined to unions which meet the criteria for indepenence established by recent legislation and which are recognised by the two Corporations. Once again the approach followed by this Amendment runs contrary to the Government's general policy and we have made it clear repeatedly that we regard independent and recognised unions as the organisations best suited to represent the interests of all employees. For these reasons, once again I hope that noble Lords will not persist in their Amendments. I beg to move.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on the said Amendment (No. 12), to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 14.℄(Lord Melchett.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 13, but doth propose the following Amendment in lieu thereof:
In page 5, line 15, after ("unions") insert ("and any other independent trade union as defined in section 30(1) of the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act 1974 which appears to the Corporation to represent a substantial proportion of its employees or of those of its wholly-owned subsidiaries").
What we are suggesting here is that, as well as the relevant trades unions, there should be consultation with any other independent trade union as defined in Section 30(1) of the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act 1974 which appears to the Corporation to represent a substantial proportion of its employees or of those of its wholly-owned subsidiaries. While voicing our protest about Amendment No. 10 we decided not to seek to resist that or to replace our original Amendment with another one at that point, because we felt, in view of the comments made in another place, and the decisions of the other place, that it might be more appropriate to move this Amendment where we are now doing it, in page 5, line 15, of the Bill, in the terms to which I have just referred. We believe that in moving this new Amendment we are seeking substantially to go towards the views expressed in the other place.
1138
The Reason given for the rejection of our previous Amendments was that they unduly extended the duty to consult. That may seem rather an odd Reason, taken in the context of the assurance of the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, that he believes that all employees should have the right to be consulted. It is difficult to see how one could extend the right beyond everybody in the organisation. However, the other place, in its wisdom, has seen fit to say that this original Amendment of ours should be rejected, because it unduly extends the duty to consult.
In an attempt to try to reach some compromise, I think your Lordships will see that we really have sought to restrict those who ought to be consulted under the law; not, as your Lordships will know, according to our genuine belief but in order genuinely to try to seek some compromise with the Government and the wishes of the other place. Here, instead of seeking as we did before to ensure that everyone has the legal right to be consulted℄and I must keep underlining this word "consulted" and put it in contradistinction to the right to be involved in collective bargaining℄we are saying that the right to be consulted should be confined to two categories: first, to those unions which are both independent and recognised, that is, the unions which have the right both to consultation and collective bargaining; and secondly, to those unions which are independent but not recognised; in other words, to unions which have been certified under the Labour Government's own legislation as being independent and therefore in no way under the domination of their employers.
I believe that this is a reasonable request and that it goes a considerable way to try to reach a compromise with the views expressed by the Government hitherto and those expressed in the other place. I beg the Government to take this seriously and to accept it as a compromise, which is what it is; to realise that we for our part are giving up a substantial part of our beliefs in order to try to reach an amicable compromise; also, perhaps, to bear in mind that this basic concept which we passed in this House was the subject of a tied vote in another place. The basic concept was only removed from the Bill on the casting vote of the Deputy Speaker, who was in the Chair at the time.

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Of course it is not really necessary to say this, but I should like to do so to be quite sure that there is no misunderstanding. I recognise that the Deputy Speaker gave his vote in the proper constitutional way; in no way was he expressing a partisan view of this issue. He was, above all, keeping the matter open for further discussion.
I beg the Government to take account of these two things, first that the other place has a tied vote on this issue and secondly that, faced with that, in this Amendment we are deliberately moving a long way from our original proposition to try to reach a compromise with the views of the Government and this very narrowly and rather formally expressed view of the other place on which, so far as the ordinary Back-Bencher and private Members were concerned, there was actually a tie. I hope that the Government will look sympathetically at this Amendment. I cannot believe that any of the independent and recognised trades unions, which, I understand, would feel very jealous℄rightly jealous℄of intrusion into their rights to collective bargaining, would find any cause for taking offence at the fact that other genuinely independent trades unions should have the right at least to consultation, but not℄I repeat not℄to collective bargaining. I hope that the Government will take into account the concession that we have made in an attempt to reach a common ground, and the fact that in another place there was a tied vote on this issue. If Parliamentary democracy is to have some meaning, then we must show some capacity in Parliament to reach compromises wherever we can. I beg to move.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, will not be oblivious of the fact that, on this issue, he has so far had the support of only the noble Lord, Lord Lee of Newton. The noble Lord, Lord Lee, made his position perfectly clear and I saw the soundness of it. He said that he could see that, in theory, there ought to be 100 per cent. consultation but that, from his experience of having been the leader of some 30,000 trade unionists, he wanted decisions to be effective so that if he were consulted and gave an undertaking he wanted to be in a position to see that it was carried out. He rather
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suggested that if independent people were not members of any trade union they could not have that certainty of being able to carry out what they had promised to do.
The Amendment moved by my noble friend meets that point absolutely. My noble friend is saying that the consultations shall not now be 100 per cent. with the individual but shall be with an independent trade union as properly defined in the Labour Government's own Act. I should have thought that meeting the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Lee, whose practical experience of this is much greater than that of many of us in your Lordships' House, would be a very good reason indeed why the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, should look at this with great sympathy. The only point that has supported him so far is the point that has now been dispensed with as a result of the wording of the present Amendment.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I should like first of all to make a small, possibly "nit-picking", point to the noble Lord, Lord Carr, about the voting. As I understand it, the tied vote occurred on an earlier Amendment and not on the Amendment which we are at present discussing.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I accept that, but I thought I had explained to the noble Lord℄and if I did not I am sorry I did not make it clear℄that the only reason why we did not move the Amendment on the earlier point was that we thought that we could more easily introduce our compromise idea at this point of the Bill. That is why it was not introduced in relation to Amendment No. 10. It was procedural and meant to be helpful, nothing more.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord for his help, and I accept it. I thought that it was worth making the point just to make sure that nobody in your Lordships' House was misled into thinking that the Amendment which we are at present discussing is that where the majority was of one vote only.
In the course of debates on the Bill the Government have explained many times why the duty imposed on the Corporation to consult under Clauses 2, 5 and 7 should

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not extend beyond relevant trade unions, as defined in Clause 56. As the noble Lord, Lord Carr, said, this Amendment accepts half of the Government's definition and I am glad to see that we are making some progress. However, I regret that the Government cannot accept the Amendment because, while acknowledging the very genuine desire for a compromise of the noble Lord, Lord Carr, the Government believe that the Amendment would undermine those in both industries as regards the very benefits which our legislation aims to provide.
The Amendment acknowledges that unions to be consulted must meet the definition of independence under the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act 1974. But where more than one union meets this definition and claims to represent substantial proportions of the Corporations employees, the Amendment would deprive all those concerned of clear criteria for deciding the issue. Our provisions in the Bill leave no room for doubt; consultation would depend on recognition and disputes about recognition could be resolved under the Employment Protection Act 1975 by the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service. We believe that those procedures which are in line with the Government's general policy on proper employee representation are in the best interests of all those in the industries. We have proposed some arrangements which we hope will prevent damaging recognition disputes arising. I suggest that the Amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Carr, offers no practical alternative and I therefore hope that noble Lords opposite will not insist upon it.
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, would the noble Lord agree that, where this is dealing with those people who are to be consulted as to the forms that industrial democracy will take℄and I emphasise that it is not over industrial democracy itself but over the forms that it will take℄under the Bill as at present drafted some 30 per cent. of the people will not be consulted or, alternatively, those who are at present not members of trade unions will, if they wish to be consulted, be forced to become members of trade unions which at the moment they do not wish to do?
Lord MELCHETT: No, my Lords, I do not agree. As the noble Earl knows, we have had lengthy discussions on this point at various stages of the Bill, and, as I have said, having discussed this issue with both Organising Committees, it is quite clear to me℄and both the chairmen of the Organising Committees have made it clear℄that they are willing to talk to any group of employees. The Bill does not say that particular groups shall not be consulted. It gives a legal right to some groups, but it leaves it open for the other people in the industry to talk as they wish, having made arrangements that are suitable to everyone involved and which do not cause long and damaging disputes of one sort or another which cannot possibly be in the interests of people in trade unions, people outside trade unions and, most important of all, the industries themselves.
Lord ORR-EWING: My Lords, will the noble Lord bear in mind that the whole excuse for this Bill, which is opposed by this side of the House and by Liberals and Cross-Benchers alike, was because it was in the Manifesto? Would he also bear in mind that the Manifesto specifically said:
"In the interests of a wider, more just and effective democracy, we shall seek to strengthen legislation protecting minorities."
Far from seeking to do that, they are seeking to bring in legislation which will dismiss minority rights. Is not this directly in contradiction with the manner in which the Labour Party put its Manifesto before the country?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, asked me the same question about a minute ago and I did my best to answer it. I am not sure that there is a great deal more that is useful that I can say to the noble Lord, Lord Orr-Ewing, that I have not already said on numerous occasions when the noble Lord and others have asked me exactly the same question. I repeat that the Bill does not remove the right to be consulted from the people about whom the noble Lord is concerned. It gives certain rights to recognised and independent trade unions but it does not remove rights from other groups.
Lord LEE of NEWTON: My Lords, I have not the 1974 Act before me and I am not certain what is the definition of an

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"independent trade union". I do not know whether it is independent of the TUC or what it is, but I have very vivid recollections about the way we worked this kind of thing in practical life. Many of your Lordships will remember the productivity agreements that were arrived at during the war. In my factory we had one before the war, but we were generally in advance of others and I shall not press that. But in those agreements there was no stipulation that one had to be a member of certain recognised trade unions in order to negotiate about productivity. We had a dozen productivity committees of which people elected within their own departments and irrespective of trade unions were members. They were not empowered to indulge in collective bargaining about wages and conidtions. The noble Lord, Lord Carr, knows that as well as I do. Within this arrangement, it was not the case that certain types were treated as being untouchables. Of course we discussed with them important matters, whether of productivity or of conditions in the factory.
The only thing that one could never agree to, for the reasons that I gave earlier and which I shall not repeat, was that they should have the powers of collective bargaining on matters that affected the lives of the majority of trade unionists. I should have thought that in this respect in relation to the present Amendment there was no problem of these people being treated as untouchables. I believe that they would certainly have rights to discuss. They would not have the right℄and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley, would agree with me in this case℄to arrange with employers agreements which would affect the lives of the vast majority of members of trade unions. Of course there will be discussions with people in what he has called independent trade unions.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I am very glad that the noble Lord, Lord Lee of Newton, has just said what he has said, because he has just described the very system which we are wanting to see established in the Bill and which the Government are refusing to allow to be established in the Bill. All along, at Committee stage, at Report stage, and again now I have made this sharp, clear
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differentiation between the right to collective bargaining and the right to consultation. I know from my experience, and the noble Lord, Lord Lee, knows from experience which is far greater than mine, that in industry it has worked perfectly satisfactorily to have various shop committees to deal with productivity and other matters of general interest to employees, without any permission to get into the field of collective bargaining; and the value of those committees has been that they have been genuinely representative of all employees, most of whom (at any rate in most engineering shops) were trade unionists, but there was no setting apart of one against another; no one was an untouchable. But this is what we are creating in the Bill; we are creating untouchables.
I say this because we are giving the legal right of consultation to some and specifically denying it to others. Although those others are told that they may be consulted, many of them have already sought to be consulted and have met with nothing but blank refusal from the Organising Committees to see them and discuss things with them. So it is no wonder that they are very nervous indeed and very worried indeed, and look to Parliament to look after their rights—
Lord LEE of NEWTON: My Lords, would the noble Lord define the types of people to whom he is referring?
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, this is the other point which I was glad the noble Lord made, when he said that he was not sure what was meant here by the word "independent". It is not in any sense meant to be independent of the TUC; it is meant in the sense, to use the colloquial phrase which has now come back into my mind, that they are not "sweetheart unions". They are certified as independent by the certification officer, set up by the Labour Government in the 1974 Act to which I have referred. I want to be quite clear, as I think I have already been with the House, that we believe that all should be entitled originally to consultation. In an attempt to compromise and to reach some agreement, I have been prepared in the Amendment to limit it only to certified independent unions. That is what we mean in the Amendment.

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I find the Government's attitude most illiberal and anti-democratic. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, keeps on talking about the Government's conviction: that what the Government are insisting on is in the best interests of all the employees. Well, who is to decide what are their best interests? The fact remains that tens of thousands of the employees in this industry do not believe that what it is proposed to enact is in their best interests. In the aircraft industry certainly at least 30 per cent. of all the employees do not accept that what is being enacted and forced upon them is in their best interests. When this Government claim to exercise democratic authority with the support of only 29 per cent. of the electorate of this country, I must say that I find it odd that they can, in the name of democracy, reject the views and feelings of 30 per cent. of the employees of the aircraft industry. But that is what they are doing and that is why I believe that the Government are taking a most illiberal and anti-democratic line.
When we come to this stage in Parliamentary proceedings we in your Lordships' House are always in a difficult situation. We have made our views very clear. We believe that very large numbers of the employees in these industries are being denied by the Government genuine rights which they ought to have. Nevertheless, I will not seek to press the matter to a Division. I can only repeat what I said earlier: the sooner that we get a Conservative Government in power, the sooner all employees of industry will have the rights to which they should be entitled.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
4.6 p.m.

LORDS AMENDMENT
15 Clause 2, page 5, line 18, leave out subsection (10).
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
16 Because it is undesirable that the duties imposed by or by virtue of Clause 2 should be the subject of legal proceedings.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move That this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 15 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 16. It is the Govern-
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ment's clear view that the courts should not have to adjudicate on industrial democracy. Therefore when we decided that it was important to underline our commitment to industrial democracy by imposing on the Corporation a positive duty to promote, we had to ensure that this duty was not enforceable by proceedings before a court of law. We therefore inserted in the Bill the subsection which your Lordships' Amendment removed. The subsection applies to all the duties imposed by Clause 2, and not just to the duty to promote industrial democracy because we wished to follow the precedent of the Iron and Steel Act 1949, as revived by the Iron and Steel Act 1967.
However, some concern was expressed by your Lordships about this subsection's effect on such questions as patent law and the rights of inventors. My noble friend Lord Winterbottom and I have already given your Lordships an assurance that the subsection does not in any way touch on any duty or liability which a Corporation may have by reason of anything else in the Bill; by reason of anything in any other enactment; by reason of anything in any other branch of law; or by reason of anything in any agreement to which it may be a party. If a person has a claim against a Corporation arising, for example, out of the law relating to patents or out of the law relating to confidential information, that person will not be able to rely on anything in Clause 2. But, equally, nothing in Clause 2 will get in his or her way.
For those reasons I urge noble Lords not to insist on Amendment No. 15 which in the Government's view would impose an improper burden on the courts.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 16.℄(Lord Melchett.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
17 Clause 3, page 6, line 3, at end insert:
"(3A) No consent or general authority shall be given in pursuance of the preceding subsection or in relation to subsection (1)(b) above unless a draft of the document containing it has been laid before Parliament and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament."
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
18 Because it would greatly restrict the Corporations' ability to respond quickly to new commercial opportunities.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 17 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 18. Your Lordships will recall that I spoke about this when dealing with Amendment No. 8.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 18.℄(Lord McCluskey.)
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: My Lords, I should like to say a few words about this specific Amendment so as not to get it muddled up with the other one with which the noble and learned Lord dealt. We on this side welcome the Government at least paying lip service to the need to have the power to respond rapidly and to have the ability to exploit market opportunities. One of our fears is that the working of the market place may be irreparably damaged if it is dominated by large State-owned Corporations, such as are brought into being by the passing of the Bill. I was also glad that the noble and learned Lord admitted that there was a conflict between proper Parliamentary control and on the other hand sufficient independence in the nationalised Corporations to ensure commercial flexibility. This is another of our misgivings about the principle of nationalisation.
The noble and learned Lord admits that under the Bill the Secretary of State is getting a considerable extension of powers, and in justification he claims that these are general powers and not specific powers. I should like to suggest to him that even if that is true℄and I am not suggesting that it is anything else℄if the Bill is read as a whole, one cannot escape the conclusion that throughout the Bill there is a great extension of the Secretary of State's powers beyond anything which we have seen in previous Statutes. I am not again taking the point that we should slavishly follow precedent, because I am sure we all accept that we have to maintain a degree of flexibility (in the sense that I should like to use that word) and react to evolving situations, which happen in
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the world of Government just as they do anywhere else. What I am saying is that, surely, if we are going to extend these powers we should at least consider the possibility that we need a corresponding increase in Parliamentary control. I should like to end up by asking the noble and learned Lord the simple question: Does he not think that it is really rather inconsistent of the Government to resist the strengthening of Parliamentary control in harness with the extension of Governmental powers?
Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNESIDE: My Lords, I do not really understand this kind of system, not having been in this House for very long. Am I entitled to say something?
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: Yes
Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNESIDE: I merely want to support the Amendment, to insert subsection (3A), because I think it tremendously important that Parliament, both the Commons and the Lords, should not be weakened in any way. That is not to say that I necessarily always agree with what the present Government do, but I do not think it would be in the interests of democracy if we never had any disagreement. Anyway, I do not think that we ought to eliminate Parliament; and when any question of importance is raised, then I think it is important that there should be resolutions in both the Commons and the Lords.
What interests me is that the Commons disagree to this Amendment for the following Reason:
"Because it would greatly restrict the Corporations' ability to respond quickly to new commercial opportunities".
My Lords, I was in another place for 38 years, and whether my own Government or the Labour Government, I always felt that they were not really very quick anyhow. I should have wanted them to have been much quicker; and to me it seems absolutely ridiculous to say,
"greatly restrict the Corporations' ability to respond quickly".
They may feel like that in another place now, but many people there, both in my Party and in the Government Party, have no idea of the length of time it

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often takes the responsible Minister to arrive at any quick decision. I think it is a most ridiculous Reason—and I mean ridiculous.
I sometimes feel that I am a little too outspoken in this House. I always like to do things politely, but I like to state my own views, and I have every intention of stating them. I think the Reason which has been put forward by the Commons is perfectly ridiculous and I just wanted to say that. I hope to goodness that on one or two occasions, anyhow, my side of the House will vote. I like my words recorded in Hansard. I think it is not very good always to come forward with excellent views and then not to vote on them, because I do not think the country understands that. I sometimes think that when the country hears on the media, or reads in the newspapers, what goes on here they really wonder that the House of Lords is after. If you state you are against something, you ought to be able to vote against it, and I should like to do that. I think this is a most ridiculous thing that has come from the Commons, and I do not really think we ought to allow that ridiculous Reason to be put into Hansard without somebody opposing it.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, I do not know whether I should say anything which will stiffen the resolve of noble Lords opposite to force this matter to a vote. I think we are agreed—and I would certainly agree with the noble Lord who spoke, Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal—that the effect of the Amendment would necessarily be to cause delay. I think we are also agreed that what is needed in the broad national interest is to ensure that the Corporations are able, with the commercial speed of response which noble Lords would praise in other contexts, to extend their activities into related fields; that is, related to the product, to the technical skills, know-how, assets or other resources of the main business. So we are at one on that; and surely the noble Baroness would also acknoweldge that, if on each occasion the Corporation had to go to the Secretary of State and thereafter the Secretary of State had to have a Resolution approved by each House of Parliament, that would be liable to cause what in some cases would be an intolerable and possibly damaging delay.
Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNESIDE: My Lords, would the noble and learned Lord allow me one moment? I am very grateful. I think probably the noble Lord is aware that I have already said that I am surprised that the Secretary of State does not drop dead, because he is asked to do so much. I should not like any Secretary of State to drop dead from overwork; but I do not agree with what the noble and learned Lord is saying at all, and I am very glad to have the opportunity to say so. I mean—
Several Noble Lords: Order, Order!
Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNESIDE: Because it is putting too much responsibility on the Secretary of State, that is no reason why Parliament, both in another place and here, should not have the right to say something. I do not like things happening about which Parliament, both Houses, have not the right to say something.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, I do not know whether it would improve the chances of survival of a Secretary of State if he had always to come forward to both Houses for an Affirmative Resolution. The other matter that the noble Lord, Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal, dealt with was the extension of powers. Here one is simply building upon experience. The experience of previous nationalisation Statutes and of the operation of these industries has indicated that the powers can be improved, and that is what has been sought to be done in different parts of this Bill.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
4.19 p.m.

LORDS AMENDMENT
19 After Clause 3, insert the following new clause:
Shiprepairing
"A. None of the functions conferred by this Act upon the Secretary of State or British Shipbuilders shall be construed as authorising or requiring British Shipbuilders to repair or maintain ships except by or through the companies referred to in Schedule 2 to this Act."
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
20 Because a limitation of the function of repairing or maintaining ships to specified existing companies is unduly restrictive.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 19 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 20. It might be to the convenience of your Lordships' House if, with your Lordships' permission, I spoke to Amendments Nos. 47, 48, 54A, 71, 80, 81 and 82, all of which deal with ship repairing.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, I wonder whether I could interrupt the noble Lord. I think that in fact it would probably be more convenient if that group of Amendments could be taken together when we reach Amendment No. 47.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I think that the Amendments will have to be moved on separate occasions, I am suggesting that I might make my one speech on ship repairing. I have told your Lordships that I have only one speech to make on this matter. I am now trying to make it for the umpteenth time and was hoping to avoid having to make it on several occasions during the afternoon.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, lest there should be any misunderstanding, I shall hope to be able to speak on Amendment No. 47 and not to have exhausted my right to speak in the debate now.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, if this Amendment is merely to be taken shortly, it might be appropriate if I, too, save my remarks for a later occasion and limit myself now to saying that this Amendment is one on which we had considerable debates on previous occasions. The other place has disagreed to it for the reasons which I gave as best I could to your Lordships when we discussed the Amendment during the Second Reading, the Committee stage, the Report stage and Third Reading. I am not sure that there is anything in this particular Amendment that I can add. I hope that noble Lords will not insist on their Amendment.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 20.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, this is the first of the Amendments on ship repairing which has returned to us. This Amendment is related to Amendments Nos. 80, 81 and 82. Those are the substantive Amendments which would remove independent ship repairers from the Bill. We have considered very carefully the Government statements and their views on our Amendments and we have also studied the debate which took place in another place. I think it would be convenient if on this Amendment we discussed the whole subject of inclusion or exclusion. I will tell the noble Lord at the outset that we think the Government have still not made any case at all for the inclusion of ship repairing in this Bill. We believe that the ship repairing companies ought not to be included in the Bill. If your Lordships agree with that, it would not upset the rest of the Bill although we thoroughly disapprove of the nationalisation proposals in the rest of the Bill. On the mechanics of achieving this exclusion, Amendments Nos. 80, 81 and 82 are the key Amendments. They are the last three Amendments which we are due to take at the end of today.
Yesterday, the Government thanked us for our co-operation in handling Amendments to make the Dockwork Regulation Bill coherent and logical. In the same spirit we are trying today to meet as far as we can points which Ministers made. Accordingly, I can tell the House that this new clause, Amendment 19, is not essential to our purpose and that I propose that the House should agree with the Commons on this Amendment No. 19.
Amendment No. 80 is a very different matter. Again in order to meet points raised by the Government we have tabled alternatives to Amendments Nos. 47, 48, 54A and 71. I am going to make only a passing reference to them. They provide for the situation of a single firm, Vosper Thornycroft. I suggest that we discuss them when we reach Amendment No. 47. So much for the mechanics. We have on several occasions discussed the substance of the Government's proposals and the objections that we have to them. I shall therefore summarise our objections with brevity.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am sorry to intervene now. There may have been a misunderstanding between

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the noble Lord and me. I understood from our exchanges at the start, that the noble Lord was not proposing to have a substantive debate on ship repairing now, but was to take this Amendment shortly and to have the major debate when we get to the substantive Amendments. It will be helpful to me (for I have now missed the opportunity of making my speech) and for the rest of the House if the noble Lord could make clear when he intends to have the major debate.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, I got in touch with the noble Lord's office early this morning and I suggested to the noble Lord's private secretary that we should have the main debate on this Amendment. I pointed out then that there were four Amendments which related to Vosper Thornycroft and which were grouped together and could be simply dealt with as a separate case and that they might be considered together when we reach the first one of the Amendments. I also said that Amendments Nos. 80, 81, and 82, which come at the end could again be, as I saw it, the subject of debate at the end of the day if there were any outstanding points on reaching Amendment No. 80, but that it would be convenient if the general question were discussed under this Amendment.
As the noble Lord moved this Amendment, he has the right to speak again and can if he wishes make his speech on this Amendment. I think it would have been wrong to bring the special case of Vosper Thornycroft into this debate. Those are consequential matters which can be dealt with when we reach the four Amendments.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am anxious not to delay the House and will certainly make only one speech. But I should put it on record that I understood the situation as the noble Lord now describes it when I started making my speech. But the noble Lord interrupted me and I understood that he was trying to change the prearranged arrangements and to take this Amendment shortly. I am happy to make one speech at the end and no doubt that will be sufficient for your Lordships.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, where the noble Lord did not conform with what I suggested was that he
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started to read out the numbers of the four Vosper Thornycroft Amendments which I had suggested should not be discussed now. That was where he misunderstood my message. I do not see any difficulty about proceeding with the general debate. I am sure that this would be more convenient to the House than to do this at the end.
Briefly, our first objection is that the ship repairing industry is a service industry and not a manufacturing one; secondly, the activities of the ship repairing firms are distinct and separate from shipbuilding; thirdly, the nature of the work requires ship repairers to be spread at various places around the coast. To be successful they must be able to offer and provide services at very short notice and to maintain the closest understanding and contact with their customers. Their initiative and efficiency will inevitably be impaired by the imposition of a centralised bureaucracy. The fourth objection is that, although there are fewer ships sailing the seas today because of the recession, the British ship repairing industry is not in difficulty and does not need to be propped up. It has been holding its own, and more than holding its own, in the last five years when it has been increasing its share of the business in North-West Europe which it has won.
Fifthly, out of about 100 British ship repairing companies the Government have selected 12 for nationalisation on an arbitrary basis. This has raised the question of hybridity, the question of whether Parliament is being fair under its own rules of procedure if an apparently arbitrary selection of ship repairing companies is included in the Bill. For all these reasons, the sensible course is to drop ship repairing from the Bill.
Let us now consider briefly the Government arguments in favour of nationalisation. These have been advanced during debates here and in another place. The Government have said that nationalisation is required in order to introduce a coherent strategy for the industry—this at the very time when it appears that a report has been written by the National Economic Development Office pointing out the shortcomings of the relationships between the Government and the existing nationalised industries. I will quote briefly from yesterday's Times, which makes clear that

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the strategy is unlikely to be coherent. The Times purports to quote from the Report:
"…government pressure has also impeded the management of the public sector, so that the Boards of nationalized industries cannot reasonably be held accountable for their economic performance 'since their ability to carry out a predetermined strategy has been increasingly circumscribed by the way Government and trade unions have exercised their powers.
"'The evidence points overwhelmingly to the conclusion that relationships between governments and nationalized industries despite some recent improvements and one or two exceptions, are confused, demoralizing to all concerned and can have damaging economic consequences for the country as a whole'."
My Lords, that is allegedly a quotation from the report. An informed commentator on radio yesterday, when asked about the report, described the relationships between Government and nationalised industries as a "shambolic mess". He was a very informed commentator; he was Sir Richard Marsh, speaking on the "World at One" radio programme. I of course remember him as a Labour Member of Parliament in another place. He went on to say that the Government have been changing policies every few weeks and that Ministers and Civil Servants kept popping in and out like mice in the woodwork. Those were his words; I took them down as I was listening yesterday. He was clearly deploring the absence of a coherent strategy. That is the view of a recently retired chairman of a nationalised industry. Is it prudent to take the risks involved in consigning the ship repairing industry to that kind of situation?
Then another Government argument has been ship repairing will not carry out the investment and modernisation needed unless it is realised. The Government here are wrong. There may have been some holding back while the threat of nationalisation has been there, but there is no serious difficulty under these heads if the ship repairing companies are released from this Bill.
Let us look at the part of the ship repairing industry which did go into public ownership through the mishap of Court Line folding up. It folded up because of the collapse of its travel and tourist side, not because of its ship repairing interests. Within 18 months one of the companies went out of business. That was Green-wells of Sunderland. About 380 men
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lost their jobs. That need not have happened. Is that the kind of new investment and progress which the Government mean? Then another pretext which the Government have used is that they have a commitment to nationalise the ship repairing industry. They may have a commitment to nationalise shipbuilding, but there has been nothing to indicate that it was ever suggested that ship repairing on its own was ever put forward as a candidate for nationalisation. When it appeared in the proposals, it was an adjunct to shipbuilding.
At no moment in recent history did a Fabian Archimedes, rushing out from his ablutions, announce that it was essential for the achievement of Socialism in Britain that the ship repairing industry should be nationalised; nor did the Labour policy committee or the Executive Committee propose or approve that ship repairing be nationalised other than with shipbuilding. Ship repairing was to be found in the Labour Party's proposals with shipbuilding and because of its supposed relationship with shipbuilding.
In the debate in another place last Thursday, the Minister, Mr. Kaufman, tried to make a lot of his contention that ship repairing was closely interrelated with shipbuilding. There is a convention that Members of one place are polite about Members in another place. As Mr. Kaufman was a little unkind in his remarks to my noble friend Lord Colville, he will not mind if I poke a little gentle fun at him in return. For the second time (because he also made the same point in Committee) Mr. Kaufman spoke of his visit to Tyneside and having walked from the Swan Hunter shipbuilding yard to the Wallsend Slipway and Engineering Company's ship repairing yard without knowing it or being able to distinguish the difference between them. I must tell him the truth: he did not know where he was. He was not going into the Wallsend Slipway and Engineering Company's yard. It is a mile away down the River Tyne from the Swan Hunter Shipbuilding yard.
There is a comic irony in his statement that he could go from shipyard to ship repair yard and back without realising he had moved from one yard to the other. The fact is that he had not. He went on to say it was also the case overseas, and spoke of his visits to yards in the Far

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East. If one looks in Who's Who one sees Mr. Kaufman lists his recreations as "travel and going to the pictures". On this occasion I think he got his recollections of them mixed up. My noble friend Lord Carr, in an earlier debate, referred to an article in the Guardian today to the effect that the Government were considering what course they might take which amounts to special pressure or even blackmail on certain companies by withholding money which had already been made available from certain companies if this Bill were held up. I hope that the Government will publicly deny, as my noble friend asked them to, that they are considering the kind of course that is conTained in that article.
Last night in Guildhall the Prime Minister was reported as saying that the highest priority must be given to the needs of industry, even over social objectives; also that we must make a success of the mixed economy. To nationalise the ship repairing firms runs directly counter to that speech. It would upset and damage an industry which is wholly inappropriate for nationalisation. My Lords, when we come to Amendment Nos. 80, 81 and 82 I suggest that we should, as a House, insist on our own views.
4.38 p.m.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, in the present state of world shipbuilding the concept advanced by Her Majesty's Government to transfer private ownership of British shipbuilding to a nationalised Corporation is a highly speculative undertaking. Nevertheless, the history of British shipbuilding in the past 20 or 25 years demonstrates that an organisation superior to that in operation for many years past under private ownership—what is called "private enterprise"—must be replaced by an organisation most stable in character, more collected in its operation.
In the course of our debates on Second Reading, the Committee stage and Report stage, I availed myself of the opportunity of rejecting the proposition that ship repairing should be telescoped with the nationalisation of shipbuilding itself. There are various reasons why we should refuse to telescope the two. As I have already indicated, it is highly speculative to nationalise British shipbuilding. One has
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only to consider the situation in Japan, Norway, West Germany and elsewhere, many countries producing ships at low cost to our detriment in this country, and the gradual decline in the industry. However, it is inevitable and I leave it at that.
But when it comes to ship repairing it is even more speculative and quite unnecessary. It will contribute nothing whatever to the advancement of our economy. Indeed, it might be an impediment to take over a vast number of small industries, some of which are struggling for their existence. At the same time to agree that British Shipbuilders can undertake repairs as and when they regard it as necessary obviously means that the ship repairing industry would be in even greater danger.
I have read the reports of all the arguments which have been used in the other place in favour of taking over ship repairing. I am bound to say that some of those arguments were laughable—certainly incoherent. I am not going to follow the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, in criticising Members of another place, particularly Ministers. Some of them are not worth bothering about, quite frankly. On the other hand, certain Members of another place are enjoying themselves, extracting great amusement and at the same time indulging in considerable excitement, by condemning some Members of this House who have ventured to express their views on this subject. Such adjectives as "backwoodsmen", "old has-beens", "misfits", and a great many more have been used. I have heard them all before but I have managed to survive. Some of those people have fallen by the wayside and those who remain had better be careful. We can take it all. It is about time that we recognised that in this democracy of ours—even with the Party system, such as it is—we should be permitted the right to express ourselves independently, irrespective of what a Government executive or caucus decides. Yesterday my noble friend Lady Burton of Coventry indulged in that exercise, and I think that she was quite entitled to do so. It does not mean that one condemns a Government or a Party; one seeks to correct the errors of judgment. That is all, and that is all I have sought to do in connection with British shipbuilding.

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One must not be at all egotistic about this and indulge in personal reminiscences, but I understand shipbuilding. I was brought up on the Clyde. I was a town councillor for a shipbuilding area for many years, with a huge majority in the days when I was popular. It has all gone now! For many years I was the chairman of the Party's shipbuilding and shipping committee and, looking at the other side of the coin, I can recall the occasion when for the first time in our history a Conservative Minister came along and asked for finance to enable a British shipbuilding company of great reputation to build a ship which was regarded as necessary. We supported him when many Conservatives were in opposition to him. Ever since then British shipbuilding has been dependent upon Government finance.
When it comes to ship repairing it is, to excuse the mixed metaphor, a horse of another colour. It is suggested that one of the companies—I need not mention its name—has been indulging in bribery and corruption and has been inviting people to dinners, functions and so on. I have not received a single invitation, but I manage on three meals a day and am quite content. What an utter nonsense it all is. The fact is that we should do this nation great harm if we took over the British ship repairing industry; nor should we do the industry, or the workers in that industry, any good.
I am not going to argue the matter again. It is better to state one's position and be done with it. I am not going to support the Government. The critics in another place can jump into the Atlantic for all I care—or some other part of the world's oceans—and I shall bear it with my customary fortitude. No, we have to make a stand. I shall make my contribution by making it clear beyond peradventure, whatever may be said about it, that this project for taking over British ship repairing should be denounced, condemned and rejected, and I hope that your Lordships will do so, too, at the end of the day.
4.47 p.m.
Lord BYERS: My Lords, I had not been aware of the private carve-up between the Government Front Bench and the
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noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, by which we have this odd arrangement whereby we are conducting the debate on Amendment No. 80 on Amendments Nos. 19 and 20. However, if this is the right opportunity to discuss ship repairing I should like to follow the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, and emphasise, very shortly, what he has said. I think that today is a time for short speeches because I sense that the Government are not going to give an inch, no matter what persuasion we bring to bear. Therefore we are wasting a certain amount of time. However, I should like to say once again how welcome the intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, has been. It helps the House very much to hear from him in the terms in which he has spoken today—as, indeed, we heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Burton of Coventry, yesterday. It shows that there is a good deal of independence on all Benches in this House, and I think that it should be welcomed. I make no secret of the fact that I think that this whole measure is extremely irresponsible, in the light of the present economic circumstances. With all our experience of the failures, the bureaucracy and the capacity for making losses in the industries which are already nationalised, it is unbelievable and lacking in common sense that any Government should embark upon further nationalisation at this time. To commit the country to further expenditure out of public borrowing—because that is what it is—of about an additional £1 billion is total political irresponsibility. But it is obvious that the Government are determined on their course and that if we try to exercise our legitimate delaying powers we shall provoke them to use the Parliament Act and they will get the whole measure in a relatively short time.
I believe that the least we can do is to save the ship repairing industry from the dead hand of nationalisation. We on these Benches do this because it is an industry which we know requires alertness, enterprise, quickness of action and quickness of decision. These are not the characteristics of nationalised industries as we have experienced them. We are also aware that if any individual ship repairing firm wishes to become part of the new nationalised industry it can negotiate to do so; there is nothing to stop it. For the rest, however, we believe that

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individual ship repairers should have the freedom to escape from nationalisation. If there are two or three firms in this list of 12 which want to be nationalised, then good luck to them, but personally I believe that the right action of this House is to resist the nationalisation of the ship repairing industry.
I want to make only one further point regarding the political aspect. I do not accept without reservation the theory of the political Manifesto. As time elapses and economic and political circumstances change, particularly when they change dramatically and substantially, so the authority of the political Manifesto itself diminishes. It has to. The situation at the end of 1973, when the Labour Party's Manifesto was written for the February 1974 Election, was quite different from the situation today. Different policies are needed and in our present circumstances we should not be spending public money on more nationalisation, Manifesto or no Manifesto. Personally, as I have said, I should like to kill the whole of this measure because I think it is ill-conceived and irresponsible against the economic climate and background in which we are living. At least what we can do is to save efficient and profitable ship repairers from the fate which the Government have in mind for them. From these Benches we shall have no hesitation in insisting that ship repairing is taken out of the Bill and I hope that the Government, against the whole economic background of today, will respond in the spirit in which our actions are intended.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, because the Opposition Front Bench have been extremely puritanical, because they have been leaning over backwards to avoid the risk of being charged with constitutional misbehaviour, they are allowing the Government to get away with three-quarters of the things they ought not to get away with. In terms of argument on principle, we should not for one minute be contemplating allowing the nationalisation of the aircraft industry; on grounds of principle and argument and common sense we should not be allowing them to get away with nationalising the shipbuilding industry. The only point on which I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, is that I see nothing wrong with the Government
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giving a grant to certain industries to enable them to carry on over difficult periods. But that does not necessarily mean that there has to be national ownership of the industry. The two things do not run together.
I gather that the reason why your Lordships are not likely to make the stand which in my view ought to be made on the aircraft industry and the ship building industry is because some mention of it was made in the Manifesto. The noble Lord, Lord Byers, has expressed absolutely my view on that. I do not think that a sentence in a Manifesto ought to be sacrosanct and be able to override the common sense of what has happened since that sentence was put into a particular document. But because mention of the document was made in the Manifesto, my noble friends, whose guidance on these matters I accept because they are wise, have thought fit not to use any powers they may have to deal with these two Parts of the Bill in the way I should like it to be done. So far as the ship repairing section is concerned, that was not mentioned in the Manifesto and—
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, it is fascinating to hear the advice which the noble Lord, Lord Harmar-Nicholls, has been given by his Front Bench on these matters, but I am afraid the advice went astray at that point because ship repairing was mentioned in both Manifestoes. I was anxiously awaiting the news of how the noble Lord's Front Bench had managed to distinguish ship repairing from shipbuilding and the aircraft industry.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, I have not had any advice from anybody; that is why perhaps my contributions are not as effective as they might be. But this is not a matter on which one needs technical advice. I was getting a little worried a few minutes ago in the debate on this important principle, because it was beginning to get very technical and procedural. It is much deeper and there is much more to it than that. This was not mentioned in precise terms in the Manifesto, and the reason my noble friends have given as to why they did not want to conflict with the elected Chamber was that it was in the Manifesto, I quite understand, although I should

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not have felt that I had to be quite as pure myself. But that does not apply to ship repairing.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I hope the noble Lord will do me the courtesy of answering the question: why does it not apply?
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, the noble Lord is suggesting that the shipbuilding mentioned automatically carries with it ship repairing.
Lord MELCHETT: With great respect, my Lords, I am not. Ship repairing is mentioned specifically in both Manifestoes. The words" ship repairing" actually appear in the Manifesto.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, as I do not want to take up too much time on that sort of argument, perhaps the noble Lord will read the Manifesto, if he can find one, and then he can form his own judgment as to how precise it may be.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, if the noble Lord will allow me, I will read out to him what was said in the February and October 1974 Election Manifestoes:
"We shall take shipbuilding, ship repairing and marine engineering into public ownership and control."
Lord ORR-EWING: My Lords, the point is—
Several noble Lords: Order!
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: But, my Lords, the noble Lord is not taking the ship repairing industry into public ownership under this Bill. The main point I want to come to is that under the Bill the noble Lord is taking into control one or two sections of the ship repairing industry. It is discriminating in a way which is against the rules, and I am saying that in the sense that appears in the Bill the noble Lord and his Government never put into the Manifesto that they would take ship repairing into public ownership in the form that is being presented in the Bill.
The real point that I want to come to—because we want to get on and to come to the vote on this Part of the Bill—is that
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this Part of the Bill is not clean. This Part of the Bill does not pass the test of whether or not it is hybrid. The position has been made perfectly clear and quotations have been given in the past. The ruling of the Select Committee was given: if there is any doubt, it is deemed to be hybrid and it should be sent to Examiners for that doubt to be removed. In 1962 Mr. Speaker in another place said that he accepted the ruling that if there was any doubt it would be deemed to be hybrid and the matter should be sent to the Examiners. The record here is perfectly clear. The Bristol ship repairing industry has expressed a real doubt and they have prepared Petitions which, if we do not vote this Part of the Bill out today, I shall make myself responsible for presenting to your Lordships to give a ruling on it. That is the first doubt.
A second doubt was expressed by my noble friend Lord Colville of Culross who put questions to the noble Lord the Leader of your Lordships' House in terms which showed that my noble friend, for sound legal reasons, had very real doubts. No answer was given to those questions which removed the doubt as to hybridity. Indeed, as a result of the answers given, quite impartial and objective legal opinion was sought outside and eminent counsel in that opinion made it clear that he disagreed with the Government on at least eight or nine of the items on which they said they had no doubt.
So if in the light of all those doubts just because noble Lords say that they are not convinced and they still have no doubts they cannot claim to have removed the doubts which others have. I sent Counsel's opinion along to the noble Lord the Leader of the House in order to support the claim I had made before, as to the Bill's hybridity. This outside, objective opinion established that there was a real doubt. The noble Lord the Leader of the House, in his reply to me, said:
"Having studied the opinion, nothing in it causes the Government to doubt the correctness of their conclusion that the ship repairing companies are not in conflict with the rules".
What he said in effect was that the Government had no doubts. He did not move far enough to say that nobody else had any doubts and the rule as it is clearly laid down and supported by the noble Lord, is quite clear; if there is any doubt at all from the source this matter ought to

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be sent to the Examiners for it to be made perfectly clear that quite apart from the principle of the Bill itself, we are working according to our rules.
The further point which made me quite satisfied that the Government were not completely clear in their own minds was the reply given by Mr. Kaufman in another place when they were dealing with other Amendments. My right honourable and learned friend Sir Derek Walker-Smith raised the point of hybridity, with some force and again with some legal backing behind his opinion and when Mr. Kaufman referred to that he did not attempt to deny any doubt. What he did is what Counsel, according to history, always do when they know they have not got a good case: they abuse their opponents. The only reply given by Mr. Kaufman on this serious point as to whether we were working to our rules was that eminent counsel who had given this opinion, which was in conflict with the Government's view, could not be relied upon, just because he had been the Chairman of the Conservative Association at Oxford, or just because he sat on the Executive of the Conservative Committee of Lawyers. I wonder what the reaction would be of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor? I wonder what would be the reaction of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, the ex-Lord Chancellor? I wonder what would be the reaction of my noble friend Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone? If in either House it was suggested that when in their private professional capacity they were giving an opinion that they were incapable of being objective and impartial because they had shown some civic interest in genuinely showing or having sympathy with one or other of the political Parties, that ought to be resented by the whole of the legal profession in this country. But for your Lordships' House, it ought to be taken into account that if the Government spokesmen have to descend to that sort of argument in order to divert attention away from the real facts of the case, it is pretty good evidence that the facts as presented have a basis. I should like the noble Lord to deal with this if he can.
My Lords, if my noble friends and the noble Lords on the Cross-Benches and other Benches do not remove it on the grounds of principle, which are unanswerable, it ought to be kept in mind
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that we would have a duty to insist that the rules be adhered to. At some stage in the future, either in Parliament or outside, this question of whether or not this is a clean Bill, whether it passes the test of hybridity, will have to be looked at to decide whether or not it ought to have been put before the Examiners, and whether when we let it pass it passes the test of legality and of keeping within the boundaries of our procedures. I hope there will be no doubt, when we vote on Amendments Nos. 80 and 81, that this section will be removed from the Bill in order to do justice to what the country needs, and in order to do justice to the sanctity of the rules under which we work.
5.2 p.m.
Lord LEE of NEWTON: My Lords, there can be no objection to noble Lords making a case against the nationalisation of any particular industry even if in the past, like my noble friend Lord Shinwell, they have been instrumental in nationalising great industries. But when these occasions are always used to denigrate the whole conception of nationalisation, then we are entitled to object. I challenge noble Lords to tell me of any set of industries in the post-war era which have increased their productivity at the same pace as the nationalised industries.
Several noble Lords: Oh!
Lord LEE of NEWTON: My Lords, I challenge noble Lords to tell me that in fact, if my noble friend had not nationalised the coal industry, there would have been any coal industry left.
A noble Lord: ICI.
Lord LEE of NEWTON: My Lords, the productivity of ICI has been good, but not as good as the great chemical industries of other nations. I mention this only because of the type of debate we are having. The coal industry was indire straits. The miner would not send his son into the pits. Again, I am challenging the Opposition to deny the fact that public ownership of coal has saved the lives of thousands of miners. There has been nothing in any of the privately owned coal industries elsewhere comparable with the efforts made in the realm of safety in the British pits. There is no coal industry in the world which can compete with it.

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My Lords, let us look at the other nationalised industries. The gas industry has had huge sums of public money spent on it. In a few short years it changed from carbonising coal, which was uneconomic, and the gas industry was going out to taking the by-products of oil. The industry then converted itself from a gas-making industry to one which merely distributes gas. The colossal sums of public money necessary for that could never have been invested unless the industry was publicly owned. I could go on talking in the same way about the electricity industry. Let us take the health industry. Had my old friend Aneurin Bevan not nationalised health, we could never have had the reduction in mortality that we have seen in this country. These are facts which no one opposite can deny.
So far as shipbuilding is concerned, this industry has remained in existence because of the huge inoculation of sums of public money. Such sums could not have been invested by the private owners. These are the facts, and unless someone wants to contradict me—and I will give way if they do—
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, I am not seeking to contradict. My noble friend may have heard what I said about the principle of the nationalisation of shipbuilding. We are seeking to take over another industry. Is my noble friend aware that in the Cabinet of 1945 to 1951, when we decided to nationalise steel, we argued about it at great length. I protested because there was a suggestion that we must take over some subsidiary undertaking, Guest Keen and Nettlefolds. Eventually we agreed to nationalise steel, but not to take over Guest Keen.
Lord LEE of NEWTON: My Lords, my noble friend need go no further. We could have been nationalising Smiths' Crisps at that time. But the peculiar composition of capitalism is not the issue before us. I agree with my noble friend, which is why, when drawing up the Steel Bill in 1965, one deliberately took out all that kind of thing. Indeed, when I look at shipbuilding as distinct from ship repairing, maybe I should declare an interest because thousands of my colleagues in my engineering union are in both industries. Sometimes they work in ship-
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building, and sometimes in ship repairing. I do not know that to them it makes much difference.
So far as shipbuilding is concerned, many hundreds of millions of pounds of public money have been invested in it, and therefore I should have thought we were entitled to expect a return for that money. Ship repairing is a different issue. I heard one Tory Member of Parliament say this morning on the radio, that we should try to denationalise those industries which are making profits; in other words, keep in public ownership those which do not make profits, and then complain that they cannot make profits. This is the kind of issue we are up against now.
I would put it to the House that there can be no affinity between shipbuilding and ship repairing unless they are of an entity in the sense of ownership, plus the fact that I have yet to hear contradicted their enormous success in the field of increased productivity and public investment. Whether you take the steel or coal industries, or any of the others, there could never have been the modernisation of those elements which are now in the public sector unless public ownership had taken place. The House and the nation had better face that as a fact which is irrefutable should anyone wish to deny it.
Lord KINNAIRD: My Lords, I did not intend to join in the debate this afternoon, but yesterday I received a letter which, in view of the various remarks made by your Lordships this afternoon, I feel it would not be out of place to read to your Lordships. The letter says:
"Dear Lord Kinnaird, Please accept my gratitude for your recent vote in the Upper Chamber against the Government Bill to nationalise the ship repairing firm of which I am an employee and a shareholder. Fears have been expressed amongst many of my fellow workers as to the future of our jobs under Government control. We are a small democratic company who have over the years built up an excellent name in the ship repairing industry and have contributed greatly towards the balance of payments in this country. Should we be nationalised, the current fear is that many foreign ship owners would rather use Continental repair facilities. Consequently, the outlook for us in this part of the country would be very bleak to say the least.
"While thanking you for your efforts on our behalf in the past may we still look for your future support in the weeks that lie ahead? Yours sincerely."
My Lords, does not that cry for freedom speak for itself?
5.10 p.m.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Harmar-Nicholls has already explained why the question of hybridity is apposite to this group of Amendments. It is a subject in which I have been taking a particular interest. I have been rather vocal outside this House in the last day or so, and perhaps it would be as well if I explained my position inside the House. I will do so briefly, because, of course, this is not an occasion on which the actual argument has to be deployed.
My Lords, as understand it, there is nothing wrong with hybrid legislation. It is just that when the Government, or any other promoters of a Bill, wish to deal with people or companies in a certain category and do not do so equally among them all, then the rules provide that they should be entitled, if they wish, to be heard before Parliament as to the way in which they are being treated. It does not mean that Parliament necessarily has to accept what they say, but they must at least be heard. That I should have thought was both fair and democratic.
Not only is that the general rule, but under the express terms of this Bill there is a real danger that trouble could arise if we did not deal with it according to the rules. In the form in which the Bill came to us first from another place, under Clause 19(2) only those companies are nationalised which are listed and which also fulfil the criteria as to ship repairing in Schedule 2. There is nothing to stop a company in Schedule 2—I do not know whether any one of them will—going to the courts after this Bill becomes law and asking the courts to interpret the words whereby the criteria have been described. If the courts some to a conclusion—and I think they would—which is different from what we have been told by the Government, then we shall find out, but find out too late, that we have all the time been dealing with a hybrid Bill, and we have not given to those people who are entitled an opportunity to be heard and to put their point of view about it. That, I think, would be a very sad thing to happen.
The reason why I am increasingly doubtful about the status of the Bill is this. The words in the criteria are very simple and straightforward. I have asked
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a number of questions of the Government, and as the Answers have proceeded the Government have introduced more qualifications and brought in more and more glosses about what these words mean. Instead of the simple words as they are in the Schedule, in order to accurately fit those companies which the Government wish to nationalise and to leave out the ones that they do not wish to nationalise, we have to have new qualifications, new points, new differences and distinctions brought in in shoals in each of the answers I have been given. Again there is no reason why the Government should not, if they wish, draft the Bill in that qualified and differentiating form. It has been done many times before in other Statutes. But they do not. They rely upon these distinctions in private, but they do not state them in the Bill. I have no doubt at all that, if I were given the opportunity, I could put your Lordships in a position such as described by the noble Lord, Lord Harmar-Nicholls, where you would not be sure that the Bill was not hybrid, and that would be all that I would have to do. I am not going to do it, because the great advantage of this group of Amendments is that it makes it unnecessary. For that reason, if for no other—and I have many others—I will be happy to support it.
I would say one other thing. In another place, both on the guillotine Motion and when our Amendments were being discussed, the Government spokesman, Mr. Kaufman, made two strange speeches. In two speeches he attacked the personal and professional probity of Mr. Leolin Price, QC, and in the second one he poked fun at me. I do not mind about the latter in the least; I agree with my noble friend that those who descend to paltry jibes and personal abuse probably are disguising a very thin case, and the Government's case has got thinner and thinner. But Mr. Leolin Price has had no opportunity to answer what was said in a privileged position in another place. I know what he would like to say, because by chance it came into my hands in text. It was not his suggestion that I should say anything about this, but I asked his consent to do so. This is what he would like to answer to Mr. Kaufman:
"It is clear to me that Mr. Kaufman does not begin to understand how the Bar works, and that he has no idea of the personally damaging content and quality of his observations about me, or in the privileged assembly in which his observations were

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made he simply did not care whether they would be personally damaging. My Opinion was prepared in the ordinary course of my practice on instructions received from a well-known firm of solicitors, and the preparation of the Opinion was an ordinary professional task. For a Minister of the Crown to suggest that my professional Opinion is worthless because of any personal political history or political interest is novel and extraordinary. The Minister's view of the value of my opinion and advice is not, I think, shared by such clients as Mr. Arthur Scargill and the trade union of which the noble Lord, Lord Briginshaw, was the General Secretary. The Minister's view is absurd as well as insulting."
I think that, since the insult appears in the Official Report, so should Mr. Leolin Price's answer. Apart from that point, I think the doubt about the hybridity stands, and for that reason we should certainly carry these Amendments.
Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNESIDE: My Lords, I will speak very briefly. I am, naturally, supporting my noble friend Lord Campbell of Croy on taking ship repairing out of this Bill. But I was a little alarmed when the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, got up and said that he intended to make only one speech. Well, that is very nice in one way, but am I to understand from that that he is not going to answer the point that was raised both by my noble friend Lord Carr of Hadley and my noble friend Lord Campbell of Croy about the article in the Guardian? I think that is a very important statement that the noble Lord ought to make during this debate. If he really stands by his statement that he is only going to make one speech, which he has already made, does that mean he is not going to answer that particular issue? I think it is very important that that particular argument on what was in the Guardian should be answered. Is he going to answer it or is he not? I should like to know. I am going to say one or two more words, but I should like an answer to that.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Baroness for allowing me to intervene in her speech. If I could reassure her, I am, when I get the opportunity, going to make one more speech to your Lordships' House on ship repairing. What I will say in it I think the noble Baroness had better wait and see.
Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNESIDE: Well, my Lords, of course I have
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to wait, because there is no other way of dealing with the matter, but I hope the noble Lord will answer what was said in the Guardian. Otherwise, perhaps I shall get up and have a word or two to say in the middle of his speech. Nevertheless, I will not bother about that at the moment.
My noble friend Lord Campbell of Croy was very amusing, which he thought was the right thing to be, about Mr. Kaufman's visit to Tyneside. As I represented Wallsend-on-Tyne for very many years until I was sadly defeated, I know a little bit about ship repairing. Mr. Kaufman may be an absolutely charming Minister; I really do not know him at all, but I am sure he is probably a very nice Minister. I am sorry he did not know where he was walking. to when he walked through from Swan Hunters to the ship repairing yard. That does not matter. The point is, does he really know anything about ship repairing? I very much doubt whether he knows anything about it at all. If he knew anything about it, it was a pity, as a very nice Minister, that he did not give us some information about the difference between ship repairing and shipbuilding. When I spoke last time I referred to ship repairing, which is a most important industry, quite different from shipbuilding. I want to reiterate that because I hope that when the vote comes we shall have overwhelming support for taking ship repairing out of this Bill. I will not say any more than that at the moment, but I certainly will vote to take it out. I still retain a lot of friends in the North-East—they very often did not support me politically, but we always got on very well—and I am quite certain that there are many men who would be well pleased if we took ship repairing out of this Bill. That is really all I want to say on the subject.
5.20 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, there has been a certain amount said about the making of personal attacks on either Members of another place or Members of your Lordships' House, and to what an extent that reveals a weakness in the attackers' arguments. As one who was subject to some attack by the honourable gentleman who speaks for the Opposition on this Bill in another place, I of course would not necessarily dissent from the arguments put forward; but I certainly do not intend myself to follow various

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noble Lords in attacking either Members of your Lordships' House or Members of another place with personal abuse. It seems to me that what we are meant to be doing in this House at any rate is arguing the case on its merits, and that is what I have tried to do throughout the passage of this Bill and what I intend to continue to try to do.
There has been extensive debate on the ship repairing proposals both in this House and in another place. I, for my part, have made it quite clear that the Government's proposals to vest in British Shipbuilders the nine privately-owned and the three Government-owned ship repairing companies listed in Schedule 2 to the Bill result from a firm commitment in both of the 1974 Manifestoes of the Labour Party. As I have said many times, these are the major ship repairing companies operating dry docks on the main estuaries. The Government firmly believe that only by vesting these major firms is there any prospect of bringing about the improvements on such matters as investment and working conditions that this industry badly needs.
The Amendments which would remove the 12 ship repairing companies from Schedule 2, together with the definitions which cover them, would prevent the Government from bringing into effect their industrial strategy for the most important part of the ship repairing sector of industry. As I have said before, and as my noble friend has reiterated in this debate, I believe that the distinctions between shipbuilding and ship repairing have been very much exaggerated. This was effectively pointed out in another place by someone who has actual experience of working in the industry.
As I have said before, there arc several examples of ship repairing and shipbuilding being carried out by the same company. There are other cases where separate ship repairing companies are in the same group as shipbuilding companies. The only conclusion to be drawn is that these activities complement each other to a considerable extent. The same types of skills are needed in the labour force, and very often common facilities are used. Separating ship repair and ship-building will in many cases lead to inefficiency and to the loss of flexibility in the use of resources.
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It is worth adding that many of the ship repairing companies in Schedule 2 have been planning for some time on the basis that they will be nationalised, with possibly one well publicised exception. The Government's discussion paper which listed the major ship repairing companies covered by the proposals for public ownership was published on 31st July 1974. If these companies are removed at the eleventh hour from the scope of the Bill, they will be faced with a situation they did not expect and which may well be unwelcome in some cases to the shareholders. Worse still would be a situation where uncertainty about the future of such companies drags on.
I do not question the sincerity of noble Lords opposite in the stand that they have taken on this aspect of the Bill. But I suggest that it is misguided, and possibly based on a lack of full understanding of the nature of the ship repairing industry and the industrial logic behind the proposals, and even in some cases of the wishes of the companies themselves, certainly in so far as the need to end uncertainty is concerned.
Could I turn briefly to the question of hybridity, which the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, and the noble Lord, Lord Harmar-Nicholls, have raised. As I understand it, the purpose of raising hybridity in this debate was to some extent at least to suggest to your Lordships that your Lordships' House should decline to accept the Commons' rejection of this House's Amendment removing ship repairing companies from the Bill, because there is an element of hybridity in the provisions relating to such companies. I do not think it would be appropriate for me to advance fully with the noble Viscount the numerous respects in which the Government consider this point is misconceived, but I must make a few comments on the argument which the noble Viscount and the noble Lord, Lord Harmar-Nicholls, put forward.
First, the Government do not agree that there is any element of hybridity in these provisions. We have considered the various detailed matters raised by the noble Viscount at other stages during the passage of the Bill, and my noble friend the Leader of the House has replied to them in a series of Written Answers. These Answers have set out the reasons

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why, in each particular case, the Government consider that the company in question does, or does not, come within the description of ship repairing companies in paragraph 3 of Part II of Schedule 2 to the Bill. Maybe I should add that we have of course had the opportunity of studying the opinion of learned counsel, to which both the noble Viscount and the noble Lord referred, and the Government do not consider that anything in it affects the view that we have formed and held consistently during the time the Bill has been before your Lordships' House.
Perhaps I could reiterate a point which I know I have made before, and which I think is fully accepted at least by most noble Lords opposite; that is, that the Government have demonstrated the conviction which they hold that there is no element of hybridity by making every possible effort to give all the information to noble Lords opposite that was at our disposal, and answering fully all the points which have been raised to us. It has not been the case that the same courtesy has been shown in return—not, I hasten to add, by noble Lords opposite, who have been in the position where the information has come to them in certain dribs and drabs and certainly was not available to all of them when the Bill reached your Lordships' House. But I should like to place on the record once again the fact that the Government are perfectly clear that the Bill is not hybrid. We have retained that firm conviction throughout the Bill's passage through your Lordships' House. Nothing that has been put to us at various stages during the Bill's passage has shaken that conviction.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, everyone will accept that the Government have no doubt. Do they, in return, say categorically that outside Government circles there is no doubt?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I think it is a little foolish to ask me to answer for every single individual either in your Lordships' House or outside the House as to whether they have doubts. After all, a great many people may not have studied in detail the various questions and answers that have been given. I have no doubt that they could have some doubts, particularly in view of the various com-
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ments that have been made in the Press and other places about hybridity in the Bill. I would suggest that anyone who has carefully considered the various questions which the Government have been asked and the answers which have been given should not have any element of doubt as to the hybridity of the Bill.
There is one other point that I should like to make briefly about hybridity. As I understand it there is no question whatsoever for the issue of hybridity being raised in this House at this stage. In fact, there is no question of it being raised after the Second Reading of any Bill except where the question of hybridity has arisen because of an Amendment made to the Bill after Second Reading. The ship repairing provisions of this Bill are in exactly the same form as they were when the Bill was introduced into your Lordships' House. Noble Lords have had ample opportunity to raise the point formally in the months that have passed, but have not done so. It is clear that ever since May, if not before, persons interested in opposing the Bill have been engaged in the most thorough and extensive researches in order to find grounds for suggesting that the Bill is hybrid.
I make no complaint about this, but the fact is that nothing which those persons have discovered, or argued, caused any of your Lordships to raise the point formally while these provisions were included in the Bill and the Bill was still before your Lordships' House. It was not made a formal issue on Second Reading nor in Committee nor on Report. I would also remind the House that in another place the issue was raised at a late stage in the passage of the Bill through that House and after considerable discussion that House decided to treat the Bill as an ordinary public Bill and not to apply any of the procedures which might have been appropriate to private legislation.
As I understand the implication behind what the noble Lord, Lord Harmar-Nicholls, and the noble Viscount have said, nearly six months later we as a House are being asked to consider the issue at an even later stage on grounds that the Government regard as even slighter than those relied on in another place. Of course this would raise the issue of comity between the two Houses. In any event I

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suggest that the use of the issue of hybridity at this stage to impede the inclusion of ship repairing in the Bill is not intended to be bona fide in the interests of individuals but wholly and solely as an excuse, and a bad excuse, to impede Government legislation on a point which has been reconsidered and voted on again in another place.
I have been asked to comment on a report which I understand has been published in the Guardian this morning. I confess to your Lordships that, having returned rather late last night from Northern Ireland and having had a considerable amount of reading to do on this Bill this morning, I have not had a chance to study in detail what the Guardian said although I have got some of the flavour of the remarks in the newspaper from things which noble Lords have said in the course of the debate.
Lord AIREDALE: My Lords, if the noble Lord is turning from the question of hybridity, does he not accept that the facts on which the issue of hybridity was raised in another place—which I think was something to do with whether or not an oil rig was a ship—are totally different from the facts on which the issue of hybridity was raised in this House?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am not sure that I accept that any new facts have been discovered which give rise to an element of doubt as to whether or not the Bill is hybrid. Some of the so-called facts which have been so-called discovered during the Bill's time in your Lordships' House have turned out not to be facts at all. I am thinking of the famous folio numbers found to be put on by the girl taking pieces of paper out of the records in Companies House in Edinburgh. Of course I agree that when the issue of hybridity was first raised in another place the particular facts on which the case was raised are not those on which the Government are being questioned in this House. As I have said, nothing which has been raised in this House has altered the Government's determination that the Bill is not hybrid.
I was coming to the conclusion of my remarks. I merely wanted to say to your Lordships' House that, although I have not had the chance to study in detail what is written in the Guardian, I have made
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clear in your Lordships' House and Government spokesmen have made clear throughout the passage of the Bill in another place that in all sincerity we feel that if this Bill is further delayed the consequences for the shipbuilding and the aircraft industries would be extremely severe. That is still the Government's view.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
5.34 p.m.

LORDS AMENDMENT
21 Insert the following new clause:
Restriction on certain powers.
". Notwithstanding anything in the two last preceding sections of this Act or in any subsequent provision of this Act or in any order, consent or authority made or given under this Act neither British Shipbuilders nor any of its subsidiaries shall—

(a) manage or operate any ship;

(b) enter into any arrangement with regard to the management or operation of any ship unless the arrangement is such that the amount of any payment thereunder of money or moneys worth to or by British Shipbuilders or any of its subsidiaries is calculated independently of the earnings of that ship;

(c) acquire and hold an interest in or form or take part in forming a body corporate or enter into any partnership with a person if the business of that body corporate or person is or is to be wholly or mainly the management or operation of any ship;

(d) receive any moneys or moneys worth in consequence of holding an interest in a body corporate or of being in partnership with any person if the amount of those moneys or that moneys worth is dependant in whole or in part upon the earnings of any ship".

The Commons disagreed to this amendment for the following Reason:
22 Because it represents an undesirable restriction on British Shipbuilders' activities.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 21, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 22. As I have explained on previous occasions the new clause would represent an attempt to limit the scope of the activities of British Shipbuilders. We want the Corporation to have maximum flexibility to operate commercially whilst at the same time remaining fully accountable. Quite apart from the desirability of the Corporation having the powers to

1179
seize commercial opportunities, this clause could have the effect of preventing the carrying out of existing activities by a subsidiary, for example the operation of tugs.
I hope the noble Earl is able to hear what I am saying above the general hubbub. I know he takes a particular interest in this Amendment and I think it would be rather unfair to him if those people leaving the Chamber prevented his hearing the remarks I am making on this Amendment. We do not want to set up British Shipbuilders as a major power in the shipping field. All we want to do is to ensure that the Corporation can assist the British shipbuilding industry in every possible way and we believe the subsidiary could be a means of securing orders which might otherwise have gone abroad.
As I have made clear on other occasions, British Shipbuilders cannot undertake any new activity without the consent of the Secretary of State, and such consent would not be forthcoming unless he was convinced the activities contemplated were in the national interest. Naturally one of the things he would consider most carefully would be the effect of the activities of the subsidiary on the British shipping industry. The occasions in practice when British Shipbuilders would operate ships on its own account or participate in joint ventures on a profit and loss basis—the two activities to which I know most concern the noble Earl—would be rare. Normally ships would be built for a specific owner to be put on long-term charter, and any other ships acquired would be put out to bareboat charter or long-term period charter at commercial rates. But occasionally British Shipbuilders might find itself with a ship on its hands, as for example when a charter arrangement fell through or an owner was unable to take delivery. In such cases the Corporation would normally seek an alternative charter, but it would make sense for it to operate the ship in the meantime.
Similarly there might be occasions when by participating in a joint venture the Corporation could induce an owner to place orders for say three ships in United Kingdom yards instead. This is another example I gave when discussing the Bill
1180
at the Committee stage. I can give an assurance that the number of occasions on which the Corporation would be likely to engage in ship operating or partcipate in joint ventures with an equity interest would be very rare, and on such occasions the Corporation would be expected to operate in a genuinely commercial manner. We believe that the Corporation must be able to take every opportunity to assist the shipbuilding industry, and that it must be able to operate so as to take advantage of commercial opportunities. Nor can we accept that the public sector should be subject to restrictions not imposed on the private sector. In view of the assurances I have given which go further than I was able to go at the previous stage when we discussed this matter, I hope that noble Lords will not persist with the Amendment.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 22.—(Lord Melchett.)
The Earl of INCHCAPE: My Lords, the new clause which your Lordships have inserted was intended to provide a valuable safeguard against British Shipbuilders embarking on ship operation or ship management. The other place has disagreed with it on the grounds that it represents an undesirable restriction on the activities of British Shipbuilders. For the reasons I advanced when I moved the insertion of this clause at the Committee stage I thought, and still think, that such a restriction would not be undesirable, in fact quite the contrary. It would be in the interests of the British shipping industry which both the Government and British Shipbuliders must look to as the main customer of the shipbuilding industry. However, in view of the assurances which the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has given me, and for which I am most grateful, I certainly do not press for this Amendment to be reinserted.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, when this new clause was being considered at the Committee stage the Government gave certain assurances and they were repeated today. The noble Lord said he thinks he went further today, but until I read what he has said I have not been able to detect that he has gone very much further. What the Government visualised in Committee, and have not

1181
changed their mind about, is that there could be situations in which the new Corporation might operate ships. The point here is whether they would operate ships and it is not a question of owning ships; they may own ships. The new clause would have ensured that they did not go into the business of operating ships.
The noble Lord indicated that there were technical objections to the Amendment which we sent to another place; for example, it might have stopped the Corporation from using a tug. Those technical objections were clearly not insurmountable and we had hoped that the Government would have been able to respond with an alternative Amendment which would have given an assurance to the British shipping industry. I therefore regret that the Government have not felt able to make some move to the shipping industry by putting forward an alternative which would have avoided the technical defects.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
23 Clause 5, page 9, line 16, at end insert "or professional organisation".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
24 Because the Amendment unduly extends the duty to consult.
5.42 p.m.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 23 but propose the following Amendment in lieu thereof, No. 24A:
Page 9, line 16, at end insert ("or professional organisation and any other independent trade union as defined in section 30(1) of the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act 1974 which appears to the Corporation to represent a substantial proportion of its employees or of those of its wholly-owned subsidiaries").
There is an error in the Amendment as printed, due entirely to the very great rush in which it had to be prepared. Thefirst three words as printed "or professional organisation" are from the Amendment which I am not seeking to insist upon, and it was not meant that they should be included in the Amendment which I am moving. As I said, the error is due entirely to the tremendous rush under which not only Members of this House but the staff of the House have been
1182
working, and I am sure that we all understand how these errors occur. I am not saying where the blame lies because it may well lie with me and my noble friends.
I wanted to stress that. I also want to stress that the only reason why we did not want to insist on "or professional organisation"was exactly the reason I gave when speaking to an earlier Amendment, when I said that we were genuinely seeking, on this question of enlarging the scale of consultation, to compromise with the views of the Government and the views of the other House. Your Lordships will notice that the wording of Amendment No. 24A is precisely that of the earlier Amendment, No. 14A, and I do not think therefore that I need explain it again. I am extremely disappointed that the Government have not taken this in the spirit in which it was offered, as a genuine attempt to compromise, with our surrendering some of what we believe in order to reach a compromise between the views of the two Houses.
While I assume, as I must, that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, will repeat what he said on the previous Amendment, may I ask him to give some assurance on this issue? He said in the debate on the previous Amendment that he believed that everybody should have the right—he used the word "right"—to consultation; but that is exactly what people do not have and fear that it is an opportunity they will not be given. If the Government cannot, for reasons good or bad, accept the Amendment, it would be helpful if Lord Melchett on behalf of the Government would give an assurance to all these people that they will in practice have the right to be consulted, as he said earlier, and that this right will not be denied them merely because their legal entitlement to it is not, in the wish of the Government, to be written into the Bill. Such an assurance would help to allay fears, which I hope he believes are genuine, in these industries.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment but doth propose in lieu thereof Amendment No. 24A.—(Lord Carr of Hadley.)
Lord GRAY: My Lords, I hope the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, is not proposing to argue, as he appeared to argue

1183
earlier, that by qualifying his use of the words "industrial democracy" with the word "effective" he can justify a suggestion that only the big or favoured battalions should play a part in these processes. I invite him to deny that if a right to be consulted is bestowed, but is bestowed selectively and restrictively as among relevant organisations, that is not merely unjust in this context but gives the lie to the stated democratic intention.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, in one sense I am not going to disappoint the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley, because I do not intend to repeat the speech I made on Amendment No. 14A. I am afraid, however, that I am going to disappoint him in the sense that I am not repeating it because I have nothing new to say in relation to the Government's attitude to Amendment No. 24A—which, as he pointed out, follows No. 14A exactly—but because it is the same as the attitude which I took to No. 14A. However I would certainly like to respond to the particular question which he asked me. As he knows, this is a very difficult subject. It is one on which I have freely acknowledged that there are considerable difficulties, and there are difficulties for all those concerned. There are difficulties for the organising committees and the Corporations, as they will be; there are difficulties for the independent and recognised trade unions, and there arc difficulties for other groups. I do not pretend that anything I am going to say tonight to Lord Carr will make any difference to the fact that those difficulties exist, and all I am likely to do in whatever I say is probably to exacerbate the difficulties, and that is why I shall be careful not to say too much.
I hope Lord Carr will accept that with a difficult industrial relations problem it is not always very helpful to have fears from either side of the House sounded off by people who do not know a great deal about them, and I confess that I am in that position, even if Lord Carr is not. This is a problem which must be sorted out with good will—and I believe that that good will exists—among those actually working in the industries and in the organising committees and the Corporations as they will be. I have no doubt, as I say, that that good will exists and that there is a wish to sort out the problems
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that exist, but I am not sure that any particular assurances from me would carry any weight or necessarily help the matter a great deal.
I have said on previous occasions that the Government wish to see everybody working in these industries involved in the consultation process and that has been made perfectly clear. I do not think there is anything more definite I could say that would be very helpful, except to reiterate my view that there is a great deal of good will, and once the Bill has become law and people are faced with settling down to working its provisions I feel sure that some of the fears which have been apparent during the passage of the Bill—and I accept from Lord Carr that they are genuine fears—will be met by the actions of the two Corporations.
On Question, Amendment No. 24A disagreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
25 Page 9, line 16, at end insert "and any other person who, or organisation which, appears to it to be representative of a substantial proportion of its employees or of those of any of its wholly owned subsidiaries."
The Commons disagreed to this amendment for the following Reason:
26 Because it is unnecessary to impose a statutory obligation to consult professional organizations.
5.48 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 25 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 26. This again covers the same ground that we have been over in previous debates and therefore I do not intend to delay your Lordships by saying very much. As I explained in relation to Amendment No. 12, we believe that to extend formal consultation rights to organisations which fail to meet the criteria for "relevant trade union" is not in the best interests of all employees in the industries and could give rise to harmful practical difficulties. I hope that for these reasons the Rouse will not insist on the Amendment.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 26.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I should like to ask the noble Lord whether he would explain the Commons Reason. The Reason states:
"Because it is unnecessary to impose a statutory obligation to consult professional organisations."
This Amendment does not even mention professional organisations. I fail totally to understand how the answer is in any way relevant to the Amendment.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I have a feeling that the previous Amendment is not the only thing that has been muddled up in the speed with which the Bill has been returned to your noble Lordships' House. I think there are five Amendments altogether which refer to industrial democracy in one way or another: Amendments Nos. 23 and 33, are one section, as it were, and Amendments Nos. 25, 29 and 35. I think that the Reasons for one lot have been transposed with the Reasons for another lot. As we have had a general debate on this issue, I hope the noble Lord will leave it at that. If he would like me to, I could give him the numbers as I think probably they should be.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, perhaps I could refer to it again in a later Amendment.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
27 Clause 5, page 9, leave out lines 25 to 31.
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
28 Because it would be wrong to deprive the Secretary of State of a reserve power to give directions to the Corporations in appropriate circumstances.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist upon their Amendment No. 27, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 28. This Amendment removes the power of the Secretary of State to give directions to the Corporations after considering their report. As I have explained on a number of occasions, the Government believe that the Secretary of State must have the power to give
"such directions as he considers appropriate for securing that the management of the activities of the Corporation and its wholly owned subsidiaries is organised in the most efficient manner."
The power is well precedented in the most recent nationalisation legislation—the Iron
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and Steel Act 1967, the Civil Aviation Act 1971 and the Gas Act 1972—and I hope, in view of that, that noble Lords will not insist upon the Amendment.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 28.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: My Lords, there is no purpose in my repeating the remarks that we have already made in connection with Amendment No. 17. Much the same general arguments apply. It is quite clear that the two sides are not going to agree about this. May I confine myself to asking the noble Lord whether he can tell us what exactly he thinks are appropriate circumstances for the intervention, as the Commons have chosen to use those words in giving us their Reasons for this?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, we went into this matter in some detail when we discussed the Amendments. I know that noble Lords opposite felt that this power would allow the Secretary of State to interfere in detail. The Government's intention is to provide the Secretary of State with the reserve power. It would certainly not be a power that would allow interference in detail. The noble Lord, Lord Carr, argued during a previous stage in the Bill that when the Secretary of State was dissatisfied with the management and organisation he should dismiss those responsible. That was the alternative to having this reserve power in the Bill. We consider that there are situations in which it would be less damaging to the morale of the Corporations for the Secretary of State to be able to give a direction on organisation after receiving a report from the Corporation. We share the view that the Corporations rather than the Government should determine their organisation, but the Government think that this reserve power could in certain circumstances provide the best way of resolving very difficult problems. For those reasons we regard it as essential.
We have provided that directions may cover only "general principles". I made the point before, but I am not sure that it has been fully taken on board by noble Lords opposite. Perhaps they have not wanted particularly to direct their minds to this point. As I said, we have made the

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change to ensure that directions only cover general principles, because that is a precedent from previous nationalised industries legislation, including Conservative precedents. I should have thought that that made it clear beyond all reasonable doubt that it was only intended that the power should be used on major matters. I hope that that explanation has gone some way to reassure noble Lords opposite.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
29 Clause 6, page 9, line 39, at end insert:
"(1A) It shall be the duty of each Corporation to seek consultation with other organisations not being relevant trade unions, as appears to it to represent substantial proportions of the persons or of any class of persons in the employment of the Corporation or any of its wholly owned subsidiaries for the purposes specified in paragraphs (c) and (d) of subsection (2) below."
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
30 Because it is unnecessary to impose a statutory obligation to consult professional organisations.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 29 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 30. We have just discussed a similar Amendment—Amendment No. 25 to Clause 5—and for the same reasons I would urge noble Lords not to insist on Amendment No. 29.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 30.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I want to point out simply that once again the Reason given by the Commons is totally irrelevant to the Amendment. Again, the words "professional organisation" are not only not included in the Amendment but were specifically excluded by your Lordships when dealing with this matter. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, said that this was all due to the rush. I cannot refrain from asking: Who has caused the rush? I think that the Government really ought to be ashamed of themselves in dealing with this matter in this slipshod and wholly unsatisfactory manner.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
31 Clause 7, page 10, line 13, leave out "consulting" and insert "seeking consultation with".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
32 Because it weakens the nature of the obligation on the Corporations to consult relevant trade unions.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 31 to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 32. Amendment No. 31 was passed by your Lordships without discussion after the mover of the Amendment had mistakenly claimed that two identical Amendments previously debated had been passed on a Division. There had not been a previous Division, because the earlier Amendments had not been moved. We on this Front Bench, naturally accepting the word of any noble Lord opposite for anything they say, did not query this remark when we were told about it. I think it is for that reason that the Amendment has got into the Bill. I hope that your Lordships will now agree to the Motion.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 32.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord WIGODER: My Lords, it might be stated that it was one o'clock in the morning when this incident took place. In the circumstances it would not be wise, perhaps, to precipitate a constitutional crisis by insisting on the Amendment.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
33 Clause 7, page 10, line 14, after "union" insert "or professional organization".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
34 Because the Amendment unduly extends the duty to consult.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on Amendment No. 33, but doth propose the following Amendment in lieu thereof:
"(or professional organisation and any other independent trade union as defined in section 30(1) of the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act

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1974 which appears to the Corporation to represent a substantial proportion of its employees or of those of its wholly-owned subsidiaries").
My Lords, this Amendment is exactly the same Amendment as that dealt with before in Amendment No. 24A, and again, as in that Amendment, the words "professional organisation" crept in by mistake owing to the rush in which we are working. I do not think that I need repeat any of the arguments and I do not expect the noble Lord to repeat any of his arguments. I simply want to say two things to him: this really is an area in which it is extremely important, not only for the good will of the employees concerned but also for the prosperity of the Corporations, that the consultation should be with everybody. The Amendment concerns Clause 7, whose subject is the formulation of the Corporation's plans and policies and the conduct of their operations and it covers such things as capital investment, research and development,et cetera.
These are matters on which people like engineers, technical experts of all kinds, accountants and other highly specialised people have a great deal to contribute and on which it is essential that they should contribute. Of course these are the very people for whom the "relevant trade unions" are not the appropriate trade unions. Unless they are consulted—although they have no legal right to be consulted—the whole of this will be made an absolute nonsense. So I hope that the noble Lord will say that the Government will make sure that, in this area, the Corporations consult everybody because, if they do not, they will be leaving out the very people who have the greatest responsibility for contributing to the most important subjects of the Corporations' future plans.
The only other point to which I should like to draw your Lordships' attention is that, once again, the Reason given refers to professional organisations which, again, have no relevance to my Amendment and to one of the two Amendments to which No. 36 replies.
May I just say for the sake of the professional organisations that we have not suddenly lost interest in them? We are simply taking the words of the Government's reply at their face value because wherever it is relevant they say that professional organisations do not have
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to be included because it is unnecessary to impose a statutory obligation. By this, I think that it is implied that the professional organisations will of course be consulted where it is appropriate. I thought that I ought to say that lest the professional organisations, reading through our proceedings, were to think that we had suddenly come to believe them to have no importance at all. That is of course not the case. We are in difficulty because where the Commons replies refer to them it is usually in appropriate and it has been difficult to say at any moment in an appropriate way that we are accepting at its face value the Government's use of the word "unnecessary" as meaning that the professional organisations will of course be consulted. I beg to move.
Lord ROBBINS: My Lords, may I ask for an elucidation? I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, will give some reply to the noble Lord, Lord Carr. I have been sitting here a little perplexed by the printing mishaps which have added slightly to the confusion, but I have been much more confused by the fundamental controversy. The other place used the phrase,
"…because it is unnecessary…to consult professional organisations".
and I ask myself, what does that mean? Does it mean that it is a law of nature that professional organisations will be consulted and that therefore it is unnecessary to impose a statutory obligation because this will automatically take place? Or does it mean something else?
It is quite clear that other provisions in the Bill confer a legal right to be consulted on organisations which, from the legal point of view, are technically slightly different organisations, but it is not plain to me that, according to the principles of natural justice, the difference is so great as to warrant the distinction that seems to obsess the other place in commenting on the Lords Amendments.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, to be honest, I had not intended to reply to the noble Lord because, as he pointed out, this is the third identical Amendment and I had really said all I had constructively to say on the first Amendment. When I replied to the noble Lord on the second Amendment I am not sure that he heard

1191
everything that I said to him and I really felt that to continue to prolong the debate on the Third Amendment might be keeping your Lordships here longer than some noble Lords would wish, particularly as I understand from an earlier discussion that there may be a Division during the later stages of our deliberations.
Of course it is important that professional organisations should be consulted by the management and the boards of these two new Corporations. None of use has ever pretended that that was not so, nor that the Corporations could be run sensibly and efficiently unless professional organisations of many sorts were regularly consulted and unless the boards of the Corporations were readily in touch with a great many people—professional organisations and others. It is for that reason that it was thought unnecessary to put a statutory obligation on the two Corporations to this effect. I am not sure that there is a statutory obligation on other Corporations or, indeed, on private companies to consult professional organisations in this way and no doubt they go on very well without a statutory obligation being placed upon them. It is for those reasons that the Commons have suggested that your Lordships should not insist upon the Amendment.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I believe that I have a right to wind up on this Amendment. May I ask the noble Lord whether he can tell us—perhaps not on the present Amendment but when he comes to the next one—whether he regards professional organisations as being in a different category in this respect to independent trade unions? The answer given by the Government is in different terms when it speaks about professional organisations and when it speaks about "other independent trade unions". I believe that the House would like to understand the inwardness of the different terms used by the Government in relation to the two types of body.
On Question, Motion disagreed.

LORDS AMENDMENT
35 Clause 7, page 10, line 14, after "union" insert "and any other person who, or organisation which, appears to it to be representative
1192
of a substantial proportion of its employees or of those of any of its wholly owned subsidiaries"
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
36 Because it is unnecessary to impose a statutory obligation to consult professional organisations.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 35, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 36. Once again, this is an Amendment that we have already discussed.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 36.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I had hoped not to have to say anything about this Amendment because I had expected that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, would respond to the question that I put to him a moment ago. Although the answer given by another place to this Amendment is clearly irrelevant because the Amendment that it is rejecting has nothing to do with professional organisations, nevertheless the answer does have something to do with them. I really think that we should know what this word "unnecessary" means. The noble Lord, Lord Robbins, has asked for an explanation. I hoped that by speaking for a few moments I might provide time for the necessary answer to come from the Box and, since that seems to have happened, perhaps I can now ask the noble Lord to enlighten us.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I did not reply initially because I thought that there was another Amendment like Amendment No. 34A to come and I was intending to respond on that. However, having had a chance to look through the Marshalled List, I see that this may well be the last Amendment relating to industrial democracy and I take the noble Lord's point that it was a little remiss of me not to have replied when moving the Amendment. I apologise. There are of course differences between professional organisations and independent, though not recognised, trade unions. The professional bodies cover the learned professions and their organisations cover very many employees well outside the range of those

1193
actually working for the two Corporations. That may be true of some independent trade unions—I am not quite sure about that—but it will also be the fact that many of the independent trade unions will concern themselves solely with representing the employees in the particular industry.
When we had a similar discussion at the Committee stage, or the Report stage—I cannot remember which—when we were considering the difference between professional bodies and independent and recognised trade unions, I made the point that although a large trade union may have members in many different companies and many different industries, it would nevertheless have an organisation and a structure within the particular company and the particular industry to be nationalised which would be relevant for consultation and collective bargaining purposes with the actual Corporation. That will not necessarily be true—indeed I should be surprised if it is true—of any of the professional bodies which would not have independent structures and representatives and full-time organisers and so on in particular companies or particular industries. So from that point of view I think that there is a considerable difference. I think it also fair to say that the representation provided by professional bodies is of a quite different character to that provided by trade unions, whether independent or independent and recognised.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
6.12 p.m.

LORDS AMENDMENT
37 Clause 7, page 10, line 32, leave out from "relate" to "the" in line 34.
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
38 Because it prevents the Secretary of State from ensuring that effective corporate planning is achieved.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 37, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 38. This clause puts on a statutory basis the arrangements for forward planning in nationalised industries which have in practice obtained for some time. The clause as the Government originally drafted it sought to ensure that
1194
the Corporations periodically draw up a plan, agree it with the Secretary of State, and in the general conduct of this operation act on lines settled from time to time with the Secretary of State. The effect of this Amendment is that, once a corporate plan had been drawn up, the Corporation could disregard it; or could, in between actual plans, proceed on a strategy not approved by the Secretary of State and even possibly, unacceptable to him.
The Government are strongly against allowing the Corporation such an option. If corporate planning is to be effective and to provide the kind of benefits which we hope will grow from it, there must be some means of ensuring that the plan is followed, or that, if strategy changed in some important respect between annual plans the Corporation continues to satisfy the Secretary of State as to the general lines of that strategy. This Amendment in practical terms makes this impossible and for those reasons I hope that noble Lords will not insist on their Amendment.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 38.—(Lord Melchett.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENTS
39 Page 11, line 18, at end insert "and which the Corporation is legally entitled to disclose"
40 Page 11, line 34, at end insert "and he shall refrain from giving any direction if the publication would be against the national interest or the commercial interests of the Corporation."
The Commons disagreed to these Amendments for the following Reason:
42 Because they are unnecessary.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendments Nos. 39 and 40, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 42.
Clause 8, with which we are now dealing, is precedented; it follows very closely Section 4(3) of the Railways Act 1974 and to some extent Section 6 of the Iron and Steel Act 1975. We oppose these Amendments both because they are undesirable and because they are unnecessary. It would be wrong, surely, to suggest, and certainly wrong to incorporate the suggestion in legislation, that any Secretary of State would, knowingly, use Clause 8 to require a Corporation to

1195
break the law, and a prohibition is there fore unnecessary. Furthermore, we feel that the national interest and the interests of the Corporation are already quite adequately safeguarded. As your Lordships will see from Clause 8, the provisions in the clause for publication are not automatic, but they operate at the discretion of the Secretary of State. It must be presumed, surely, that he will act in the national interest as he conceives it.
As Clause 8(3) is now drafted, before publication the Secretary of State must consult the Corporation. If the Corporation were to indicate to the Secretary of State that publication was thought to be against its commercial interests, it can surely be assumed that the Secretary of State would insist on publication only in the rather unlikely event that some reason of national interest overrode the Corporation's commercial interests. For those reasons I hope that noble Lords will not insist upon their Amendments Nos. 39 and 40.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendments, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 42.—(Lord McCluskey.)
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: My Lords, we are not going to insist on these Amendments from this side and I wish to say only three things to the noble and learned Lord. First, I do not think that the railways or the iron and steel industry are particularly happy precedents, and I sincerely hope that we are not going to find the shipbuilding and aircraft industries going the same way as the railways. Secondly, we are grateful for the assurance from an eminent lawyer that the indemnification that we were seeking in Amendment No. 39 is indeed unnecessary. Whether the noble and learned Lord has satisfied the noble Lord, Lord Robbins, that he has in fact defined what he means by the word "unnecessary" I rather doubt. However, he has gone some way towards reassuring us, I am certain. Finally, he makes certain assumptions about the Secretary of State, and I am very glad that he has this kind of confidence in the Secretaries of State that we have had from time to time. I only wish that I could share his unbounded trust and optimism in the good sense and
1196
wisdom of all the Secretaries of State we sometimes have.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
41 Clause 11, page 15, line 2, at end insert—
"(10A) Before a draft of an order under subsection (6) or subsection (7) above is laid before the Commons House of Parliament in accordance with the preceding subsection, the Secretary of State shall lay before Parliament a statement in which shall be given so far as is practicable and in his opinion not contrary to the commercial interest of the Corporation concerned, the following information regarding that Corporation, namely,—

(a) its plans for capital investment;

(b) the trends expected in the amount and value of its production and sales;

(c) the amount, sources and application of the funds available or likely to be available to it;

(d) the sources of finance from which it proposes to borrow;

(e) its present arrangements and future plans for repayment of the amounts mentioned in subsection (6)(a) or subsection (7)(a) above; and

(f) such further information as to trends in the Corporation's financial results and capital employed as may be avail able and has not been published in the Corporation's Annual Report or in any other statement of its results.".

The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
42 Because it is unnecessary.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 41, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 42. Amendment No. 41 seeks to put into the Bill a statutory requirement that the Secretary of State should provide, in effect, a prospectus to Parliament when he lays an order to increase a Corporation's financing limits under the clause. The Government are, of course, entirely sympathetic to the principle that Parliament should have full and useful information against which to judge an application by the Secretary of State for an increase in financing powers. But the Government consider that the Secretary of State, being answerable to Parliament, would provide this anyway in the normal course of events. We do not however, consider that the appropriate way of securing this aim is by Statute. For one thing, it is very difficult to lay down in Statute the matters which need

1197
covering. Certainly this Amendment does it inadequately and only in broad outline.
I should like to give just a single example, in the case of British Aerospace. One of the key items on which an order would need to be judged would be the Corporation's plans for development, or participation in development, of new civil aircraft. This is not classed as capital investment, in the terms of item (a) of the Amendment. The bare figures of "application of funds" (mentioned in item (c) of the Amendment) without some narrative explanation would be of little value to the House. In short, what is needed is not the answers to a kind of pro-forma, but a reasoned statement, according to the circumstances of the industry and its situation at a particular time, and supported by estimates of the relevant production and financial figures.
My Lords, there is also the question of commercial confidentiality—and this is important. The Amendment certainly makes an exception for this, but we believe that a statutory requirement not fulfilled for this reason could in some circumstances in itself draw the attention of competitors to factors of which it might be advantageous for them to know. Noble Lords opposite may not agree with this, but it is they who have been so resistant to the provisions of the Industry Act, for example, on disclosure of information for this very reason; and they have moved a number of Amendments to this Bill on the same point, one of which we accepted in the other place.
As I have said, the Government are sympathetic to this suggestion, but they think that it would be wrong to lay down the procedure in industrial Statutes on an industry basis. It would be better to try to co-ordinate the Government's practice in relation to all the nationalised industries which from time to time may need increases in their borrowing limits. The Government are already exploring ways in which this might best be done. In the meantime, at least one of the major public corporations, the British Steel Corporation, has undertaken to provide the fullest information against which to judge the case for increased borrowing wherever future orders for borrowing Bills are due to come before Parliament; and I give an assurance that my right honourable friend will write to the two chairmen asking them
1198
to follow the same practice. I beg to move.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 42.—(Lord Winterbottom.)
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, since I pressed this very hard, back in the summer, in relation to another Act, and expressed the very gravest disappointment at the response of the Government in relation to this Bill at the last stage of our proceedings, may I say that I appreciate the assurance which the noble Lord has just given, I take it in the spirit in which it is given, and will look forward to beneficial results for Parliamentary control in the future.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
6.23 p.m.

LORDS AMENDMENT
43 Clause 25, page 31, line 30, at end insert
"and for the purposes of this paragraph there shall be taken into account the largest amounts, if any, approved in the case of those securities under section 24(1)(c)(ii) above, and, in the case of each of those amounts and the amounts approved under section 23(l) above, where the number of days comprised in the final financial period exceeds or is less than the number of days comprised in the period of control in respect of which that amount was approved, that amount shall be treated as increased or, as the case may be, reduced by multiplying that amount by the fraction, of which the numerator is the number of days comprised in the final financial period and the denominator is the number of days comprised in that period of control.".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment but proposed the following Amendment in lieu thereof.
44 In page 31, line 26, leave out from second 'of' to 'the' in line 29 and insert such amounts as to ensure that the aggregate payments of dividend for that period on those securities are equal to the maximum amounts permitted under section 24 above or, if larger amounts have been approved under section 23(1) above, to'.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 43, to which the Commons have disagreed, but doth agree to Amendment No. 44 proposed by the Commons and to the words so inserted into the Bill. I would remind noble Lords that this is the Amendment in the moving of which the noble Lord, Lord

1199
Redesdale, won the admiration of us all and bewildered quite a few of us with his obvious grasp of an arcane and abstruse provision. When we accepted, in that state of mind, Amendment No. 43 moved on Report by the noble Lord we made it clear that we might wish to look again at the drafting proposed. I think we were all in agreement that the original Amendment was very complex and might benefit from some simplification.
We have now looked carefully at the substance of what was proposed and what was said in support of it by the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale—we read it very carefully; we had to—and in the light of this it would appear, I hope, that all his objectives can be achieved by the simple Amendment which has been proposed by the Commons. This Amendment simply refers to Clause 24 as a whole, and therefore embraces both the case where no previous final dividend has been paid and the question of pro-rating for time.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed, but doth agree to the Commons Amendment No. 44 in lieu thereof.—(Lord McCluskey.)
Lord STRATHCONA and MOUNT ROYAL: My Lords, I wish I had not undertaken to answer this one in view of the bouquets which were passing in the direction of my noble friend Lord Redesdale, but I am sure that on his behalf I can respond to the noble and learned Lord. I would make the point that it is always so much easier to criticise some body else's draftsmanship, and on this occasion I suppose we are in the position of being the biter bit. I would simply say that I am advised that we still prefer our drafting to the Government's drafting. Having said that, I believe that the drafting that the Government have produced probably covers the point, but I should like to be able to entice the noble Lord into saying exactly what their intention is, to make it abundantly plain that the intention lying behind their wording is what we want.
I wonder whether I could ask the noble and learned Lord to give an assurance that where the dividend for the final financial period is to be related to the large amount approved under Clause 23(1)
1200
of the Bill, and that amount was approved in respect of a previous period of control of a particular length, the amount of dividend in respect to the final financial period will be based on the amount previously approved but adjusted appropriately where the final financial period is shorter or longer than the period of control in respect of which the amount in question was approved. I am sure it will not come as a surprise to the noble and learned Lord to know that I did not write those last remarks myself.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, if I may say so to the noble Lord, they were beautifully read; and, if I may respond in kind, the simple answer is, "Yes". If a larger amount has been approved for an earlier period of control, the dividend required for the final financial period will be the largest amount approved for any earlier period of control pro-rated for the length of the period to which the dividend relates.
On Question. Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
45 Clause 30, page 41, line 37, leave out from first "of" to end of line 42 and insert "any sum the right to repayment of which could be treated as a security under section 21(6) above".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment but proposed the following Amendment in lieu thereof:
46 Page 41, line 37, leave out from 'repaid' to 'or' in line 42 and insert 'any sum the right to payment of which, if the sum had been repaid, would, following the service of a notice under section 21 above, have been treated as a security or part of a security under subsection (6) of that section.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 45, to which the Commons have disagreed, but doth agree to Amendment No. 46 proposed by the Commons and to the words so inserted into the Bill. With the leave of noble Lords, I will deal with Amendments Nos. 56 and 57 at the same time and move them in due course. First, I am indebted to the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, who, before I rose to my feet, pointed out a number of errors in Amendment No. 46 as printed. That gave us time to inquire into the cause, as a result of which I can tell noble Lords—and I look at No. 46—that it should read as follows:
"Page 41, line 37, leave out from 'repaid' to

1201
'or' in line 42 and insert' any sum the right to repayment of which, if the sum had not been repaid, would, following the service of a notice under section 21 above, have been treated as a security or part of a security under subsection (6) of that section'".
I can direct the noble Earl's attention to the Official Report of the Commons proceedings in column 752, where he will find that in fact, before the Commons, the Amendment was in the correct form and that a printing error has crept in between that stage and this.
My Lords, it was suggested by the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, during our Report stage that the drafting of Amendment No. 45—and this applies to No. 56 as well—was defective. We agreed to consider that matter, and on consideration we agree with his view. The two Amendments proposed in lieu have the effect of keeping more closely to the drafting included in the Bill as it first left the Commons. I therefore beg to move.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment but cloth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 46 in lieu thereof.—(Lord McCluskey.)
6.30 p.m.
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, I am delighted to know that the noble and learned Lord agreed with me; that is very flattering. I wish that he had agreed with some other more important Amendments that we put forward, but I am grateful. We had a discussion on Clause 22, as it was originally, in Committee. The Government thought that they would redraft it and, having redrafted it, I pointed out at Report stage, that it might have been, for want of a better expression, "bog drafted". The noble and learned Lord said that he did not think that it was so; but that he would look at it. He looked at it again and met our points and, as he pointed out, it was "bog drafted" again or "bog printed" in so far as it left out the word "not", which is fairly relevant, and it referred to "payment" as opposed to "repayment".
I would also draw his attention to Amendment No. 46 and to an even more "pithy bog" where the word "repair" has been used instead of the word "repaid". It is understandable in the
1202
heady excitement of the Bill that the word "repair" has direct connotations and that must have permeated through to the draftsman or printer. But I hope the noble Lord will note that, too.
The other point is where there is a difference in the words as submitted in the Commons Amendment from the Amendment which the noble and learned Lord moved on Report stage. At Report stage, the Amendment used the words:
"repayment of which could be treated as security".
The words here are different. They are: "could be treated as a security or part of a security". I should be grateful if the noble and learned Lord could explain how such a loan could be treated as part of a security. I can understand how a loan or part of a loan could be treated as a security, but I do not understand how anything can be treated as part of a security.
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, again I am indebted to the noble Earl for giving me notice of this matter. First, my own impression is that the draftsman has been slightly zealous. That is not uncommon in lawyers. I hope your Lordships will forgive me if I say that this reminds me of the well-known lawyers' story of the young woman who gave birth to twins and having brought a paternity suit against the putative father was met with the reply: "My client denies that he is the father of the said twins or either of them." That is in the same category as this.
The explanation which I can offer to the noble Earl is this. We are here talking about inter-company loans. If there was one loan of a certain sum made at a certain time and no part of that loan was repaid, the whole sum would be treated as one security. Equally, if one loan was made on one date and all of it was repaid, that would be treated as one security. But if there was one loan made on one particular occasion and part of it only had been repaid and part not repaid, then the two parts might be dealt with slightly differently. There might be arbitration about the part repaid and not about the other part; or it might be the other way round. Accordingly, at the end of the day both would be treated as one security. That is why the words "or part of a security" have been put in. It is to cover the situation where perhaps part of the loan has been repaid.
The Earl of LAUDERDALE: My Lords, before we part with this Amendment, may I say, since the Government instead of rejecting Lords Amendments out of hand have proposed a counter Amendment, that perhaps this is the moment to draw attention to the dichotomy in the attitude of the Government towards these Bills in general. On the one hand, we see in the Government counter Amendment (in fact, on a technical point) that they are glad to have had the opportunity to think again. That is quite apart from more than a score of their own Amendments that they put forward on Report. But before this Bill passes and before this Session ends, I believe that it is in the interests of this House that one should protest again at certain things that have been said else where in direct contradiction—twice by the Prime Minister and once by each of two Members of his Cabinet, Mr. Varley and Mr. Benn. Despite their opportunity to think again they have been saying, in effect, that if the House of Lords persists in amending these Bills, we—that is, the Government—will go to the country for a mandate to abolish their institution as at present functioning. That is, in effect, what they have been saying. They have been saying that they do not want discussion but now that on this Amendment they have admitted discussion was useful to them, we have an opportunity to refer firmly, quietly and I hope effectively to these quite unworthy suggestions of pressure from another place.
Parliament exists, among other things, through mutual respect, respect between the two Houses. Just as we have a convention that we do not make undue fun, or only in the nicest possible way, of the other place, so it is quite proper that we should reply when they make threats against us. The implication is quite clear from things that have been said openly and privately in another place that they think that they could run a "Lords versus People" campaign.
"Lords versus People!"What a cry, when it is we who insist on debate!"Lords versus People!"What a cry, when the whole country knows perfectly well who is running away from debate!"Lords versus People!"What a cry when we, and if it came to the crunch, the media, too, would make it clear to the public who have been responsible for
1204
blocking discussion through the use of the guillotine in another place. "Lords versus People! "What a cry when those aiming to muzzle us must face the charge thereby of opposing Parliamentary Government itself. Muzzling Parliament! Do they not realise that they stand condemned out of their own mouths and by their own gestures and stances.
In muzzling Parliament do they seek more power yet? The greater the power, the more dangerous the abuse. Do they equate Government in times of economic crisis with a new and greater mountain of legislation that has no relevance to the problems of today? If they are looking to us to be sausage machines turning out second-rate, ill-considered legislation and if that is their view of the purpose of Parliament, then all that one can say is in the words of the famous Lord Lovat on the way to the scaffold: "The greater the mischief, the better the sport". The question is, said Humpty-Dumpty, "Who is the master? That is all!" Is it a question of Parliament mastering the Executive or the Executive mastering Parliament? This is an old story and an old issue, but it must be faced and I make no apology for taking up two or three minutes of your Lordships' time now at this late stage of this Bill, at this late stage of this Session, to draw attention to it once again. The spectacle that we have witnessed does no credit to either House of Parliament. Policies have been debased without being debated; so that all that is not compulsory shall be forbidden. It all reminds one of the famous adage:
"Nature, our father and mother, gave us all we got;
the State, our elder brother, swipes the lot!"
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, I am not sure that this is the right occasion to be discussing the issues which the noble Lord has raised. I content myself merely by saying that the House in considering this and other Bills recently has not been a revising Chamber; it has been a wrecking Chamber. In that character it is digging its own disappearance from our institutions. The British people will not be content with a House of Lords of 1,100 members, 800 of which are there only because they are sons of their fathers. I think it is correct that there should have been a warning from Members of the

1205
Government that if the House of Lords continues in this way its abolition in its present form will become inevitable.
Lord ORR-EWING: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, did he hear the broadcast of the noble Baroness, Lady Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, who is the Chief Whip on the Government side, in which she said there had been no filibustering in the discussions on these Bills? She made that public statement which surely has far more weight from the Government Front Bench than it would have from the Back-Benches of the same side.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, before I sit down, it is very rare that I disagree with the noble Baroness, if indeed she said that. We on the Back-Benches can have independent opinions, and I certainly have them.
Lord LEATHERLAND: My Lords, may I rise most apologetically and suggest the we get on with the Amendment.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT
47 Clause 30, page 42, line 12, after "if" insert—
"(a) it is a transaction the effect of which is to transfer or grant to any person any property or rights belonging to the company in connection with the business of repairing, refitting or maintaining ships carried on by it other than at a shipyard or other works in which the company had an interest in possession on the initial date, or
(b)"
6.42 p.m.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on Amendment No. 47 but doth propose the following Amendment, No. 47A in lieu thereof:
47A page 42, line 12, after ("if") insert—
("(a) it is a transaction the effect of which is to transfer or grant to any person any property or rights belonging to the company effecting the transfer, being property or rights used by the company in connection with the business of repairing, refitting or maintaining ships carried on by it at a place which is not a shipyard or other works in which the company had an interest in the possession on the initial date, or
(b)")
It would save time if we could also discuss Amendment No. 48 and its alternative, No. 48A, Amendment No. 54A and its alternative, No. 54B, and Amendment No. 71 and the alternative, No. 72A. The group has the same purpose. We have discussed ship repairing in general on Amendment No. 19 but this group of Amendments relates to one company, Vosper Thornycroft, and is consequential to our intention that ship repairing should be removed from the Bill.
Just now we found a misprint. The Government's alternative Amendments contain the word "repair" instead of "repaid". While we were busy trying to take the word "repair" out of the Bill, it looked as if they were trying to bring it in again. I immediately acquit the Government of any attempt of backdoor nationalisation! These Amendments would allow Vosper Thornycroft's ship repairing business to be removed from the scope of the Bill. It is a separate business; I have described it at an earlier stage of the Bill. It is one of the largest ship repairing businesses in the country. It happens by an accident of organisation to be a separate department within one company instead of being a separate company or a subsidiary.
It would be wrong to leave that ship repairing business in the Bill while the ship repairing industry was being taken out of the Bill. The effect of the Amendments is to enable Vosper Thornycroft to exclude its ship repairing department. The new Amendments (which appear in the bolder type) have been provided as various improvements to the ones that have been sent back from another place, taking into account the comments which have been made by the Government. They should therefore be easier for the Government to accept. I commend to your Lordships' House the new alternatives. If your Lordships agree to these, it is still open for the Government to suggest any further improvement in another place. I beg to move.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 47 but doth propose Amendment No. 47A in lieu thereof.— (Lord Campbell of Croy.)
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I confess that I became lost when the noble Lord read out the list of Amendments to which

1207
he intended to speak with this Amendment. I believe I am right in thinking he is solely dealing with the Vosper Thornycroft point and not going any wider than that. As the noble Lord knows, the group of Amendments to which he has spoken, as they were originally proposed by your Lordships, would have allowed any shipbuilding company named in Schedule 2 to hive off its ship repairing operations without consent from the Secretary of State. I understand that this was meant to apply only to Vosper Thornycroft which has a separate ship repairing division. As the noble Lord now understands, there are several other shipbuilding companies carrying out ship repair operations within the same company. The Government believe that it would be wrong to have such a provision which would allow the breaking up of existing company structures in which ship repairing is closely integrated with shipbuilding. Of course those arguments apply just as strongly to the particular case of Vosper Thornycroft as they do to the general case, and it was on the general case that we argued the point when the matter was last before your Lordships. I do not think there is anything further that I can constructively add to the debate
which we previously had on the subject of ship repairing.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has again expressed the Government's anxiety that other shipbuilding companies in Schedule 2 will avail themselves of these provisions and hive off their ship repairing sections. My information is that that is not so. Of the shipbuilding companies named in the Schedule, I under stand that Swan Hunter Shipbuilding Limited is the only company with a sizeable ship repairing activity. I also understand that it is not their intention to avail themselves of a provision of this kind if it is included in the Bill. My understanding is that Vosper Thornycroft are the only company which will make use of these provisions if they eventually find their way, as I hope they will, into the Bill.
6.48 p.m.
On Question, That this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 47 but doth propose Amendment No. 47A in lieu thereof?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 173; Not-Contents, 65.

CONTENTS

Airedale, L.

Cottesloe, L.

Gisborough, L.

Amory, V.

Craigavon, V.

Glendevon, L.

Ampthill, L.

Craigton, L.

Goodman, L.

Amulree, L.

Crawshaw, L.

Goschen, V.

Arran, E.

Cromartie, E.

Gough, V.

Auckland, L.

Cullen of Ashbourne, L.

Gray, L.

Balerno, L.

Dacre, B.

Greenway, L.

Balfour of Inchrye, L.

Daventry, V.

Grey, E.

Barrington, V.

de Clifford, L.

Gridley, L.

Bathurst, E.

De Freyne, L.

Hacking, L.

Belstead, L.

De La Warr, E.

Hailsham of Saint Marylebone, L

Berkeley, B.

Denham, L. [Teller.]

Halsbury, E

Blakenham, V.

Deramore, L.

Hampden, V.

Bourne, L.

Derwent, L.

Hanworth, V.

Boyd of Merton, V.

Digby, L.

Harmar-Nicholls, L.

Brabazon of Tara, L.

Dormer, L.

Harvey of Tasburgh, L.

Brougham and Vaux, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Hawke, L.

Burton, L.

Dudley, E.

Henley, L.

Byers, L.

Dundee, E.

Hereford, V.

Caccia, L.

Eccles, V.

Hives, L.

Camoys, L.

Elibank, L.

Home of the Hirsel, L.

Campbell of Croy, L.

Ellenborough, L.

Howe, E.

Carr of Hadley, L.

Elles, B.

Hylton-Foster, B.

Carrington, L.

Emmet of Amberley, B.

Inglewood, L.

Cathcart, E.

Erskine of Rerrick, L.

Inverforth, L.

Chelwood, L.

Exeter, M.

Kemsley, V.

Clifford of Chudleigh, L.

Faithfull, B.

Killearn, L.

Cobham, V.

Ferrers, E.

Kimberley, E.

Colville of Culross, V.

Gage, V.

Kings Norton, L.

Cork and Orrery, E.

Gainsborough, E.

Kinloss, Ly.

Cornwallis, L.

Garner, L.

Kinnaird, L.

Kinnoull, E.

Northesk, E.

Sempill, Ly.

Lauderdale, E.

Nugent of Guildford, L.

Sharples, B.

Lindsey and Abingdon, E.

O'Brien of Lothbury, L.

Sherfield, L.

Long, V.

O'Hagan, L.

Slim, V.

Loudoun, C.

O'Neill of the Maine, L.

Stamp, L.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Onslow, E.

Strathclyde, L.

Mackie of Benshie, L.

Orr-Ewing, L.

Strathcona and Mount Royal, L.

Macleod of Borve, B.

Pender, L.

Strathspey, L.

Mancroft, L.

Rankeillour, L.

Sudeley, L.

Margadale, L.

Rayne, L.

Suffield, L

Marley, L.

Reading, M.

Templemore, L.

Merrivale, L.

Reay, L.

Terrington, L.

Molson, L.

Redesdale, L.

Teviot, L.

Monck, V.

Robbins, L.

Teynham, L.

Monk Bretton, L.

Rochdale, V.

Thorneycroft, L.

Monson, L.

Rochester, L.

Trevelyan, L.

Morris, L.

Runciman of Doxford, V.

Tweedsmuir, L.

Mottistone, L.

Ruthven of Freeland, Ly.

Vernon, L.

Mowbray and Stourton, L. [Teller.]

Sackville, L.

Vickers, B.

St. Aldwyn, E.

Vivian, L.

Moyne, L.

St. Davids, V.

Wade, L.

Munster, E.

St. Helens, L.

Ward of North Tyneside, B.

Napier and Ettrick, L.

St. Just, L.

Wardington, L.

Nelson of Stafford, L.

Sandford, L.

Westbury, L.

Netherthorpe, L.

Sandys, L.

Wigoder, L.

Newall, L.

Seear, B.

Wolverton, L.

Norfolk, D.

Selsdon, L.

Young, B.

NOT-CONTENTS

Allen of Fallowfield, L.

Hunt, L.

Morris of Kenwood, L.

Aylestone, L.

Jacques, L.

Murray of Gravesend, L.

Bernstein, L.

Janner, L.

Northfield, L.

Birk, B.

Kagan, L.

Parry, L.

Blyton, L.

Kaldor, L.

Peart, L. (L. Privy Seal.)

Brimelow, L.

Kennet, L.

Peddie, L.

Brockway, L.

Kirkhill, L.

Phillips, B.

Champion, L.

Kissin, L.

Pitt of Hampstead, L.

Collison, L.

Leatherland, L.

Popplewell, L.

Davies of Penrhys, L.

Lee of Asheridge, B.

Ritchie-Calder, L.

Delacourt-Smith of Alteryn, B.

Lee of Newton, L.

Rusholme, L.

Donaldson of Kingsbridge, L.

Llewelyn-Davies, L.

Sainsbury, L.

Elwyn-Jones, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, B. [Teller.]

Stedman, B.

Fulton, L.

Stewart of Alvechurch, B.

Gordon-Walker, L.

Lloyd of Hampstead, L.

Stone, L.

Goronwy-Roberts, L.

Lovell-Davis, L.

Strabolgi, L. [Teller.]

Grantchester, L.

McCarthy, L.

Taylor of Mansfield, L.

Greenwood of Rossendale, L.

McCluskey, L.

Wells-Pestell, L.

Hale, L.

MacLeod of Fuinary, L.

White, B.

Harris of Greenwich, L.

Maelor, L.

Wilson of Radcliffe, L.

Henderson, L.

Melchett, L.

Winterbottom, L.

Houghton of Sowerby, L.

Milner of Leeds, L.

Wootton of Abinger, B.

On Question, Motion agreed to.

Resolved in the affirmative, and Motion agreed to accordingly.

LORDS AMENDMENT
48 Clause 31, page 44, line 28, at end insert:
"(dd) it is a transaction the effect of which is to transfer or grant to any person any property or rights belonging to the company in connection with the business of repairing, refitting or maintaining ships carried on by it other than at a shipyard or other works in which the company had an interest in possession on the initial date; or".
6.59 p.m.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, this matter was discussed in the
1210
last debate. Therefore, I beg formally to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 48 but doth propose Amendment No. 48A in lieu thereof:
48 A Page 44, line 28, at end insert:
("(dd) it is a transaction the effect of which is to transfer or grant to any person any property or rights belonging to the company effecting the transfer, being property or rights used by the company in connection with the business of repairing, refitting or maintaining ships carried on by it at a place which is not a shipyard or other works in which the company had an interest in the possession on the initial date; or").
Moved That the House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 48 but doth

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propose Amendment No. 48A in lieu thereof.—(Lord Campbell of Croy.)

LORDS AMENDMENT
50 Clause 31, page 42, line 39, leave out from "reduced" to end of line 41 and insert "in accordance with section 38(7A) below".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
55 Because they might involve charges on public funds, and the Commons do not offer any further Reason trusting that this Reason may he deemed sufficient.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that the House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 50, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 55. In doing so, I think that it might be for the convenience of the House if I speak also to Amendments Nos. 51, 52 and 53, or at least address my remarks to those Amendments, all of which were disagreed to for the Reason numbered 55. All of these Amendments are concerned with the amount of compensation payable under the Bill. Amendments Nos. 50, 52 and 54 deal with adjustments to the basic compensation terms laid down in the Bill while Amendments Nos. 51 and 53 represent a fundamental rewriting of the compensation provisions.
The Commons have given as their Reason for disagreeing with all these Amendments that they might involve charges on public funds. We have already on previous occasions discussed at considerable length all the Amendments in this group. Amendments Nos. 50 and 54 are concerned with the price at which assets of the vesting companies may be hived off before vesting day. They propose that the price of assets hived off should, in effect, represent the contribution of these assets to the value of the company's securities at the reference period. Under the Bill as drafted the question of price has been left to the discretion of the Secretary of State. In all cases where he has exercised this discretion already the Secretary of State has specified that the price shall be the open market price at the time of disposal. This has been accepted by the companies in virtually every case. There is complete justice in this approach. We have given assurance to the companies, and in certain cases the Bill actually specifies this, that
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any investment into the vesting companies after the reference period will be repaid in full. It is therefore entirely fair that any disposals of assets after the reference period should be treated on the same basis. To do otherwise would be to destroy the symmetry of the provisions of the Bill, to the benefit of shareholders and to the detriment of the Corporations and the taxpayers.
Amendment No. 52 is concerned with severance payments. As has been explained in your Lordships'House on three previous occasions, we do not believe that such a provision is necessary. The Bill already contains provisions in Clause 20 which have the effect of substantially reducing, if not eliminating, the effects of disruption which might be caused by the vesting of one subsidiary of a group. Clause 20 is new in this Bill. There is no precedent for it in previous nationalisation measures and its effect is to eliminate the need for a separate severance provision.
Amendments Nos. 51 and 53 both seek to effect a fundamental change in the compensation provisions. They are completely unacceptable to the Government. They seek to destroy the carefully worked out objective basis of valuation laid down in the Bill and replace it with terms which are at best ill-defined and at worst entirely open ended. Amendment No. 51 provides for the existing terms of the Bill to be ignored and the valuation to be carried out on any basis which the arbitration tribunal thinks fit. Amendment No. 53 is at the least unnecessary and if, as we believe, it seeks to overthrow the basis of compensation in the Bill, it is both unacceptable and inconsistent with the existing words. For those reasons I hope your Lordships will not insist on this series of Amendments.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on the said Amendment (No. 50), to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 55.

LORDS AMENDMENT
51 Clause 31, page 48, line 24, at end insert
"of, if on application by the stockholders' representative or the Secretary of State, the arbitration tribunal consider that, having regard to all the circumstances, that amount does not represent fair compensation, such

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amount as the tribunal shall determine to be fair compensation in respect of those securities."
Lord SELSDON: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 51 but propose an Amendment in lieu as on the Marshalled List:
51A Page 48, line 23, after ("securities") insert—
("having taken into account, on application by the stockholders' representatives or the Secretary of State, all factors considered relevant by the arbitration tribunal in order to ensure that the compensation in respect of these securities shall be fair").
It is very difficult for those of us who only occasionally have a toe in politics to understand exactly how the Parliamentary system now works. Those of us on these Benches, the Cross-Benches, the Liberal Benches and throughout your Lordships' House, when we see something which we believe is unjust and unfair, feel that we should speak out against it. We feel, too, that the Government of the day—of whatever political complexion it may be—should give us a reasonable answer. On Amendment No. 51 which I tabled originally there was considerable debate and discussion on the principles underlying the method of determining compensation, and to receive a formal communication which says that the Commons disagree to these Amendments because they might involve charges on public funds, and the Commons do not offer any further reason, trusting this Reason may be deemed sufficient, is almost insulting. But I suddenly realised that for one reason or another the Commons were really prevented from discussing the whole question of compensation, as they have been prevented from discussing it almost throughout the passage of the Bill. Therefore I thought it was appropriate not to assume that the Commons were by nature unintelligent but to try to pursue a reply or some information from the Government through other channels.
It was as a result of this pursuance of things through other channels that I received yesterday a letter from Mr. Kaufman. In view of the evidence before me I do not support the view that Mr. Kaufman is totally unapproachable, unwilling to co-operate and unwilling to reply, because I received a communication
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from him very shortly after I had raised, through various channels, the need for a communication. Whether that communication is acceptable or not is another matter, but surely in seeking information from the Government it would have been preferable for this information or attitude to have been given to us, perhaps in the middle of the night, by the Government rather than that odd letters should be sent to Back-Benchers in an endeavour to explain the principles which underlay compensation. That is perhaps a criticism of procedure rather than of intention.
Noble Lords throughout the House have demonstrated to my satisfaction and to the satisfaction of others that the principles which the Government proposed to adopt for determining compensation were not fair. They were decidedly unfair. We object to the Government saying that a Stock Exchange valuation was a fair price, and we object in particular to the former Prime Minister, the right honourable Sir Harold Wilson, saying that the compensation will be fair but that this will be a matter for Parliament, when in fact it did not become a matter for Parliament. Therefore with this Amendment today I seek further information from the Government which I hope they will be able to give.
I begin by referring to the letter which I received yesterday from Mr. Gerald Kaufman. One is extremely grateful for this because it is the first sign that I have seen of the Government seeking to co-operate with a Back-Bencher who is not a professional politician, who has to work, as many of us do here, and who is trying to do something which he believes is in the interests of the nation. According to Mr. Kaufman, the Government's first concern has been to choose a basis for compensation which is objective. With that we agree. He says that at the same time it was necessary to choose compensation principles of general application which could none the less take account in the fairest possible way of the different underlying circumstances of 43 different companies in four different industries to be acquired.
These are points which we have raised in your Lordships' House and noble Lords opposite were rather unwilling to accept that argument. The Government then, Mr. Kaufman goes on to say, "after

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careful consideration decided that a share or imputed share basis of valuation most nearly met"—these general criteria. He did not say it does meet; he said it "most nearly" meets. I do not agree that a share or imputed share basis of valuation is necessarily the right method of valuation. But what I would argue now is that we have, first, the Government's declared objectivity; and, secondly, we know there is a need for expediency, and the need for expediency is because of the considerable delay which has taken place since this Bill was first drafted and because of the financial situation of many companies in the shipbuilding industry.
If something is not done—if this Bill is not passed or other action is taken—there could be considerable unemployment and very serious financial consequences. It does not matter what happens, but some action must be taken. While I do not approve of the action that the Government are seeking to take, it was in the Manifesto and therefore we must try to support it within certain reasonable modifications. One thing that I, as a private sector man and as a banker, cannot support is a method proposed for compensation which, by every rule book in the Western free democratic world, is unfair and wrong. It is the precedent I have argued against, not the application here, because to establish such a precedent which is known to be unfair, and which on consultation throughout the world is seen to be unfair, is damaging not only to this nation now, but to the future of industrial investment in the United Kingdom.
My Lords, I will not go into all the arguments that come with it, but I will try to take heart from a few of the statements made by Mr. Kaufman. I know the noble Lord, Lord Winterbottom, will try as hard as he can to give us some comfort. At the end of his letter, which I have made available, Mr. Kaufman says:
"I hope that the compensation terms of the Bill represent a conscious attempt to achieve objectivity by recourse to the methods and mechanisms of the Stock Exchange and achieve equality of treatment for all the interests affected through the flexibility with which the terms are drawn. The Government believe that the end product will be fairest."
What I am concerned about is that the end product will be fairest. I am not now so much concerned with the various methods that may be employed.
The object of my Amendment concerns the consideration of compensation, and there we come to the phrase "relevant factors". Ideally we would ask the Government to say, "We will take into account all relevant factors in consultation with all appropriate authorities and bodies, and sort out compensation". I believe that is how they started in this. They intended to be fair. I believe their advisers and the whole Civil Service are pathologically incapable of being unfair or unjust. It is not necessarily their intention to be unfair and unjust, but I believe that the Government, perhaps through a failure to grasp or understand the complications of compensation, set out to do something which was unfair and unjust.
Now we come to the point on "relevant factors". If there is no other basis on which to start, I will accept that some form of valuation related to the methods and mechanisms used by the Stock Exchange is a good one. It is not ideal, but it is difficult to find another alternative. The reason why it is so difficult to find alternatives is because of the differing factors of 43 companies in four different industries. There is one case where it can be deemed to be fair; that is, with the one company out of 43 which is quoted on the Stock Exchange. It is only fair for that company because it does not have a single shareholder who has control, but is comprised of many minority interests, all of whom own shares and regard the value of those shares as the price at which they could sell them on a particular day. Whether or not they wish to sell them does not come into it, because the company will be taken over, and they will be forced to sell.
But for the other companies, one starts with the question: If they had been quoted, what would the price have been? What I would repeat as succinctly as I can is that if one starts on that basis, one must take into account various relevant factors. The determination of what those relevant factors may be is a different matter. Mr. Kaufman said:
"To attempt to list the factors in the Bill would risk injustice. A list might result in a particular shareholder not being able to refer to a particular factor which he considered relevant. If no attempt is made at a list, it is clear that any factor which anyone thinks is relevant to valuation can be put to the arbitrator."

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This is relevant to valuation, though not necessarily relevant to an imputed or notional share valuation. The letter says "relevant to valuation".
My Lords, my argument is that it seems to me, as the Bill is currently drafted—and I am not a lawyer—that all factors which may be relevant t0o valuation need not to be taken into account. Here we rely to some extent on the Government advisers and on Whinney Murray who will be advising the Government here. If one is a professional firm, such as Whinney Murray, of the highest reputation, it is their duty to act in the interests of their client, to implement and utilise law and all codes of practice. In short, it is their duty to negotiate prices downwards, and to utilise all the measures in their power to do so, otherwise they are not performing their job professionally. But as the Bill is drafted, where the Government have said "relevant factors", it does not refer to all factors that could be classed as relevant.
Therefore, my Amendment in lieu is designed to enable the Arbitration Committee to decide whether or not a factor is relevant. In view of the apparent attempt of the Government to drop the insistence that a share price is fair, I have dropped the word "fair" from the original Amendment and propose that it be left to the Arbitration Committee to decide not what price is relevant, but what matters are relevant.
If I can give a simple example without listing all the relevant factors, one can have a company which owns certain assets. These are immediately disposable—land required for housing, or land in a strategic position. These assets can be sold tomorrow by a liquidator, for a large amount of money. There are companies in that situation. Equally, there are other companies who have land and buildings which are in such a position that while the immediate value of that land and buildings is nothing to anyone else, it has some form of agricultural or strategic value. The way in which you treat assets may make a considerable difference. There is also the matter of the performance the companies have undertaken in a particular period of time. Mr. Kaufman says:
"In particular, both parties"—
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referring to one side or the other—
"will consider factors which had a bearing on the prospects as well as the underlying condition of the companies concerned as seen during the reference period, which may have a bearing on the value of their shares".
This narrows it down to shares again, but we are concerned with several valuations of businesses.
The objective of my Amendment, in case your Lordships think otherwise, is not so much to increase the price that may be paid by the Government for compensation, but to ensure that those companies which have performed well and have utilised funds well, and will utilise new funds well, will be given a chance to obtain a realistic price, and that those companies which have failed, whether by fault of their own because the world is a hard and cruel place, will not be given unjustly compensation which will then be squandered and wasted. The overall amounts cannot vary, but it is important that the basic principles employed outside by private sectors throughout the world and by other Governments are fair, and are seen to be fair.
I know that the noble Lord, Lord Winterbottom, will go as far as he can on this, but since we are now faced with possibly the last points to be raised on compensation, it may be appropriate for me to point out that I have tried to be as independent as I possibly can be in this case. I have not at any moment participated in other sectors of the debate which could be construed as Party political, although I have voted with my Party. This may be true of others who may be stockbrokers or bankers who have spoken on this subject. It must be one of the roles of this House that those of us who are here by accident or design, if we have anything to contribute, should contribute it as independently as we can. I am conscious, too, of the fear of those on the Front Benches and on all sides of the House when compensation or matters concerning money are raised, which they may not fully understand, that they may be forced into a position of seeking to obtain more money for the capitalist system or raising emotional factors which should be outside the jurisdiction of this House. On that basis, I will sit down and await with eager anticipation the reply of the noble Lord, Lord Winterbottom, and, I hope, some contributions from my noble friends. I beg to move.
7.19 p.m.
Lord GOODMAN: My Lords, may I rise briefly to say that at an earlier stage I indicated my views about the compensation provisions. They have been absolutely impeccably presented by the last speaker in terms of the greatest fairness and with the least possible provocation. I should like to endorse what he said about the seeming apprehension on the part of the Opposition and on the Liberal Benches to intervene in this debate because of the suggestion that might be raised that, in some ways, they were supporting monetary interests against the less privileged section of the community.
I think this is a completely misguided and misplaced apprehension. I think their concern should be to ensure justice. Nothing that was urged by the noble Lord gave rise to any suggestion that anyone was going to get a penny the more. It might well be that people would get less as a result of sensible compensation provisions. I would urge on the Opposition and on the Liberal Benches to consider whether they have not a duty to ensure that there are inserted into this Bill sensible provisions. In my view, without any disrespect to the authors of the Bill, these are not sensible provisions. I cannot see why anyone should be deterred from moving to the point of Division a matter where it is a question of whether sense or nonsense prevails. We have a duty, and we were reminded earlier that we are a revising Chamber. Nothing is more suitable by way of revision than to convert nonsense into sense. I would think it is an absolutely impeccable and classical illustration of the revision of a provision.
I do not intend to keep the House long; there are many matters to discuss. But I would say just this. On the question of the quoted companies, it is not, I think, unfair to say that a quoted price should be taken. The quoted price to a large extent is a roulette consideration, but the fact remains that the owner of the shares could have sold at that price. On that footing, although objection could be taken, it is not an objection I propose to take at this moment. On the question of the unquoted companies, the idea that there should be a notional listing seems to me to be absolutely Alice in Wonderland. I do
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not know how you can possibly achieve a notional listing. I am not going to repeat what I said last time, but if you take into account the factors necessary to procure a Stock Exchange listing it is quite clear that no arbitration tribunal could, except by the exercise not only of rule of thumb but of absolute guesswork, arrive at any conclusion based on that notion.
I cannot see why this Amendment—which is a highly sensible Amendment; it merely says that the arbitration tribunal should take into account all relevant factors—should give rise to the slightest difficulty. You cannot take into account how many shares would be placed on the market. You cannot take into account how many shares would be overhanging the market as a possible means of depressing or enhancing the price. You cannot take into account what the public would think of the status of particular directors. You cannot take into account what form of service agreements would have been entered into with the directors of the company, which would have a bearing on the actual listing. There are about 11 million matters you cannot take into account in trying to arrive at a notional listing.
I venture to think that only the most honourable tyro in these matters would have evolved this piece of drafting. Nobody wants to take objection to drafting efforts by honourable tyros. Nor does one want to enact them. I do still plead with the Government to consider that this Amendment would restore a good deal of sanity to this provision, which is notably missing in relation to the unlisted companies. I would also urge that, even if it is felt as a matter of principle that no one should divide on so vulgar a question as money, nevertheless those of us who have a feeling that this is not much of a principle where justice is concerned should take the law into our own hands in this matter.
Lord CULLEN of ASHBOURNE: My Lords, I should like to add a very few words in support of my noble friend's Amendment on one particular point which I think is important. During the course of the debates on this matter, several noble Lords have pointed out that actual, quite apart from notional or imputed, share prices represent prices at

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which willing buyers and sellers are prepared to carry out transactions. But in the back of their minds there is always the feeling that there might possibly be a take-over bid coming, and they know that if that does happen for the bid to be successful the price would need to be substantially higher.
Oddly enough, only today one of the most distinguished professional investors, in an interview with a City editor, made the point that there are now two markets in equities. The first is the ordinary market for those who buy and sell shares, and the second is for the whole companies, which prices are one and a half to twice the market price of the other shares. The point I am seeking to make is that if the base value of a security is determined with reference to the market price, or what the market price would have been if a share had been quoted, agreement between the Secretary of State and the stockholders' representative will be highly unlikely. Furthermore, I would hope that the arbitration tribunal would consider that the difference between the values of the two types of equities is an extremely relevant factor in assessing the proper value of the shares to be nationalised, since it is quite evident that there is a substantial premium over the market price to which the shareholders are entitled. This is the very point that was underlined in today's paper, to which I referred. It is a professional view by a person with a lifetime of experience, and it is not—I repeat not—a Party point.
Lord MONSON: My Lords, I rise to support as strongly as I am able the Amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Selsdon; if the Government do not accept it, like my noble friend Lord Goodman, I hope, that he will press it to a Division. The noble Lord, Lord Selsdon, has been exceptionally polite throughout in his assessment of the Government's assumed motives when we have been discussing these compensation terms, and it has not got him terribly far. Therefore, I am afraid I must be somewhat more blunt. Some days ago a noble Lord on the Opposition Front Bench revealed that the compensation terms for one particular naval shipbuilder would be the equivalent of one year's profits. Let us not mince words; these are the politics of the Mafia. I doubt whether,
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supposing there were any private industry left to nationalise in Yugoslavia, Poland or Hungary, the compensation terms would be as low as these. I think one would have to go to post-Dubcek Czechoslovakia or to Albania to find such derisory terms—a price equal to one year's profits. Things have come to a sorry pass when Her Majesty's Government indicate that they are behaving really no better than Maoist Albania. Why have intelligent and moderate members of the Labour Party accepted this? Could it have something to do with what was revealed this morning by that Right-Wing Labour group, the Social Democratic Alliance; namely, that 33 Labour Members have philosophies more in tune with Eastern Europe than with the West? It would seem that Labour moderates are so terrified of these people and of the Marxists in Transport House, and, above all, in the constituencies, that they are driven to act against their better judgment.
Lord ROBBINS: My Lords, I will be very brief. There is clearly a head-on collision between the starting assumptions from which the Government proceed in setting out what they regard as fair provisions for compensation and the starting point of those of us who disagree with them. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, said with serene confidence, dogmatically, that the provisions in the Bill were entirely just. If I could muster such serene confidence about anything on this earth, I would say equally emphatically that they seem to me to be supremely unjust.
But the purpose this evening is not to rehearse the technical arguments, which have been mentioned already and well discussed at the Committee stage, but rather to question whether the Amendment moved by the noble Lord does anything to improve matters. From my point of view, if this were accepted by the Government then whether they start from what the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, has called the Alice in Wonderland basis of initial valuation, or whether they adopt something more sensible, if this provision—namely, that
"on application by the stockholders' representatives or the Secretary of State, all factors considered relevant by the arbitration tribunal …"—
could be taken into account, I should be satisfied. I find it extraordinarily difficult

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to conceive the frame of mind in which a provision of this sort can be resisted. Clearly the Reason given in No. 55
"Because they might involve charges on public funds, and the Commons do not offer any further Reason trusting that this Reason may be deemed sufficient"
is not such as to appeal to anyone who is not deeply committed to one point of view. I hope that this Amendment will be adopted, and if it were pressed to a Division I personally, having regard to all the consequences, would certainly be prepared to go into that Lobby.
Lord HACKING: My Lords, I rise simply to acknowledge the submissions which have been made by the noble Lord, Lord Selsdon, to say that he has support from another quarter.
7.31 p.m.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Selsdon, who has made such a valuable contribution to our discussions over the nights that lie behind us, has made a further attempt to amend the compensation terms on lines which he considers to be more equitable. My only regret is that in looking at the communication which he had from my honourable friend the Minister of State he looked at a gift horse in the mouth with, I thought, rather excessive intensity. After all, it was an attempt to clarify the argument that the noble Lord and I, and other noble Lords in this House, have had over a rather long period as to what is fair and how shares should be valued. We have not been indulging in a dialogue of the deaf. The noble Earl may have a small snigger, but the noble Lord, Lord Kings Norton, today received proof that it was not a dialogue of the deaf. I was able to present him with what he wanted at the appropriate moment in the process of this Bill. It is not a dialogue between the deaf. Sometimes some Governments may be a bit deafer than others.
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, I was only smiling at the expression, not at the inference.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: Well, my Lords, we are on our way. May I say that I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Monson, was rather spoiling his case by overstatement. I am not anybody's creature,
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whether he be an Albanian or someone very far to the Left of centre of my own Party. What I am talking about is this Bill and its implications for the economy of the country and two major industries.
Lord Selsdon's Amendment is similar to Amendment No. 53, which was pressed by the official Opposition at Committee and which the Government were unable to accept. Indeed, the Commons have also disagreed with Amendment No. 53 for Reason No. 55. The terms provide for quoted securities to be valued on the basis of their Stock Exchange quotations and unquoted securities on the basis of imputed quotations. In the case of unquoted securities, the value will be arrived at by negotiation between the Secretary of State and the stockholders' representative, or with recourse to independent arbitration.
We believe that the terms of the Bill ensure that compensation will be fair on two counts. First, the Stock Market provides an independent and objective means of assessing a company's worth at any given time. The price of shares as quoted on the Stock Exchange represents the price at which these shares will be bought and sold. The use of the past reference period does not render this argument invalid. The stock market is lower now than during the period up to February 1974 and, in most cases, the shares quotations of parent companies are well below the reference period levels, some substantially so. The fact that a reference period extending over six months has been chosen enables the future trends of a company to be clearly identified. The Stock Exchange does not think from day to day; it analyses the situation, and during this period they have six months in which to make a long-term analysis of the future of these companies.
Secondly, independent arbitration is provided for under the Bill so that all security holders will be treated both equally and impartially. This means that not only are the terms of the Bill fair but also their method of application. Amendment 51A requires that the tribunal, at the request of the Secretary of State or the stockholders' representative, shall take account of all relevant factors in order to ensure that the compensation is fair. However, the Bill already provides in

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Clause 38(3) that the Tribunal shall have regard to all relevant factors. As I have made clear, the tribunal is an independent body and it would not be acting properly if it had regard to factors relevant to a Stock Exchange valuation yet failed to take account of them. The present words may be different, but since the effect is exactly the same there is no need to duplicate the provision as the Amendment seeks to do.
The Bill currently provides for unlisted securities to be valued on the basis of what would have been their quotation on each of the relevant days had they been quoted at that time. The arbitration tribunal, in determining the basis value is required to have full regard to all relevant factors. There is nothing novel in this approach. It is analogous to the process undertaken by the Stock Exchange in fixing a price for a previously unquoted security. In fixing a price, the Stock Exchange acts within the requirements of its own code of practice set out in the Listing Agreement. This Agreement goes much wider than any legislative requirements and requires the publication of a great deal of very detailed information with particular emphasis on price sensitive information. I wish to assure the House that, in the compensation negotiations, it is not the intention of the Government to seek to carry out the valuation on any less stringent a basis than that used by the Stock Exchange.
Indeed it could be argued that the Bill goes further. It allows for the arbitration tribunal to take account of all relevant factors, not just those required by the Listing Agreement. Either party to the negotiations is free to bring into the negotiations, and before the Tribunal, any factor which it considers relevant. And it will ultimately be for the tribunal to decide what weight should be placed on that factor. The mechanisms of valuation which will be used are therefore closely akin to the well established and well tried practices of the stock market itself. As the noble Lord knows, we are talking about Stock Exchange mechanisms in this matter, and rather not, except indirectly, comparable prices.
As has been made clear in another place, much of the work of the valuation will be carried out by experts specifically retained for the purposes of the negotiations. The Government have secured the
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services of a leading firm of city accountants, Whinney Murray and Company, who will be involved in the detailed mechanics of the valuation. In addition, the Government will be calling on the detailed advice of the Government Broker, Mullens and Company, to assist in assessing the particular stock market factors which would have affected the price of securities during the reference period, had they been quoted. The association of these two companies with the valuation process only serves to emphasise what we believe is the inherent fairness of the basis and method of valuation laid down in the Bill. It is for these reasons that I ask the noble Lord not to press his Amendment.
Lord GOODMAN: My Lords, might I ask the noble Lord a question before he sits down? He mentioned the name of a very reputable and highly respected firm of accountants. Have those accountants been asked whether in their view it is sensible to attempt to value unquoted shares on the basis of a notional quotation?
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, my noble friend who is in charge of the Bill reports that they have, but I would have thought that a firm of that eminence would not have undertaken the duty unless they were satisfied of the background situation.
Lord GOODMAN: My Lords, may I be permitted to ask a further question? This is a highly technical matter; it is not a political matter. It would be most unfortunate if it were pressed to a Division. This is a Bill which in many aspects so far as the shipbuilding and aircraft industries are concerned is fairly free from controversy, and it would be a great pity if quite needless controversy were brought into it. Would the Government be prepared to consult with Whinney Murray on the question I have asked and reflect again if they get an answer which accords with my own view of the matter and that of many other Members here?
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I am sorry that the noble Lord felt inhibited in replying to the last question from the noble Lord, Lord Goodman. May I raise one point about what he was saying? I believe that the noble Lord was genuinely

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trying to reassure us about the Government's intention in relation to the compensation being fair. He rested considerably on Clause 38(3), a subsection which brings in the arbitration tribunal. The noble Lord was stressing that this subsection provided that:
"The arbitration tribunal…shall have regard to all relevant factors".
I wonder whether he would look at subsection (3) rather carefully as I try to speak about it. What disturbs me about the subsection—and I hope the noble Lord can tell me that I read it correctly—is that it says:
"The arbitration tribunal, in determining the base value that any securities would have had if they had been listed…shall have regard to all relevant factors.".
In other words, they can only have regard to all relevant factors in relation to the base value which securities would have had if they had been listed at the time in question. If I interpret that subsection correctly I am worried about its restrictiveness to a past date, whereas when I read the letter which Mr. Kaufman sent to my noble friend Lord Selsdon, and to which he referred, I see that in the middle of the second paragraph on the second page of his reply Mr. Kaufman said:
"Both parties will consider factors which had a bearing on the prospects as well as the underlying condition of the company.".
If the Government could tell us that subsection (3) allowed the tribunal to have regard to all relevant factors in relation to the prospects as well as the underlying conditions in accordance with Mr. Kaufman's letter, I for one should be a lot happier. I am not a lawyer or a financier or an accountant, but I have been trying to apply my lay mind to this. It seems to me that if we could absorb all the relevant factors which could be taken into account by the tribunal and that Mr. Kaufman's letter was indeed correct, that the prospects as well as the underlying factors at the time could be taken into account, we should all feel a lot easier and feel that the chances of justice being done were considerably greater than we at one time felt. I wonder whether, with the leave of the House, the noble Lord would feel able to explain his understanding of the subsection.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, as my noble friend has exhausted more than once his ability to speak in this debate it might
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be helpful if I attempted to reply. I think it is the tradition of the House that unless people are moving or replying to the debate on the Amendment they should speak only once. My understanding is that the Government's case is that in regard to securities quoted on the Stock Exchange part of the price will reflect the future prospects of the company. In other words, as my noble friend said in replying to the debate, the value of the securities as quoted on the Stock Exchange is not simply a matter of looking at the thing from day to day. In listing securities the Stock Exchange will have taken into consideration the future prospects of the company; that is the current value of the shares and the future prospects and the trading picture on that particular day or week.
Therefore, it is quite clear that when we are going through this exercise of imputing a value to the shares which are not quoted it would be open to the tribinal—I hope the noble Lord, Lord Carr, will take this point because it is the direct answer to the question he asked—to take into account the prospects of the company, and that will be a relevant factor in the tribunal's consideration because it would be a relevant factor if the securities were listed on the Stock Exchange in arriving at the value.
Lord WARDINGTON: My Lords I think I understood the noble Lord, Lord Winterbottom, to say something to the effect that the negotiators could have recourse to the Stock Exchange Listing Agreement. This is very important and is different to a price. The Stock Exchange Listing Agreement actually takes into account something that I tried to explain the other day—the possibility of a notional price. If you are bringing a new issue to the market you have to make a guess, and prospects are part of it. In effect, the Stock Exchange has to monitor the information and protect the public and the seller from a wrong price
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, the difference is so narrow that I really cannot see why a reasonable answer could not be given to the noble Lord, Lord Goodman. Everybody wants to be fair. If the noble Lord, Lord Winter-bottom, represents the view of the Government—as of course he must—what he wants to do is not at all dissimilar

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from what the noble Lord, Lord Selsdon, is trying to achieve. It would be a pity to push this question to a Division. It is so near that it ought not to give the impression of a confrontation on a matter to do with the proper spending of money. Is there no way of approaching this? The noble Lord said that nobody could speak again but the House could give permission to the noble Lord, Lord Winterbottom, to do so.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, if I may by leave of the House make a second speech, my noble friend Lord Winter-bottom has made three and it would be trying the patience of the House if he were to make a fourth. As the noble Lord said, I do not think there is very much between us. Therefore, we hope that the noble Lord, Lord Selsdon, will not feel it necessary to press his Amendment. An Amendment in a similar form to this one has already been discussed and divided on and rejected by another place, so it would not appear to be particularly constructive, when things between us are so narrow to put this Amendment into the Bill. Having heard the very clear exposition and the full statement which my noble friend has been able to give, and also given the fact that I was able to give a straight, Yes in reply to the question which the noble Lord, Lord Carr of Hadley, asked me, which seemed to be the point troubling him. I hope that that is not the intention of the noble Lord, Lord Selsdon. It seems that in fact there is nothing left between either side of the House and I hope noble Lords will agree to leave the Bill as it was.
I did not understand exactly what the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, was asking us to do but I can certainly give an undertaking to look at what he said in Hansard, and if there is any further information we can give the noble Lord or any further facts which he has brought to light and which have not been considered I will undertake to look into the matter and, if necessary, to write to him.
Lord GOODMAN: My Lords, I have been impressed by what has been said from the Government Benches in the last few moments and if the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, will look again into the question whether the accountants consider
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that the suggestion of a notional Stock Exchange quotation is something on which they could work, I should be very influenced by that.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, for making that point, which I confess I had not fully taken when he first put the question. I will certainly look into that matter again. My understanding is that the accountants have been asked about it, but I will look into it and write to the noble Lord.
Lord SELSDON: My Lords, it almost seems that we have here a classic case of the professional versus the politician; that does not imply that politics is not a profession. When one listens to noble Lords who come from the same walk of financial life as I do or from legal life, one believes them and knows that they share one's own views and that they do not share views that have been imposed on them or put forward by the Government Benches. If, at the beginning of the drafting of the Bill, the Government had consulted those who know this field, had made it clear that consultations were going on and that the end product would be, as Mr. Kaufman said, fairness, many of us need not have spent half the night—or was it the whole night?—discussing this issue in your Lordships' House.
Whatever comes out of this compensation discussion, it is clear that when a Government seek to impose their will, and their uninformed will, on a nation, they are entering difficult waters and that gradually the hackles of those who feel that they know rise, until one arrives at confrontation, the very confrontation that Governments should seek to avoid; confrontation among the financial sector, industry and Government. The Government may not have been aware of the hare that started to run and the dangers that could have come if this hare had been allowed, as it could still do, to gather pace.
I do not intend to press the Amendment, but I will not press it for reasons different from those which the noble Lord, Lord Winterbottom, put forward, because I detected from some of his remarks that he was speaking very much from a prepared brief. I also know that he shares my view that it is the end result that must be fair and must be seen to be fair. I should like

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the Government, perhaps on another occasion, to give an undertaking that they do not believe that a share price or imputed share price is a fair valuation for a company. It may be used as a starting basis for valuation, but to declare to the outside world that that is the Government's view is dangerous to foreign investment.
We have spoken enough on this subject. It is tedious and can become extremely boring. If the Government will assure us that they will in the end be fair, then that is something one must accept, but I warn them about the commitment into which they are entering. They are entering into a financial commitment which will exceed £2 billion. That is merely money. They are, however, trespassing on certain aspects of morality which are far more damaging to the nation. While £2 billion for an enormous industry is not a fantastic amount of money compared with what may be required for the future, if they damage one factor that still remains so far as the United Kingdom is concerned on a worldwide basis, that of good will, they will have done something they will regret for the rest of their days. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

LORDS AMENDMENT
52 After Clause 35, insert the following new clause:
Compensation for severance.
".—(1) This section applies to a person who:

(a) is entitled to receive compensation under section 35 above in relation to the securities of a company (the "relevant company"); and

(b) suffers special loss or damage or reasonably incurs expenses (not being taxes) as a direct result of the vesting of those securities in a Corporation.

A person to whom this section applies shall be entitled to receive a payment (to be determined in like manner to the compensation payable to him) equal to the loss or damage or expenses referred to in subsection (1) above.
(3) Where the relevant company forms part of a larger undertaking, the payment referred to in subsection (2) above shall include a sum equivalent to the reasonable cost of re-arranging the affairs of that undertaking and a sum calculated by reference to any increase in the proportion of the overhead expenses of the undertaking to the volume of the business over which those
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expenses are spread, so far as that increase is due to the vesting of those securities and is not reasonably capable of being avoided or diminished."
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
55 Because it might involve charges on public funds, and the Commons do not offer any further Reason trusting that this Reason may be deemed sufficient.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 52, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 55. We have already discussed this Amendment.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on the said Amendment to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 55.—(Lord Melchett.)

LORDS AMENDMENT
53 In page 52, line 41, at end insert:
"taking into account all factors which the arbitration tribunal consider relevant in order to ensure that the compensation in respect of the securities shall be fair.''
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 53, but doth propose the following Amendment in lieu thereof:
53A In page 52, line 41, at end insert—
"taking into account all factors which on application by the Stockholders' Representative or the Secretary of State the arbitration tribunal shall deem relevant in order to ensure that the compensation in respect of the securities shall be sufficient fairly to make good the earning power represented by these securities "
In view of the discussion we have just had I need not spend much time moving this Amendment. I want simply to record a few points on which the various parts of the House are in agreement and not to emphasise those points on which we may be in disagreement, and I will try to put the seal on the greater understanding, the greater degree of assurance, of what the Government believe will come out of these compensation provisions. The Government have said on a number of occasions that they wish the compensation to provide the present owners of the assets with amounts which will fully replace the earning power of those assets which they now have to vest in the new Corporations. We on these Benches and spokesmen on the

1233
Liberal and Cross-Benches have made it clear that if that is the intention, there is no difference between us; our fears and differences have been about the mechanism which we have been discussing. In Amendment No. 53A I have deliberately used drafting which would import into the Bill the precise words used by Ministers.
The key to the Amendment appears in the words:
"…in order to ensure that the compensation in respect of the securities shall be sufficient fairly to make good the earning power represented by these securities".
Those words have been used by Ministers on a number of occasions and I remind the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, of two occasions when they were used; I could give many more examples but I will not do so in view of the time. The Minister said:
"My contention is that the compensation paid will reflect the earning value of the asset".
He also said:
"The only real test of fair compensation is whether it makes good to each and every shareholder the capital and income that that shareholder has lost from the acquisition of his or her shares. That is precisely what the Bill tries to do."
We do not question the good faith of the Bill in trying to do that. We only question its adequacy in doing it and that is why in Amendment No. 53A we want to import into the Bill the words:
"…taking into account all factors…relevant in order to ensure that the compensation in respect of the securities shall be sufficient fairly to make good the earning power represented by these securities."
In other words, all we would write into the Bill in this Amendment is the assurance that the Government's own declared aim shall be what happens. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment (No. 53), but propose Amendment No. 53A in lieu thereof.—(Lord Carr of Hadley.)
8 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, Amendment No. 53A seeks to qualify the meaning of "fair'', including the Amendment No. 53 with which the Commons disagreed. During our lengthy debates on the compensation provisions of this Bill, the Government have repeatedly made clear that a stock market-based valuation of securities reflects the earning power of the
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underlying assets. When the Stock Exchange seeks to fix a price for a previously unlisted security, it assesses the value of that security on the potential investor. The value is based to a significant extent on what earnings the investor can expect from that security and hangs on the earning power of the underlying assets.
In order to achieve the result, the Stock Exchange works on the basis of the very detailed requirements of the Listing Agreement which we discussed when talking about the previous Amendment. This Listing Agreement which serves as a code of practice for all stock market dealings, requires very wide-ranging information about the records and prospects of companies to be made available well beyond the minimum statutory requirements. Under the Bill exactly the same process will apply. The Bill already provides that the arbitrator shall have regard to all relevant factors. Either party in the negotiations, either the Secretary of State or the stockholders' representative, can bring into the negotiations and ultimately before the arbitration tribunal any factor which he or she considers relevant to a particular case. The first part of Amendment No. 53A therefore is already covered in the current text of the Bill.
My Lords, as to the reference to fairness, I have already, and repeatedly, made the Government's position clear. The Stock Exchange employs a detailed process for fixing the price of a previously unlisted share and, so far as I am aware, no one suggests that this is unfair. We are using the same mechanism. I suggest that if it is fair in one case, it is likely to be fair in the other. It is the view of the Government that the present compensation terms are, for the reasons I have outlined, fair to all parties. In those circumstances, Amendment No. 53A at best adds up to the existing provisions of the Bill and at worst it reduces the clarity of the provisions as they are in the Bill, if your Lordships insist on the Amendment. I hope, therefore, that the noble Lord, Lord Carr, will not press his Amendment.
Lord SELSDON: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, had reference to some sort of document which I had hoped he had dismissed a few moments ago. The professionals are all agreed that the share price is not a fair basis. What I am asking the Government to

1235
say is that that be the starting basis, nothing more. I hope we can get away from that, which is the emotive factor about which I spoke earlier.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I should be a great deal happier if the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, had not made the speech which he has just made, because I now go away feeling that, I am sure unintentionally, he has back tracked on what the noble Lord, Lord Winterbottom, and he himself said in discussion on the previous Amendment. Perhaps I am wrong. I can only speak as a listener. I am sure that unintentionally—that is what he seemed to be doing; he started off by objecting to the Amendment because it put a qualification on the meaning of the word "fair". The only qualification it is putting on the meaning of the word "fair'' is his own definition of the word, in the words that he had used on more than one occasion.
We started off by fearing, and I think also believing, that the Government's view of what was fair did not coincide with our view of what was fair. As we proceeded with our rather lengthy debates, the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, and also the noble Lord, Lord Winterbottom, on more than one occasion gave a definition of their intentions which was very satisfactory to us and led us to feel that at least we could share their objectives.
Because there has been this doubt arising from the wording of this Bill, not only inside this House but outside it, we really believed that by writing in the Government's own definition of what was fair and their objective in compensation, we would be doing something not only to allay our own doubts but also, above all, to allay the very real doubts of people outside who have not all been here listening to the speeches of noble Lords, therefore judging the sincerity and integrity of the Government's intentions. Whatever we may think about them having heard the noble Lords, they are not held so confidently outside this House, because the people merely read the Bill, see the basic method proposed, and think it cannot possibly lead to a fair result.
It is because the Government appeared to be running away from their own
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decision in rejecting this Amendment that I said a few moments ago that I wished the noble Lord had not made the speech that he had made, and perhaps we could have ended on the basis of the previous speeches. I am not going to advise your Lordships to vote on this Amendment. I think we have got to the stage now when the proof of the pudding is going to be in the eating. I only hope that the confidence which was rather increased by our debates on the previous Amendments will not be dissipated by what happens in practice.
I must only say to the Government, as my noble friend Lord Selsdon said in his speech leading up to the withdrawal of the last Amendment, that if the end result of this is seen not to be fair, it will not only be the shareholders of the assets who will suffer, it will be the whole of this country which will suffer; its unique name in finance and trading right across the world, and the chances of further investment in this country from people outside. I say only this to the Government at this stage of the Bill, "For goodness' sake live up in practice to the best of your assurances, not to the least clear of them''. My Lords, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

LORDS AMENDMENT
54 Clause 38, page 53, line 45, at end insert:
"(7A) If, by virtue of an approval given by the Secretary of State pursuant to section 30 or 31 above, property, rights or liabilities have been transferred by the company in question, then, for the purpose of determining, in accordance with subsection (1) above, the base value of the securities of the company or such of them as are specified in the approval, it shall be assumed that, immediately before each of the relevant days,—

(a) the property, rights or liabilities so transferred were not vested in the company, and

(b) in place of that property, those rights or liabilities there were vested in the company funds equal to any consideration which passed to the company as a result of the property, rights or liabilities being so transferred.''

The Commons disagreed to the Amendment for the following Reason:
55 Because it might involve charges on public funds, and the Commons do not offer any further Reason trusting that this Reason may he deemed sufficient.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 54, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 55. This is an Amendment that we dealt with when speaking to Amendment No. 50.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 55.—(Lord Melchett.)

LORDS AMENDMENT
54A Page 53, line 45, at end insert:
"(7B) If any property rights or liabilities belonging to the company in connection with the business of repairing, refitting, or maintaining ships carried on by it other than at a shipyard or other works in which the company had an interest in possession on the initial date shall have been transferred or granted to any person and the consideration for the transfer or grant shall have been received by the holders of securities of the company or any of them, then, for the purpose of determining the base value of any securities of the company in accordance with subsection (1) above, it shall be assumed that immediately before each of the relevant days such property rights or liabilities were not vested in the company."
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
55 Because it might involve charges on public funds, and the Commons do not offer any further Reason trusting that this Reason maybe deemed sufficient.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, Amendment No. 54B was discussed in the earlier debate. Therefore I now move formally that this House doth not insist on Amendment No. 54A, but propose Amendment No. 54B in lieu thereof:
54B Page 53, line 45, at end insert:
("() If, pursuant to a transaction falling within section 30(2)(a) or section 31(2)(dd) above, any property or rights such as are therein mentioned have been transferred by the company in question, then, for the purpose of determining, in accordance with subsection (1) above, the base value of the securities of the company, it shall be assumed that, immediately before each of the relevant days—

(a) the property, rights or liabilities so transferred were not vested in the company, and

(b) in place of that property, those rights or liabilities, there were vested in the company funds equal to any consideration which passed to the company as as result of the property, rights or liabilities being so transferred.'')

Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment (No. 54A), but doth propose Amendment No. 54B in lieu thereof.—(Lord Campbell of Croy.)

LORDS AMENDMENT
56 Clause 39, page 57, line 5, leave out from first "of'' to end of line 8, and insert "any sum the right to repayment of which could be treated as a security under section 21(6) above''.
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment but proposed the following Amendment in lieu thereof:
57 Page 57, line 4, leave out from 'of' to end of line 8 and insert 'any sum the right to repayment of which, if the sum had not been repair, would, following the service of such a notice, have been treated as a security or part of a security under section 20(6) above '.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 57 in lieu of the Lords Amendment No. 56.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 56 and doth agree to the Amendment No. 57 proposed by the Commons in lieu thereof.

LORDS AMENDMENTS
58 Clause 47, page 64, line 26, leave out from "in'' to end of line 27 and insert "one or more of the activities specified in section 2(1) or (2) above, other than—
(a) a Corporation, or''.
59 Clause 47, page 64, line 32, leave out "British Shipbuilders" and insert "a Corporation".
60 Clause 47, page 64, line 33, leave out "the sale of ships" and insert "that or those activities".
61 Clause 47, page 64, line 35, leave out sub section (2).
62 Clause 47, page 65, line 8, leave out "British Shipbuilders" and insert "the Corporation concerned".
63 Clause 47, page 65, line 10, leave out "British Shipbuilders" and insert "the Corporation".
64 Clause 47, page 65, line 12, leave out "British Shipbuilders" and insert "the Corporation".
65 Clause 47, page 65, line 17, leave out "British Shipbuilders" and insert "the Corporation".
66 Clause 47, page 65, line 23, leave out "British Shipbuilders" and insert "the Corporation".
67 Clause 47, page 65, line 30, leave out "British Shipbuilders" and insert "the Corporation".
The Commons disagreed to these Amendments for the following Reasons:
68 Because they would undesirably extend the clause.
Lord WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendments Nos. 58 to 67 en bloc, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 68.
When the Government accepted during Committee stage in this House the need for this clause covering shipbuilding and ship repairing, they were not accepting that the fair trading legislation introduced by the Party opposite was deficient in that in general a procedure such as that in Clause 47 is necessary or desirable when a nationalised industry is competing with the private sector in either its main line or its ancillary activities. We recognise special circumstances in shipbuilding and ship repairing where some yards will remain outside public ownership. We strongly consider that the only activities of British Shipbuilders which should be covered by fair trading provisions are the sale of ships and the provision of ship repair services; just as Section 30 of the Iron and Steel Act 1967 was also restricted to the selling of certain iron and steel products and covered no other activity.
So far as sale and provision of services is concerned with respect to aircraft there will be no private sector company in this country manufacturing complete fixed wing aircraft or guided weapons—apart from Britten Norman which assembles light aircraft mainly builtabroad. Therefore, providing for an equivalent provision to Clause 47 for British Aerospace is unnecessary. By extending the scope of the clause to all activities of the Corporation your Lordships would risk subjecting a vital part of our national heritage to restrictions which would inhibit its commercial success, on the pretext of protecting competitors who are already quite adequately protected. We see no reason why the legislation passed by the Party opposite to ensure fair trading by both very large public and private sector companies and monopolies should not be adequate for these Corporations.
Aside from the substantial fair trading legislation which will apply to the two
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Corporations I can of course reiterate our assurance that British Shipbuilders and British Aerospace would have no wish to extract unfair advantages. Both Chairmen of the Organising Committees have agreed to make a formal policy statement on future trading practices in due course and they are both deeply committed to fair trading. I therefore urge noble Lords not to insist on these Amendments.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on the said Amendments, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 68.—(Lord Winterbottom.)
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, it is no good pretending that we are anything but disappointed at the Government's attitude and the decision of the other place in relation to the Amendments. I shall not ask the House to divide on this matter. I do not think it is a matter on which your Lordships would think it desirable to get into an ultimate state of conflict with the other place; but the situation is unsatisfactory because the reasons that the Government accepted in the end were valid in persuading them to include British Shipbuilders really are equally valid in relation to the aircraft side. The noble Lord said that it was recognised that on the shipbuilding side there were some yards outside public ownership. As far as aircraft were concerned, he seemed to think that no such clash could arise. I rather thought that one of the reasons why Scottish Aviation was being included in the Corporation was so that there might be a light aircraft producer within the Corporation in the future. So there could well be a light aircraft producer both inside the Corporation and outside public ownership. Therefore, so far as aircraft production is concerned, there is or is foreseeably liable to be—one does not have to use much imagination to foresee it—a likelihood of this arising. There are exactly the same circumstances as persuaded the Government that a fair trading clause was necessary for shipbuilding.
Returning to repairing, again I understand that the Government agreed to ship repairing having a fair trading clause because of the fact that there will be ship repairers outside the public sector. Indeed, they are all to be outside the public sector, but that is another matter and of course that will not be so because the ship

1241
builders themselves may undertake repairing activities. However, as I pointed out at an earlier stage, there are major aircraft repairers in the private sector and will continue to be so in the future. So, once again, the very arguments that led the Government to accept a fair trading clause for the shipbuilding and ship repairing sides apply—perhaps not on such a scale at the moment—in principle and practice equally to the aircraft side.
I shall not tonight go into all the other aspects other than sale but, if one looks only at the one activity of sale the same arguments really apply, not just in theory but in practice, to British Aerospace as apply to British Shipbuilders. I repeat that I shall not ask your Lordships to divide on this matter but here again this is a matter where there ought to be the minimum of political conflict and the maximum of desire for consensus. It is immensely disappointing that once more the Government's will to reach any consensus seems near to zero.

LORDS AMENDMENT
69 Clause 48, page 65, line 45, at end insert—
"(2) In carrying out their obligations the Corporations shall make available to the bodies corporate referred to in subsection (1) above any information or facilities which the said bodies corporate—

(a) could reasonably expect to have access to as members of their respective United Kingdom industries before vesting date; and

(b) will be made available by each Corporation to their wholly owned subsidiaries after vesting date.

(3) The information or facilities made available pursuant to subsection (2) above may be the subject of such reasonable charges as are agreed between the parties.".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
70 Because the Northern Ireland companies should not be excessively integrated in the activities of the Corporations.
8.16 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that the House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 69, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 70. The Government are anxious to see proper co-ordination between the new Corporations and publicly-owned companies in Northern
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Ireland which are carrying out the same activities. I hope that I have been able to make that clear to the noble Viscount and his noble friends. We believe that Clause 48 tabled at Report in another place by members of the Party opposite should secure this objective so far as British Shipbuilders and Harland and Wolff are concerned. The Government accepted the argument made by your Lordships that the principle is just as important for the aircraft industry in Great Britain and Northern Ireland and therefore brought forward an Amendment during Report stage in this House which extends the scope of the clause to cover British Aerospace and Short Brothers and Harland.
I should make it clear that the clause as it is extended, and as it has been agreed by another place, in no way departs from the independence of the Northern Ireland companies. But it should ensure that the Corporations and the Northern Ireland companies are in a better position to face foreign competition. However, the intended requirement in your Lordships' Amendment No. 69, that the same information and facilities should be made available to Shorts and to Harland and Wolff as to the Corporations' wholly-owned subsidiaries, could go much beyond what we consider desirable. The Amendment could result in integrating the activities of these companies in the new Corporations.
As I have explained on numerous occasions, the Government are opposed to this because we feel strongly that these firms should continue to be considered primarily in the context of Northern Ireland. Of course there is a need for co-ordination. Hence our acceptance of Clause 48 and our Amendment to extend it to aerospace. In this way the two companies can retain the separate identities, which we believe they should have without becoming isolated from the industry in Great Britain. However, for the reasons I have given now and when your Lordships last discussed the Amendment, I would ask the noble Lords not to insist on Amendment No. 69.
Moved, That the House doth not insist on the said Amendment, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 70.—(Lord Melchett.)
Viscount ROCHDALE: My Lords, I shall be very brief but, as I moved the Amendment to which the Commons have disagreed, there are one or two things that I really must say. I believe that my noble friend Lord Brookeborough and I who first put down the Amendment would wish to say how glad we are that the Amendment to incorporate Short Brothers and Harland has been maintained by another place. I have always assumed that in matters dealing with Northern Ireland all Governments follow a bipartisan policy. In view of the fact that the noble Lord is Minister of State in the Northern Ireland Office, I should not wish to embarrass him in anything that I may say. On the other hand, I think that the noble Lord must be careful not to take undue advantage of that latitude, and the fact that he acquiesces in the line that the Commons have taken to delete our Amendment makes it rather difficult for us.
If the Bill had been an entirely non-controversial one, and if all Parties had agreed that a certain line of action had to be taken which would have adversely affected Northern Ireland, that might have been permissible, if it was seen to be in the general national interest. But as we all know, this is a highly controversial Bill, and if one has a highly controversial Bill and one allows in it something that will damage interests in Northern Ireland just to make it easier for Party political matters to go through in the rest of the country, that is not right. That is rather how one sees the line that has been taken on our Amendment. I should not have thought that it can help the credibility of the noble Lord when he wears his other hat in Belfast.
However, I do not intend to pursue this matter further, but I should like to look for a moment at the Reason given by another place for not agreeing with the Amendment. The Reason refers to excess integration. The noble Lord himself referred to those words. The word "integration", whether or not it is excessive, has never been mentioned, and I claim that nothing in our Amendment would bring about integration. The fact that these two words have been used makes me realise all the more that the Amendment has not really been studied and understood. However, the noble Lord has given certain assurances that
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it is the Government's intention that there should be a degree of co-ordination.
In conclusion, I would say merely that I very much hope that those who have to operate this clause in their day-to-day work will consider very carefully what has been said on this Amendment, and will consider the reasons for the Amendment which were given in considerable detail at both Committee stage and the Report stage, and will then do their utmost to use such discretion as their political leaders allow them to minimise the very genuine fears which we on this side of the House have as to how it may affect the companies.

LORDS AMENDMENT
71 Clause 56, page 79, line 23, at end insert—
"or any factory, dry-dock, graving dock, or other premises or land situated in the United Kingdom to which an acquired company was entitled to an interest in possession or a licence to occupy and which on or at any time after the initial date was being used for repairing, refitting or maintaining ships unless such factory, dry dock, graving dock, or other premises or land are either wholly appurtenant to the shipbuilding undertaking carried on at a shipyard or other works in which the acquired company had an interest in possession on 31st July 1974 or are mainly appurtenant to property or rights which are wholly appurtenant to that undertaking or cannot reasonably be severed therefrom;".
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
72 Because it would undesirably exempt certain transactions from the safeguarding provisions of the Bill.
8.23 p.m.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on Amendment No. 71 but doth propose the following Amendment, No. 72A, in lieu thereof:
72A Page 79, line 23, at end insert ("or any factory, dry-dock, graving dock, or other premises or land situated in the United Kingdom in which an acquired company was entitled to an interest in possession or a licence to occupy and which on or at any time after the initial date was being used for repairing, refitting or maintaining ships unless:

(i) that factory, dry dock, graving dock, those premises or that land is or are wholly appurtenant to the shipbuilding undertaking carried on at a shipyard or other works in which the acquired company had an interest in possession on 31st July 1974 or is or are mainly appurtenant to property or rights which are wholly appurtenant to that undertaking; Or

1245

(ii) that factory, dry dock, graving dock, those premises, that land, that property or those rights, as the case may be, cannot reasonably be severed from the shipbuilding undertaking").

This is the last of the Amendments which were discussed with an earlier Amendment concerning Vosper Thornycroft.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on Amendment No. 71 but doth propose Amendment No. 72A in lieu thereof.—(Lord Campbell of Croy.)

LORDS AMENDMENT
73 Clause 57, page 79, line 42, at end insert—
"(1A) This Act shall not come into operation with respect to British Aerospace or to any of the companies referred to in subsection (1) of section 19 above, until such day as the Secretary of State may appoint by order made on or after the date of the first meeting of the next Parliament, but shall otherwise come into operation immediately."
The Commons disagreed to this Amendment for the following Reason:
74 Because it is important that the vesting date for the aircraft industry should not be so postponed.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendment No. 73 to which the Commons hays disagreed for the Reason numbered 74. This Amendment is wholly unacceptable to the Government. Although not debated in another place, there was no attempt to resist the Motion to disagree with your Lordships on the Amendment. This Amendment would impose a delay on the implementation of legislation which would be entirely unacceptable. In the Government's view it represents a fundamental challenge to the principles of the Bill and the will of the elected Chamber. The Government are particularly concerned over the industrial effects of further delay. I have spelled out many times to your Lordships how important it is to end the uncertainty over the future of the aircraft industry so that it can play an effective part in the discussions on international collaboration which are about to enter a critical phase. I hope that noble Lords opposite will not insist on the Amendment.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendment to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 74.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, at this stage of our proceedings your Lordships' House has to be selective, indeed extremely selective, in what it decides to insist upon. This has not been an easy decision to take. We have decided to concentrate our attention at this stage on ship repairing, and I believe that to be the right decision. Therefore, with sadness, I am going to advise my noble friends not to insist upon this Amendment. I do this with sadness because we must now watch the aircraft industry submit to the sentence which has been imposed upon it, contrary to all informed industrial opinion and contrary to the findings following the very careful study conducted by the Plowden Committee, which was set up by a Labour Government. Contrary to all this evidence and all these recommendations the Government are hell-bent on submitting the aircraft industry to this doctrinal sentence and fate.
I fear—and if I am wrong, I am wrong, and the country will be glad that I am wrong—that the result of this in the years to come will be an industry smaller in size than it otherwise need be, less active internationally than it otherwise would have been, and of a lower technical quality in relation to other countries than it is now. This is not a sentence of death on the aircraft industry, and those working in it will struggle, as they have always done in the past, to keep it as alive and kicking as possible. But it will be far more difficult for this industry, once nationalised, to remain alive by international standards than it has been hitherto. It will be a very sad day for many thousands of people in this country who obtain their employment from this industry and a very sad day for our exports and for the general technological standards of this country when the Bill, once it is an Act, is implemented.

LORDS AMENDMENTS
75 Schedule 2, page 81, leave out lines 15 to 17.
76 Schedule 2, page 82, leave out lines 30 to 33 and insert"15,000 gross tons".
77 Schedule 2, page 83, line 43, leave out "except in the case of a warship".
78 Schedule 2, page 84, line 5, leave out from "registered" to end of line 9.
The Commons disagreed to these Amendments for the following Reason:
79 Because it is important that the warship-building companies referred to in these Amendments should come into public ownership.
8.27 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lord, I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendments Nos. 75, 76, 77 and 78, to which the Commons have disagreed, for their Reason numbered 79. Throughout the passage of this Bill the Government's position on this issue has been made clear many times. These warship builders, who in the Government's view are successful largely because they are major Government contractors, form an important part of the shipbuilding industry, employing about 20,000 people out of some 70,000 people in shipbuilding as a whole. The Government consider that it would be illogical that those yards which are most dependent on Government orders should not vest in British Shipbuilders. Leaving the warship builders outside the scope of this Bill would be inimical to rational planning. We must not forget that other companies as well as the three specialists builders have warship building capability. As I said at the last stage of the Bill in your Lordships House, although it remains Government defence policy increasingly to concentrate warship orders on the three specialist yards, it has always been acknowledged that it will be necessary to place orders with other yards from time to time.
Companies such as Swan Hunter Shipbuilders, Scott Lithgow and Cammell Laird have significant warship orders. To split warship building between British Shipbuilders and the three specialist firms would be against the best interests of the industry as a whole and those who work in it. I hope that for these reasons noble Lords will not insist on these Amendments. I beg to move.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendments, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 79.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has said, the Government have debated this subject several times in your Lordships' House and we have given the reasons why we thought it wrong that the three specialist warship building firms should be nationalised and I shall not rehearse those reasons now. We believe that including these three companies will be detrimental to their interests and to their
1248
effective functioning. We greatly regret that the Government have not accepted these Amendments and that they have come back from another place. I would have hoped that the Government would accept them and thereby give a boost to British industry where specialist building of warships is concerned.

LORDS AMENDMENTS
80 Schedule 2, page 81, leave out lines 19 to 30.
81 Schedule 2, page 82, line 12, leave out "a shiprepairing company".
82 Schedule 2, page 82, line 42, leave out paragraph 3.
The Commons disagreed to these Amendments for the following Reason:
83 Because it is important that the ship repairing companies referred to in the said Amendments should come into public ownership.
8.32 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, with the leave of your Lordships I beg to move that this House doth not insist on their Amendments Nos. 80 to 82 inclusive, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 83. We have already had our main debate on ship repairing, to which of course these three Amendments refer, and I think—I hope, at least—the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, has said almost as much as he has to say on the subject. I certainly have.
My Lords, I was asked earlier about the article which appeared in today's Guardian, and it seems right that I should take this opportunity to respond to the questions that were asked me on that occasion. As I understand it, the article is speculating on what might happen if noble Lords opposite continue to insist on deleting ship repairing from this Bill. I do not intend to speculate on what might happen should noble Lords opposite continue on that course, but I and other Ministers, both in your Lordships' House and in another place, have never made any secret of the difficulties facing the shipbuilding industry in this country and around the world at the present time. Nor have we made any secret of the major decisions facing the aircraft industry, both in this country and around the world. We have stressed again and again the very serious effects on these industries of further delay. My Lords, I also want to make it absolutely clear that the Government are committed to public

1249
ownership of all three industries covered by the Bill—aircraft, shipbuilding and ship repairing.
Moved, That this House doth not insist on the said Amendments Nos. 80 to 82, to which the Commons have disagreed for the Reason numbered 83.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord CAMPBELL of CROY: My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, said, we had our debate earlier, on Amendment No. 19, and I certainly do not intend to repeat the arguments that I deployed then or to extend the debate into a discussion now. These Amendments will have the effect of deleting the ship repairing companies which are at present named in Schedule 2. But, my Lords, the noble Lord took this occasion, right at the end of our proceedings today on this Bill, to say something more about the article in today's Guardian about which both my noble friend Lord Carr and I had asked him questions. What we asked him was to deny publicly that the Government were considering, if the Bill did not go through in this Session, placing special pressure on particular companies, because the article indicated that the money would be available and that the Government might then almost blackmail certain companies by withholding money so far as they were concerned. The noble Lord has not answered that question, because he has not made any denial of the Government's intentions as apparently written in this article. He has merely said that it is speculating. We were hoping that he would be able to deny this particular speculation, and I certainly think that before I sit down he ought to say something more on that.
In any case, this Bill could go through in this Session if the Government will accept that ship repairing is inappropriate and will allow ship repairing to drop out of the Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, was advising them very strongly about this again today. He has done so previously. We know very well that there are other noble Lords in all parts of the House who know that the ship repairing industry can be left out of this Bill without upsetting the rest of the Bill, and that this would be one small thing which the Government could accept, and one effect of the consideration of the Bill within your Lordships' House which would
1250
promote a great deal of good will towards this country and towards the Government. So there is an answer so far as the noble Lord is concerned, which is that if the Government accept the deletion of ship repairing then the Bill will not be held up. The noble Lord was speaking in terms of the Bill being held up and speculating on the consequences, but I hope that if I give him the opportunity now he can deny what the Guardian has reported about a particular line which the Government, they say, are considering.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I said I did not intend to speculate on what might happen in the future, but it is quite clear to me that the effects of further delay on the industries affected by this Bill will be so catastrophic that it would be thoroughly irresponsible of anyone—your Lordships' House or anyone else—to seek further to delay the Bill; and in view of that it seems to me that it would not be wise even to waste time thinking about it. I certainly hope that noble Lords opposite will ponder very carefully the serious consequences on the industries should the Bill be further delayed.
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I really find this extremely disturbing. Here is a report in a major newspaper which really amounts almost to a blackmail threat as to what the effects would be to many tens of thousands of people working in this country, to say nothing of all their customers and suppliers, and all the rest of it, if Parliament chooses to take a certain course. I regard this as a very serious charge indeed. As I said at the beginning of this afternoon, I cannot believe for one moment that that can be the Government's intention, but I really do not understand, whatever the Government may feel about the actions we may or may not take, why they cannot flatly and categorically deny that charge. It is a scandalous charge, and I would have thought that they would have been only too eager to make quite clear that this report, in its implications, was wholly unfounded. If the Government persist in their failure to do that they really cannot be surprised if people outside this House, at home and abroad, draw deductions which I still believe cannot be true but which, for some obscure reason, the Government seem reluctant to deny.

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Perhaps I may say one more thing, and it is this. The Government really cannot get away with blaming any delay upon us. It is impossible for your Lordships' House to wreck this measure, even if they wished to do so. If we vote, as we shall in a moment or two, on these Amendments, carry them and remove ship repairing from the Bill, the Government can without further delay have the whole of the rest of their Bill to nationalise shipbuilding, aircraft manufacture and slow marine diesel engine manufacture. They can have that without any delay at all; and if they really still believe that ship repairing also must be nationalised, then they can introduce a Bill to deal with ship repairing at the beginning of the next Session of Parliament.
Lord DAVIES of LEEK: My Lords, I am grateful for the noble Lord giving way. How can the ship repairing industry be blackmailed? It is speculation. I was under the impression that the ship repairing industry was in a first-class position financially at one time. This is what they have told us. How can the Government therefore be blackmailing it?
Lord CARR of HADLEY: My Lords, I do not think that the noble Lord can have read the article. I did not say that the ship repairing industry has been blackmailed. I said that this report was attempting to blackmail Parliament by making threats about what would happen to us if we do something. By all means let the Government go and fight an Election on the abolition of this House. I for one should not be afraid to stump the country on such an Election in the next few weeks. Instead of taking it out on us, they are threatening to take it out on the industries for what Parliament
does. That is the wickedness in this report. I cannot believe that any Government would think of this. I do not understand why they do not deny what must be a false report. If they will not deny it then they cannot be surprised if some people believe that there is some truth in the report—and if there were truth in it, it would be an absolute scandal.
My Lords, may I reiterate that there is really no question of any action that your Lordships' House may take about these Amendments causing any delay at all as to the major part of this Bill, the greater part of this Bill. The only thing that could be delayed to some extent could be the ship repairing industry and as the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Leek, has just pointed out there is no urgency about nationalising ship repairing even if there was some need for it.
Viscount ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, there is one small point. I might be able to help the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Leek. There is no question of blackmailing ship repairing. Ship repairing fights in an international field which is totally different from that in which the other industries fight. For that reason ship repairing is all right. It fights for itself. The two other industries can indeed be blackmailed because they are Government-supported and if the Government withdraw their support they are in a nasty position. That I would agree.
8.43 p.m.
On Question, Whether this House doth not insist on their Amendments Nos. 80 to 82 to which the Commons have disagreed for their Reason numbered 83?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 51; Not-Contents, 144.

CONTENTS

Allen of Fallowfield, L.

Jacques, L.

Peart, L. (L. Privy Seal.)

Aylestone, L.

Kaldor, L.

Peddie, L.

Birk, B.

Kirkhill, L.

Pitt of Hampstead, L.

Blyton, L.

Leatherland, L.

Popplewell, L.

Brimelow, L.

Lee of Newton, L.

Ritchie-Calder, L.

Brockway, L.

Llewelyn-Davies, L.

Rusholme, L.

Champion, L.

Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, B. [Teller.]

Stedman, B.

Collison, L.

Stewart of Alvechurch, B

Davies of Leek, L.

Longford, E.

Stone, L.

Davies of Penrhys, L.

Lovell-Davis, L.

Strabolgi, L. [Teller.]

Donaldson of Kingsbridge, L.

McCluskey, L.

Taylor of Mansfield, L.

Elwyn-Jones, L. (L. Chancellor)

MacLeod of Fuinary, L.

Wells-Pestell, L.

Goronwy-Roberts, L.

Maelor, L.

White, B.

Grantchester, L.

Melchett, L.

Wilson of Radcliffe, L.

Greenwood of Rossendale, L.

Milner of Leeds, L.

Winterbottom, L.

Hale, L.

Morris of Kenwood, L.

Wise, L.

Harris of Greenwich, L.

Oram, L.

Houghton of Sowerby, L.

Parry, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Airedale, L.

Ferrers, E.

Nunburnholme, L.

Amherst of Hackney, L.

Gage, V.

O'Hagan, L.

Amory, V.

Gainsborough, E.

O'Neill of the Maine, L.

Auckland, L.

Gisborough, L.

Onslow, E.

Balerno, L.

Gladwyn, L.

Pender, L.

Banks, L.

Gore-Booth, L.

Penrhyn, L.

Barrington, V.

Gough, V.

Platt, L.

Bathurst, E.

Gowrie, E.

Rankeillour, L.

Beaumont of Whitley, L.

Gray, L.

Reading, M.

Belstead, L.

Greenway, L.

Redesdale, L.

Berkeley, B.

Gridley, L.

Robbins, L.

Blakenham, V.

Hacking, L.

Rochdale, V.

Bourne, L.

Hampden, V.

Rochester, L.

Boyd of Merton, V.

Hanworth, V.

Runciman of Doxford, V.

Brabazon of Tara, L.

Harmar-Nicholls, L.

Ruthven of Freeland, Ly.

Broadbridge, L.

Harvey of Tasburgh, L.

Sackville, L.

Brougham and Vaux, L.

Hawke, L.

St. Aldwyn, E. [Teller.]

Burton, L.

Henley, L.

St. Davids, V.

Byers, L.

Hereford, V.

St. Just, L.

Camoys, L.

Hives, L.

Sandford, L.

Campbell of Croy, L.

Home of the Hirsel, L.

Sandys, L.

Carr of Hadley, L.

Hornsby-Smith, B.

Seear, B.

Carrington, L.

Hunt, L.

Selkirk, E.

Cathcart, E.

Hylton-Foster, B.

Selsdon, L.

Chelwood, L.

Inglewood, L.

Sempill, Ly.

Clifford of Chudleigh, L.

Inverforth, L.

Shuttleworth, L.

Colville of Culross, V.

Kemsley, V.

Skelmersdale, L.

Cork and Orrery, E.

Killearn, L.

Somers, L.

Cornwallis, L.

Kings Norton, L.

Stamp, L.

Cottesloe, L.

Kinloss, Ly.

Strathclyde, L.

Craigavon, V.

Lauderdale, E.

Strathcona and Mount Royal, L.

Craigmyle, L.

Lindsey and Abingdon, E.

Strathspey, L.

Craigton, L.

Long, V.

Sudeley, L.

Crawshaw, L.

Loudoun, C.

Suffield, L.

Cullen of Ashbourne, L.

Mackie of Benshie, L.

Templemore, L.

Dacre, B.

Macleod of Borve, B.

Teviot, L.

De La Warr, E.

Margadale, L.

Thorneycroft, L.

Denham, L. [Teller.]

Molson, L.

Trevelyan, L.

Deramore, L.

Monck, V.

Tweedsmuir, L.

Digby, L.

Monk Bretton, L.

Vernon, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Montgomery of Alamein, V.

Vickers, B.

Eccles, V.

Morris, L.

Vivian, L.

Elibank, L.

Mottistone, L.

Ward of North Tyneside, B.

Ellenborough, L.

Mowbray and Stourton, L.

Wardington, L.

Elles, B.

Newall, L.

Westbury, L.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Noel-Buxton, L.

Wigoder, L.

Erskine of Rerrick, L.

Norfolk, D.

Wolverton, L.

Faithfull, B.

Northesk, E.

Young, B.

On Question. Motion agreed to.

8.54 p.m.
Lord CARRINGTON: My Lords, there seems to be a little confusion. Is it right that the Government accept that these Amendments were taken together and that they are all effective? There is no point in having a Division if it is not necessary. I should like an undertaking from the Government that they consider it all right; then we shall accept this.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, certainly we do not consider it is all right; but I moved three Amendments en bloc, and I certainly accept that the Division
1254
which we have had covers all the Amendments.
Lord BYERS: My Lords, does that mean we now move on to endangered species, including the Government?
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, there is one extinct species and that is the Liberals.

ENDANGERED SPECIES (IMPORT AND EXPORT) BILL [H.L.]
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that the Commons Amendments be now considered.
Moved, That the Commons Amendments be now considered.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENTS
[References are to Bill (153) as first printed for the Commons]
[No. 1.]
Clause 1, page 2, line 8, leave out subsection (3),
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 1. I should like, with the House's permission, to speak also to Amendments Nos. 4, 6 and 76. These are I think the most important issues on which Amendments were made in another place. During Report stage in this House, your Lords-ships expressed a strong desire to enable private individuals and bodies other than Customs to bring prosecutions for offences connected with illegal import. The House then inserted the provisions which appear as subsections 1(3), 1(9) and 1(10) in your Lordships' copies of the Bill, creating specific offences and penalties for illegal import and for the handling of illegally imported goods.
The Government accept entirely the views of your Lordships that the voluntary conservation bodies can play a useful role in the enforcement of this legislation. But I repeat, as I said on Report, that Customs must remain the prime enforcement body under this Bill: it is they to whom we must look to ensure that we can fulfil our international obligations under the Convention. We must ensure that any extra activity complements the work of Customs and does not obstruct it. We must also ensure that innocent individuals are not open to harassment and that legitimate traders are not unduly hampered.
We have given careful thought to the suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, that certain designated bodies only should be empowered to bring private prosecutions. But we concluded that there are too many bodies with an interest in this field. None is so obviously pre-eminent as to dispel all argument, and selection would be an invidious process. We have therefore sought, in close consultation with the parties concerned, a solution which would allow any person or
1256
body, other than Customs, to bring proceedings in certain cases and yet safeguard the powers of Customs and avoid so far as possible overlap with their work. The exercise has been protracted and difficult and I owe much to the positive contributions made by the Retail Consortium and by the conservationists themselves. The result is Amendment No. 6.
Our objective has been to create conditions in which conservationists can pursue suspect items which are on sale or display within the country. Their activities would then be complementary to those of Customs, whose main role is naturally enforcement at the point of importation. The new clause would make it an absolute offence to sell, to offer or expose for sale, to have in possession for sale or to display any item the unlicensed import of which is made illegal by this Bill. It does not make an offence of possession alone—it must be possession for the purpose of sale. But it covers also goods made from illegal imports provided those goods are of a kind listed in Schedule 3.
A defence is provided in subsection (2) whereby anyone charged may show that he made inquiries when he took delivery of the goods. The inquiries have to be "such as are reasonable" in the circumstances. The interpretation of the term "reasonable" in any particular case would of course be entirely a matter for the courts. The other leg of the defence, that the person charged must have had no reason to believe that the goods were illegal at the time the alleged offence was committed, is I hope self-explanatory.
Subsection (3) provides a means whereby a trader can satisfy the requirement of making reasonable inquiries. If he obtains from his supplier a certificate which complies with the terms of the subsection, he will be deemed to have made reasonable inquiry. This provision has been made in response to a request of retailers. There is, however, no need for anyone to trouble with certificates if he prefers to pursue his inquiries in other ways. Subsection (4) provides an offence for false statements on the certificate. Subsection (5) provides penalties which conform with those generally applicable to offences of this kind and have regard to the custodial penalties in the Customs and Excise Act 1952 for illegal import with

1257
intent to evade. Subsection (8) ensures that the penalties for prosecutions under the Customs and Excise Act are not affected. Amendment No. 76 would extend the scope of the Long Title to allow for the control of certain transactions, such as display, which might conceivably not be regarded as trade.
I have been given to understand that the voluntary conservation bodies support Amendment No. 6; also that traders' representatives are satisfied that it would not involve their members in excessive paperwork or improper harassment. The new clause will also clearly separate the respective roles of Customs and of other bodies and ensure that Customs legislation is not disapplied. I trust, therefore, that noble Lords will agree that Amendment No. 6 substantially fulfils the objectives they had in mind and can therefore replace the provisions which Amendments Nos. 1 and 4 would delete.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, it would be churlish if we on this side of the House were not to stand up and say that we are grateful to the Government for their Amendment No. 6. This always was a non-Party political Bill, which was designed with the conservation of wild flora and fauna in mind. The Customs' point of view was very fully argued in this House, and the case against only Customs having the right to prosecute was heavily argued as well. I think that the arguments in another place were fairly put at a time of great dissension. We have achieved a very reasonable result and I must say to the noble Baroness that we on this side of the House are very grateful.

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 2.]
Clause 1, page 2, line 33, at end insert—
'(5A) The Secretary of State may charge for the issue of a licence under subsection (2) above such sum (if any) as is for the time being prescribed by order of the Secretary of State'.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 2. This Amendment is linked with Amendment No. 18. The two Amendments give the Secretary of State a permissive
1258
power to charge for licences issued under the Bill and require him to pay any proceeds into the Consolidated Fund. Amendment No. 19 is also relevant. It provides that the power may be exercised only by order, subject to Negative Resolution.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 3.]
Clause 1, page 3, line 11, leave out 'for the time being specified in Schedule 3 to this Act' and insert 'to which Schedule 3 to this Act for the time being applies'.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 3. It is purely a drafting Amendment, bringing the wording into line with that in subsection (1)(c).
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment. —(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 4.]
Clause 1, page 3, line 23, leave out subsections (9) and (10).
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I spoke to this Amendment on Amendment No. 1. I beg to move Amendment No. 4.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 5.]
Clause 3, page 5, line 16, leave out subsections (2) and (3).
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 5. It is linked with Amendments Nos. 8 and 19. The effect of these Amendments is to gather up the procedural provisions relating to most of the order-making powers of the Secretary of State and place them in one new clause.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 6.]
After Clause 3 insert the following new clause:
Offence to sell etc. things imported contrary to section 1 or their derivatives
.—(1) Subject to subsection (2) below, a person who sells, offers or exposes for sale, has in his possession for the purpose of sale, or displays to the public,—

(a) anything which has been imported contrary to section 1 above, or

(b) anything which is made wholly or partly from anything referred to in paragraph (a) above and which at the time of the alleged offence (though not necessarily at the time of importation) constitutes an item to which Schedule 3 to this Act for the time being applies,

shall be guilty of an offence; and in the following provisions of this section a "restricted article" means anything falling within paragraph (a) or (b) above.
(2) A person shall not be guilty of an offence under subsection (1) above with respect to a restricted article if he proves to the satisfaction of the court—

(a) that at the time when if first came into his possession he made such enquiries (if any) as in the circumstances were reasonable in order to ascertain whether it was a restricted article, and

(b) that, at the time the alleged offence was committed, he had no reason to believe that it was a restricted article.

(3) Without prejudice to the generality of subsection (2)(a) above, a person shall be taken to have made such enquiries as are there mentioned if he produces to the court a certificate which was furnished by the person from whom the accused obtained possession of the restricted article (the supplier), which was signed by the supplier or by a person authorised by him, and which states that—

(a)the supplier made enquiries at the time the restricted article came into his possession in order to ascertain whether it was a restricted article, and

(b) the supplier had no reason to believe at the time he relinquished possession of the restricted article to the accused that the article was at that time a restricted article.

(4) A person who furnishes for the purposes of subsection (3) above a certificate which he knows to be false in a material particular, or recklessly furnishes for those purposes a certificate which is false in a material particular, shall be guilty of an offence.
(5) A person guilty of an offence under subsection (1) or (4) above shall be liable—

(a) on summary conviction, to a fine not exceeding £400;

(b) on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or a fine, or both.

(6) In this section any reference to sale includes references to barter and exchange.
(7) For the purposes of this section a restricted article is displayed to the public if it is displayed
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to the public generally or any section of it, and (in either case) whether in return for money or otherwise.
(8) For the purposes of any proceedings under section 45 or 304 of the Customs and Excise Act 1952 (penalties for improper importation and evasion of restriction on importation) for an offence in connection with the importation of anything contrary to section 1 above, this section shall not be taken expressly to provide a penalty for that offence.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, again I spoke to this Amendment on Amendment No. 1. I beg to move Amendment No. 6.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No.7]
Clause 4, page 5, line 26, leave out from first 'may' to end of line 33 and insert make an order under this section relating to any kind of animal.
(1A) An order under this section may provide that (subject to such exceptions as may be specified in the order) it is prohibited to do such one or more of the following things as is (or are) specified in the order, that is to say—

(a) to import by sea any live animal of any kind to which the order is expressed to relate;

(b) to import any such animal by sea unless it is imported at a port or one of the ports specified in the order in relation to animals of that kind;

(c) to import any such animal by air;

(d) to import any such animal by air unless it is unloaded at an airport or one of the airports specified in the order in relation to animals of that kind;

(e) to import any such animal by land;

(f) to import any such animal by land unless it is brought across the boundary into Northern Ireland at a place or one of the places specified in the order in relation to animals of that kind.

(1B) Any prohibition or restriction in any order under this section shall not apply to an animal which the Secretary of State authorises to be imported otherwise than in accordance with the order and which is imported in accordance with that authorisation.
(1C) In subsection (1A) above—
"airport" means an aerodrome for the time being designated as a customs airport under section 15(5) of the Customs and Excise Act 1952;
"port" means any area for the time being appointed and named under section 13(1) of that Act as a port for the purposes of customs and excise.'
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree

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with the Commons in their Amendment No. 7. In so doing, I should also like to speak to Amendment No. 77. This Amendment would redraft and expand on the wording of Clause 4(1) which empowers the Secretary of State by order to restrict ports of importation for live animals. The Amendment makes specific provision not only for ports but also for airports and the land boundary into Northern Ireland, and clearly defines the terms "ports" and "airport". Amendment No. 77 is a drafting Amendment to make clear that the power to restrict ports of entry is not restricted to seaports only.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 8.]
Clause 4, page 5, line 34, leave out subsections (2) and (3).
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I spoke to this Amendment on Amendment No. 5. I beg to move Amendment No. 8.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—[Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENTS
Nos. 9 to 17.]
Clause 4, page 5, line 43, leave out 'any scientific authority or' and insert 'one or more of the scientific'.
Clause 5, page 6, line 1, leave out from 'to' to end of line 6 and insert 'do so, he may give a direction under this section in relation to the animal.
(1A) Where a direction has been given under this section in relation to an animal, and has not been revoked by the Secretary of State, the animal shall, immediately after the relevant event,'
Clause 5, page 6, line 7, after 'at' insert 'the'
Clause 5, page 6, line 11, leave out `subsection
(1) above,' and insert this section'
Clause 5, page 6, line 13, leave out, knowing that a direction has been so given,—'and insert 'knows or ought to know that a direction has been so given and who —'
Clause 5, page 6,line 15, leave out paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) and insert—

(a) knowingly takes the animal, or knowingly permits it to be taken, at any time after the relevant event to premises which he knows or ought to know are not at the time of the taking the specified premises; or

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(b) knowingly moves the animal, or knowingly permits it to be moved, at any time after the relevant event, the circumstances of the removal being that —

(i) it is made from premises which he knows or ought to know are at the time of the removal the specified premises, and

(ii) he knows or ought to know that the removal is made in the absence of, or otherwise than in accordance with any condition attached to, such a requirement or permission as is referred to in subsection (1A) above; or

(c) knowingly keeps the animal at any time after the relevant event at premises which are occupied by him and which he knows or ought to know are not at the time of the keeping the specified premises,'

Clause 5, page 6, line 34, at end insert—
'(2A) In this section "relevant event" means, in relation to an animal, whichever of the following occurs later: —

(a) the completion by the animal of any period of detention (whether in quarantine or otherwise) in accordance with any provision made by or under any enactment, being detention connected with the importation in respect of which the direction concerned was given;

(b) the departure of the animal from any premises connected with the importation in respect of which the direction concerned was given.'

Clause 5, page 6, line 39, leave out subsections (4) to (7).
After Clause 5, insert the following new Clause:
Provisions supplementary to section 5.
'.—(1) Before he specifies any premises for the purposes of section 5 above or revokes a direction given under that section, the Secretary of State shall consult one or more of the scientific authorities.
(2) The Secretary of State shall not specify any premises for those purposes unless they are such that in his opinion the animal in relation to which he proposes to give, or has given, a direction under section 5 above may suitably be kept there.
(3) Any person duly authorised in writing by the Secretary of State may, at any reasonable time and (if required to do so) upon producing premises which are for the time being specified in relation to any animal for the purposes of section 5 above for one or both of the following purposes: —

(a) in order to enable the Secretary of State to decide whether the premises remain such that in his opinion the animal may suitably be kept there;

(b) in order to ascertain whether the animal is being kept on the premises.

(4) Any person who wilfully obstructs a person acting under subsection (3) above shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £400.'
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 9 to 17 en bloc
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendments —(Baroness Stedman.)

LORDS AMENDMENT
[No. 18.]
Clause 8, page 8, line 44, at end insert:—
'(2) Any sums received by the Secretary of State under this Act shall be paid into the Consolidated Fund.'
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I spoke to this Amendment on Amendment No. 2. I beg to move Amendment No. 18.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 19.]
After Clause 8 insert the following new clause:—
Orders.
.—(1) An order under any of the relevant provisions may be varied or revoked by a subsequent order under the provision concerned.
(2) The power conferred by each of the relevant provisions to make an order shall be exercisable by statutory instrument which shall be subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament.
(3) In this section "the relevant provisions" means sections 1(5A), 3 and 4 above.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I spoke also to this Amendment on Amendment No. 5. I beg to move Amendment No. 19.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment —(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 20.]
After Clause 8 insert the following new clause:—
Interpretation.
.—(1) For the purposes of this Act an individual of the family Hominidae (man) is not an animal.
(2) In this Act a reference to a dead animal of any particular kind includes a reference to the body of an animal of that kind—

(a) which is frozen, dried or preserved by chemicals, or

(b) which, although not complete (whether because it has been eviscerated or because it has had the whole of its inside removed
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and has been stuffed, or for any other reason), is substantially complete and externally substantially resembles the complete body of an animal of the kind concerned.

(3) In this Act a reference to a dead plant of any particular kind includes a reference to a plant of that kind—

(a) which is frozen, dried or preserved by chemicals, or

(b) which, although for any reason not complete, is substantially complete and externally substantially resembles a complete dead plant of the kind concerned.

(4) In this Act "enactment" includes an enactment of the Parliament of Northern Ireland or of the Northern Ireland Assembly and an Order in Council having the same effect as such an enactment.
(5) Except in so far as the context otherwise requires, a reference in this Act to any other enactment is a reference to that enactment as amended, and includes a reference to it as extended or applied, by or under any other enactment, including this Act.'
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 20. It is linked with Amendment No. 22. They are primarily drafting Amendments. Together they place the provisions concerned with interpretation of terms in the Bill in one separate interpretation clause. The Amendment also adds a new subsection (1) which provides, I am sure your Lordships will be happy to learn, that man is not covered by the Bill. Noble Lords may remember our concern at this oversight at the Bill's Third Reading in this House.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 21.]
Clause 9, page 9, line 5, leave out '(1) and 5(1) to (6)'and insert'(1B), 5 and (Provisions supplementary to section 5) and for the first reference to him in section 1(5A)'
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 21. Clause 9(2) lists those references to the Secretary of State which in Northern Ireland are to be read as references to the Department of Agriculture. This Amendment makes two changes of substance. It removes the power for Northern Ireland to make separate orders restricting ports

1265
of entry under Clause 4(1), while leaving them with the power under Clause 4(1)(b) to authorise other ports in exceptional cases.
The other significant change is consequent upon Amendment No. 2. In Northern Ireland the Department of Agriculture will have the power to collect any charges made for licences, although the power to make orders enabling such charges to be made will be confined to the Secretary of State.
There are also minor drafting changes to bring the subsection into line with the redrafted and divided Clause 5.
Moved, That the House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 22.]
Clause 9, page 9, line 7, leave out subsections (3) to (6).
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 22. I spoke to this with Amendment No. 20.
Moved, That the House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENTS
[Nos. 24–49.]
Schedule 1, page 11, leave out line 19.
Page 12, leave out line 25.
Page 12, line 41, at end insert—

Waterfowl

Any domestic form of Anser anser

Domestic goose

Any domestic form of Anser cygnoides

Chinese goose

Any domestic form of Cairina moschata

Muscovy duck

Any domestic form of Anas platyrhynchos

Domestic duck.'

Page 13, line 9, after 'jungle fowl' insert and domestic fowl'

Page 13, line 11, after 'pheasant' insert'(otherwise known as ring-necked pheasant)'

Page 13, line 15, leave out 'Amherst 'and insert' Lady Amherst's '

Page 13, line 21, at end insert—

'Any eomestic form of Meleagris galloparo

Turkey'

Page 13, leave out line 24.

Page 13, leave out line 29.

Page 13, leave out lines 32 to 35 and insert—

'Columba livia

Domestic pigeon

Streptopelia orientalis

Rufous turtle dove

Streptopelia bitorquata

Javanese turtle dove

Streptopelia decaocto

Collared dove

Streptopelia capicola

Ring-necked dove (otherwise known as Cape dove)

Streptopelia tranquebarica

Red turtle dove

Streptopelia chinensis

Spotted dove

Turtur chalcospilos

Green-spotted wood dove'

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 23.]
Clause 9, page 10, line 3, at end insert—
'(9A) In section 7 of the Protection of Birds Act 1954 (restrictions on importation of certain wild birds and eggs) subsection (1) and paragraph (a) of subsection (2) are hereby repealed; and accordingly in paragraph (b) of subsection (2) for "such a licence as aforesaid" there shall be substituted" a licence granted under section ten of this Act" and the word "other" (wherever it occurs) is hereby repealed.'
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 23. This Amendment would repeal an obsolete provision in the Protection of Birds Act 1954 which would otherwise overlap with provisions in the Bill. The provision relates to imports of quail, lapwing and game birds.
If in the future it should seem desirable on conservation grounds to reintroduce import control on these birds, it can be done by order under this Bill. If control seems desirable on other grounds, it can be done by order under Section 7(2)(b) of the Birds Act, which remains unaffected by this proposed repeal.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

Page 14, leave out line 9.

Page 14, leave out lines 17 and 18.

Page 14, leave out line 20 and insert—

'Agapornis cana

Madagascan lovebird

Agapornis taranta

Black-winged lovebird

Agapornis roseicollis

Rosy-faced lovebird

Agapornis fisheri

Fisher's lovebird

Agapornis personata

Masked lovebird

Agapornis lilianae

Nyasa lovebird

Agapornis nigrigenis

Black-cheeked lovebird'

Page 14, leave out line 23.

Page 15, line 17, leave out 'White-cheeked' and insert 'White-browed '

Page 16, leave out line 8.

Page 16, leave out line 10.

Page 17, leave out lines 5 to 7 and insert—

'Sporopipes squasrifrons

Scaly-crowned weaver'

Page 17, leave out lines 12 to 15 and insertx2014;

'Quelea cardinalis

Cardinal quelea

Euplectes anomalus

Bob-tailed wydah

Euplectes diadematus

Fire-tailed wydah

Euplectes gierowii

Black bishop

Euplectes nigroventris

Black-winged bishop

Euplectes aureus

Golden-backed bishop

Euplectes capensis

Yellow-rumped bishop

Euplectes axillaris

Fan-tailed wydah

Euplectes hartlaubi

Marsh bishop

Euplectes albonotatus

White-winged bishop

Euplectes progne

Long-tailed bishop

Euplectes jacksoni

Jackson's bishop'

Page 17, leave out line 30.

Page 17, line 44, after 'Bibron's ' insert' clawless'

Page 20, line 7, column 2, insert 'Mangrove frong'

Page 20, line 30, column 2, insert 'Green toad'

Page 20, leave out line 35.

Page 20, line 36, column 2, insert' Giant tree frog'

Page 23, line 19, leave out' explanation' and insert' guidance

Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, with the leave of the House, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 24 to 49 en bloc. Many of these Amendments to Schedule 1 of the Bill relate to Appendix III of the Convention. These are Amendments Nos. 24 and 25, 31 to 37, 39 to 43, and 47. The Convention requires us to control the species added by other countries to this Appendix and these Amendments cover the additions that have been made since the Bill was first introduced. Noble Lords will remember that, because of the way Schedule 1 works all the Amendments which delete animals from the Schedule have the effect of bringing them under control.
The remaining Amendments help to consolidate the work done in this House introducing reverse listing and common names in Schedule 1. Amendments Nos. 26 and 30 add additional common species of birds to the free list. Amendment 33 adds the domestic pigeon to the free list, although the other species there listed result from changes to Appendix III. Amendments Nos. 27 to 29, 38, 44 to 46,
1268
and 48 provide additional or more appropriate common names for the species concerned. Finally, Amendment 49 is purely a drafting Amendment.
Moved, That the House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendments.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENTS
[Nos. 50–54.]

Schedule 2, page 24, line 3, at end insert—

'Gnetacae

Gnetum montarum'.

Schedule 2, page 24, line 11, at end insert—

'Magnoliaceae

Talauma hodgsonii'.

Schedule 2, page 24, line 19, at end insert—

'Papaveraceae

Meconopsis regia'

Schedule 2, page 24, line 22, column 2, at end

insert—

'Podocarpus nerifdius'.

Schedule 2, page 24, line 33, at end insert—

'Tetracertraceae

Tetracertron'.

Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendments 50 to 54 en bloc. All these Amendments relate to plants added to Appendix III of the Convention by other countries.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendments.

COMMONS AMENDMENTS
[Nos. 55–74.]
Schedule 3, page 25, line 40, at end insert—
'Aonyx (clawless otters)'.
Schedule 3, page 25, line 41, at end insert—
'Lutra (common otters)'.
Schedule 3, page 25, line 42, at end insert—
'Paraonyx (clawless otters)'.
Page 26, line 2, at end insert—
'Amblonyx cinera (oriental small-clawed otter)'
Page 26, line 5, at end insert—
'Enhydra lutris (sea otter)'.
Page 26, line 23, at end insert—
'Lutrogale perspicillata (smooth-coated otter)'.
Page 26, line 30, at end insert—
'Pteronura brasiliensis (giant otter)'.
Page 26, line 36, at end insert—
'9A. The skin and scales of any animal of the family Manidae (pangolins)'.
Page 26, line 44, leave out 'sub-species Moschus moschiferus moschiferus' and insert 'species Moschus moschiferus'.
Page 27, line 1, after 'The' insert 'whole or any part of any'
Page 27, line 5, leave out 'claws'and insert 'flippers'.
Page 27, line 6, at end insert—
'15A. The meat and cartilage, including callipee and callipash, of any animal of the family Cheloniidae (sea turtles).'
Page 27, line 16, at end insert—
'Gallus gallus (red junglefowl and domestic fowl)'.
Page 27, line 17, after 'colchicus (' insert 'common pheasant, otherwise known as'.
Page 27, leave out line 27.
Page 27, line 33, after 'cristatus (' insert 'Indian'.
Page 27, line 34, leave out'sub-paragraphs 'and insert 'paragraphs'.
Page 27, line 38, at end insert—
'18A. Any egg, whether whole or blown, of any bird other than—

(a) a bird of any of the following species, namely—

Alectoris chukar (chukar)

Alectoris rufa (red-legged partridge)

Coturnix japonica (Japanese quail)

Gallus gallus (red junglefowl and domestic fowl)

Perdix perdix (common patridge);

(b)a bird of any domestic form of any of the following species, namely—

Anas platyrhynchos (domestic duck)

Anser anser (domestic goose)

Anser cygnoides (Chinese goose)

Cairina moschata (Muscovy duck)

Meleagris gallopavo (turkey)

Numida meleagris (Guinea fowl).'

Page 27, line 39, leave out 'the family Cyatheaceae,' and insert 'any of the families Cyatheaceae and Dicksoniaceae'.
Page 27, line 41, leave out 'explanation 'and insert' guidance'.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, with the leave of the House, I beg to move that the House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 55 to 74 en bloc. These Amendments to Schedule 3 to the Bill result from the continuing and wide consultations which we have held with the scientific authorities, conservation groups, and traders. Many of these Amendments bring additional parts and derivatives under control. Amendments 55 to 61 would place the skins of all species of otter, and certain of their products, under licence. This fulfils the undertaking we gave in this House at an earlier stage to reconsider the problem of otters. Amendment No. 62 deals with the skin and scales of pangolins, a kind of anteater with distinctive scales, and Amendment No. 63 extends control to all natural musk, not only that from the endangered sub-species. Amendment No. 64 makes clear that parts of reptile skins, as well as whole skins, are subject to control. Amendments Nos. 65 and 66 deal with products of the sea turtle family and would extend the controls to include those products used in turtle soup.
Amendments Nos. 67 to 70 deal with plumage. They place that of the wild junglefowl as well as that of the domestic fowl on the list of plumage which can be freely imported, and provide more appropriate common names for two other species. Amendment No. 72 would subject all birds' eggs, except those of common poultry, to control. Amendment No. 73 is designed to avoid possible confusion between two families of tree ferns which are not clearly distinct. Finally, Amendments Nos. 71 and 74 are minor drafting Amendments.
Moved, That the House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendments.—(Baroness Stedman.)
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, I should particularly like to thank the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman, and the Government for having introduced the otter family into Amendments Nos. 55 to 62. We had particularly drawn the attention of the Government to this family, and the Government were always inclined to favour this. I am grateful that they have been able to do so.

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 75.]
In the Preamble, page 1, line 5, leave out from 'Kingdom' to end of line 7 and insert 'on 31st October 1976'.
9.14 p.m.
Baroness STEDMAN Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 75 to write into the Bill the date on which the Convention came into force in the United Kingdom.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 76.]
In the Title, line 2, leave out 'trade in them' and insert' to restrict certain transactions in respect of them or their derivatives'.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I spoke to this Amendment when dealing with Amendment No. 1. I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 76.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)

COMMONS AMENDMENT
[No. 77.]
In the Title, line 4, leave out 'ports' and insert 'places'.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, I spoke to this Amendment when speaking to Amendment No. 7. This is the final Amendment to this Bill, which has had a chequered career over several years, so may I take this opportunity of giving my thanks to all noble Lords who have taken part, and who have helped us, from all sides of the House. I particularly regret that my noble friend Lord Wynne-Jones is not able to be with us tonight to see this Bill actually go forward on to the Statute Book. Officially, I should like to pay tribute to his persistence and long fight to make this Bill part of our British law. I should also like to express my thanks to all the voluntary organisations and scientific authorities for their help and co-operation. I thank noble Lords opposite for their support tonight in
1272
getting this Bill through quickly. I now revert to what I am supposed to be doing, and I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in their Amendment No 77.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Baroness Stedman.)
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, I, too, would like to echo the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman, in regretting that the noble Lord, Lord Wynne-Jones, is not able to be here tonight. The noble Lord has persevered not only on this Bill, but on previous Bills which have been lost through the various ups and downs of the Parliamentary timetable. The Government have been criticised by various people, including some noble Lords on my side of the House, for being slow in getting this Bill moving. The World Convention demanded that if we were to have an influence and a vote, we had to do it by a certain time. However, at the end of the day, the Government have met the timetable and I congratulate them. We have all done a good job.