Lords Sitting of 14 December 1978

Preamble
The House met at eleven of the clock: The CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Saint Albans.
The Lord Brownlow —Sat first in Parliament after the death of his father.

PETROL TAX INCREASE: SUGGESTED EXEMPTIONS
Lord SWAYTHLING: 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 when the projected cancellation of the excise licence and the increased petrol tax come into force they would consider a system of "red" petrol (such as they used during the last war) which would be free of the increased petrol tax and could only be used in agricultural machinery or stationary engines which do not travel on the road.
The PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY of STATE, DEPARTMENT of the ENVIRONMENT (Baroness Birk): My Lords, the noble Lord's suggestion will certainly be considered, but any relief of this kind would add considerably to the complication and expense of the excise duty structure and carry a serious risk of evasion of the proper duty on petrol for road fuel use.
Lord SWAYTHLING: My Lords, while thanking the noble Baroness for that Answer, I would ask her whether she does not agree that something must be done for those who use petrol and who, if the price is increased in this way, will receive no contrary advantage by way of the saving of the £50 excise licence? There are numbers of people in this country who use stationary engines which require petrol, and I would ask the noble Baroness whether Her Majesty's Government will consider what can be done for them.
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, as I understand it, most agricultural vehicles and machinery are powered by diesel fuel which, as the noble Lord knows, is dutied at a low rate. A number of reliefs are available, including relief on heavy oil used in horticulture and exemption from VED for agricultural machines. But I repeat that, because of the difficulties and costs of enforcement, it really would be impracticable to extend the relief to petrol. I recognise the noble Lord's point and sympathise with it, but it is difficult in a case like this for the results not to turn out a little harder on one minority group than on others.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that, unless the new system is accompanied by a reduction in taxation or by allowing users to set off the cost of travel from their home to work as a tax allowance, it is going to inflict grave hardship on all those members of the community who do not live next door to where they have to work?
Baroness BIRK: That, my Lords, is an entirely different question and has nothing specifically to do with agriculture or "red" petrol.
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARY-LEBONE: My Lords, is it not the case that the real trouble is the high rate of taxation generally, including the tax on petrol? Would not this particular suggestion lead to a vast number of new regulations and new criminal offences, and are we not making too many regulations and creating too many criminal offences?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, in doing away with VED we should be doing away with a whole section of administration and bureaucracy—something of which I should have thought the noble and learned Lord would approve. I am sure the noble and learned Lord will appreciate that the more exceptions one makes the more difficult it is to avoid the situation he envisaged. It is a very difficult point.
Lord DAVIES of LEEK: My Lords, while thanking my noble friend for the gracious way in which she always answers these difficult questions, may I ask her whether she appreciates that, unless some allowance is made in respect of engines

711
used in agriculture, for windmills and on lonely farms, which bear no road tax, then, if the price of petrol is pushed up by X pence, they will have imposed a tax which hitherto did not exist? Consequently, some attention must be paid to the point made by the noble Lord on the other side of the House.
Baroness BIRK: Yes, my Lords, I very much appreciate what my noble friend has said and what noble Lords opposite have said. I said at the beginning of my original Answer that the noble Lord's suggestion will be considered; and I suggest that if noble Lords feel they would like to pursue this themselves, they should do so with the Excise Department. But I shall certainly make sure that all the comments which have been made are passed on to my right honourable friend.
Lord LUCAS of CHILWORTH: My Lords, can the noble Baroness assure the House that there will be adequate opportunity for consultation, so that all the various and different interested parties to this proposal can put forward exactly the type of view put by my noble friend?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, I understand that consultations are going on through the Department of Transport; and there will be an opportunity at some point for this to be discussed in Parliament.
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARY-LEBONE: My Lords, I hope that when the noble Baroness reports to her right honourable friend she will make it quite clear that I was far from endorsing the suggestion made by the noble Lord, Lord Swaythling, because otherwise she will get the wrong end of the stick.
Baroness BIRK: No, my Lords, I did appreciate that, and to make quite sure I will read it again in Hansard. I appreciated what the noble and learned Lord was saying.
Lord SWAYTHLING: My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that the "red" petrol scheme worked perfectly well during the war and that it was quite easy to detect if people were using it when they should
712
not be doing so? Therefore, why should not "red" petrol be used in this way?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, as the noble Lord knows, the "red" petrol system which was used during the war was concerned not with taxation but with rationing, and it was enforced by police by means of roadside checks. The number of cars on the road has increased enormously and enforcement would require considerable extra manpower, which, again, would involve more public expenditure. Frankly, it is doubtful whether that would be acceptable to Parliament or to the general public.
Viscount ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that in fact the categories of machine which use petrol but which do not go on the road are very much larger than has so far been mentioned? Among others which come immediately to mind are the family lawn-mower and the family boat.
Baroness BIRK: Yes, my Lords, I am aware of that, and have added them to the list of those already mentioned.
Lord WIGG: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that, as anybody who served in the Armed Forces during the last war knows, you can take "red" petrol without much difficulty and that even amateurs like myself can take the colour out?
Lord FERRIER: My Lords, does the noble Baroness agree that, in terms of other tools using petroleum, there are in agriculture, horticulture and forestry a number of power tools in use and the cost of petrol now proves to be a very severe burden?
Baroness BIRK: Yes, my Lords, we are aware of that. It is a question of trying to get a balance between the various costs on either side. I appreciate this and, as I have said, I will pass on all the points that have been raised.
A noble Lord: My Lords, will the noble Baroness not agree that—
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, I think that I have the House with me in saying that we should move on.

UK/IRELAND: CURRENCY DISPARITY
11.15 a.m.
Lord MOYNE: 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, if the Republic of Ireland enters the European Monetary System and the United Kingdom refuses to do so or postpones her decision, they can ensure that the many thousands of Irish citizens working in the United Kingdom are not made to suffer hardship through disparity between the two currencies; and how Her Majesty's Government propose to prevent speculation without imposing hardship.
The SOLICITOR-GENERAL for SCOTLAND (Lord McCluskey): My Lords, the noble Lord will be aware of the decision by the Government of the United Kingdom not to participate in the exchange rate mechanism of the European Monetary System. The Government of the Republic of Ireland is still, I understand, considering its position. Meanwhile, the parity link between the Irish pound and the pound sterling continues; and the circumstances envisaged by the noble Lord's Question remain hypothetical.
If the link were to be broken, sterling earned by Irish citizens in the United Kingdom might become worth either more or less in terms of Irish pounds. The Government could not however undertake to ensure that nobody was adversely affected by exchange rate movements in this or any other situation. Should controls to prevent speculation become necessary, the intention would be to avoid creating difficulties for individuals or companies so far as possible.
Lord MOYNE: My Lords, while thanking the noble and learned Lord for his sympathetic reply, may I ask him to urge Her Majesty's Government in consultation with the Government of the Republic, if the hypothetical circumstances arise, to seek to minimise any difference between the value of the two pounds so as to reduce the uncertainty and hardship which could face Irish
714
wage-earners in this country who support a family at home, and so as to prevent the smuggling of currency across the Irish border from becoming a profitable activity?
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, first, consultations have taken place between the Governments of the two countries, and these consultations continue. One of their objects—and not the only one—is to minimise, so far as possible, any difficulties which may arise because of some disparity between the two currencies. But one must not jeopardise the effect of any controls that may be necessary to prevent speculation. I think that cross-border smuggling in Ireland is not an entirely new problem, but it is one of the problems which will have to be looked at in the light of any such development as the noble Lord's Question envisages.
Lord O'NEILL of the MAINE: My Lords, is the noble and learned Lord aware of the unfortunate effects which the breaking of the link with sterling will have in the North of Ireland as; well as in the South? Is he further aware that a bank like the Ulster Bank has more branches in the South of Ireland than in the North and, equally, the Allied Irish Bank of Dublin has many branches in the North of Ireland; and that, in addition, the two currencies circulate freely in the two countries and those of us who have spent a lifetime trying to improve relations between North and South would deplore a final breaking of this link?
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, the Government are certainly well aware of the importance of the matters to which the noble Lord draws attention; but may I remind the House that the Government indicated their firm intention to keep sterling stable in terms of the effective rate—and that should help. The Irish themselves are considering, on the basis that they do go in—if they go in—taking measures to try to preserve the link with the pound. That may be difficult, but there is no certainty, given these circumstances, that the two currencies will diverge to the extent of causing any real problem.
Lord LEATHERLAND: My Lords, will my noble and learned friend bear in mind that if Irish citizens come to this

715
country to take the jobs of English men and women, then they must expect to conform to the policies and laws of this country?
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, I should not like to put the matter in that way, but no doubt it is technically correct.
Lord HAILSHAM of SAINT MARY-LEBONE: My Lords, would not the noble and learned Lord agree that the presence of Irish men and women in this country is wholly welcome and that the contribution they make to our economy is very widely appreciated on this side, if nowhere else?
Several noble Lords: Oh!
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, may I say that I entirely agree with the noble and learned Lord about the value of the contribution made by these people. It was that appreciation which lay behind the somewhat dusty answer that I gave my noble friend.
Viscount ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, is it not clear that, if the two currencies diverge and the Irish pound rises above ours, it will then be a clear sign that we have made a mistake in not following their example?
Lord McCLUSKEY: My Lords, it may take a long time to judge who has made what mistake.

CROSSROADS HOUSING AREA, SA: DEMOLITION
11.20 a.m.
The Lord Bishop of GUILDFORD: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether, in view of the widespread dismay at the stated intention of the South African Government to demolish the Crossroads housing area in Cape Province, and in the light of Clause 5 of the EEC Code of Conduct for Companies with interests in South Africa, they have assurances from British companies
716
working in Cape Province that they have—

(a) ascertained whether any of their employees are living in Crossroads and whether they or their families are threatened with eviction, and

(b) have sought to protect the interests of such employees by the provision of appropriate legal and financial assistance.

The MINISTER of STATE, FOREIGN and COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (Lord Goronwy-Roberts): My Lords, a number of South African subsidiaries of British companies employ people living in Crossroads. The British parent companies are aware of their responsibilities under the Code of Conduct concerning their subsidiary companies' policies regarding accommodation and other living conditions in South Africa. We entirely share the widespread concern about the plight of those who now live in Crossroads and about the threat to their future, and we urge the South African Government to adopt a humane and flexible approach to a problem which arises from their apartheid policies.
The Lord Bishop of GUILDFORD: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his very sympathetic Answer, and am grateful indeed for his expression of sympathy in this matter. May I ask whether the Government intend to press upon firms operating in South Africa that it is only on the basis of the following of the European Common Market Code of Conduct that our continued contribution to the South African economy can be justified?
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: Yes, certainly, my Lords. The code, as the right reverend Prelate has reminded us, was adopted unanimously by the Nine and is now being commended to other members of OECD. We have published a White Paper which goes perhaps a little further than the consensus of the Nine in that we have included an annexe of guidance to parent companies, and also an annexe which sets out a report format. We expect every company which has operations in South Africa to report annually to the Department of Trade indicating what they are doing to alleviate, if not to solve, the

717
very real problems arising from the operation of the South African migrant laws. So far I am very glad to say that we have received 120 reports from various companies, and I expect that in due course we shall be assessing the content of these and publishing the results.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend the Leader of the House, I beg to move the Motion standing in his name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That Standing Order No. 43 (No two stages of a Bill to be taken on one day) be dispensed with for the purpose of taking the Consolidated Fund Bill through all its remaining stages this day.—(Lord Strabolgi.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

CONSOLIDATED FUND BILL
On Question, Bill read 2a; Committee negatived.
Then, Standing Order No. 43 having been dispensed with, pursuant to Resolution, Bill read 3a, and passed.

PUBLIC RECORDS (AMENDMENT) BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a; an Amendment (privilege) made.
Lord TEVIOT: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill do now pass. I have very little to say except to wish the Bill well on its way. I know that there have been discussions as to the financial implications which are in progress and I hope that a satisfactory solution will be reached. I was hoping that we might hear from the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, who has so kindly given time to this matter. I had hoped that he was going to make a statement.
Baroness LEWELYN-DAVIES of HASTOE: My Lords, perhaps it will be for the convenience of the House if I explain that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor is in Cabinet.
Lord TEVIOT: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness. In that case I shall undoubtedly be hearing from him. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill do now pass.—(Lord Teviot.)
On Question, Bill passed, and sent to the Commons.

CONSERVATION OF WILD CREATURES AND WILD PLANTS (AMENDMENT) BILL [H.L.]
11.24 a.m.
Lord SKELMERSDALE: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. I find this a very humbling experience for two reasons which I shall now explain. First, because I am in loco parentis for the prime mover of this modest piece of legislation, the late Lord Cranbrook, whose unfortunate death was just three weeks ago. He was a man whose long list of achievements in the public service was immense. He started his adult life as a soldier, both in this country and in India, where he met my father. Knowing the late Earl as we did it is no surprise to your Lordships to learn that they were both founder members of the Outi Conservation Society in the early 1920s.
He had a long connection with local government both in his home county of Suffolk and in London where he became an alderman of the LCC. He also succeeded his father when he was only 15, making him, so I am told, the second longest serving Member of your Lordships' House, where he was constantly active. He was Parliamentary Private Secretary to the first Commissioner of Works, the late Lord Peel, and served over many years on several Royal Commissions. His lifelong interest was natural history in all its forms, and he was for 46 years a member of the Linnaean Society, and was its treasurer for 13. He was also a trustee of the natural history section of the British Museum for 8 years. From a Parliamentary aspect, he was the prime mover of all the early conservation measures and was concerned to move conservation from a bandwagon, to which many people pay lip-service, to a science; and this is not the least important part of

719
the Bill to which I am seeking your Lordships' agreement this morning.
The Conservation of Wild Creatures and Wild Plants (Amendment) Bill which he introduced and saw through all its stages last Session was his last great work, seen through under great difficulties when he was very ill with cancer. Indeed, I maintain that it was this that kept him alive when he was so very ill. He taught me a tremendous amount about Parliament and conservation, and it is my great regret that the hope I expressed on Third Reading of the Bill last Session, that he would continue his teaching for many years to come, was not to be fulfilled.
It was my misfortune to get to know him only in the last year or so of his life, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman, who I am glad to see is to speak later in this debate. Even at this late stage, knowing that he was to die soon, he set about taking up a new zoological study of Picidium species, the freshwater pea mussels, many of which are very small and almost indistinguishable from each other. This study necessitated much detailed work, both in books and in forming his own reference collection. In other words, he was active as an amateur naturalist right through until the very end.
He was, with his customary good nature, his ready smile and unstinting generosity, a true friend, to both my father and myself. Of course we had our differences and I felt obliged to vote against him over the otter controversy early last Session. I shall say more of this in a minute. He was not one to hold a grudge: he believed above all in the absolute supremacy of Parliament, that what Parliament decided was right. The nation in general, and your Lordships' House in particular, will be a poorer place without him.
Several noble Lords: Hear, hear!
Lord SKELMERSDALE: The second reason why I feel humble, my Lords, is that it is mostly my fault that this Bill is not already on the Statute Book. In the Committee stage last Session, my late noble friend added a Schedule to the Bill which is still there on page 7 onwards, in a mixture of light and heavy type. This is in fact nothing really to do with the
720
Bill at all but amalgamates an Amendment Bill with its existing Act in one continuous piece of prose. This particular Parliamentary aid was invented by a Member of another place, Mr. Keeling, in the 1930s and is usually used in finance and local Bills. It is beloved by lawyers because it obviously makes the Act very much easier to understand with its various amendments. But it is hated by draftsmen, and with my experience of last Session—which I shall tell your Lordships about—I can well understand why. It is surprisingly difficult to achieve a continuous piece of prose amalgamating both an Amendment Bill and the existing Act, and so it is seldom used. However, we seem to be getting a little more adept, and in recent years it has been used more and more both in connection with this Bill and, I believe, in the Petroleum and Submarine Pipelines Act of a couple of Sessions ago.
I suppose I should be standing in a white sheet today as I failed to duplicate my Amendments to the Bill on Third Reading in the Keeling Schedule. This prevented the Bill from going through another place on the nod, and, as there was no time there for it to be properly debated, it fell by the wayside. Perhaps, therefore, one could say that it is poetic justice that my late noble friend has left me to carry on this matter.
Turning to the Bill itself, not only has the new version enabled me to put right my innocent omissions of last Session but also to put right a few other matters. Regretfully, it is not perfect and has several spelling mistakes which the Clerks tell me can be put right when it is next printed. I was not responsible for checking the final proof of the Bill, as my late noble friend was still very much in control. That was unfortunate and perhaps, knowing the situation as I should have done, I am guilty in this respect. Even the Explanatory Memorandum is wrong in three places and refers to wrong dates of the principal Act, as you will see from the correction slips which I hope are available to everyone. The Act which this Amendment seeks to amend is the only Conservation of Wild Creatures and Wild Plants Act that we have, and its correct date is 1975.
I hope, my Lords, having gone through many Amendments and many discussions

721
in the last Session, that the Bill itself is sufficiently well remembered by your Lordships for me not to go through the usual step of expounding on the Explanatory Memorandum. I hope it will suffice if I make a few general points. The Bill is intended to amend the 1975 Act to give partial protection to vulnerable wild creatures as listed in the Schedule—not the Keeling Schedule, but the one on page 3 of the Bill. Its main theme is that the existing Schedule 1 to the Act, which gives complete protection under the law, should be used only for endangered species. As the law stands, it is made up of what are called protected species. Unfortunately, science allows us no such category. The International Union for the Protection of Nature has listed four categories of species: the endangered, which deserve our full protection; the vulnerable, which may or may not move into this category; the rare; and those not deserving of any protection at all.
By definition, once identified as belonging to a particular group, they can, as I say, either go up or down into the next group. It so happens that the species on the protected Schedule, with the possible exception of the otter, are endangered. That makes the position easier; but there are a number of species set out in the Schedule to the Bill on page 3 which are vulnerable and deserve a modified form of protection. Clause 5 of the Bill allows a person to take a vulnerable wild creature for the purpose of identification or marking so long as it is released without unreasonable delay. In other words, naturalists can study it without getting a licence from the Nature Conservancy Council. This degree of protection is intended to interfere as little as possible with the normal activities of field naturalists.
However, Clause 5 goes further by specifically preventing the man-in-the-street who has a phobia about spiders, snails and slugs from committing an offence by treading on them or otherwise destroying them even though they are vulnerable or endangered. This was quite rightly put into the Bill last Session after several severe criticisms by your Lordships on Second Reading. The other thing the Bill seeks to do is to create a new offence of disturbing the nests of mammals while occupied with dependent young. This is a great step forward in conservation
722
legislation, and for it we have principally to thank the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby.
I said earlier that I would say a word about my differences with the late Lord Cranbrook about the otter. I believe it to be vulnerable but not endangered. He agreed: he was all for waiting until this Bill became law before protecting it, by adding it to his new Schedule of vulnerable creatures. However, in the circumstances pertaining in last December the only way of giving it immediate protection was to add it to the protected Schedule to the Act that existed. I still believe this to be the correct action at the time and if this Bill becomes law, when the Nature Conservancy Council does its quinquennial survey in 1980, I hope the animal will then be moved from Schedule 1 to Schedule 3 of the composite Act—always assuming, of course, that the advice which the Nature Conservancy Council gives at that time will be much as I suspect it would be now.
Situations in the animal world can change quite quickly, and therefore I am not trying to obligate the Nature Conservancy Council. There is a case, of course, for doing it now, but my late noble friend and I agreed that while it is Parliament's job to produce laws, it is the specialist adviser's job (in this case the NCC) to alter the Schedules by means of persuading Ministers to give the force of law to their findings. In other words, in this case it is up to the Nature Conservancy Council to alter the Schedules: it is not a job for Parliament to do. Politicians, even part-time ones like me, are, alas! not normally scientists, although I am delighted to see that my new noble friend Lord Cranbrook, himself a professional zoologist, is to make his maiden speech today. I shall listen very carefully, as I am sure we all shall, to what he has to say.
On Third Reading during last Session the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman, admitted that the Bill as introduced was a piece of legislation that was neither necessary nor desirable. However, my late noble friend had many consultations during the passage of the Bill with both the noble Baroness and her advisers, with the result that on 24th May, 1978, at col. 980 of the Official Report she said:
"… the Bill as amended is one that we can be very proud of in this House … It leaves the House now in a very satisfactory state."

723
I hope we shall learn this afternoon that this is still the Government's attitude. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Skelmersdale.)
11.37 a.m.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, like my noble friend Lord Skelmersdale, I, too, wish to pay tribute to my late noble friend Lord Cranbrook who for the past two years so gallantly carried on his work, defying his illness. I think this Bill which, as my noble friend has said, is his work, will be a most suitable memorial to him. I also welcome the fact that his son is going to speak on this, his late father's Bill, as his maiden speech: that is a most welcome and unusual event. We seldom have the opportunity to pay tribute to a father and welcome his son in connection with the same Bill.
My noble friend Lord Skelmersdale, I think we would all agree, has taken on the mantle of the late Lord Cranbrook extremely well. He has introduced this Bill clearly and succinctly and he was good enough to explain to me what he was going to say. I hope the noble Baroness will be able to accept it on behalf of the Government. My noble friend, as I say, explained the Bill fully and I do not propose to detain your Lordships for very long.
The lack of protection in the principal Act of 1975 for so many creatures which were vulnerable but not directly endangered was, as I think we would all agree, a blatant reproach to us all who are interested in this matter. This Bill fills the gap and will, I trust, be welcomed by the Nature Conservancy Council. Had this Bill been law, as my noble friend has said, it would have obviated the necessity for the NCC to have a special order for the protection of the otter. It would only have to have been put in the Schedules of the vulnerable species.
I particularly welcome the fact that this Bill makes it an offence to destroy or disturb the refuge or nest with the unweaned young in it or of any endangered or vulnerable mammal. In this House, my Lords, we have had a very good record on conservation and I think we have covered this subject pretty well over the past few years. I hope we shall not
724
hear today that this Bill is not necessary or desirable, or that it is a sledge-hammer to crack a small nut. It crosses the t's and dots the i's of the principal Act and gives it much more real meaning. If this Bill is passed, it will give us legislation in this field which could well be a model for other countries to follow. I look forward to hearing what is the Government's view, but, in the meantime, from these Benches I wish this Bill every success, and I also give my noble friend Lord Cranbrook every good wish in his maiden speech.
11.41 a.m.
The Earl of CRANBROOK: My Lords, I have been told on good authority that it is proper, and I am sure that in most circumstances it is indeed very sensible, to wait longer than 21 hours and 10 minutes as a new Member of your Lordships' House, before venturing to make a maiden speech. As your Lordships know, there are special circumstances which prevail today on this occasion, and I crave your Lordships' indulgence. I beg your Lordships to grant me, if not total protection, at least a temporary place in Schedule 3 among other vulnerable creatures. Permit me, by your generosity, a few moments, during which I hope I may be forgiven any minor solecism that your Lordships may detect in my words.
The sad event which has brought me to your Lordships' House is still too close in time to let me respond with equanimity to the many kind words that have been spoken, both privately and publicly in your Lordships' House, yesterday and today. I am much moved by the tribute paid by my noble friend Lord Skelmersdale. From reading the pages of Hansard, I am as fully aware as your Lordships that he himself has played a notable part in shaping the Bill now before us, and brings to the subject a high degree of expertise in his- own right in the field of botanical conservation. I am equally grateful for the warm words of my noble friend Lord Mowbray, who has shown a consistent interest in this Bill. Again from my reading of Hansard, I am aware that on some occasions some of the more arcane points of zoological nomenclature have badgered him, if not exactly had him foxed.

725
But I do not wish to stand before your Lordships today merely to utter words of filial gratitude, nor am I in a position to comment in detail on any particular phrase or clause of the Bill now before your Lordships. During its passage through this House, it has received the close attention of several noble Lords to its undoubted benefit. There may yet be small points that require refinement, but it is clear that the aims and main concepts are very sound.
Although nowadays I might qualify for amateur status, I am, in fact, as has already been mentioned, a professional biologist and conservationist. Twenty years ago I entered the final stage of my education as a graduate research student under the benign but stimulating supervision of the noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman, who I am glad to see is due to speak later this morning. At that time, the noble Lord simultaneously held three jobs, any one of which would have fully occupied a normal man. Since my graduation from the University of Birmingham I have spent the greater part of my professional career abroad, engaged in zoological research in the tropical rain forests of the Far East. I still maintain close connection with the region.
In my latest involvement, I have been treading, quite literally, in the footsteps of the noble Lord, Lord Shacklcton, who is also due to speak after me this morning. It is that noble Lord's pioneering climb to the summit of Mount Mulu that I have actually followed, and I can assure your Lordships that the noble Lord is still recalled in the long houses of Borneo with affection and admiration, simply under the name of Edward. It is from the standpoint of the professional biologist that I wish to say a few words in review of the main features of the Bill which is now before your Lordships' House, coupled with the 1975 Act, and commend it to your Lordships.
First, this is not a Bill based on sentimentality, but it is based on science. It seeks to protect not organisms which appeal by virtue of big, round brown eyes, fluffy fur or beautiful blooms. It seeks to protect organisms of all kinds, extending throughout the plant and animal kingdom into realms which, I recognise, have sometimes been unfamiliar to many noble Lords. Moreover, it seeks to
726
extend protection not for protection's sake, but only in cases where human activity is shown to be detrimental, or potentially detrimental, to the survival of the organisms in the Schedules. It is only in such circumstances that legislative intervention can be expected to be effective as a conservation measure.
I have used the term "organism" not to add to your Lordships' confusion, but to hold in reserve my second point of commendation; namely, the introduction of the word "creature" into the vocabulary of British conservation. Though perhaps, at first sight, this is a minor achievement, I think it has proved very useful in moving away from the term "animal", which had been previously used, and which in the popular sense, is far too often confused, both by noble Lords and by other people, with the term "mammal."
Thirdly, the present Bill introduces the concept of graded status that has been evolved by international conservation bodies. I refer, of course, to the distinction already mentioned by my noble friend Lord Skelmersdale between endangered species and vulnerable species; endangered species being defined as those in danger of extinction, whose survival is unlikely if the causal factors continue to operate, and vulnerable species being defined as those likely to move into the endangered category in the near future, if the causal factors continue operating; that is to say, those species whose populations are decreasing because of over-exploitation or from other causes, or whose populations are already seriously depleted and whose ultimate security is not assured. There is a significant difference between these categories and their separate recognition in legislative terms is another breakthrough.
Fourthly, the Bill contains the concept of periodic monitoring. Conservation is not a static process, especially in lands, whether Eastern lands or Western lands, with dense human populations and expanding rural technology; especially in those places where the environment is changing rapidly, in directions hard to predict. In such circumstances, conservation legislation must contain provision for regular review and for appropriate modification in response to new eventualities.

727
I now come to my final point. As I said, I have spent much time abroad in developing countries whose responsible authorities have been, or are, currently engaged in the process of devising conservation legislation appropriate to their national needs. Not infrequently, I have seen British legislation provide at least an initial model for local game laws or conservation Statutes. I therefore very warmly support the point raised by my noble friend Lord Mowbray. Just as the Bill now before your Lordships drew upon the lead provided by an international conservation agency in its own formulation, so do I believe that, in its turn, this Bill, if it becomes law, could prove to be not only important to British wildlife, but also of great benefit as a guide to conservation practice in those other countries—still not a few—which continue to look to the United Kingdom to provide a lead, or at least some kind of guidance in the field of conservation.
11.50 a.m.
Lord SHACKLETON: My Lords, it is seldom, if ever, that I have been so glad to congratulate a maiden speaker in your Lordships' House. The noble Earl, Lord Cranbrook, carries a name which is very familiar to all of us, and I see that he is sitting by, I believe, a kinsman of his—the noble Earl, Lord Glasgow—who is a distant kinsman of mine. Indeed, if I may say so, if there is justification for the hereditary principle in your Lordships' House it is to be found in the name of Cranbrook.
Perhaps I may say a word about the noble Earl's speech. Then I should like particularly to pay my own tribute to his father. As the noble Earl pointed out, he did benefit from having some education from my noble friend Lord Zuckerman, but he is quite inaccurate in saying that my noble friend Lord Zuckerman only does three jobs; I have never known him when he is not doing 12.
All three of us have had a continuing interest in that beautiful country of Sarawak in Borneo. The noble Earl developed an interest that turned him into one of the world's greatest experts on bats when working with Tom Harrisson at the Kuching museum in Sarawak. He has written a standard work on mammals
728
in Malaysia. I am glad that he is helping to teach us that animals do not mean just mammals, because I have spent so much of my life trying to explain this to other people. He is the editor of Ibis, so he must also be a considerable ornithologist. He is, of course, a professional zoologist, and noble Lords will know from his speech the quality that he is bringing to your Lordships' House.
The fact that the noble Earl follows so quickly after his late father is a sorrow. But also there is satisfaction for us, because the noble Earl—and I speak now very much as somebody who sits on this side of the House—was one of those individuals who rose above Party political issues and who established areas of interest and continuity among us all. It was my good fortune, both when I was a Back-Bencher and later when I was the Leader of your Lordships' House, to co-operate with him in a number of ways. Indeed, I had hoped to write a short obituary note for The Times, but alas! there is no Times to write it for; so I take this opportunity to refer to some of the noble Earl's contributions.
Perhaps his most well known contribution was the Seals Bill. This was a Bill which took several years to get through. The noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, has already learned that to pilot a Private Member's Bill through your Lordships' House is not the easiest thing in the world. Nor do the ramparts of technical opposition fall at the first blast of anybody's trumpet. It is a prolonged and difficult task. It is one that calls for skill and understanding on the part of both the individual who is moving the Bill and the Government. I believe that the late Lord Cranbrook did get that understanding.
In the case of the Seals Bill, I was, perhaps fortunately, put in at the last moment under orders to block the Bill. It is an illusion among civil servants and, indeed, Ministers that the House of Lords is like the House of Commons, where you can block anything if you want to do so. When I rose to speak it was quite obvious that your Lordships were going to move with the Earl of Cranbrook. Therefore, I had the pleasant task—which is what I wanted to do—of disobeying my instructions and encouraging the Bill, which ultimately, after a long

729
and tedious passage, passed into law. It has had a great effect. Not long after the Bill had passed into law I remember that I was in Shetland, staying with the Lord Lieutenant, Robert Bruce. He said, "A remarkable thing has happened. You see that jetty? Lying upon it are a lot of sleeping seals. Within six months of the passing of the Bill the seals knew that they could no longer be shot at. They come up regularly now and sleep on that jetty".
As chairman of the Seals Advisory Committee, the noble Earl played an important part in conservation. I do stress the importance of the understanding of conservation as opposed to the rather blind views of those who, regardless, consider it to be some form of protection. I shall not go into the issue of the culling of seals. None the less, there is such a thing as a scientific understanding of these matters.
If I remember rightly, the noble Earl was also responsible for ensuring that whales should continue as a Royal fish. I remember that the Lord Chancellor, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hail-sham of Saint Marylebone, was very cross about this particular measure. Indeed, the Conservative Government had the Whips on against the noble Earl. That was a very dangerous thing to do to the late Lord Cranbrook; he had too strong a following on both sides of the House. The Government were defeated on that occasion.
The noble Earl was involved with meteorites. Indeed, he was involved in any scientific issue. I remember that he helped me when we were trying to do something about the British Museum Library, particularly in regard to the National Reference Library of Science and Technology. He and I were allies, along with the noble Baroness, Lady Wootton of Abinger, and others, and this ultimately, I believe, contributed to the setting up of the British Library. The noble Earl was a great and good man and a good friend to us all.
I could go on to deal with many aspects, but to those who are sometimes critical of the Seals Bill and who now hold this rather blind view on the culling of seals, may I say that one of the things which most concerned the noble Earl was the
730
use of strychnine in the killing of seals by fishermen. Unless we look at these problems of conservation and of culling, we shall find people taking the law into their own hands, and there will be the poisoning and indiscriminate killing of seals.
There was the Meteorites Bill, which I do not think passed into law. However, the noble Earl was certainly a great ornament of this House. The noble Lord, Lord Balerno, my noble friend Lord Hunt and others all knew him and his work.
It is satisfactory that the noble Earl is going to join us. He is involved in present-day scientific activity, particularly in the Mount Mulu expedition. My noble friend Lord Hunt has been out there. There is still one unclimbed peak there if anybody wants to try it. I do not know whether it was the noble Earl, Lord Cranbrook, who was responsible for climbing Gunong Api. For mountaineers, however, there is still another nice mountain, Gunong Bennerat, to climb in that area. But the important point is the scientific work and the excellence which may contribute to the survival of rain forests and also be of real importance to the survival of mankind. Therefore, we are very pleased to see the noble Earl.
We are also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale. I must say that I am grateful for the Schedule—however painful that may have been to the draftsmen—which in effect consolidates the new provisions into the old Statute. It makes it a great deal more intelligible.
I am confident that the Government will encourage the Bill. I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Mowbray and Stourton, was rather suspicious. He must realise that my noble friend is always helpful on good occasions. I wish only that she could be more helpful on the subject of the Ordnance Survey, which I shall not now draw into the discussion.
This is a worthwhile Bill and I hope that it will have a speedy passage through your Lordships' House. Presumably it will then be picked up by the Commons. Whether it will be picked up there during the course of this Parliament is, however, a matter that we shall know about later. I am very glad to support the Bill. I shall not go into the details, beyond commenting upon the fact that the definitions and the

731
further refinement of thinking in this area is itself a permanent contribution.
11.59 a.m.
Lord CRAIGTON: My Lords, I wish to add my congratulations to those already expressed to the noble Earl, Lord Cranbrook, on his maiden speech. From personal experience I have found that he is both extremely well informed and highly respected as a naturalist. I had the pleasure of sitting with him on two committees, the Council of the Fauna Preservation Society and the editorial board of the International Zoo Year Book. On both of those committees his father also sat with great distinction and the son sits today with the same distinction. Noble Lords will already have realised how great a contribution the new Earl of Cranbrook can make to our deliberations.
For myself, as for other speakers, a great loss was occasioned by the death of the late Lord Cranbrook, it was a great loss to the cause of conservation and it will be greatly felt. I have said before in this House that no one in either House knew more of the history and the intricacies of current wildlife legislation than Jock Cranbrook; we shall miss him and we shall miss his great knowledge. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, for the tribute that he paid. He said what we all want to say, and as with Lord Skelmersdale, the late Lord Cranbrook and I did not always agree. Twice I joined in dividing the House against him: once I won, the other time I lost; but we remained friends and colleagues and the late Lord Cranbrook would not be surprised—although I am afraid my noble friend Lord Mowbray and Stourton may be disappointed—when I say that I do not support this Bill. In my view it is not essential at this time.
In recognising that some animals like the otter can possibly be classed as vulnerable rather than endangered the Bill creates the Schedule 3 vulnerable class. Those in Schedule 3 are given all the same protection as Schedule 1 except—and it is the exception that worries; me. Schedule 3 animals can be taken for identification or marking. Thank goodness! we could not take the otter for identification or marking. Otters can be taken by an authorised person
732
—authorised by whom?—by the landlord, provided they are subsequently released on the spot where they were caught. How can anyone, however skilled, be sure of catching, marking and returning to where it was caught a fish—a burbot—without injury to it? How does one enforce the catching, the marking and the returning provisions for a butterfly or a dragonfly, or even a beetle? How does one mark a black-veined moth and return it, without injury?
This is an important but not a vitally urgent matter and, in my view and in the view of many people for whom I speak, it should properly be included in the legislation which must follow from the Nature Conservancy Council's statutory quinquennial review in 1980; and although I disagreed with the late Lord Cranbrook in regard to this Bill I agree entirely with his views on future conservation. Those of us who heard him speak on the 15th July at the all-Party Conservation Committee of both Houses of Parliament realised that he laid down completely what should happen in the future. He laid down the broad lines that the legislation in 1980 should take; powers to protect not only species but to include habitats and species management; powers to control populations; powers to control the over-exploitation of species in inshore waters. These are major problems, and out of that 1980 review without doubt will come the major increased powers of protection that the late Lord Cranbrook called for when he spoke upstairs on the 15th July. Perhaps added to that Bill will be some of the provisions of this minor Bill, if it does not reach the Statute Book before then, and which will then be included, as they should be, in their proper context.
12.5 p.m.
Lord DE CLIFFORD: My Lords, I, too, would like to pay my tribute to my friend the late Lord Cranbrook. I am probably fortunate among your Lordships because I knew him in this House 50 years ago. When I took my place in your Lordships' House he had been sitting here for two or three years and he was the kindest guide and mentor that I have ever had. He taught me many things about your Lordships' House and we had one or two stirring moments in committees upstairs, where he was most active and adequate in dealing with counsel.

733
I was always interested in what he did. Although I am not a naturalist I am interested in the conservation of wild creatures, and it is my great pleasure to see his son here today making his maiden speech. I should like to congratulate him on a marvellous speech and I hope we may have many more opportunities of hearing my noble friend speak on this and other subjects.
I should also like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, for starting the Bill again. He has obviously learned one thing which has been apparent to me all the time I have been sitting in your Lordships' House; namely, that ultimately there is only one way to get anything done—provided you can last the time out—and that is by constant persistence. My noble friend is of an age when I think his persistence, before he actually grows a long white beard, might well pay oft" in many directions in your Lordships' House—provided we last that long!
My Lords, I go along with this Bill. I am not very knowledgeable about the wild creatures that are included in the Bill but I fully understood from my late friend the importance of what he was trying to do. I should also like to say that we, as inhabitants of this country, during the course of trying to improve things, should make sure that we do not endanger by our own acts so many of these wild creatures. I think we must watch our legislation with considerable care. We have reached the stage now where by our own deliberate acts we are making endangered creatures. One of the creatures about which I am particularly worried, is the badger. By our own acts we are slowly but surely eliminating this animal, which is to my mind a basic part of the countryside. I trust that Parliament will watch carefully all the steps that are taken in such cases. I end with those few words. I hope that your Lordships' House will give this Bill a fair wind.
12.9 p.m.
Lord ZUCKERMAN: My Lords, I do not think that I should add to the eloquent and moving tributes that have been paid to my old friend Lord Cranbrook. There are many things that I could say in addition to those that have been said, but perhaps the only thing I should add is that in the work that I have
734
done—in one of those several jobs to which reference appears to have been made—in connection with the Zoological Society of London, he demonstrated an enormous wisdom in dealing with what are essentially emotive issues, where science comes after feeling. He had this wisdom in dealing with people and showing which way one should handle a subject where there is controversy, in order to bring the matter to the right solution.
I am one of those who have been made lonely by his death, and I sincerely hope, and I know, that his name will be carried on in your Lordships' House with the same brilliance that the present Lord Cranbrook demonstrated this morning. Lord Cranbrook did me the honour of referring to the fact that I was his supervisor in one part of his education. My noble friend Lord Blake is not here at the moment, but he will remember perhaps an old don at Christchurch, called Carter, I think. When I joined the House, I remember Mr. Carter telling me, "You will hear a lot of nonsense from some of the people round here about teaching these undergraduates. Pay no attention. Most of them will look after themselves. Certainly do not bother about those people who are not going to get a third, but if you spot in advance someone likely to get a first associate your name with him and take the credit'". I should like to take a little of the credit for the magnificent maiden speech of Lord Cranbrook today.
I do not know whether this is a controversial Bill. I have read it carefully. I was in correspondence with the late Lord Cranbrook many a time about this Bill, and as President of the Fauna Preservation Society—and here I fear I differ somewhat from my noble friend Lord Craigton—I must say that I support this Bill. As Lord Skelmersdale has said, we are all anxious to achieve the goal of the conservation of as much as can be realised in the circumstances of today. We do not want to see endangered species disappearing. We do not want to make vulnerable species more vulnerable. It is all a question of tactics. The 1975 Act separated endangered species from the rest. I think it was always the late Lord Cranbrook's feeling that there is an intermediate class of vulnerable creatures. He defined it in an article which appeared in Country Life on 5th October this year, in which he told us that vulnerable

735
creatures are, as it were, different from creatures which are already totally endangered. As he put it here:
"By definition, vulnerable species are not rare to the point of being endangered. Indeed they are probably not even very rare to the point where it is at first noticed that they are declining in numbers and should be regarded as vulnerable."
The question is who judges the evidence, or who gathers the evidence. Reference is made to field naturalists and specialist societies. Are they really competent to decide these matters? We know that if we had been debating this Bill in the age of the dinosaurs, those dinosaurs would still have disappeared. Every five years, I can see the Nature Conservancy Council asking itself," Shall we put these old dinosaurs on the endangered list?" And the day would have dawned when there were no dinosaurs. It is a dynamic world in which we live; evolution is still taking place. Major geographical and environmental changes are taking place. Human population is expanding. Animal habitats are being encroached upon. These things are happening all the time. But are we to wait until, in the words of my old friend Lord Cranbrook, it makes a difference if you just take one specimen away from the existing stock? No, my Lords, I do not think that is good. I do not know whether—and this is where I sincerely hope the Government will give a clear line—the only advice the Government accept on these matters is that of the Nature Conservancy Council. When the Otter order was being debated—I do not see the noble Lord, Lord Wynne-Jones, in your Lordships' Chamber at the moment, but I hope he will not mind my recalling something he said on that occasion—
A noble Lord: He is here.
Lord ZUCKERMAN: I am very glad that the noble Lord, Lord Wynne-Jones, is here to hear me differ from him. On that occasion when the Otter order was being debated, Lord Cranbrook was opposing the Nature Convervancy Council's advice to the Government, and Lord Wynne-Jones surprised me by saying that the Government—and he was quite correct: here, I do not differ from him—had set up by Act of Parliament, and your Lordships' House had helped in doing so, the Nature Conservancy Council in order to advise Government on these matters of
736
when creatures should be put on the endangered list. Then he went on to ask—and he was commenting on the attitude of those like myself who were not quite certain about the otter:
"Are we to go to this man here or that man there, or are we to choose some other body not named in the Act? Do we realise how subversive this attitude is and how we are completely upsetting the whole procedure of an Act of Parliament which we wanted?"
He went on to say that the named authority, the statutory body, was the Nature Conservancy Council.
"Therefore, I suggest that we would be doing something which is political madness, to overturn this order without very much clearer evidence and advice."—[Official Report, 6/12/77: col. 1551.]
I wanted to rise after Lord Wynne-Jones had made those remarks, but I did not because in one of my jobs in the past I was adviser to Government, and I was once taken to task by a Permanent Secretary colleague who had heard that at some dinner party I had made a cynical remark, saying about this business of advising Governments that the day I heard my advice had been accepted I should know it was bad advice.
I want to know whether the Nature Conservancy Council can really tell us at what moment a vulnerable species becomes an endangered species. Are these five-year intervals sufficient? On the occasion of the debate on the Otter order, I myself—and I know that here I shared the late Lord Cranbrook's views completely—was very sad about the separation from the Nature Conservancy Council of its research body, which is now NERC, and I made remarks to that effect My point here is that, unless we do recognise this intermediate class, I would like to know who will say, and at what moment, that these grey area creatures must now be put on the right schedule so that they are protected by Act of Parliament.
Lord SHACKLETON: My Lords, I should like to interrupt the noble Lord. He will recall that this House did, in the end, persuade the Government to allow the Nature Conservancy Council to do some research. Indeed, I am told that if anything there are now complaints that it is doing too much research.
Lord ZUCKERMAN: My Lords, I accept that correction from the noble

737
Lord, Lord Shackleton. On the other hand, I think I know a certain amount about the research that is being done here and there. I am not confident about the separation from executive bodies of the information-gathering functions and limbs which they ought to have: we have done too much of that. I still believe that there is a separation, however much is being done by the Nature Conservancy Council.
In conclusion, I should like to raise one or two small matters. With respect, I should like to inform the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, that it is possible to mark animals in ways which are not apparent. It is not necessary to put a ring on them. A radio transmitter can be fitted. How ever, I agree that it would be extremely difficult to fit a radio transmitter to a grasshopper, but it is possible to mark a grasshopper in other ways which would identify the said grasshopper. These are scientific matters which—
Lord GRAIGTON: My Lords, if I may say so, the noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman, has laid himself wide open. Can he catch the grasshopper and be sure of not injuring it?
Lord ZUCKERMAN: My Lords, it now becomes a zoological matter. I am certain that if one caught the said grasshopper in the first instance, one could do so in the second. I hope that the Government will give the Bill a fair wind. I support the Bill and I hope that if there are any controversial matters they can be dealt with during the Committee stage. I hope that when we have finished with the Bill it will be passed in time to the other place, whatever Government is in power, and will then receive the right kind of treatment. At present, we are dealing with something to which the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman—who is to reply for the Government—referred on a previous occasion. She said, "No piece of legislation is perfect; we have to change as we go along". My Lords, this is a moment for change.
12.23 p.m.
Lord GRIDLEY: My Lords, I am sure that your Lordships would think it appropriate for me to pay a small tribute to the maiden speech which we heard earlier of my noble friend Lord Cranbrook.
738
I do not think that I could possibly improve on the delightful way in which the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, paid his tribute to what my noble friend said, or indeed improve on the tribute he has paid to the hereditary principle which brings my noble friend to the House. I hope that if consideration takes place in connection with any reform of your Lordships' House, the tributes which have been paid to that principle might bear fruit in any such future consideration.
I warmly welcome the Bill which has been moved by my noble friend Lord Skelmersdale. I interpret its main aim as to strengthen the Conservation of Wild Creatures and Wild Plants Act 1975, and I do so for a number of reasons, but for one outstanding reason which is that of public opinion in the country at present upon which I shall make a few comments later. I have only one reservation. In my view the amendments to the main Bill do not go far enough. However, I have no doubt that there will be time for consideration of that matter during the Committee stage.
I particularly welcome the substitution of the word "protected" by the word "endangered". In this connection I must declare an interest for I have the responsibility of being an adviser to the People's Trust for Endangered Species. In view of that responsibility, for experience gained from my work in connection with the People's Trust for Endangered Species, and the splendid work which it is performing at present, I wish to draw your Lordships' attention to the widespread concern in Britain, among all classes, about our endangered species and the extent to which that is being supported financially by members of the public.
The noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, mentioned whales, and I think it not inappropriate that I should say something about whales. During 1978 up to the present date the public in this country subscribed £100,000 to the People's Trust for Endangered Species in connection with its whale project. As noble Lords will know, Great Britain, with a number of other countries, is a co-signatory of the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling which was set up in Washington in 1946 and which came into force, I believe, in 1948.

739
The co-signatories of that Convention recognised the interests of the nations of the world in safeguarding its natural resources for future generations and the dangers that could be caused by the over-fishing of whales and the desirability of establishing a system of international regulation. During this year there was an abortive meeting of the Commission in London, which achieved nothing. It would seem that what predominated was commercial pressures, scientific disagreement as to what should be done and so on, which nullified the objects for which the Commission was set up.
The Trust which I humbly represent is virtually concerned with the future of the sperm whale. Indeed, 5,000 tons of sperm oil are imported to Britain on an annual basis. The International Convention will be meeting in Tokyo in 1979 and the Trust is making representations to the Convention and is making funds available for further sicentific research. However, it is believed—and this has yet to be established scientifically—that only 4,000 sperm whales remain in existence. It is also being established scientifically that substitutes are possible in place of sperm oil. I believe that at present the import of sperm oil is prohibited to the United States of America. Therefore, why should it not be prohibited to the United Kingdom. Why should not consideration be given to that?
I welcome the Bill. I believe that there is public concern for its acceptance. I have gone perhaps wider in my consideration of this subject than other noble Lords in their speeches. However, the Bill covers the conservation of wild creatures and I stress, for the reasons that I have given, and the public support which the Trust which I have mentioned has received, that public opinion is widely concerned, at present, about the conservation of all species. I call attention to that public opinion and to the concern for our endangered species. I give a warm welcome to the objects of the Bill.
12.29 p.m.
Baroness STEDMAN: My Lords, as noble Lords have said, this House has a very good record as regards conservation matters and I should like to add my tribute to the late Lord Cranbrook by
740
saying that that is due to a very great extent, to the work which he did in this House as regards various forms of conservation. He was responsible for seeing this Bill through to its present stage and I endorse all that has been said about the noble Earl by other noble Lords. We all know of the late Lord Cranbrook's very great service to nature conservation, including the part which he played in getting the Conservation of Wild Creatures and Wild Plants Act 1975 on to the Statute Book. I am sure that his enthusiasm for the cause of nature will be missed not only in this House, but in many other places, as will his very wide-ranging knowledge of the subject.
I should also like to express my appreciation and congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, who, as he hinted in a sense fell into this position by accident but who, for this Bill, has really taken on the mantle of the Late Lord Cranbrook. We wish him well in the passage of the Bill through the House and we appreciate the efforts that he has made in order to bring it once again to our notice. I should also like to pay tribute and to congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Cranbrook, himself on his excellent maiden speech. It was a very thoughtful and a very knowledgeable contribution. I am sure that everyone in the House looks forward to hearing him regularly on conservation issues especially, and on other issues which come before the House.
Noble Lords, will know that at the Government's request a number of changes were made at various stages by the late Lord Cranbrook when we had this Bill before us last Session. We have welcomed the willingness with which these were incorporated into the Bill. Like the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, we are still not completely convinced about the need to introduce a legislative distinction between the endangered and the vulnerable creatures, which is the fundamental purpose of this Bill. But we are agreed that the Bill would make a useful contribution to the cause of nature conservation.
The noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman, asked questions about the advice which the Department receives. The NCC is still our advisory committee. We are happy to receive thoughts, ideas and even advice, gratuitously or otherwise,

741
from any of the other specialist societies, but our ultimate authority for giving us official advice is the Nature Conservancy Council, and it is now able to do much more research than was possible initially.
The quinquennial review is coming up, and the noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman, questioned whether the five-year period is the right one. I suggest that we wait until we have that quinquennial review, and then we shall have a better idea whether the review needs to be for a longer period or even for a shorter period. In the circumstances, Her Majesty's Government will not oppose the passage of the Bill if that is your Lordships' wish, and I am certain, from the speeches we have heard today, that it is. We shall also work with the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, if any crises arise during the passage of the Bill through this House, in the hope that we can send a good and proper Bill to the other place with a fair wind.
12.32 p.m.
Lord SKELMERSDALE: My Lords, in summing up, may I say how very grateful I am to the noble Baroness for her expressions of limited appreciation for this Bill. Of course, I am also extremely grateful to my new noble friend Lord Cranbrook who made such an outstanding maiden speech today. He was good enough to pad out part of my speech which I omitted concerning the actual definitions of the IUCN categories of "endangered", "vulnerable", "rare", and so on. I am grateful to him. My noble friend Lord Mowbray and Stourton spoke about the lack of protection in the 1975 Act for vulnerable creatures, which is now corrected. I think that in fact he made one small mistake when he said, if I understood him correctly, that there would have been no need for an order to be made for the otter had this Bill been enforced. In fact, an order would still have been needed for the otter to be put into Schedule 3 as opposed to Schedule 1.
The noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, paid tremendous tribute to my late noble friend, as indeed did every speaker in this debate. I shall certainly make it my business to ensure that my late noble friend's widow receives the relevant copy of Hansard. The noble Lord, Lord Craigton, who is my overseer on the all-
742
Party Conservation Committee of both Houses of Parliament was, to say the least, critical of the Bill. I know that he was putting forward the views of the Society for the Promotion of Nature Conservation, which I know well; I have had long discussions with the society. However, perhaps I could point out three matters to him. First, as I said right at the beginning, this is a scientific Bill, and Schedule 2 is to define in law a scientific category of creatures. I suspect that he would like to give total protection to both vulnerable and endangered species. If so, he would only cloud the issue by amalgamating two categories into one Schedule.
The noble Lord also mentioned marking. Of course, one is not obliged to mark a moth. Here, I should like to quote from a letter written by the late Lord Cranbrook. It says:
"On the question of marking vulnerable creatures for population studies, all those specialist societies whom I have consulted do not think that it is likely to cause significant mortality".—
In other words, not so much mortality that the creatures are likely to move up into the endangered group. The letter continues:
"One of the objects of the Bill is to stress the importance of encouraging field naturalists to study our fauna generally".
That point was made in the debate. Therefore, to answer the noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman, I think that by their very nature the specialist bodies have a tremendous amount of expertise, and although it should not be up to them to define the groups which eventually get into law, they should certainly be one of the sources to which the NCC goes for its advice.
The noble Lord, Lord Gridley, again welcomed the Bill. He spoke at some length about the Whales Convention of 1948. However, I would remind him that this Bill deals with inland species of creatures, whether they be fish or land-based, and does not seek to do anything about creatures in the sea. As I said at the beginning, I am very grateful that the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman, and her Department for the Government remain willing to see this Bill through on to the Statute Book. Her Department has already given me various pointers as to where I could improve the Bill, and I

743
shall be moving a few Amendments in Committee. However, for now, it only remains for me to wish all noble Lords a very merry Christmas. My Lords, I beg to move.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

SUSPECTED PERSONS (ABOLITION) BILL [H.L.]
12.37 p.m.
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. This is a Bill to abolish the offence which is known as "sus" or, to put it in more technical language, the offence of being a suspected person loitering about in, or frequenting, a public place, with intent to commit an arrestable offence. Basically, this offence is still in the same form as was laid down in the Vagrancy Act 1824, when the number of vagrants was considerably swelled by the destitute ex-Servicemen returning from the Napoleonic wars, and it was thought appropriate in those days to label offenders as "idle and disorderly persons", "rogues and vagabonds", and "incorrigible rogues". The suspected person falls into the second of these categories. If he is unfortunate enough to have been convicted on two previous occasions, then he may be promoted to the rank of "incorrigible rogue".
First, I think that I should cite a couple of examples just to give your Lordships some indication of the flavour of this offence. The first example is a case which occurred on 22nd February this year when Hubert and Paul, two young West Indians, were travelling home together from work in the Tottenham Court Road area to Camberwell, where they lived. They turned off Camberwell Church Street into Vestry Road at about 6.30 in the evening. Then Paul turned into Oswyth Road, which lead off Vestry Road, while his friend continued along Vestry Road. Oswyth Road runs into Shenley Road, where Paul lives. But before he reached the junction with that road a police car drew up alongside him and he was arrested on a charge of sus. The two officers later said in court that they had seen the young man trying
744
the doors of parked cars in Grace Road and Dagmar Road, which also run off Church Street a little further along. One of the officers said that it was still daylight at the time these observations were made, although of course that would be impossible at 6.30 on an October evening. The court, as one would expect, chose to believe the police evidence rather than that of the two boys, and Paul, who is 17, was convicted of the offence.
The second example occurred on 4th May when again two young West Indians Donald and Gregory, came down Brixton Hill in a bus at about 11 a.m. and got off outside Morley's. They crossed Electric Avenue and then went into the market, down Granville Arcade. They crossed Atlantic Road and into another arcade, and turned right into First Avenue, where they stopped to talk to a Mr. T, who is a friend of one of the boys and owns a patty shop in the market, and then continued down Fourth and Second Avenues into Coldharbour Lane. They entered the Labour Exchange there and collected their Giro cheques for unemployment benefit.
As they were coming out, the police arrested them, and they said that the boys, who were 21 and 22 years old had stood in a bus queue at Morley's on Brixton Road where one tried to "dip" people in the queue whilst the other one jostled. They were then alleged to have crossed the road and done the same thing outside Boots. The officer said that he followed them through the market, and they had not stopped anywhere, which was contradicted by the evidence given by Mr. T, the owner of the patty shop. The officer further said that his attention had been caught by these particular young men in Brixton High Street, because they were black and therefore, he said, more likely to be thieves. At Knightsbridge Crown Court, the evidence of the patty shop proprietor did not save Donald and Gregory from being convicted.
Those two examples are typical, in that the evidence against the accused was that of police witnesses only, and also typical in that the majority of these cases concern young West Indians. The cases I quoted were not entirely typical in that it is rare for the defence to have any witnesses at all.
In 1971, the then Home Secretary set up a working party to consider the law

745
relating to vagrancy and other street offences, and this body produced a working paper in 1974 and then a final report in 1976. They themselves pointed out that this law of suspected persons is "peculiar"—that is the word they used—in that it attempts to control behaviour which is neither a substantive offence itself nor an attempted offence, but which the public interest nevertheless requires to be punishable. I should have thought that it was more appropriate to the KGB or the DINA than to the Home Office to punish conduct which is neither a substantive offence nor even an attempted offence.
It was said in the working party report that the criminal law requires too much evidence for an attempt charge to deal with behaviour indicating merely an intent to commit an arrestable offence. According to the working party, the police say that they need "sus" to deal with what they call preparatory acts, such as trying the doors of parked cars, suspicious behaviour round buildings where there is no evidence to show the exact nature of the intended offence, or any other acts by the accused which may not have gone far enough to justify a charge of attempt.
The police see the offence as having a substantial deterrent value, we are told, and they consider it to be a useful measure in crime prevention. Unfortunately, I have to give these views of the police at second hand because I was unable to elicit any direct comments from them. In reply to inquiries that I made to the Metropolitan Commissioner, his Deputy wrote to say that the Commissioner did not dissent from any of the recommendations made by the working party but did not think it would be proper for him to comment on a Private Member's Bill. Whether this is because of some rule of etiquette of which I am unaware, or because the Home Office have issued some instructions on the matter, I should be very interested to know, because I think it is a pity that I was not able to consult the police on a criminal matter which is the subject of intended legislation, and I hope that the Minister will say that the police are quite free to express opinion on these matters, just as he emphasised in the debate on the gracious Speech that they are to give evidence to Royal Commissions.
But if the working party did express a view which coincides exactly with that of
746
the police, it would not be very surprising, because seven of the members; of the working party were Home Office officials, four were senior police officers, and then there was one representative each from the Department of Health and Social Security and the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions. I think it is deplorable that, apparently without listening to any other views, the Government should have announced their acceptance of this body's recommendation that an offence on the lines of "sus" would have to be retained.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris, was good enough to say in a letter he wrote to me recently that, after the Law Commission has reported on the law of attempt, which I understand may be in the spring—the noble Lord may confirm that in his reply—the Government will consider most carefully the views which have been expressed on the need for a new offence. But, if the Government have already accepted the recommendations of the working party, then what is there for them to consider? If, on the other hand, the weight of opinion in favour of abolishing "sus" is examined now, as we should have the opportunity of doing in the debates on this Bill, and we then consider that abolition is the right solution, then I do not believe that there are any grounds for waiting until the Law Commission has reported.
The opinions I have studied are, I must tell your Lordships, unanimously in favour of abolition. The National Council for Civil Liberties has been against "sus" ever since it was formed, and in its first annual report of 1934 there is a reference to the
"alarming increase in the arrests by the police of suspected persons' who are alleged on the flimsiest evidence to be loitering with intent".
The Runnymede Trust has published a valuable study which concludes that, when the Vagrancy Act is reviewed,
"the charge of being a suspected person should not… be replaced by another similar charge but should be repealed altogether".
The National Association of Probation Officers, whose president is the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and whose vice-president is the noble Lord, Lord Wells-Pestell—whom I am glad to see in his place—passed a resolution at their Annual General Meeting expressing the view that the continued use of this provision is
"unsound in principle, open to abuse in practice and thus contrary to natural justice".

747
The Catholic Commission for Racial Justice says:
"This law is open to abuse on a number of counts",
and it then proceeds to enumerate them. The Race Relations Group of the South-wark Diocese and the Church of England see
"the use of the Vagrancy Act 1824 as a particular feature in this downward spiral"
in police community relations. Mr. Duncan Campbell, a distinguished journalist whose name may not be entirely unfamiliar to the Home Office, writing in Time Out of 27th October, said:
"Magistrates will continue to convict on the apparent basis that there is something inherently suspicious about a black teenager standing on a street corner".
Alderman Gurmukh Singh, a magistrate himself, and chairman of the Camden Council for Community Relations, writes to me to emphasise that
"community relations councils have been concerned about the operation of this section for a very long time, and representations about its use have been made to the Home Office".
I myself have had letters—and I daresay the noble Lord, Lord Harris, will have received copies—from Watford Council for Community Relations, Hammersmith, Camden, and several others. I think the noble Lord will be constrained to agree that this is the virtually unanimous view of every CCR and of every community relations officer who has expressed an opinion on the subject. The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants supports abolition, and then, last but by no means least in this selection of opinions, there is the Scrap Sus Campaign itself. I should like to ask, do none of there powerful organisations, representing substantial interests, carry any weight in the Home Office?
Now may I attempt to summarise the main objections to a law of this kind. The working party itself recognises,
"the view that an offence of being suspected of being about to commit a serious offence in a public place is open to abuse, and lays the police open to allegations of abuse when they invoke it".
The overwhelming majority of these cases are decided on the evidence of two police officers reading from the same set of notes, and, as the magistrates are always going to believe the police rather than the defendants, the burden of proof
748
is effectively shifted on to the defendant to prove his innocence. Of those who pleaded not guilty, in a sample of 170 cases looked at by Runnymede, only 15 were dismissed.
Baroness PHILLIPS: My Lords, I wonder whether the noble Lord would care to correct one remark he made? Police evidence is never given by two officers from the same set of notes; they always have separate notes. I say that having been a magistrate in Central London for a long time.
Lord AVEBURY: Perhaps I used a form of shorthand which was inappropriate, my Lords; I meant to refer to notes which the two police officers have carefully prepared in advance of giving their evidence in court, so there is virtually no difference between the stories they give, and I am sure that will be familiar to the noble Baroness.
In some of the cases where "sus" is used, a charge of attempted theft would be more appropriate. As the Runnymede Trust report points out, that would be a more effective way of preventing the suspect from committing an actual criminal offence than the Vagrancy Act, because that Act requires evidence of at least two suspicious acts, and between the first and second acts the person being observed might actually commit a criminal offence, whereas if the law of attempt were used he could be arrested after the first observation. The use of attempt also has the advantage that it requires a higher standard of proof and allows the accused to opt for trial by jury in a matter which could have a serious affect on his reputation and future career, and we must remember that this offence is used primarily against young people.
If it is a question of preventing an immediate offence, the police have the power of cautioning, or of arrest under Section 2(5) of the Criminal Law Act 1967. Yet another alternative in certain cases is the charge of "going equipped to steal", where the accused has instruments which would enable him to break into cars or buildings. That charge could have been used, for instance, in the second example given in Appendix F of the Working Paper, which is supposed to demonstrate the necessity for a charge of "sus",

749
because in that case the person who was trying the doors of parked cars had a key in his possession which he was using on the locks to help him break in. More generally in connection with those examples given in Appendix F, in the majority of cases there is not sufficient evidence to support any charge whatever—there may have been other evidence which is not provided in that appendix—and in other of the cases quoted it is possible that alternative charges might have been preferred.
As to the claim that "sus" acts as a deterrent, there appears to be no evidence whatsoever to back it up, and I am sure that if there had been, it would have been produced by the working party. If it were true, one would expect that other forms of street crime would have been less prevalent in the Metropolitan Police Divisions, where "sus" is used extensively. I know of no such results. I have tried to obtain them, but unfortunately the nearest offence to "sus", attempted theft, cannot be analysed into police divisions in the same way as the statistics which were given to me for "sus"; therefore one cannot tell in cases where "sus" is used extensively in a police division whether the number of offences of attempted theft is that much lower, which would help to establish the case. On the other hand, the Rev. Jack Pawsey of Camberwell has said to me:
"It is the reverse of a deterrent. Faced with a charge and conviction for something he never did, the accused joins the growing band of young people for whom it is irrelevant whether something is lawful or not. This builds up villains".
It is clear that the case asserted by the working party for the use of "sus" as a deterrent is not upheld by all police forces in the country or by all police divisions within the area of Greater London. London, Liverpool and Manchester account for 17 per cent. of the population of England and Wales, but they account for 74 per cent. of the people proceeded against for "sus".
To take some figures recently given to me by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, in a recent Parliamentary Answer, for Greater London, in the second quarter of 1978 there were 81 arrests in Lambeth, 37 in Brent and Harrow, 30 in Wandsworth, 22 in Haringey and Enfield, 17 in Lewisham and Bromley, and four in Greenwich and Bexley, I
750
doubt whether there is any other offence to show such an extraordinary variability within the area of Greater London. The figures given to me by Lord Harris also demonstrate that West Indians are far more likely to be charged with the offence of "sus" than whites or other ethnic minorities. In the four divisions I just mentioned, the percentages of West Indians to the total arrested during that quarter were, respectively, 80, 38, nine, 23 and nil.
Some people may like to believe that those figures merely reflect a greater propensity of West Indians to commit certain types of crime, but if that were so the figures might be expected to be roughly in proportion to the West Indian populations of the police divisions in question, and that clearly is not so. In that second quarter of 1978, 65 West Indians were arrested in Lambeth, which has a total new Commonwealth American ethnic origin population of 29,488; in Brent and Harrow, where there are slightly more West Indians, 31,859, there were only 14 arrests of West Indians; and in Haringey and Enfield, where there are slightly fewer West Indians, 25,211, there were only two arrests. One can see, therefore, that there is an enormous variation in the use of this charge against West Indians from one police area to another.
Others will conclude, as I do, that the report of the Select Committee on Race Relations and Immigration on the West Indian community of 1977 had some relevant things to say on the subject which have been either glossed over or forgotten. I would remind your Lordships that the Select Committee accepted that the police share the host community's prejudices, that these influence them in the course of their duties and that there is some harassment of West Indians, especially the younger ones. It is only too likely, therefore, that at least some of the "sus" charges against young blacks have been trumped up by officers affected indirectly by racism or, to put a more favourable construction on it, that those charges would have been based on observations coloured by the stereotype image of young blacks as troublemakers which some policemen have. There is already in the West Indian community an extremely powerful feeling of hostility of which I am sure your Lordships are aware, towards the police, and this is no longer true only among

751
the young people. It extends, I am sorry to say, increasingly to the older generation, who see their own or their friends' children being punished for offences which nobody thinks they committed. Thus, in the end the result is that the police will be seen as the enemies of the whole of the West Indian population, and the enforcement of the law in general will, by that process, be made more difficult.
This law is opposed by the vast majority of intelligent people who have examined it outside the Home Office, and particularly by those who are concerned with the preservation of our civil liberties. Alternative charges are available where there is real evidence that a crime is about to be committed. There is no evidence that "sus" acts as a deterrent, and many police forces hardly use it at all. It causes untold damage to race relations. Now is the time to abolish it. I beg to move.
Moved, that the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Avebury.)
Lord MISHCON: My Lords, while the noble Lord might have a lot of sympathy in this House if he were to deal with his case on the basis of a crime having to be certain in its language, is he aware that he might lose a lot of sympathy if part of his case is to allege corruption of the police or prejudice on the part of the police and, indeed, incompetence of our courts?
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, I am not sure whether it is proper for me to reply after the Question has been put. However, the words which I was quoting were taken almost exactly from the report of the Select Committee on Race Relations and Immigration which did not seem to excite any particular controversy at the time. I thought that it was generally accepted that the police were simply a microcosm of the community as a whole, and that therefore it was inevitable that there were some officers in the police force who were motivated by racist considerations. Furthermore, while immense precautions have been taken throughout the Metropolitan Police to minimise the damage that this may cause, nevertheless some of the arrests which we have been discussing may have been effected by officers who are prejudiced, or by officers who, as I said, while not immediately prejudiced them-
752
selves, have their observations coloured by the sterotype image which has been formed in the police of young blacks as troublemakers. It would be extremely unwise of your Lordships to sweep this matter under the carpet and to pretend that nothing of that kind takes place within the Metropolitan Police.
Baroness MACLEOD of BORVE: My Lords, I should like to ask the noble Lord about one point before he sits down. I understood him to say that in his view magistrates always took the side of the police. May I ask him upon what he bases that view?
Lord AVEBURY: It is based, my Lords, upon the large number of cases that have been analysed by the Runnymede Trust, and which are dealt with in some detail in its report.
1.1 p.m.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: My Lords, I am afraid that it must be a reflection upon my intelligence that I cannot join in an automatic and wholesale rejection of this branch of the law. On the contrary, it seems to me to be a particularly difficult subject, and one where I hope I can put forward a balanced approach to your Lordships for your consideration. It is said that there is a law here which is causing injustice, and if that is so, I should be the first to support the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, in bringing the matter to Parliament. It is also said that a particular sector of the community is suffering this injustice more than others, and if that is so, Parliament should be particularly vigilant to look into the matter. That must be a case which would apply generally, but not least if it is said that damage is being done to race relations as a result. There again Parliament must be very careful.
Injustice may be caused by the law itself, or it may be caused by the way in which the police and the courts either are, or are said to be, applying it; and this I think is the point of the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, and my noble friend Lady Macleod of Borve. Certainly as to the law itself, I should be the first to presume that an Act passed in 1824, in the circumstances which the noble Lord has described, and which has not been amended since 1871, and last in 1891 as

753
to substance, probably needs to be looked at again. I believe that this point is unlikely to be challenged by anybody.
However, I am a little afraid that much of the complaint derives not actually from the contents of the law itself, but from the way in which it is being administered. We certainly ought to provide the police and the courts with clear-cut rules and with proper tools with which to carry out their functions. If they are having difficulties in administering this law, that is one thing, but simply to complain about the way in which they are doing it on a selective basis seems to me perhaps less than helpful.
I believe that first we should consider the conduct that this criminal offence catches. Five minutes past midnight a police constable saw a respondent looking, apparently with interest, at the back of a large shop. He saw the respondent go round to the back of the premises, followed him, and lost sight of him. Shortly afterwards he found the respondent, whom he obviously suspected of being up to no good, up some scaffolding which would have enabled him to break into the place, the back of which he had hitherto been observed looking at. The police constable thereupon arrested him. At that time the respondent was only a trespasser on the scaffolding. He had not attempted to break in. He was charged with being a suspected person. He admitted that he intended to commit a felony. In fact he was not convicted because there was not sufficient time between the two parts of the offence. That case did not involve a teenager from Brixton. It occurred somewhere quite different in 1950.
Another police constable saw the respondent near a terminus in Birmingham on a Sunday. There were a number of people about to board a bus, and the respondent pushed among them. He had his hands before him, and he was seen to tap the pockets of persons. He did not attempt to board the bus himself, though there was plenty of room upon it, and when it started he went back on to the footpath. A second and a third bus arrived at the terminus and on each occasion the respondent repeated his activities. He then moved to another street and did the same. Actually I have corrupted that account because it did not involve
754
buses, but rather tramcars, in Birmingham in 1916. That did not involve teenagers from Brixton, whether black or white.
There is a very long story about a chap in the West End who was seen by a chauffeur all over Soho trying car doors. He went into a pub and came out again. The police were brought, and they watched him for three hours. He actually got into one car, but there was nothing in it. In street after street he looked at all the cars and he tried the rear doors of most of them and the front doors; of some. At about midnight, after three hours, he was arrested.
My Lords, those are three of the very typical kinds of activity with which the police have to deal and which come before the courts. The last one which I described occurred in 1936, and so I do not think that that involved teenagers in Brixton standing on the street corners, either.
Clearly this is a law which is used as a preventive measure. One of the things that the Home Office working party asked Parliament to do was this. They asked Parliament, because they did not think that it was right that they should do so themselves, to consider whether this application of the criminal law should continue as a preventive measure, or—they put it another way—as a measure of social control. I think that the noble Lord would do them justice in saying that they did not seek to make that decision themselves. They said that it was for Parliament to do that, and that is why I welcome this debate today. Although I am not a card-carrying member of the KGB, or indeed of DINA, I am not convinced that this branch of the criminal law has lost its utility. It is said that in some areas the Act is not used, or used hardly at all, but that it is in conurbations that it has its main impact. I do not find this wholly surprising. It sounds to me like an urban crime. Although I hope that I shall not be proved wrong tomorrow morning, in my part of Suffolk I should not have thought that the opportunities are quite as great as they are in Soho, nor is the opportunity of police supervision quite so great, either.
Among the statistics that I have found is this. In one year or other which was being compared 17 cases were brought under this legislation by the Avon and

755
Somerset police, whose area includes that of Bristol. Those who would wish to abolish this offence altogether might ponder this: Do they think that the potential victims of all those 17 cases in the area of the Avon and Somerset Constabulary should have the protection which is granted to them by this law wholly removed? More so, do they think that the much greater number of people who are at the moment protected by this measure in the conurbations should have their protection wholly removed?—and, my Lords, wholly or at least very largely removed it would be, because the noble Lord has suggested the alternatives. I quite take the point that if somebody is to try car doors, and he has a bunch of keys, which he jingles along, trying key after key, he is going equipped with the means to commit theft. That would be a perfectly proper charge, and that would do the trick—more than do the trick. But that is not what happened in the Soho case. There, the man had no keys; he had no equipment at all.
Then there is attempted theft. That sounds all very well until you see what the courts have said about it. Here is a case three years ago in Wrexham:
"The defendant was employed as a clerk by a company in Wrexham. On that day she took a wallet from the drawer of the manageress. She looked into it to see if it contained any money. The justices found that both when taking it and when looking into it she had the intention of stealing money from the wallet and would have taken money from it if there had been any in it. There was in fact no money in the wallet.
"Held, on the facts of the case that the defendant could not be convicted of the attempted theft of money because the commission of the substantive offence was in the circumstances impossible".
My Lords, apply that——
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Viscount for giving way. If the only observation of this woman was that she looked into the purse, that was a single observation and she could not have been done for "sus" anyway.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: No, my Lords; and nor could a person who looked in 14 cars, in which it turned out there was nothing to steal, be done for attempted theft. This is the trouble; and this law can be applied all over the sort of
756
activities that I have illustrated to your Lordships by reported cases which have been dealt with by the superior courts.
The noble Lord also mentioned Section 2(5) of the Criminal Law Act 1967. This occurred when Parliament abolished the difference between misdemeanours and felonies and re-asserted the power of a policeman to arrest a person whom, with reasonable cause, he suspected of being about to commit an arrestable offence. We had invented the dreadful term "arrestable offence" on that occasion. The difficulty about this is that the only remedy is to take the person before the magistrates and have him bound over. It is quite true—and I am sure my noble friend Lady Macleod knows this very well—-that if there is then a breach of the binding over there is a power to commit the person concerned to prison for quite a long time. Actually, that is the only thing that can be done other than letting him off altogether. I do not think that that is necessarily a very suitable answer. It is rather like, is it not, the rule whereby every dog has one bite free. I should have thought that the proceedings on a breach of a binding over order on a second occasion, if that was the only way in which this sort of activity could be caught, would be likely to be criticised as even more arbitrary and unpredictable than the present rules which are applied in the case of an offence under the Vagrancy Act; and certainly if that was the sole bulwark left I would be particularly unhappy that we were not substituting something even worse than that which is now criticised.
It must be, I suspect, my Lords, for reasons such as this that almost everybody who has considered this matter has concluded that what we really need to do is to redefine this offence. The Law Society say so, the Home Office Working Party say so—and they both give suggestions—and even, in fact, as a second string, do the Runnymede Trust. I must pay tribute to the report produced by the Runnymede Trust. I doubt whether I have ever seen a document which is so fair in the way in which it puts these matters, and a more helpful one I would find it hard to discover. But they, too, say that, although they would prefer to see the offence abolished altogether, if it is not they wish to see redefinition. The

757
noble Lord, Lord Avebury, does not, and that, I am afraid, is where I wholly disagree with him.
We are in trouble about this Bill because it is fundamental to it—and this must be the principle that underlies any Second Reading that it should receive—that it solely abolishes the offence and puts nothing in its place. If the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, were to say that he would abandon the Long Title, the Short Title and the underlying principle, and would be prepared to see the insertion at the Committee stage of a new offence to take the place of this, which we could then discuss in some detail, then I think we might be making some progress. Of course, on that occasion we could consider all the complaints which have been made about the evidence which needs to be brought—whether it should be confined solely to the police or whether there should be an independent witness; whether there should be a case for jury trial or whether it should continue to be dealt with solely by the magistrates, and so on. At the moment the principle of the Bill allows none of this, and I myself find this unacceptable.
There is one other qualification and difficulty. I have, with due humility, from time to time attempted to draft Amendments to legislation. I think there was only one occasion when I got it right, and that was for the fourth time of trying. Even with the skill of the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, and others who would take part from the Back Benches, I think it unlikely that we would on our own be able to provide a satisfactory, watertight and workable alternative to the present offence. We could possibly do it if Parliamentary counsel were to assist us and if the noble Lord, Lord Harris, could offer the assistance of the Home Office. But unless we can have assistance from that quarter—because we cannot do it as Back-Benchers or from the Opposition Front Bench—and unless the noble Lord is prepared to rethink altogether his main concept of abolition, then I would suggest to the House that this Bill ought to proceed no further today.
1.16 p.m.
Lord GARDINER: My Lords, while supporting the Motion before the House,
758
I do not altogether agree with either of the two speakers who have addressed your Lordships so far. Of course, what everybody knows is that this old Act—154 years old, tending to deal with the position after the Napoleonic War—has been highly criticised by numerous bodies for years and years, but has never yet received the consideration of Parliament. I did not know it but we have been told, and I accept it, that it is 44 years since the National Council for Civil Liberties first criticised it. I do know that it is; 10 years since that Left-Wing revolutionary body, the Law Society, condemned it in their publication. The terms of the recent resolution from the National Association of Probation Officers at their annual meeting were:
"This Association opposes the continued use of suspected person charges under Section 4 of the Vagrancy Act 1824, believing such charges to be unsound in principle, open to abuse in practice and thus contrary to natural justice. We resolve to campaign with other interested groups to secure this reform of the law".
I must say that I myself find it very difficult to equate this law with the rule of law at all. I should have thought that we should nearly all of us have agreed that a proper criminal law should provide, so far as it can, that those who commit criminal offences should be punished and, if necessary, sent to prison, while those who do not commit criminal offences should be acquitted. Here in this law—and it is the only one I know of in English law—a man of unblemished character can be sent to prison for three months, without the right to trial by jury, when he has not committed any criminal offence and cannot even be convicted of an attempt to commit a criminal offence, merely because there is evidence that he intends to do so.
This has very long been awaiting consideration. All the race relations bodies, from the literature they send me, are very alive to the grave harm which in various parts of the large conurbations this is doing to race relations as between the coloured community and the police; and it is clear from the figures recently given by the Government that, in some areas of London where the black population is 5 per cent., the percentage of those who are convicted under this old Act is nearly 50 per cent. No doubt the noble Lord, Lord Pitt, will be able to tell us further about the effect it has.

759
I propose to support the Second Reading of this Bill, but simply because what so many of us wanted for so long is just that Parliament should have an opportunity to consider this whole legislation which I think everybody agrees ought in any case to be revised if only on the question of wording. It has been reported that Mr. Arthur Latham when recently addressing a meeting said that the previous day he had received a Written Answer from the Minister of State, Home Office, Mr. Brynmor John, in which he said that the Government had accepted in principle the recommendations of the 1976 Working Party on Vagrancy and Street Offences and intend to seek suitable legislative opportunities in the present Parliament.
It worries me to think that Ministers of State should spend sleepless nights seeking opportunities for Parliament to consider this branch of our law. Here is the opportunity now. This House can alter the Long Title of the Bill; the Government can put down in Committee any proposed alternative legislation they like. I am very glad indeed that, while the Government have been worrying as to how they could obtain a suitable legislative opportunity, here we are at the Second Reading of this Bill. And if your Lordships give the Bill a Second Reading we shall have that opportunity. I hope we take it.
1.22 p.m.
Lord GLENKINGLAS: My Lords, I have a certain reticence in speaking following a noble and learned ex-Lord Chancellor on a subject on which I cannot be professionally very knowledgeable; but, on the other hand, I did have the opportunity, the good fortune, perhaps, to have a grandfather who was a very distinguished officer of the police in the Royal Irish Constabularly. He happened to resign on the day of my birth—longer ago than I care clearly to remember—but he lived on to the age of 90 so that I had a good deal of opportunity of learning at his feet something of the difficulties of police work. In his day it was not a difficulty of dealing with colour for I do not think there was very much of a coloured population in Ireland before the first world war. But there were very real difficulties of the same sort in dealing with religious problems which, so far as I can make out, are still not entirely solved in that country.
760
The two things that he sought to instil in me as a young person were these. The first was that you should try to achieve the highest possible quality you can in your selection of policemen, people who would be trained to be both very skilled and, if possible, to have the highest integrity that you could achieve. But the second—and this was equally important—was that if you were successful in the first, then you must expect Parliament and the public to support the police to the greatest possible effect.
I have had since no connection with Ireland, except by reading the newspapers. But in the last 20 years I have had considerable contact with Jamaica. I happened to buy a house there for my mother who enjoyed it very much. I did that because in Jamaica, of all the places that I have visited, and I have been in many places in the world, there was in those days less feeling of colour than in any other country that I have visited. I myself am now, and always have been, extremely pleased to be with coloured people, particularly Jamaicans, because I enjoy being with them. It worries me, therefore, a great deal when there are cases as described by the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, in his speech today in which it is said that the police have a particular reason for being unfair to coloured people. I agree with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, that terminology, particularly if the Act happens to have been written 150 years ago, is likely to be difficult. I find legal terminology often difficult even when it is written only a year or two ago.
I wonder whether the problems that faced London after the Napoleonic Wars were so very different from those which face London and many of our big conurbations today. I am not going to argue about whether the terminology is good or bad. In most legal things, I do not understand it whichever it is. I make no apology for that. But I believe that this particular Act was conceived by the Parliament of the day as something which was designed to protect the citizen from the likelihood of crimes on the street. In the last 20 years or so, is it not the fact that crimes on the street have been increasing by leaps and bounds year after year?—whether by black people or white people, to me is totally irrelevant. It is a period in which that type of crime—the

761
muggings, the car stealings and such things—is increasing only too painfully obviously.
If we are to repeal this Act, as the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has suggested, and not put anything in its place, I think that we are opening the floodgates to those people who I believe are deliberately trying to make difficulties for the police—and, of course, there are opportunities for doing it. There are policemen who are not as high-principled as I or many of your Lordships might believe; but I think it is a very concerted effort by certain people to create problems for the police. If we repeal this, what is going to be the next action of those people? They are going to attack, perhaps, the process (which I do not fully understand) of the law of attempt. That will be the next one; and, one by one, the police powers (which I believe that they should have) to prevent crime will be whittled away. I do not believe that it is really right for your Lordships to think that any police force in the country believes that their task will be made easier by creating confrontation between blacks and whites, or between Catholics and Protestants or, indeed, between Conservatives and Liberals, or Labour and Liberals.
My Lords, this is not the duty of the police, Their duty must be, and always has been, to be fair and honourable among all people. If we take the view that the police are wrong, then let us make certain that we know upon what grounds we are taking that view and not merely report rumours and, I believe, report statistics most of which, if you study them with care, you could shoot any number of holes through. If Section 4 remains the only check that there is on what one might call open criminality on the streets, even if it is defective—and I agree that it may be so—surely it is our duty as Parliament to bring in something which is an effective check on open criminality in the streets. I myself should be extremely unhappy for it to be removed—which is what the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has asked for—unless we have some other method of helping the very large number of citizens of all colours, religious and persuasions who are in danger as they walk around many of our urban areas at night.
1.30 p.m.
Baroness PHILLIPS: My Lords, I should like to take up the point made by
762
the noble Lord who has just spoken. How far different from when this Act was first placed on the Statute Book is the situation in the vast cities today? I am an Inner London dweller and I am also a magistrate in Inner London. I think I can speak with some knowledge. I found it very strange that the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, constantly referred to West Indians. In the school of which I am chairman of governors, we have a large number of white children and a large number of black children. Without exception, the children have been born in London. I prefer to refer to them as Londoners; indeed, in court the only reference ever made, as I recall, is where the individual lives. It is a pity to be so emotive when trying to deal with an issue of this kind.
We read that in 1824 suspicious persons might be loitering by waterways and so on. Where would they be loitering today? They would be loitering in car parks, for example. If your Lordships doubt this in one week I have had three friends who in different cities—all cities because these are offences of the conurbations—have had the boots of their cars; successfully emptied and anything loose within the car removed. Listening to one of the phone-in programmes on a London radio station the other evening—and these programmes are very revealing—a woman said that she had a small shop in London—she would not disclose the area—and each morning saw groups of youths—she did not describe their colour—assembling by a bus stop. They were there all day long and she said she had seen them stealing from people. The presenter said: "Why do you not tell the police?". She replied, "What! And get my shop window kicked in".
These youths were obviously loitering with intent to steal, as they were suspicious persons. A third area that I should like to refer to is the new shopping precincts. I have been around a number of these and there are curious rules governing them in many cases because they are private property and therefore the police cannot patrol them. But it is always the case that within all these shopping precincts there are a large number of young people, whether it is a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday or Friday. Being an ex-teacher I consider they are of an age which makes them

763
obvious truants. No one can approach them and no one does so. They linger a little while but their next act is invariably to enter a shop and to steal. They are suspicious persons.
I feel that the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, slightly condemns magistrates. He seems to have a rather poor opinion of their intelligence and hearing. When he said that two policemen used the same set of notes, it was not the same as he said subsequently, that two policemen had similar notes. I should have thought that if people reported the same incident it would not be unreasonable if their notes were similar. Magistrates are given notes of conduct. They are given a lot of instruction and assistance. We do not sit there as illiterates; we try to administer the law and attempt to listen very carefully to everything that is said. We are told in relation to this particular charge of a suspected person that the evidence may consist of suspicious conduct, such as trying doors or feeling pockets. Evidence of previous convictions is admissible to prove the defendant is a suspected person even if the convictions were not known to the person who was keeping the defendant under observation. I do not think that there is any other way that one can deal with this matter.
It might have been better if certain policemen within the Palace of Westminster had been more suspicious of some of the people recently who have been flinging things about when they entered the premises. But there is no way you can tie up precisely a crime, or are we always going to wait until the crime is committed before we do something? It is relevant to remind ourselves that the original description of the police—and, so far as I know, it still remains a description—is the keeper of the Queen's Peace. In other words, in order to prevent crime. We have latterly come to accept they merely detect and catch criminals. But primarily they are there to prevent crime. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, that if he does not think there are any incorrigible rogues about nowadays he cannot have read some of the descriptions of gentlemen who go around with shotguns shooting people before they even attempt to rob them. I would say the incorrigible rogue is as much with us today as ever was, though
764
obviously there is not likely to be a suspected persons charge for him.
If we look at the cases which come before us in the courts in Central London, it is salutary to recognise that so far as I can recall in Great Marlborough Street and Bow Street we have had very few of the colour to which the noble Lord appears constantly to refer. We had a number described as coming from Scotland: perhaps we should now fear that the Scots will say that this is prejudice against them. It was certainly true that outside Westminster Abbey, the Houses of Parliament and at Piccadilly Circus Underground station there were the same individuals who loitered. Obviously they were either keen on going into the Abbey, although they never did so; they were either keen on entering the Houses of Parliament, although they never did so; or keen to travel on the Underground, though they never bought a ticket.
I seriously suggest that there could be no other way that one could deal with this type of individual, I feel very strongly about this because on Friday of last week my gentle daughter-in-law had her purse snatched at a bus stop by two youths who followed her off the bus. That was not a suspicious person; that was definite theft. They were not caught. But these same people had been hovering about at the bus stop prior to this particular action, as we now discover. This is the virtue of this particular offence. The magistrates are sensible enough to demand evidence. The first thing you ask is: what was the arrestable offence? I would say over a number of years, having heard this, naturally it will apply to big cities but it would be very unfortunate if we did not have something of this character.
I am with those of your Lordships, particularly the knowledgeable ones, like the noble Viscount, who suggest that we can devise some other type of offence. It would be a sad day if we removed yet another power from the police. Already we make their job very difficult; I should be the last one to want to add to that. Perhaps we might recall that the word "Spiv" actually came from "suspected persons and itinerant vagrants". The vagrants may not be quite so itinerant nowadays but they are with us. I should certainly not be a party to trying to make

765
the job of the protection of the law-abiding more difficult.
1.38 p.m.
Lord GIFFORD: My Lords, even if there was not experience and evidence of the way in which this particular law is being abused, one could with common sense readily anticipate the potential of its abuse by the terms in which it is worded. It has three ingredients, each of which is wholly unsatisfactory. First, it has to be shown that the person concerned is a suspected person. In every other branch of the law to be a suspected person may be sufficient—but only if suspicions are reasonable—for one to be arrested. It is never sufficient for a crime to be proved against one and for one's liberty to be taken away.
Secondly, it has to be shown that one was loitering in a public place. All sorts of people loiter in public places: unemployed people loiter because they have nowhere else to go. Badly housed people loiter in public places because they do not like staying inside. Children after school loiter; teenagers loiter; window-shoppers loiter; people waiting for buses and taxes loiter. Yet, there is something dirty about the word "loiter". No doubt it was originally used to describe people considered to be the riff-raff of society in the 19th century, and all too easily it can now be used to describe those who are thought to be riff-raff by enforcers of the law.
The third ingredient is "with intent to commit an offence"—an equally monstrous ingredient, I would suggest. Normally it is not a crime to intend to commit a crime except in the rather special case of a conspiracy, when several people agree to commit a crime. The reason why it is not a crime to intend to commit a crime is that it is unsafe to act on what is merely in somebody's mind—something which has not yet been done. It is unsafe and oppressive, and almost unknown in the law. We had an example of it recently in connection with the Official Secrets Act, when one person was charged with "an act preparatory to committing an offence". The judge would not allow it to go to a jury because he said it was too oppressive to allow people to go before the courts when it is not suggested that they have committed a substantive offence.
766
So in the suspected person cases, one of two things will happen: either no arrestable offence will have been committed, in which case I suggest it is oppressive and unsafe to curtail somebody's liberty, or an overt act has been committed, in which case the person concerned should be charged with an offence. I reject the argument that there is a need for an offence which is less than an offence. The public are protected by the laws of burglary, theft and robbery and all the other armoury of offences in the Theft Act and other statutes; and if the price for the protection of the public must be that the police must observe a little bit longer and arrest people when an offence has been committed, then that is; the price to be paid for the liberty of the subject. We must remember that too many abuses are committed around the world in the name of preventive justice, with people being arrested by the police because it is thought, feared or believed that they are about to commit an offence even though they have not yet done so.
In all the cases that have been put forward in the working party and elsewhere as examples of the need for a suspected persons offence, the answer I would give is this. Either there is evidence in those examples of a substantive offence being committed or else there would have been if the police had been a bit more persevering and a bit more hard-working and i', instead of just observing suspicious behaviour, they had waited to see whether or not an offence was committed—because, if it was not, the person should not be arrested but, if it was, then there would be better means of proving the actual offence.
So the law depends on an assessment of what sort of person you are, the way you behave and what is in your mind. It is no answer to say that in practice various overt acts are alleged: that is not the point. The very wording of this is an invitation to officers who have an instinct that someone is up to no good to act on those instincts before any proof is forthcoming. All too often, as I shall indicate in a moment, the evidence is subsequently embroidered so as to put before the court that overt acts have been committed when they have not. All too often the instinct which leads an officer to arrest the suspect is the result not of reasonable suspicion but of prejudice or preconception.

767
So much for what one might expect merely by looking at the law itself. But that is not really why we are here discussing it today. The reality is that this charge is repeatedly being used as a weapon of harassment by police officers in the Metropolitan district and in other large cities, and the victims of the abuse are predominantly young black people. In a sense, this should come as no surprise when one remembers the ingredient of the attacks. This crime, as I have sought to show, is so defined as to permit police officers to give rein to their preconceptions and their prejudices, and in an era of widespread racism it is really no surprise that those in the police force who are racist turn towards a racial minority as the object of their suspicions and harass them by arresting them without cause on suspected persons charges.
Let us not live in Cloud Cuckoo-Land about the absence of racism in the police force. One does not have to be a demagogue or extreme Left-winger in order to recognise and research it. Recently there has been published a most impressive short document by the Catholic Commission for Racial Justice on the police and the black community in the Metropolitan area. They have talked to both sides, and it is worth reading what they found on talking to a police officer. In an interview with a police sergeant they record—and I quote:
"He admitted that some policemen are racist and that although they admit it to their friends and colleagues they do not make their views known to their superiors. He quoted a number of racist incidents he had experienced. Asked what he did in such situations, he said, Well, what can I do? You can't report it because you work with them—and who would take any notice?'."
That is the end of the policeman's quote and the end of my quote from the Catholic paper. Let us then bear in mind that not only does racism exist but it is extremely difficult to check and it is being unchecked often by senior officers.
No doubt I and others who campaign for the abolition of the crime of "sus" are called upon to submit evidence of the abuse. I would submit it from three bases. The first comes from the acquittals themselves. They are of many kinds. I have noticed, reading a large number of reports and being involved in a large number of cases, that there are three
768
varieties. There are cases where the evidence is insufficient even as led by the police officers. A typical case of that is the case of Mr. Adewunmi, reported in the Tottenham Herald on 17th February 1978. He was stopped as being a suspected person because he was seen in Oxford Street to walk closely behind two women and he had been followed because of the manner in which he was conducting himself. That is a minority, however. There at least the officer was being honest in what caused him to stop the man.
The second category are cases of proven perjury. There are cases where magistrates have been taken to the vantage point from which it is said certain things have been observed, and they have been able to see that no such things could possibly have been observed. There is the case in Tower Hamlets which is quoted in the Catholic paper I quoted earlier, of a black youth accused of picking pockets by the Elephant and Castle shopping centre. Detailed evidence was given of what this man is said to have done by officers observing him from a particular vantage point. The magistrate was persuaded to go there and it was found that the vantage point did not and could not show those acts. The case of Errol Mark in Oxford Street, is a similar case in which, from a third floor window, police officers said they could see down into the street when in fact they could not. Those, again, are few in number.
The majority of acquittals are those where magistrates have been unsatisfied; I accept that quite frequently there have been cases where magistrates have been unsatisfied, even on the detailed evidence of police officers alleging specific allegations, that those officers are telling the truth. Quite apart from the acquittals, it would be my contention, as a practising lawyer and as someone just looking at the common sense of the matter, that for every person suspected for "sus" who is rightly acquitted there must be many who are wrongly convicted. The evidence is of police officers alone and of the defendant or defendants alone.
The evidence of the police officers purports to come from notebooks which they have made up in consultation, as they are permitted to do, and as they invariably do, so that the facts alleged are virtually identical. No corroboration is

769
ever possible, one way of the other. That is why it is such a dangerous charge. If someone is accused of theft, there will be a victim; there will be stolen goods. If someone is accused of assault, there will be an injury to confirm that a crime has been committed. But in "sus" one is not to know, apart from the evidence of the prosecution witnesses, that the crime has even been committed.
There have been remarks made this afternoon about the approach of Benches to "sus" cases, and some, I readily accept, are very fair. But even so, there are bound to be many innocent people convicted. I would put the cases as of two kinds. One kind is of people who come before certain courts—and there are certain courts in London which are notorious, and rightly notorious, for the way in which magistrates or Benches believe without question and rubber-stamp the evidence of police officers. The other kind is of courts where the Bench, with the utmost goodwill, does not have the means of really determining the truth, the means of showing that a police officer, apparently of good character, apparently with no axe to grind, may have given perjured evidence, as has been proved in many cases. That is the evidence which comes from the cases themselves.
In addition to that, there is the evidence, much more diffuse, but to be taken notice of nevertheless, which comes from the community and from those who are close to it. In a submission of evidence to the Royal Commission on Criminal Procedure, entitled Fair Deal for All and published in October 1978, to which I shall have occasion to return, there is a quotation from an assistant headmaster, Mr. Russell Proffitt, on the experience that he has, as someone constantly involved with young people. This is what he says:
"Black youngsters don't use such technical terms as suspected person', loitering with intent'. To them it's victimisation, and to them it's harassment. It does exist and it does happen. It is not exaggeration because every opportunity you have to listen to youngsters, you will get repeated stories, time and time again, about being stopped, about being questioned, about being searched. There is a striking sameness about the descriptions offered by the blacks: repeatedly stopped, shouted at, searched, insulted, sometimes arrested, and sometimes convicted, when with intent' could well mean no more than looking in a shop window or waiting at a street corner with a friend. It could well be that all the youngsters have got together and made up
770
a story that they could give whenever they are asked what their experience was. To my mind, that is impossible. It may well be that a fair percentage of what they have to say is true".
Again and again, you will get those accounts given by people who work with young people. I have myself been a member of an informal gathering which took place in North London to inquire into the cases of suspected person arrests and convictions in Tottenham. It was difficult to make final judgments about any case, but from the witnesses who came forward, from the people who spoke from the floor, there is no doubt that there is widespread and repeated allegation that the powers of the police have been grossly abused in certain areas.
I come to the consequences of this, and to what we should do today. The consequences of this—and I recognise that "sus" is only an example, but an important one—are that there is spreading through the black community today, and especially among black youth, bitterness, suspicion, despair, hostility and alienation. The evidence of that is overwhelming and incontestable. The conclusion of the Runnymede Trust, whose report was praised by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, is this:
"Arresting people on sus is, in the context of police/community relations, a counter-productive method of crime prevention. Its extensive use in parts of London and one or two other major towns has merely succeeded in convincing young blacks and their parents of the racial prejudice of the British police force and the inherent unfairness of the British legal system".
The Catholic organisation, commenting on that concludes:
"We found nothing to contradict this conclusion and much to support it".
Those are the conclusions of outside organisations which have tried to look into this problem. But I do not think—and I hope that I am not trespassing on your Lordships' time—that the debate would be complete without the view of those who look at it from the inside.
The same report to which I referred earlier was compiled by a number of highly responsible people—Mr. Foster, an ex-policeman, Mr. Udo, the manager of International Personnel, Miss Phoenix, an MBE, law centre workers, lawyers, community workers and the Reverend Manning, a priest. This is its conclusion,

771
and I beg your Lordships to take it seriously:
"The black community, in its relations with the police and the law in general, does not get a fair deal. The police use their powers unfairly against black people by constant harassment, brutality, raids and mass arrests of black youths, and are insensitive to crimes committed against black persons and property… Certain laws have been passed specifically to deny black people their basic human rights; and some Judges are inclined to apply the laws unfairly against blacks. Police and courts treat members of the black community in this unfair manner because of the inherent racism in British society. The overall effect of the unfair treatment dealt to blacks is the growing degree of alienation of the black community from the white community and the worsening state of race relations generally. If a multi-racial society is sought for in Britain, then the existing British institutions—economic, education, law etc.—must be restructured to accommodate blacks. In the final analysis, police-black problems are deeply rooted in societal problems".
Lest that be thought exaggerated or hysterical, let it be remembered that it is the thought of responsible people working in the black community, and not something published in newspapers so as to inflame the people. It is something that was put forward to a Royal Commission. These are people seeking to work through constitutional channels, seeking to make the establishment aware of the reality of the situation on the ground.
What, then, is to be done? I accept that my speech has ranged wider than the crime of suspected person alone, but the abolition of "sus" is one of a number of actions which is uniquely within the power of your Lordships' House. It is a legislative action, and it is one that is being fervently called for by the organisations and individuals to whom I have referred. Of course, it is only part of the solution but it is a step which we must take. If we take it, it will show that we are ready to listen and learn and respond One can ask: what is democracy, if it is not to respond to a cry for help, and increasingly a cry of anger, coming from a substantial section of the population.
If we refuse to listen to it, if we say "We must wait and see. You are perhaps not so important as a lobby as other people, and we must back the police", we are saying to that section of the people that there is little object in their seeking the redress of their grievances by constitutional means. That, I fear, will be the message that goes out if the vote of
772
this House, or the overall decision of this House, reflects the stony-hearted reaction, which he justifies in the name of balance, of the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, and the equally insensitive reaction which has come so far, and which I hope will not come later today from those who answer for the Government. If we do not listen, we are driving a further wedge into our community. We are stoking up the kind of conflicts that noble Lords wish to avoid. I urge your Lordships, with such authority as experience of these tensions can give me, to give a Second Reading to this Bill.
Baroness PHILLIPS: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, I should like to say that I am not an insensitive reactionary merely because I dare to disagree with the noble Lord's point of view. This happens to be a democracy in which each individual is allowed to state his point of view without receiving the rather harsh comments which I think the noble Lord handed out.
Lord GIFFORD: My Lords, I rise again only to say that I do not recall having handed out harsh comments to the noble Baroness. I recall saying harsh things about certain Benches in this country, but I specifically excepted the noble Baroness from any particular strictures.
2 p.m.
Viscount MONCK: My Lords, I always feel a little nervous about supporting the police in their powers, because a little voice comes from the back of my mind saying, "There, but for the grace of God, go I". The fact is, however, that there is only one member of my family who has been under suspicion from the police. That was my mother-in-law. She was breathalysed because they said that her car was wobbling about the road. As her daily intake consists of one glass of sherry, they were disappointed in their efforts. They eventually discovered that one tyre of her car was slightly down and that this was making the poor old dear wobble. I have to confess that she will be furious with me for having mentioned her if she listens tomorrow to the BBC; she did not know that I was going to do so.
The whole of my family, myself included, are innocent of loitering with intent, and that is why I am prepared to enter the

773
lists. I always try to obtain the opinion of both sides when a question like this is raised. In this case, the two sides are the police top brass and those who loiter with intent. I consulted the police top brass. They are the top brass in a country shire and have nothing whatever to do with a metropolitan district, London or anywhere else. I obtained quite a lot of information from them, but after using my best endeavours I could not find anybody who confessed to loitering with intent. I tried very hard, but the suggestion made to me was that, knowing that this Bill was on the stocks, they had all gone underground in the hope that the Bill would become an Act so that they could then continue with their nefarious proceedings without fear of being arrested.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has told us that a working party was appointed in 1971 to consider this question. It reported in 1974—rather a long period. In fact, it was so long that one poor member of the working party died before the report was publised. The composition of this working party was as follows: seven from the Home Office, one from another Government Department, one from the Department of the Director of Prosecutions and four police. Your Lordships may think that it was a rather weighted gathering—that is, weighted against the police. Nevertheless, their conclusion was as follows:
"Our provisional view is that an offence on the lines of the existing offence of being a suspected person under Section 4 of the Vagrancy Act 1824 is still necessary".
I shall read the whole of their conclusions if noble Lords wish, but I dare say that they would prefer to be spared. That is the conclusion to which the working party came.
In my humble opinion, the numbers and powers of the police have, over the years, been reduced. The former must be increased and the latter must not be reduced. Perhaps it is not fully understood that this Bill will also reduce the powers of private persons. If a private person sees someone acting suspiciously in the street, he can hold the chap or "chapess" until the police arrive. Such people should be encouraged and not discouraged. There are too many people today who, as in the story of the Good Samaritan, pass by on the other side.
774
There are certain forms of stealing which it would be very difficult to combat without a suspected person charge. There is the case of a chap in a car park who is seen going around trying doors. Here may I introduce the case of the innocent bloke. If you go around trying the doors of certain cars in a car park, the cars not being your own, and it is only because you are boxed in that you are doing so, in the hope of finding some method of egress, the explanation is perfectly simple, perfectly innocent and I am sure would be believed.
In this connection, I should like to mention a rather amusing cartoon which appeared some years ago in the Police Gazette. The scene was a car park, with a police constable and another man. The police constable says: "I've been watching you for 10 minutes, sir, trying to find the car that fits your key". That is typical of car park thieves. They do not act if anybody is about, so their actions can be seen only from a distance. Therefore it is virtually impossible to be sure that anything is taken. If the suspected person charge is removed, the police will be absolutely hamstrung. They are also hamstrung in the case of pickpocket gangs, which I shall not go into in detail because I do not wish to delay your Lordships.
As most of your Lordships know—anyway, those who live on the right side of Hadrian's Wall and Offa's Dyke—there is an area in the south of England that is known as the New Forest. It is called "New" because it is only 900 years old. This particular place is a favourite spot for picnickers and it is notorious for car thieves. What happens is that they steal and immediately hide their booty. They come back to fetch it later. If the police are about in the park, the car thieves, of course, do nothing. So what the police do is to observe from some way off by using what the racegoer calls "bins". I call them glasses, but let us call them binoculars. By the time they have seen somebody acting suspiciously and have reached the spot it is impossible to prove theft by any particular person from any particular vehicle. Therefore, the suspicious person rule gives them the only chance possible of arresting the chap, or "chapess", whom they have seen acting suspiciously.
There was an interesting case in the New Forest concerning a certain gentleman who, so that I can absolutely avoid

775
hurting the feelings of any of your Lordships, I shall call Adolf Hitler. Adolf was arrested as a suspicious person in 1975. When he came up for judgment, 122 other thefts were taken into consideration. In 1976—do not ask me why he was set free so soon—he was again arrested as a suspicious person, and 57 other offences were taken into consideration.
We have already heard from the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, that a Royal Commission is sitting at the moment on the subject of police powers. Is it not rather foolish to abolish one small section of police powers when a full report is going to be made available? I have no hesitation in saying that I very much hope that we shall bury this Bill today and I would willingly send a wreath or, if donations in lieu are required, a donation to any reputable charity.
Several noble Lords: Hear, hear!
2.10 p.m.
Lord PITT of HAMPSTEAD: My Lords, I hope in the few minutes available to me to be able to change a few minds and to pursuade your Lordships to agree to give this Bill a Second Reading, because the law is bad. That is the one really firm ground on which we should change this law.
As has already been said, the section is all-encompassing. The Act was passed in 1824, at a particular period in Britain's history of which I am sure many of us are not too proud. The law is therefore 154 years old. It is about time we looked at it, even if we were to decide that we wanted to carry on; but I hope to be able to show why we should not agree to continue with it. As the noble and learned Lord the former Lord Chancellor said, it is the only offence for which a man with a previously unblemished character can find himself in prison without ever having committed an offence. That is quite serious. Moreover, as a result of many of the amendments and many of the interpretations which have been given, the powers under the Act are extensive. For example, as extensive as the wording of the 1824 Act is, there was an amendment in 1871 which further extended that;
776
and I shall read Section 15 of the 1871 Act, which provides that:
"in proving the intent to commit a felony it shall not be necessary to show that the person suspected was guilty of any particular act or acts tending to show his purpose or intent",
and that he may be convicted if, from the circumstances of the case, and from his known character as proved, it appears that his intent was to commit a felony.
Although there is a general rule in criminal proceedings debarring the prosecution from tendering evidence to show that the defendant is a bad character or is guilty of criminal acts other than the offence charged, Section 15 which I have just read abrogates that rule. Moreover, Lord Chief Justice Goddard in 1949 confirmed that, in these words:
"There is no doubt that under the words of that section, if strictly construed, the character of the defendant can be given in evidence and therefore previous convictions can be proof on the question whether he intended to commit a felony".
But it did not stop there, because Lord Chief Justice Goddard went on to say:
"It must be obvious that the prosecution must be allowed to prove a man's previous convictions to show that he was a suspected person".
Mr. Justice Humphreys in 1950 went further. He said this:
"The words suspected persons' in section 4 of the Vagrancy Act 1824 and their meaning have been discussed in many cases, to most of which we think it is unnecessary to refer. No case would seem to have been reported which has raised this point, but in our opinion there is nothing in the Act or in any of the authorities to which our attention has been drawn to suggest that the previous convictions must be known to the arresting officers in order to prove that as a result of those convictions the person convicted became a suspected person".
There he was giving a Judgment in the Court of Appeal.
I hope that your Lordships appreciate fully the magnitude of this legislation. It is not necessary for the police officer to know of any previous convictions or anything that shows the person to be a bad character in order to regard him as a suspected person. Moreover, it is not necessary to show that the person suspected was guilty of any particular act or acts tending to show his purpose or intent. That is the consequence of the Judgments I have been reading. As the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has told your Lordships, if a man is convicted a second time he is then deemed to be an incorrigible rogue,

777
can be sent to the Crown Court and may be imprisoned for a year.
As a result, the judges, no doubt instigated and morally supported by the attitude of juries, enter into the most complex arguments of jurisprudence to avoid the consequences of this outdated legislation. There is a solid body of complex decisions from the High Court which generally control the actions of the magistrates. My noble friend read some of the directions which are handed on to the magistrates in this matter.
In order to convict any person of a criminal offence the law requires that two essentials must be fulfilled beyond reasonable doubt. The first is what lawyers call mens rea, which in layman's words I would translate as a "wicked intent"; and the second is what the law has called actus reus, which again I would interpret as a positive physical act. The point is that it is only under Section 4 of the Vagrancy Act that a person may be arrested, charged and convicted without these things being present, except in the philosophical flights of fancy of the lawyers, because that is what is required in order to establish in this crime that there is both a mens rea and an actus reus.
In practice, therefore, justices of the peace—and they are the people who are in the main burdened with the administration of this law, and I speak as one of them—find that what they are really doing is having to convict persons who in reality the prosecution are alleging are attempting to commit a criminal offence. That is what it amounts to, and unless you really believe that this person would have committed a criminal offence you should hesitate to convict.
We are all aware that the law concerning the attempt to commit an offence is extremely complex and I am pleased that at least one noble and learned Lord who sat in a recent case before your Lordships' House is listening to this debate, because in its judicial capacity your Lordships' House has battled with this matter on several occasions in an attempt to arrive at a just and equitable decision. The last case on which I noticed that one noble and learned Lord who is now present was sitting is the case of Horton v. Smith. I am sure the noble and learned Lord knows what I am saying
778
and he can certainly confirm the immense difficulty properly imposed on the prosecution when alleging an attempt to commit an offence. It is because Section 4 of the Vagrancy Act completely bypasses these difficulties that certain people want it retained. It is also because of that that certainly I, and, I know, many other people strongly argue that this legislation is completely outdated and should be repealed. It is legislation which is wrong in principle.
It is no use behaving as though when one argues this case one is being unfair to policemen or magistrates. The law is difficult for the police to enforce; it is difficult for magistrates to interpret. It is a bad law. What is more, a number of social surveys have been carried out in connection with persons most likely to be brought within this legislation, and it is quite clear that it is the least adequate persons, and probably those least capable of defending themselves, who are oppressed by this legislation.
The noble and learned Lord the former Lord Chancellor asked for my comments about the situation in the black community. Of course, it is inevitable that the blacks would be among the victims here. For one thing, they are the least defensible. They are the people least able to defend themselves at the moment in this society. But that is not all. It is no use pretending, as we do so often, that policemen are all saints. The police are a cross-section of society and there will be prejudiced policemen, just as there are prejudiced noble Lords. The society is as it is. If you pick a cross-section of society, some of them will be good men, some of them will be bad men; some will be prejudiced, some will have no prejudice; some will also be of criminal intent in the way in which they carry out their duties. You will have all kinds, and it is no use pretending that you can only have one kind. The law, therefore, must be such that people are not oppressed by it. The real schism of this Act is that it does harm to society, in that it puts many decent people in jeopardy; it creates terrible friction between the police and certain sections of the community, and, what is more, it is a very difficult law to interpret.
My Lords, I hope your Lordships will give this Bill a Second Reading. Amend it if you wish; we can amend any Bill

779
which comes before us. But let us at least look at it. This is our opportunity for looking at it. Let us look at it and see whether we can change the law. If we cannot abolish it—although I think we ought to abolish it—let us see whether we can improve it. Before coming here I talked to a lot of people in the law, and I have had a number of suggestions as to the ways in which this matter can be better dealt with. We will see what comes out on Committee. We will see what the Government have to say. My Lords, please give this Bill a Second Reading, and let us look at this old law, which in fact is a bad law.
2.23 p.m.
Baroness WHITE: My Lords, before my noble friend rises, may I intervene for just 50 seconds. Unfortunately, I could not come to the early part of this debate, and therefore I have not been able to listen to the arguments on the law. But I think one should at least hope for some indication from my noble friend as to what guidance may be given to the Metropolitan Police. I say this because of a small incident that happened to me some 18 months ago when my handbag was snatched in Lower Sloane Street—a fairly reputable area as a rule. The very first question I was asked by the police, who came very rapidly to the spot, was, "Was he black?" I said that a youth had snatched my bag, and the very first thing they asked was, "Was he black?". As it happened, he was not. I think one should say that, because it came so spontaneously, and, plainly it seemed to them that the obvious first question to put to someone in that situation was, "Was he black?".
House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.
The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
2.25 p.m.
The MINISTER of STATE, HOME OFFICE, (Lord Harris of Greenwich): My Lords, I have listened with great care and attention to everything that has been said in the debate today. The issue we are discussing is obviously a matter of considerable importance, and I think that the debate we have had has been a very
780
helpful one, both as far as the House is concerned and as far as the Government is concerned. The noble Lord, Lord Ave-bury, made it clear that in proposing this Bill his principal concern is with the maintenance of good community relations in general and the improvement of relations between the police and black youths in particular. I respect this concern and I acknowledge the sincerity with which the noble Lord holds this particular view. In my turn, I want to make it abundantly clear from the outset that, as I am sure does the whole House, the Government regard the maintenance of good community relations in this country as a matter of paramount importance, important both as an end in itself and as a necessary and significant element in the health of our community as a whole. This much I think is common ground; indeed it would be very surprising if it were not so.
Of course, as is widely recognised, the maintenance of good relations between the police and the public and between the police and the ethnic minorities is one absolutely crucial aspect of this matter. When one sees the experience outside this country, particularly in North America, where in the past the situation has been profoundly unsatisfactory, one becomes aware of the very high cost that is paid in terms of social tranquillity as a result of that very unsatisfactory situation.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, believes—and I certainly appreciate the clarity with which he has put forward this particular view—that the repeal of this suspected person offence would remove a cause of friction and that as a result it would serve the cause of good community relations. Indeed, my noble friend Lord Pitt put this even more strongly, and I know others also share this view. I share this general objective, but quite apart from other considerations, which I hope to set out in a moment or two, I do not believe that the Bill would in fact achieve that objective. Indeed, I think we have to face the fact that it might well have precisely the opposite effect.
Good community relations are possible only within an established framework of law fairly but firmly enforced. Any attempt to remove or weaken powers necessary to support this framework may, I fear, create anxieties and exacerbate the tension which we all wish to disperse.

781
So this is not a debate between those who wish to secure good community relations and those who are absolutely indifferent to that objective. It is, among other things, a debate about the best means of achieving good community relations in this country and about the likely effect that this Bill would have upon them.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, did at one stage say one thing which, if he will forgive my saying so, appeared to be a marginal overstatement of his case. This was where he indicated that the vast majority of intelligent people outside the Home Office share his view on this Bill. It did seem to me a remarkably extreme statement. I am not quite sure on what evidence he bases it. I suspect that there are a very substantial number of people outside the Home Office, who would strongly contest the objectives of this Bill.
However, I must say that the slight overstatement of the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, pales into insignificance compared with the quite extraordinary speech made by my noble friend Lord Gifford. Let us remind ourselves of what he said. Everybody appeared to be a racialist: the police, of course, are racialist; the courts are racialist; and the judges are racialist. I wonder what effect he believes his words will have when reported outside this House. Does he really believe that they will do anything for good community relations in this country? It was, in my view, absolutely pernicious nonsense and it is clear that the effect of those words reported outside this House will do nothing to improve community relations and could, indeed, do precisely the reverse.
Lord GIFFORD: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, has made an attack on me and I think that I should reply. It may do damage if he misreports and misquotes my words. I did not say that all police, all courts, or all judges were racialist. I said that there was racialism to be found in the police force, on Benches and in the courts. Will the noble Lord not accept that that is so and indicate what his office is doing to improve that situation?—because if he is blind to it, then it is his office which is blind and discrediting and leading to the bad relations such as exist in North America, and not I, who am speaking as to what I find on the ground from my
782
experience as a lawyer and a person involved in race relations.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, Members who are present can form their own view as to what the noble Lord has just said and relate it to what he said in his speech. I repeat: I think that he made a damaging speech and did damage to good community relations in this country. In particular, the point which I found in many senses most objectionable of all was the total blind indifference to everything that has been done not only by many people actively involved in community relations in this country, but also by a very large number of dedicated policemen, both in London and outside, to build bridges between themselves and the coloured community.
I think that it is most important to understand what this particular offence means in real terms. It is not just a question of someone acting suspiciously—that is not the offence. I remind noble Lords that the offence—which is; one of a number which appear in Section 4 of the Vagrancy Act 1824—is that of being a suspected person or reputed thief frequenting or loitering in a street or place of public resort, et cetera, with intent to commit an arrestable offence. Of course, there are a number of decided cases relevant to the interpretation of the offence, and the effect of those is that a person can be charged as a suspected person when there are a number of incidents of suspicious behaviour which add up to something more than mere suspicion, but which fall short of an attempt. The offence requires not merely the formation of a criminal intent, but positive evidence of that intention in the form of a series of overtly suspicious acts.
The standard of proof required to secure a conviction is not below that required for the conviction of other offences and, of course, the burden of proof rests entirely upon the prosecution. The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, quoted somebody as saying—indeed, I think it was a journalist working for Time Out—that if one was a black teenager, simply by standing on a street corner one put oneself in peril of being charged with this offence. I am bound to say that I do not believe that there is the slightest truth in that statement. I have just indicated the standard of proof required. I leave it to

783
the House to judge whether what the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has said on this particular point—it was not really what he said but what the journalist on Time Out said—can, in fact, have any justification whatever.
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, I certainly do not wish to shelter behind the particular journalist whose words I quoted, because I was endorsing those words by reading them to your Lordships. The case that was mentioned by, I think the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, was one where the magistrates went to the scene of the alleged offence and it was found that the police officers could not possibly have seen the youths standing at the bus stop where it was alleged that they had been attempting to "dip", and it proves that the journalist was correct.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I obviously know nothing about the particular situation which has been mentioned by the noble Lord. All I can say is that if his case is that the person concerned was acquitted of this charge, then I am not clear what bis concern is. Of course it is a serious matter if unreasonable charges are brought against anybody for any offence—not just this offence but any offence. All I would say to the noble Lord as regards this is that we do now have in this country a more thorough system of dealing with complaints against the police than exists in any other country in the Western industrialised world. I am bound to say that I speak with personal knowledge of this matter—the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, is, I recognise, an expert on many matters, but I am pointing out to him that I have had the opportunity of discussing this with a number of people involved in both the administration of justice and the police service in most of the Western European countries and the United States. All I am saying to the noble Lord is that, on the basis of that knowledge, we have a more thorough system in this country than exists anywhere else either in Western Europe or in the United States. That is a fact.
Of course, I recognise that if people make a complaint and they do not believe that their complaint has been upheld, they may feel a sense of injustice, in the same way as if they go to court
784
and do not win their action they also experience a sense of injustice. However, that does not mean that the system itself is unfair. If police officers behave unreasonably, and if it is alleged that they have committed a criminal offence, the case papers must be looked at by the Director of Public Prosecutions. If it is alleged that they have committed an offence against police disciplinary regulations, the papers now go to a board appointed by the Prime Minister, none of whose members are serving police officers or have at any stage been serving police officers. That seems to me to be a fairly impressive system which we have every reason to congratulate ourselves upon.
I once more turn back to this offence. As I have said, it was examined, along with others, by the working party whose report we have discussed today. It was a working party appointed by Mr. Maudling when he was Home Secretary and it reported in the lifetime of the present Government. As has been said, it consisted of a number of people—police officers, Home Office officials and officials of other Government Departments. It recommended that the Vagrancy Acts should be totally repealed and their provisions replaced, where necessary, by more modern offences.
In the case of suspected persons, the working party considered that an offence on the lines of the existing one remains necessary to deal with behaviour which falls short of any other criminal offence, or of an attempt to commit an offence, but which in the public interest ought to be punishable. On publication of the working party's report, which was in 1976, the Government announced that they accepted its recommendations in principle, and would seek suitable legislative opportunity to implement them.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has asked: Why do we need such an offence at all—this is really at the heart of the argument today—or an equivalent offence in a modernised form, as the Working Party on Vagrancy and Street Offences recommended? I think that the answer is pretty clear—namely, to deal with a number of situations where a person commits acts which clearly reveal his intention to commit a serious offence. It may be a group of intending thieves trying

785
door handles—a case which has been mentioned by a number of noble Lords who have spoken—who would otherwise be committing no offence whatever. Or, it may be others standing in bus queues—another example which has been cited—waiting for a chance to steal a housewife's purse. The Commissioner of Police has told the Home Office that the offence is viewed by his senior operational officers as an important measure for the prevention of crime, particularly at a time when the offences with which it is associated appear to be increasing. That is a fact which we have to take very seriously into account in a debate of this character.
I think it is right that we should look at the background to this problem. In the last few years there has been a substantial increase in the number of recorded offences of burglary, theft from the person and from motor vehicles. As the Commissioner says, if police observe these preparatory actions and have grounds for acting under the present law, it is surely in the public interests that they should intervene by arrest and so prevent the commission of the full offence. This early arrest can be for the benefit of the potential victim—if I may say so, a person not referred to in many of the speeches which have been delivered today, but who we, on all sides of this argument, have to take very seriously indeed.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: My Lords, I referred to such people.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, the noble Viscount reminds me that he, in fact, referred to them. I am bound to say that it was not a point to the centre of the argument of many who have spoken in this debate. Let us examine the position of the potential victim for a moment. Do not forget that he will be the person who will be most affected if there is any delay in police intervention. It could result in unnecessary injury; it is not simply a question of, say, a purse being stolen; it is a question of the degree of violence which will be used—and often is used in street offences in London and elsewhere—to deprive someone of that purse. With great respect to all those concerned, this seems to me to be a most important aspect of this argument. I think that it is very difficult to deny that
786
were we to have no offence of this character whatever—and there is common ground that it should be in a more modern form; there is no difficulty over that—there would be a serious risk that many people today who are prevented from suffering injury as a result of prompt action by the police, in the future would suffer quite significant injury. When discussing a matter of this sort, it is most important to consider this aspect.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, made a number of criticisms about this offence. I think it is necessary for me to deal with one or two aspects of this matter now. In his speech the noble Lord suggested that it is inherently objectionable to rely on an archaic 1824 provision which seeks to control behaviour which would not otherwise be an offence or an attempted offence. Further, the people charged are found guilty on the basis of evidence given by the police without, as he said, independent corroboration. Since the police have, he suggests, stereotyped young black people as petty thieves, this tends to distort their observations of them when they are seen on the street, waiting at bus stops or at underground stations. Further, the point is made that other offences, such as attempted theft and going equipped for stealing, can be deployed just as well against pickpockets, bag-snatchers and car thieves.
Let me take the last point about alternative charges first, because it is a very important aspect. If it were to be valid, we would not, of course, need a suspected persons offence at all. On that point the noble Lord is undoubtedly absolutely right. But let me refer again to the views of the Commissioner of Police. He had told us—and I know that other senior officers of police share this view; indeed, many of them have told me that they share it—that the repeal of the existing offence under Section 4, without the substitution of a similar provision to deal with suspicious behaviour which falls short of an attempt to commit a full offence, would leave a major gap in the powers of the police to prevent crime. This could not be filled by the use of alternative charges.
People intent on committing crimes of this kind would be free blatently to select their potential victims, safe in the knowledge that the police could not intervene and arrest them—not until the actual

787
offence had taken place. The Commissioner agrees with the working party's recommendation that such powers remain necessary, but that redrafting should take account of modern terminology and, of course, relevant case law.
I come to another difficulty about the noble Lord's Bill. As the House will be aware, we have a law of attempt in this country which is narrower than in some other jurisdictions, and recent decided cases have tended to restrict rather than widen its scope. The Law Commission, which is examining the law of attempt thoroughly, put forward for consideration in a working paper some proposals made by a working party which it had assisting it, for widening this particular offence to include a "substantial step" test, though expressing some reservations about it. An approach of this kind would extend the law of attempt to include such conduct as lying in wait for, searching out, or following the contemplated victim or object of the intended offence, or reconnoitring the place contemplated for the commission of the intended offence.
We do not of course know what view the Law Commission will take in its final report about the law of attempt. But in a situation of this sort it is obviously desirable that the Government should have the Law Commission's recommendations before taking a considered decision about the extent and formulation of a new suspected persons offence.
I must emphasise that without adequate statutory provisions making illegal pre-patory acts of the kind caught by the present suspected persons offence, the community would be put at a serious disadvantage. It would mean that the police would have to maintain observation, supposing that were possible, until the attempt was made before intervening—perhaps unsuccessfully—to protect the victim, and to catch the offenders.
Viscount COLVILLE of CULROSS: My Lords, if the noble Lord is going on to deal with a different point, could he perhaps answer the question which I asked him. Is he saying that, until the Law Commission has reported on this, the Government would not be able to assist on the formulation of an offence which we could put into this Bill in Committee?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I am, indeed, saying just that We hope to receive the Law Commission's report fairly early next year, I believe some time in the spring. I think that at that stage we shall be in a much better position to form a view as to what is the most sensible thing to do.
Another ground of criticisms is that there are variations in the use made of this offence within and between various police forces. It is said that some use the offence a great deal, some very little, and in the case of the Metropolitan Police criticism has been made that it is used on an altogether too generous scale. This was, indeed, another argument which lay at the heart of the case put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Avebury. Further, it is alleged by the noble Lord and others that it is used discriminatorily against black people. Certainly in a matter of this sort and in a matter of this sensitivity, I think it is right to go into these allegations, including those concerning the arrest figures which have been made by the Runnymede Trust. However, I believe that such figures are an unsafe base on which to mount an attack on the use of the suspected persons offence.
For instance, let me deal with this problem by looking into the situation on Merseyside—I am not pushing on one side the situation in London—where the coloured population is, in fact, at a much more modest level than in some of the other urban areas about which we have been talking today. Yet, of course, it is an area where a significant number of people are proceeded against for this offence. In 1977, 489 people on Mersey-side were involved in being proceeded against for this offence. The Chief Constable of Merseyside tells me that he regards the provisions for dealing with "sus" offences contained within Section 4 as an essential operational requirement for dealing with criminals on Merseyside, particularly, he says, with those involved in street offences.
He says that on many occasions the only legislation that could reasonably be used to prevent the opportunist thief who comes to the attention of patrolling officers is the Section 4 offence. He says the police in Merseyside have had some success in frustrating the pickpocket and those who steal from cars who would otherwise thrive

789
on the conditions which exist in most of the large conurbations. The Chief Constable also explained that the offence is used in circumstances when a charge would not be preferred under any other legislation and is, on the whole, a preventive action allowing a police officer to fulfil one of his primary functions in preventing crime rather than allowing a crime to be committed before making his arrest.
Before I sit down I should like to pose a question to the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, which I hope he will consider. The noble Lord has suggested today that if the suspected person offence were to be repealed the police would be able to rely on other offences or attempted offences. But does he really believe that other offences, such as attempted theft, can deal with all the behaviour that we have been discussing today and which, at the moment, is included in the suspected persons offence? If he does believe this—and I must emphasise that the Government and the police do not—then I would invite him to consider what precise purpose the repeal would serve. If, on the other hand, he believes, in common with the Government, the police and the working party that the repeal would mean that some conduct now dealt with by the law would in future go unpunished, then I would ask him to consider and explain what this conduct might be.
Is he content at what this would imply? Are we to envisage, for example, that a man may try successive car door handles, and be seen to do so, without any repercussions of any sort? Does he mean, at a time when street crime is a serious problem in many of our urban communities in this country, that the powers of the police, who strive to protect the public, should be so limited? I look forward to the noble Lord's answer to these points because they are the absolutely central questions involved in the debate today.
Certainly the Government are well aware of the objection that has been voiced in this House today and by many people outside—and many people of considerable good will—that the present law is unfair to the ethnic minorities in this country. Of course, as I emphasised at the beginning of my speech, it is a matter of serious concern to us, and indeed to anybody who wants good, civilised community relations
790
in this country, that this should be so. Certainly for our part we are determined to do all we can to improve relations between the police and the ethnicminorities.
I think it has been helpful in some respects to clear the air by having this debate today. There is significant public concern on this matter, and it is helpful that we have had this debate today. However, I hope that I have made clear the strong arguments which justify the existence of an offence of this kind. I have indicated today the lengthy study which has already been given, and continues to be given, to its re-formulation. I have pointed out that we need to take into account the views of the Law Commission's work in related fields. Once we have that report we shall be in a position to decide the best manner in which we should proceed. I think it would be foolish to try to do it any earlier.
However, I must make it clear that the repeal of the offence, without replacing it by anything else, would not be, so far as we are concerned, an acceptable course. It would in my view damage both the enforcement of the law and indeed the maintenance of good community relations. In the light of what I have said, and in the context of the valuable debate that we have just had and the explanation I have given, and the action which the Government propose to take on this matter, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, will not press ahead with his Bill today. If he does so, I must make it clear that the Government will be unable to support him.
Lord GARDINER: My Lords, before my noble friend sits down, may I ask him whether we are to understand that the Government do genuinely intend to introduce legislation on this subject in this Parliament?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I very much hope so. I tried to point out earlier that we are hoping to receive the report of the Law Commission around Easter of next year. But, as my noble and learned friend will no doubt be aware, there are some honourable gentlemen in another place who are trying to bring the life of the present Parliament to a rapid conclusion.
2.56 p.m.
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for the valuable and comprehensive reply he has given to the debate we have just had, and for the information about the Government's intentions with regard to forthcoming legislation on the Vagrancy Acts. The noble Lord was good enough to ask me some questions at the end of his speech with which I am delighted to deal. I do not wish to detain your Lordships for very long, but these are important questions to which the Minister is entitled to have an answer.
I hope I did not give the impression that all the charges which are now preferred against people for "sus" could be dealt with by other means. What I was saying was that in certain of the instances which are familiar from the examples given in the working party's report, and in some of the other cases that have been quoted, that charges of attempted theft, or going equipped for theft, would have been more appropriate.
May I just take the 11 examples given in Appendix F of the working party's working paper, with which the noble Lord is no doubt familiar. I would say that in the case of No. 4 there was not sufficient evidence there to establish a charge, or to give grounds for arrest. No specific acts were described. No. 5, the man had done nothing wrong. He might have been trespassing, but that was not a criminal act. No. 7, there was not sufficient evidence to support a charge of any kind. No. 8, the same; no specific acts were described. No. 9, there was no series of acts that could have given rise to suspicion. No. 10, was not "sus" either.
The answer is that a great many of offences at present dealt with by means of this charge would disappear from the criminal courts altogether but that the remainder of them, and perhaps it would be a comparatively small minority, would be dealt with by alternative charges. The noble Viscount, Lord Colville, gave three examples at the beginning of his speech. If I may say so, at least one of them could have been dealt with by alternative legislation. The noble Viscount said that the accused had looked round at the back of the shop; he then went round there and ascended some scaffolding and so he was
792
on the walls of the building. He could have been dealt with under the enclosed premises part of Section 4, as is made clear in the discussion on the enclosed premises legislation in the working party's report.
I hope I did not give the impression that the only reason for introducing a Bill of this nature was the effect it has on community relations, important though that aspect of it is. If I may say so, I thought that the Minister was extremely harsh on the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Gifford; 100 per cent. of which I agreed with. If more noble Lords took the trouble to discuss these matters with community relations councils, and with organisations representing the black community, they would be forced to agree that the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, were by no means exaggerated and conveyed very clearly the feelings of the black community on this particular piece of legislation.
We did not rest our case on that, important though it is that the support of the black community should be given to the police in the enforcement of law, and difficult as it is for them to do so as long as they consider that the legislation is being used in this way against them.
I must make it absolutely clear that I am not in any way seeking to undermine the powers of the police to deal with street crime or of the courts to deal with crime in general, and I bitterly resent any allegation that, because we want to alter this law, we wish to undermine the peacekeeping powers of the police or the courts. I thought the noble Baroness, Lady Phillips, came rather close to suggesting that anybody who wished to change or reduce the powers of the police was automatically in favour of law breakers. I notice that the Metropolitan Commissioner in his evidence to the Royal Commission on Criminal Procedure did not even mention "sus", and therefore I cannot believe it is as important as the noble Lord suggested.
Nor did the Minister produce a convincing or statutory explanation as to why the offence is used so extensively in some areas and not in others. He quoted an interesting communication he had received from the Chief Constable of

793
Merseyside, where, as I mentioned, the offence is used almost as extensively as it is in London. It would be interesting to know why this part of Section 4 is not used in some of the other conurbations, for example in Birmingham or Glasgow, where I do not think it is suggested street crime is any less prevalent than it is in London, Liverpool or Manchester; why, for some reason, the police forces in those areas do not find it necessary to apply this legislation.
I do not wish to detain the House, but I must comment on the timetable which the Minister outlined. I realised before I brought the Bill before your Lordships that the Law Commission would be reporting something later this Session, probably in the spring, and I appreciated from what Lord Harris had been good enough to tell me in his letter that the Government had the intention of introducing more comprehensive legislation to reform the law on vagrancy and street offences.
I considered this matter to be of such urgency as to brook no delay, and I felt that, irrespective of what the Law Commission might say in the spring, if in the meantime we were to abolish the offence of "sus" and it was found that in extending the law of attempt there was still some gaps which Parliament felt should be filled, there would be no reason why that
could not be done. It would simply mean that for a short period, a few months at the most, we should be without the offence of "sus" or anything similar to it on the Statute Book. That would then give us a practical opportunity to test on the ground whether the Minister's claims were correct.
If we found that street crime generally did not increase in the interim period, we would then know exactly where we stood when we came to deal with the Government's legislation to reform the Vagrancy Act as a whole and deal with the recommendations of the Law Commission on attempt, In my view, that is the only way to establish the truth as between the two sides in this argument.
We strongly believe that the abolition of "sus" would do nothing to increase street crime; that, on the contrary, by improving co-operation between the black community and the police it would help to reduce crime generally. The Minister takes an opposite view. Let us proceed with the Bill, get it on the Statute Book and see which of the two views is correct.
3.3 p.m.
On Question, Whether the Bill shall be now read 2a?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 32; Not-Contents, 82.

CONTENTS

Airedale, L.

Hylton, L.

Ritchie-Calder, L.

Avebury, L. [Teller.]

Kaldor, L.

Sainsbury, L.

Darling of Hillsborough, L.

Lee of Newton, L.

Shinwell, L.

Evans of Claughton, L.

Lloyd of Kilgerran, L. [Teller.]

Swaythling, L.

Gardiner, L.

Walston, L.

Gifford, L.

Longford, E.

White, B.

Gladwyn, L.

McGregor of Durris, L.

Wigg, L.

Gosford, E.

MacLeod of Fuinary, L.

Wigoder, L.

Hale, L.

McNair, L.

Winstanley, L.

Hampton, L.

Milford, L.

Wootton of Abinger, B.

Houghton of Sowerby, L.

Pitt of Hampstead, L.

Wynne-Jones, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Adeane, L.

Cockfield, L.

Douglas of Barloch, L.

Amory, V.

Cole, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Ampthill, L.

Collison, L.

Effingham, E.

Auckland, L.

Colville of Culross, V.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Balerno, L.

Cork and Orrery, E.

Elton, L.

Belstead, L.

Cottesloe, L.

Evans of Hungershall, L.

Brentford, V.

Craigavon, L.

Faithfull, B.

Brooke of Cumnor, L.

Crathorne, L.

Fortescue, E.

Brooke of Ystradfellte, B.

Cullen of Ashbourne, L.

Fraser of Kilmorack, L.

Carrington, L.

Davies of Leek, L.

Garner, L.

Cathcart, E. [Teller.]

de Clifford, L.

Glenkinglas, L.

Charteris of Amisfield, L.

De Freyne, L.

Greenway, L.

Clancarty, E.

Denham, L.

Gridley, L.

Clitheroe, L.

Derwent, L.

Hanworth, V.

Harmar-Nicholls, L.

Monk Bretton, L.

Segal, L.

Hewlett, L.

Monson, L.

Simon of Glaisdale, L.

Hunt, L.

Morris, L.

Skelmersdale, L.

Hylton-Foster, B.

Morris of Borth-y-Gest, L.

Sligo, M.

Ilchester, E.

Mowbray and Stourton, L.

Somers, L.

Inglewood, L.

Northchurch, B.

Stamp, L.

Jacques, L.

Orr-Ewing, L.

Strathclyde, L.

Kinnaird, L. [Teller.]

Phillips, B.

Strathcona and Mount Royal, L.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Porritt, L.

Lyell, L.

Robbins, L.

Strathspey, L.

Masham of Ilton, B.

Rugby, L.

Teviot, L.

Merrivale, L.

St. John of Bletso, L.

Trenchard, V.

Molson, L.

St. Just, L.

Ward of North Tyneside, B.

Monck, V.

Sandys, L.

On Question, Motion agreed to.

Resolved in the negative, and Motion for Second Reading disagreed to accordingly.

ROYAL ASSENT
3.13 p.m.
The Lord CHANCELLOR (Lord Elwyn-Jones): My Lords, I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that the Queen has signified her Royal Assent to the following Acts:
Consolidated Fund (No. 2) Act,
Cunninghame District Council Order Confirmation Act,
Monklands District Council Order Confirmation Act,
District Council of Renfrew Order Confirmation Act,
British Railways Act.

SAINT LUCIA TERMINATION OF ASSOCIATION ORDER 1978
3.14 p.m.
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS rose to move, That the draft Saint Lucia Termination of Association Order 1978, laid before the House on 5th December, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, the order will be made under Section 10(2) of the West Indies Act 1967. It will terminate the status of association between the United Kingdom and Saint Lucia, and Saint Lucia will then be a fully independent sovereign State. It is proposed that the order should come into effect on 22nd February 1979. The West Indies Act requires that any order made under this section must be laid in
796
draft before Parliament and approved by a Resolution of each House of Parliament. Saint Lucia is the third Associated State to move to complete independence. The House will recall approving the Termination of Association Order for Dominica on 24th July, and Grenada moved to independence in 1974.
The West Indies Act 1967 introduced a totally new status for our dependent territories, that of Associated State. Under this Act, the Government of the territory concerned acquired total autonomy over all its internal affairs, the British Government retaining responsibility for foreign affairs and defence. This new concept seemed appropriate for the needs of the time and corresponded to a situation of very small territories which did not themselves wish to move to full independence. In 1967, it was still our hope that some new form of regional political association would emerge in the wake of the defunct West Indies Federation. For this reason, it was made easier for the Associated States to move to independence in association with other Commonwealth countries in the region than to move to separate independence. However, the West Indies Act made it clear that the relationship was to be entirely voluntary, and prescribed means for achieving separate independence.
Attitudes among people and Governments in the area have now changed. All the Governments concerned recognise that there is no immediate prospect of a basis for close regional integration. Meanwhile, since the passage of the Act territories of similar or even smaller size and resources in other parts of the world have moved to separate independence, and have even been admitted to the United Nations. It is, therefore, entirely understandable that the Governments of the Associated States are

797
beginning to feel that the time has come when they should assume full responsibility for their external affairs and defence, and re-engage in a modern relationship with the United Kingdom.
Saint Lucia is well-qualified to move to independence. The economy is one of the more secure and diversified in the region. The recurrent budget is running substantially in surplus; and it attracts considerable overseas investment. Its outstanding natural beauty makes it a very popular tourist resort. The present Government of Saint Lucia are well aware of the potential for development, and they have an impressive programme for future development which will not disturb the essential character of the island and its people.
There are three main methods by which Associated States can pass to independence under the West Indies Act. Under Section 10(1), each Associated State has the power to terminate association with Britain, either in association with another Caribbean Commonwealth country or on its own. Under Section 10(2) of the Act, the British Government are empowered to terminate association unilaterally. There is, of course, nothing in the Act to stop an Associated State from moving to independence by mutual agreement with the British Government. Although no conditions are laid down for the use of this latter procedure in the Act, both this Government and their predecessor have taken the necessary action only when they felt confident that they were acting in accordance with the wishes of the Government and the people of the territory concerned. It is this procedure which the Saint Lucia House of Assembly, in a resolution dated 24th October, have asked us to follow. We therefore need to consider whether conditions exist in Saint Lucia which would make it right for us to agree to the termination of association.
The first question we have to consider is whether the Saint Lucia Government have a mandate to ask for independence. The present Government, under its Premier, Mr. John Compton, have been in office continuously since 1964. He has always stressed the voluntary nature of the status of association, and has indicated his eventual intention of seeking full independence. At the last General
798
Election in May 1974, his Party's manifesto included an undertaking to seek independence after their return to office, either in association with another Assoicated State or, if it should be in the best interests of the people, on their own. His Party was returned to office with 10 out of 17 seats in the House of Assembly and 51·6 per cent. of the popular vote, as against the 7 seats and 43·4 per cent. of the vote gained by the opposition Saint Lucia Labour Party.
The Saint Lucia Government, therefore, could certainly be said to have a mandate to request independence. However, the Opposition have maintained that Mr. Compton does not have a mandate to seek independence and that there should be an election first, arguing that the people of Saint Lucia should be consulted directly about independence. While not necessarily accepting the Opposition's point of view, the British Government believed that they should take serious account of the attitude of a Party which won a substantial share of the seats in the House of Assembly and of the popular vote at the last election. At talks that my honourable friend in another place (Mr. Rowlands) held with the Saint Lucia Government and Opposition in April 1977, the Premier agreed to publish a consultative Green Paper setting out the advantages his Government saw in independence and, after a due interval for the public discussion of the document in Saint Lucia, it was envisaged that a further meeting would be held in London to review the outcome of the discussion. The Green Paper was published in August 1977, widely circulated, and the public were invited to submit their views to the Select Committee of the House of Assembly. A number of organisations and individuals did so and the report of the Select Committee was approved by the House of Assembly in November 1977.
My honourable friend the Minister of State held a further round of talks in London in March this year with the Government and Opposition, to consider the outcome of the public discussion of independence and the proposed amendments to the constitution. At the talks it was agreed that the process of consultation would be further consolidated and as a part of this that the Government of Saint Lucia should publish for public discussion a draft constitution for an independent

799
Saint Lucia. Subject to the outcome of these processes my honourable friend said that he would be prepared to call a constitutional conference within four months.
My Lords, 12,000 copies of a draft constitution and 14,000 copies of a Layman's Guide were published shortly afterwards and a wide range of organisations and invididuals submitted their comments to the Select Committee, who tabled a further report to the House of Assembly in July. In view of the evidence of a wide measure of support shown for independence and the constructive comments made on the draft constitution, my honourable friend decided to convene a constitutional conference which was held at the end of July at which a constitution was drafted. A large measure of agreement was reached on the constitution at that conference. However, the Opposition continued to maintain that there was insufficient evidence that the people of Saint Lucia wanted independence. They also reserved their position on whether Saint Lucia should be a monarchy as the Government proposed, or a republic and they were unable to agree that there should be a nominated as against an elected Second Chamber. During the debates in the Saint Lucia House of Assembly in October, the Opposition maintained their stand. However, in the votes on the resolution seeking independence and the promulgation of the new constitution they did not formally divide the House.
I think the House will agree that there has been a serious attempt by the Saint Lucia Government to consult the people and promote public discussion of the issue of independence and an independence constitution. The discussion has been intensive since May 1977. The British Government are not aware of any significant opposition to independence. Even the Opposition do not dispute the principle of independence. They have simply argued that the people should be consulted directly, preferably at a general election. The Premier of Saint Lucia does not, however, intend to hold an election before it is due, which is by September 1979. He argues that it would not be possible to hold an election on the independence issue alone since people vote not on single issues but on a whole range of issues at elections. There is also the point that
800
the Saint Lucia Opposition do not oppose the principle of independence. If there were to be an election it is not clear on what basis it would be held and what the situation would be if the Opposition Party won. For example, would this be a vote against independence? In the opinion of the British Government the picture would be even more confused. In any case, the British Government cannot force the Saint Lucia Government to hold an election. This is entirely a matter for the Premier and the Government of Saint Lucia.
We have, therefore, made a decision to recommend the termination of association based on the evidence available to us. We believe that the Saint Lucia Government have a mandate to ask for independence and that they have done all in their power to ascertain the wishes of the people. All the evidence points to the majority of the people of Saint Lucia supporting the Government in their policy.
We also consider that the constitution which has been proposed is a very good one and although there is not complete agreement between the Saint Lucia Government and Opposition on all of its provisions, I am satisfied that it reflects the wishes of the majority of the people of Saint Lucia. I should add that many of the new provisions such as that for the Parliamentary Commissioner, the Electoral Commission and the Constituencies Boundaries Commission have been included at the specific instigation of the Opposition. I should like to pay tribute to the Opposition for the important and constructive role they have played in the formulation of the Constitution. At the same time I must record the British Government's appreciation of the generous attitude of the Saint Lucia Government both at the constitutional conference and in discussions on the draft constitution since the conference. They have been flexible and open-minded and although they were not prepared to accept all the Opposition's proposals, the resulting document is an impressive one, reflecting a wide measure of consensus between the Parties.
Her Majesty's Government have weighed all these matters carefully and they concluded that they should agree to the request of the Saint Lucia Government to recommend that the status of association should be terminated. Association State-

801
hood has served us well but there is now a clear movement among the Associated States towards independence and this is supported by other Commonwealth Governments in the Caribbean. In fact these Governments have urged the British Government to expedite the independence of the Associated States by the use of Section 10(2) of the West Indies Act. They have made it clear to us that they would not understand any attempt to place unreasonable obstacles in the way of the independence of Associated States which are not imposed on dependent territories whose constitutional relationship with Britain is not as advanced as that of the Associated States. Insistence on the use of Section 10(1) which would involve a referendum would be regarded as such an obstacle. We see no reason for further delay in the case of Saint Lucia. I am sure that the House will join me in wishing the Government and people of Saint Lucia well at this important moment in their history and to look forward for continued co-operation between us and them in the future as in the past. I seek the approval of the House for the draft order in council terminating the status of association with Britain. I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft Saint Lucia Termination of Association Order 1978 laid before the House on 5th December, be approved.—(Lord Goronwy-Roberts.)
3.28 p.m.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, it is always a pleasure to welcome an approach to independence of a people in association with this country. The noble Lord, Lord Goronwy-Roberts, has given us a full and illuminating account of the stages by which it has been sought to ensure that the nature of the independence constitution shall be in accord with the general wishes of the population of Saint Lucia. None the less, there are quite a number of substantial points outstanding: the question as to whether there is to be a monarchy or republic; whether the Senate is to be appointed or elected; whether the prerogative of mercy is to be exercised in accordance with or merely following advice from a specialist Committee; and the means by which the Governor General shall be appointed. These are not insubstantial questions and one hopes that they
802
can be resolved to the satisfaction by the Government and the people of Saint Lucia before the operative date of the Instrument, 22nd February next year.
One would, in the normal course of things, suggest that the noble Lord's honourable friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil should make another visit to that charming place and happy people to bring this about. However, the expense of bringing him back for an Election which is perhaps due to occur in the interim might make it more prudent for a delegation to come in the opposite direction. I am sure the Members of Saint Lucia who would form the delegation will regard a few days of English February weather a small price to pay for ultimate independence.
It is a pity that we cannot refer to this as the independence instrument rather than a termination of association instrument which sounds prosaic. It is a pity, too, that we could not have passed this yesterday which I believe I am right in saying was the National Day of Saint Lucia. However, we shall forgive the Government for that because they made such efforts to get the Wales Referendum Order through on St. David's Day.
In wishing the population of Saint Lucia well, one ought to offer them words of advice. In the first instance, I would say that their small population of 114,000 only is not a large one in a predominantly hostile world in large groupings. I hope that not only will they look to us in friendship in the future, such as we have always shown them in the past, but that they will consider the great advantages to be gained from co-operation in larger associations, particularly for small territories scattered in areas of the world which may yet prove to have temptingly wealthy resources hidden below the seas around their coastlines. After all, even if oil is now being developed around the world, there are many forms of mineral extraction which have not yet fallen within the grasp of modern technology. They may find themselves coveted in the future and I trust that they will look not only to us but also to their neighbours for friendly support in these circumstances. It remains only to thank the noble Lord for bringing this instrument to the House and to wish Saint Lucia well when it is finally independent.
3.31 p.m.
Lord McNAIR: My Lords, I too, would like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Goronwy-Roberts, for the very able summary which he has given us of the events leading up to this order. I have done the same research as the previous speaker and I could tell your Lordships how many square miles the island covers, but I suspect that the people of Saint Lucia know these facts much better than we do. One curious fact came to light in my researches and that concerns the earlier inhabitants of these Windward Islands back in the 16th and 17th centuries. The ferocious and indeed voracious Caribs, according to an ancient historian, used to find Frenchmen far more digestible than Spaniards. This gave me, as a lifelong francophile, some food for thought, if I may put it that way.
More relevantly, my Lords, I have no wish to delay the approval of this order or the departure of the few remaining of your Lordships for your Christmas holidays. Therefore there is nothing more to say, except that the Liberals in this country, like everybody else, wish Saint Lucia a very peaceful and prosperous future—eventually, I hope, in voluntary association with some of their island neighbours.
3.33 p.m.
Lord WALSTON: My Lords, may I add my own good wishes to those which have already been expressed. I am perhaps more closely associated with Saint Lucia than any other Member of your Lordships' House. In fact, when I first came here it was suggested to me by some leading politicians at the time that I might take as my designation the name of their island. I thought there might be a certain amount of arrogance in doing so, and I did not do it. But for all that, I have a very great affection for the island and a good many years of experience of it.
When I was first thinking of expanding my farming operations to the Caribbean, I considered many different islands and I took the advice of a very experienced senior official of one of the banks who knew the Eastern Caribbean very well. When I mentioned Saint Lucia to him, he said: "Ah yes, that is a most beautiful island. Scenically it is the loveliest of them all; culturally it is the most fertile
804
of them all, and touristically it is completely unspoiled". He then looked me straight in the eye and said: "But you would not like it at all". I said: "Why not?" He said: "The trouble of it is that the population is 95 per cent. Roman Catholic, and it is run by a set of damned Socialist politicians".
My Lords, that did not seem to me any disincentive at all and I have never regretted my association with it. As my noble friend has said, it is a very beautiful island and, more than that, it is an island inhabited by some very fine people indeed. It has a political system which I think is the envy of all the other islands of the Eastern Caribbean. It has a most responsible Government and a most responsible Opposition. I am certain that its future is a bright one. I am delighted that it is now about to receive what, in fact, is its own complete independence—if I may say so, somewhat overdue independence. I hope that it will remain an important and valuable member of the Commonwealth. I am sure that its association with this country will always be close and valuable, and I join in the wishes which have already been expressed for a very happy future to all its inhabitants.
3.36 p.m.
Lord AUCKLAND: My Lords, anybody who has had the pleasure and privilege of visiting Saint Lucia, as I did six years ago on a business visit, will always remember this island as the epitome of friendliness and beautiful scenery, and as a place in which to relax, although not such an easy place in which to do a job of work, for the purpose of my visit was to look at the Rodney Bay scheme.
There are a number of people on the island to whom tribute should be paid at this stage. The honourable John Compton, the Prime Minister, whom I had the privilege of meeting over there, is one. As other noble Lords have said, he has done an extremely fine job on the island. I should also like to pay tribute to the honourable Nicholas Taylor, who some years ago was the High Commissioner for Saint Lucia over here, and who, since I visited the island, has been a very firm friend of mine.
I echo one or two of the reservations which have been mentioned. Of course,

805
the island of Dominica, which received its independence a few weeks ago has, as I understand it, half the population of Saint Lucia, and rather less in the way of mineral resources, and of that very important aspect, tourism. After the unfortunate experiences which Saint Lucia recently had with an air line that had its problems, the island is now recovering, and is getting back to being a very good, inexpensive and delightful tourist area.
As I understand it, the Queen will have sovereignty over the island, subject to ratification by the other Commonwealth countries. This, I believe, is eminently desirable. I hope, too, that we in this country will continue to trade with Saint Lucia. I am thinking particularly of the banana trade between the port of Barry and that very fine harbour at Castries. One hopes that that will continue, and that whatever form of association is eventually agreed, as apparently an election is not to take place, the harmonisation between this country and that lovely island will not only be continued, as it goes on its way to independence, for which we all send it every good fortune, but will be very heavily cemented.
3.40 p.m.
Lord SEGAL: My Lords, may I from these Government Benches also express my own congratulations to the island of Saint Lucia on attaining its independence, and join in extending to its Government and all its inhabitants our good wishes for a happy and prosperous future.
Everyone who, like myself, has had the good fortune to visit this beautiful island, both in an official capacity as the leader of a Parliamentary delegation and in a private capacity while holidaying in the Caribbean, can have only feelings of admiration and affection for the good people of Saint Lucia. It is an island which always makes a warm appeal to the visitor, and fortunately its many scenic charms, its wonderful beaches and its excellent hotels have enabled countless thousands to visit its shores, whether on cruising Cunardars, on banana freighters, or by direct flights to the island, especially from Britain and Canada.
With so much talk of independence now floating over the Caribbean, I feel that Saint Lucia—if, indeed, any order of priorities can be claimed for independence
806
—ought to have staked its claim long ago, certainly as early as any other island whose claim for independence is still in the pipeline. For Saint Lucia has enjoyed a progressive Government, and wise and steady leadership under the premiership of John Compton—as several Members of your Lordships' House have already mentioned, he is one of the great figures of the Caribbean area—that have evoked the admiration of all who are concerned with the future of the West Indies, and the envy of many of its less fortunate neighbours.
My interest in Saint Lucia was first aroused as long ago as 1943 when I was staying on the Island of Mauritius with Edward Twining, as he then was—later to become a Member of your Lordships' House—and one of the great patrician figures of Britain's old colonial empire, as Governor of Borneo and later as Governor of Tanganyika. I recall his delight on hearing the news of being promoted from Labour Adviser to the Government of Mauritius to become Administrator of Saint Lucia. Since those days, Britain has maintained the warmest political and economic ties with the island and, on the whole, has deserved well of its inhabitants. Especially since Saint Lucia was granted associate status in 1967, these links have been steadily forged and strengthened.
Now in full maturity, Saint Lucia has more than justified its right to independence. It celebrates its freedom not so much in a mood of euphoria (although that is abundantly merited) but in a steady, sober evaluation of the problems that still lie ahead. For independence, newly won, can be a heady wine for the uninitiated. In parts of Africa it has meant heavier burdens, heavier responsibilities and harder work than ever before. But Saint Lucia enters on its independence with many advantages. It is progressive and outward looking. It has an industrious population. It is comparatively free from the eroding influences of corruption. It has already established a tradition of integrity and good government. It can easily become a leader in that part of the world, with the ultimate vision of a Confederation of the Caribbean Islands working towards mutual consultation and mutual assistance. I believe that independence can be a great step forward towards that goal.

807
Meanwhile, we in Britain must not opt out of our responsibilities towards Saint Lucia. I hope that aid, both technological and financial, will be given to Saint Lucia in the future even more generously than in the past so that we can launch the island safely and happily towards its destiny. But there is one special plea that I would make to the island today. On our visits to Saint Lucia, we were enormously impressed by its up-and-coming young men. We found many of them full of vision, idealism and enthusiasm. I hope that they will be given every opportunity to share in the responsibilities of self-government, so that they can feel not confined and frustrated, casting longing glances overseas, but that they will be enabled to assume the mantle of government in due course, when their time will come. It is sad to reflect on how many of the most gifted young men of the Caribbean leave their shores to seek their future in colder climes. We hope that independence may give them wider opportunities towards a fuller and more creative life and better prospects of self-fulfilment.
Having said all that, I should like to reiterate all our good wishes to Saint Lucia on achieving full independence. We shall watch its progress with the liveliest interest and with a glowing sense of pride. I also hope that we shall do our utmost to ensure for it a propitious future.
3.46 p.m.
Lord PITT of HAMPSTEAD: My Lords, I wish to join in welcoming this order and in wishing Saint Lucia the very best now that it has terminated its association with this country. In answer to the noble Lord opposite, I would say that the point about termination of association rather than independence is that of course these territories were virtually independent before. They all had internal self-government. What is more, it was always hoped that the vast majority of them would cease association with Britain and would become associated with one of the larger West Indian islands. Unfortunately, these are dreams which do not always come true, and now it is generally accepted that in the Caribbean the territories will all have to become independent and then subsequently try to build something. They have been trying
808
in the economic field. There is "Carecon", and one hopes that it will blossom forth later on into something in the political field.
In welcoming Saint Lucia's acceptance of its responsibility for external affairs and defence (because that is all it is) I am very pleased for Saint Lucia because in John Compton we are welcoming one of the most reasonable-minded of Caribbean leaders. Therefore we may hope that, now that Saint Lucia can speak for itself when it deals with the other territories, it will give a real push towards integration. I know that it has already started because in fact Saint Lucia, St. Vincent, Antigua and St. Kitts and Nevis, when they reach that stage, have already agreed to a large number of common services and joint posts after independence. What is more, Barbados has indicated that it would join in supporting them and in sharing many of the services with them. So there is already a move on a smaller scale in that direction, and in fact the independence of Saint Lucia gives it just that impetus that is required.
I am grateful to the noble Lord the Minister for dealing with the two very serious points about which the Caribbean leaders have always been worried: the question of forcing any of the territories to go to independence through a referendum. I shall not dilate on that, but I am glad that the point was made because it would be a grave mistake for this country to force any Caribbean territory to go to independence through a referendum. Let us remember that these territories are already independent; what exists is only an association with Britain. Britain is merely responsible for their external affairs and defence. If we are in fact to ask the man in the street to vote in a referendum as to whether Britain should continue to represent him, or that he will represent himself, I hope it will be realised what type of campaign would have to be waged. I am glad the Government understand that and do not run that risk; and I am very grateful to the Minister for making the point to the House so that Members in fact recognise it too.
I am also very glad that the Government have avoided allowing themselves to be drawn into the internal politics of any of these territories. There is not much

809
doubt about what has been going on in Saint Lucia; the Opposition think they may win the next Election and they want independence to be granted under them, and therefore they are playing "keep it going for as long as possible until it is our turn". I am very glad the Government did not allow them to land the island in that kind of nonsense—because it would have been nonsense. I noticed that the petition which the Opposition tried to sponsor against independence got 1,090 votes. I have just come from an island, which has half the population of Saint Lucia, and they managed to get 13,000 votes on a petition to stop two men from being hanged. So if somebody says that having got 1,100 or 1,200 or 1,500 or 2,000 votes out of a population of 114,000 he is showing that there is some opposition to something that is taking place, if there was that opposition he would get a lot more votes than that and many more signatures on a petition.
My Lords, it is important to the Caribbean—and I am glad the Minister made the point—that all these territories move briskly to independence, because it is only after they are all able to talk as equals that they will be able to do something for the area. While I am on my feet I want to throw out a suggestion which the Minister might wish to bear in mind. I think the time has come when Britain, the United States, Canada and Trinidad should jointly work on a sort of Marshall Plan for that area. Those are the three outside countries and the one internal country that can afford to do it. I am sure Barbados would play its part in that; the Barbados contribution will, of course, be mainly in the field of technical support. It is one of the areas with the highest literacy, and therefore it can make a good contribution in that respect. But in terms of finance it is Trinidad that will have to make the financial contribution. If those metropolitan countries, Britain, the United States and Canada, in cooperation with Trinidad, could work out a form of Marshall Plan for developing the area, that would be a great step forward. But, as I said earlier, the first step is independence, and we must welcome today the order that will move Saint Lucia along that road.
3.53 p.m.
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, this has been an agreeable debate,
810
and I am particularly grateful to the official spokesmen for the Conservative and Liberal Parties for their contributions. The noble Lord, Lord Elton, mentioned certain outstanding matters. I am very glad to assure him that we have no reason to think that such outstanding matters, many of them matters of minor and drafting importance, will not be disposed of satisfactorily before February. He also mentioned the procedure of the Prerogative of Mercy Committee. This will be exercised by the Governor-General on advice of the appropriate Saint Lucia Minister, and there is no dispute on this matter since the House of Assembly amended the Section of the Constitution in accordance with the wish of the Opposition.
As to the hope he expressed, on behalf of us all, that in due course there should be the right sort of regional co-operation, we believe that moves towards regional co-operation will gather momentum as the associated States move to independence. Other Governments in the area, including Barbados, have been considering ways of sharing common services, such as defence, coastguards service and the like. We hope that this trend will continue. This was very powerfully reinforced by what my noble friend Lord Pitt said on this question of looking forward to co-operation, and, who knows, possibly integration, certainly on a service basis, possibly on a broader political basis. It is for the peoples of the Caribbean to decide among themselves at what pace and in what manner to achieve the closer relationship.
The noble Lord, Lord McNair, made an informed and graceful speech welcoming the new Member of the Commonwealth, if I may slightly anticipate the event. I think that that was echoed by other noble Lords who took part and I join with them. The Commonwealth is a unique organisation. There has not been, there is not and I doubt whether there will ever be, an association of free and independent peoples of varying sizes, natures, colours, creeds and languages, who come together in this way under one head—the Commonwealth. Whether as members they have opted for a Monarchical system or for a Republican system, they all agree that the Queen shall be the head of the Commonwealth. If there is one argument for the Commonwealth in this turbulent world of disorganisation it is that this organisation

811
works. I have yet to see an aspiring so-called dependent territory coming to independence which has not of itself said: "How do we become a Member of the Commonwealth?". It gives me deep delight as a Minister to assist in the implementation of this freely expressed choice.
The noble Lord, Lord Walston, reminded me a moment ago that he almost included Saint Lucia in his title. I wish that he had done so. His speech would then have been even more memorable. He referred to the beauty of the island. I have not had the privilege of visiting Saint Lucia but I am told by everyone who has been there that it is a breathless beauty. He also reminded us of the quality of its people—a very fine people. That was echoed by my noble friend Lord Segal who referred to the number of young men and, one presumes, young women in the island—because where there are young men or young women they are usually both together. There is a beauty of attitude of the people of these islands which the modern would outside these islands would do well to emulate. I echo what he has said about the development programme which we shall promote and sustain. There are encouraging figures—which I may make available in the normal way in the Official Report—which we shall also promote and sustain. I hope that these developments project will help those young people to achieve in their own country work and sustenance which too many of them now, for various reasons, seek outside their own country.
The noble Lord, Lord Auckland, expressed the general feeling that there may be difficulties facing a small country. However, I think that he and I would agree that Saint Lucia is perhaps more than marginally better placed to look to the future than some of its neighbours. Indeed, he mentioned one of two. He agrees that the form of government is a matter for Saint Lucia's Government and people. It is clear that they have chosen a monarchical system, but even if they had not done so, as I said earlier, then their claim and title to membership of the Commonwealth would be in no way impaired.
I close on a note sounded by my noble friend Lord Pitt of Hampstead who has perhaps very special qualifications for
812
speaking on these occasions and whose recent contributions to our better understanding and the better development of affairs in this part of the world we all admire so much. He said that the time had come for a number of countries—and he named them—to consider whether they should be special friends of the area. I do not want to prejudge even as attractive a proposition as he made. I should like to speak for a moment not as a Minister but as a friend of the area, and certainly as a friend of my noble friend. I was very glad that he reminded us of the rather special relationships which Canada has with the Caribbean. This is not always known or appreciated. I know how proud our cousins in Canada are of the long tradition of service to the Caribbean, or better still the long tradition of co-operation with the people and the countries of the Caribbean. Therefore, it is on a very hopeful note that I repeat the Motion which I made at the beginning of my remarks. I beg to move.

SHOPS (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1978
4.1 p.m.
The MINISTER of STATE, NORTHERN IRELAND OFFICE (Lord Melchett)The MINISTER of STATE, NORTHERN IRELAND OFFICE (Lord Melchett) rose to move, That the draft Shops (Northern Ireland) Order 1978, laid before the House on 22nd November, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, this order will provide for six-day trading in Northern Ireland by amending the Shops Act (Northern Ireland) 1946, so that district councils can exempt traders from the requirement that on one week day in each week they should close not later than one o'clock in the afternoon. The order will allow a district council to exempt all shops in its area or a specified part of its area, or shops of a specified class.
The order will bring the law of Northern Ireland into line with the law of the rest of the United Kingdom. This change has been asked for by the large Belfast city centre stores which see six-day trading as essential for the economic and social development of Belfast. The Government share this view and have no doubt that the order will make a very

813
worthwhile contribution towards revitalising the commercial life of the city. The change will also be welcomed in many other areas of Northern Ireland where the existing law is regarded as being unnecessarily restrictive. I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft Shops (Northern Ireland) Order 1978, laid before the House on 22nd November, be approved.—(Lord Melchett.)
4.2 p.m.
Lord SIMON of GLAISDALE: My Lords, before your Lordships agree to this Motion, I wonder whether I may say a few brief words not only on the merits of the order, which I welcome, but also to express some misgivings at the way in which Northern Irish business is handled here. At the moment the legislature in Stormont is suspended. That means the Parliament at Westminster has a heavy responsibility to consider very carefully and punctiliously the legislation that affects the people of Northern Ireland; indeed, I would say it should be done with the same fullness of consideration as would be given by the Stormont Parliament.
Today's business cannot be considered without also considering the background. In the last Session your Lordships were much concerned with the devolution legislation, and it came to be the accepted practice for your Lordships to adjourn for one hour during the evening for supper. During that time Northern Irish business was put down for discussion. That meant that it was discussed in an empty Chamber, and perfunctorily, and was often cut short. I was particularly concerned about something that happened on 20th July this year. I shall not go into the details, but there was laid before your Lordships' House a measure, the momentousness of which could hardly be exaggerated, nor, indeed, could its controversial nature. It was a matrimonial causes measure.
As a former President of the Divorce Court in this country, I felt it my duty to comment on the measure. I wrote to the Minister to say so, and indeed to the Whips. Nevertheless, that measure was put down for discussion with five other measures. Two of them were appropriation measures which opened to the field of debate the whole scope of Government
814
in Northern Ireland, and indeed we had important and instructive contributions from two noble Lords who were particularly concerned.
The result was that the matrimonial causes order came on for discussion only 13 minutes before the close of the dinner hour, and, by the time the Front Bench speeches had been made, only four minutes remained. Naturally, at that time noble Lords concerned with the devolution legislation were returning and were anxious to get on with the business. That was a particularly striking example, and, indeed, two further measures remained for discussion after the matrimonial causes measure.
In this Session a different practice seems to have arisen; it is to put the Northern Irish orders down for discussion on a Thursday evening, which is, I apprehend, not a convenient time for many of your Lordships to attend. I noticed that on 23rd November there were two orders put down for discussion. I imagine that the noble Lord will not minimise the importance of these measures. The first, concerned with health and social security, came on for discussion at 4.45 p.m. and concluded four minutes later. The second one came on at 4.49 p.m. and concluded two minutes later. Your Lordships will have no difficulty in measuring the discussion that was available on those important measures. The second was again a controversial measure on the rehabilitation of offenders, which your Lordships' House had found very difficult when the English legislation was discussed. That is the way it was handled Parliamentarily, in spite of the responsibility which, I venture to suggest, rests on us at Westminster in handling Northern Irish Parliamentary affairs.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I do not wish to delay the noble and learned Lord, but I was hoping he was going to make clear that the Rehabilitation of Offenders Order, to which he has just referred as being passed by your Lordships' House in a brief space of time, was almost identical to an order which your Lordships' House had passed in the previous Session, and I dare say that that goes some way to explain the length of time your Lordships thought fit to spend discussing it the second time it came here.
Lord SIMON of GLAISDALE: My Lords, that is absolutely true so far as the second measure is concerned, with one important difference, and that was that the other place had disagreed with your Lordships' House as to whether one should proceed by Affirmative or by Negative Resolution. I do not imagine the noble Lord will minimise the constitutional importance of that alteration.
Today, again, three orders are put down. This is only the first. There is an appropriation measure and an emergency powers measure. That is all I have to say about the handling of the Northern Irish business. Your Lordships may think that, to put it mildly, the way that it has been dealt with is, if I have represented the matter accurately, at the very least open to misconstruction in Northern Ireland.
As for the measure itself, I welcome it unreservedly. It is over 20 years since I was a Home Office Minister, but I can remember being impressed at the time by the way the shop hours legislation inhibited the small independent shopkeeper from offering a service to the public which could not be vouchsafed by the departmental and chain stores. I hope that this, like the English and Scottish legislation, represents a trend towards greater freedom in trading.
4.11 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord for his welcome to the order we are discussing. I must tell him, with respect, that he has not represented the picture accurately so far as the discussion of Northern Ireland legislation generally is concerned.
Lord SIMON of GLAISDALE: If the noble Lord intends to say that, my Lords, I hope he will make good his contention.
Lord MELCHETT: Certainly, my Lords, and I was intending to do that. The noble and learned Lord suggested there had been occasions when the discussion of Northern Ireland orders had been cut short; indeed, he used that phrase. So far as I am aware, during the time I have been responsible in your Lordships' House from this Bench for bringing
816
forward Northern Ireland orders, that has not been the case. Even when orders are put on during the dinner hour, as they were in the last Session, it is entirely a matter for the House to decide how long the discussion should go on and when it should be curtailed. It may be called the dinner hour, but the discussion which starts during that period may go on for as long as the House wishes, and if any discussion is brought to an end, it is brought to an end by the House and not by the Government or the Minister either in bringing forward an order at a particular time or in attempting, in the noble and learned Lord's words, to cut short the debate.
The noble and learned Lord and I have corresponded about his feelings on the debates on the Matrimonial Causes Order. I would only tell him that it is now in effect and has been widely welcomed in Northern Ireland. As for the two orders which the noble and learned Lord mentioned were debated on 23rd November, and indeed the Northern Ireland business today, I suggest that 4.15 p.m. in the afternoon, when we are discussing orders today, or 4.45 p.m., when we discussed orders on 23rd November, cannot really be described as bringing Northern Ireland orders forward late in the evening, again a phrase he used. There was as much time then, and there is this afternoon, available for discussion as the House wishes to use. There is no question of the discussion being cut short. I may do my best to facilitate your Lordships' House by introducing orders as briefly as I think is reasonable, but I am happy at any stage to answer any questions noble Lords may wish to raise on any orders I introduce.
As I attempted to explain in my intervention in the noble and learned Lord's remarks, I thought the discussion we had on the Rehabilitation of Offenders Order when it came before your Lordships' House for the second time covered the point which the noble and learned Lord made—indeed, the point I mentioned in my remarks—and which had been raised in another place, and of course all the orders we are discussing today and those we discussed on 23rd November had already been fully discussed in and passed by another place when we came to discuss them.

817
As has always been my practice with noble Lords who show an interest in Northern Ireland legislation, of whom there are some in this House, I am always willing and happy to discuss the orders in advance and to arrange for them to be brought at a time which is convenient for anybody who wishes to come here to discuss them. That has always been the Government's practice and will continue to be so.

APPROPRIATION (No. 4) (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1978
4.14 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT Lord MELCHETT rose to move, That the draft Appropriation (No. 4) (Northern Ireland) Order 1978, laid before the House on 28th November, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, the order authorises the issue out of the Northern Ireland Consolidated Fund of the financial requirements of Northern Ireland Departments as set out in the Autumn Supplementary Estimates. The order will provide a sum of £129 million, and will bring the total Estimates provision to date for 1978/79 to £1,461 million, an increase of £143 million over the total for 1977/78. The first Schedule to the order contains details of the services for which extra provision is needed, and further information is contained in the Autumn Supplementary Estimates volume which is available in the Library.
The largest amount in the order is for industrial support, where £43 million will be used mainly to help new companies and support existing firms. Of the £21 million needed for the Department of Education, almost half will go to meet the cost of the April 1978 pay award to teachers. Expenditure by the Health and Social Services Boards has increased, and an additional £14 million is needed for pay increases and for additional services. An increase of £12 million is needed to meet the cost of higher social security benefit rates, and a further £11 million for the funding of schemes administered by the Department of Manpower Services. £11 million is being sought for the Northern Ireland milk industry. I have tried very briefly to summarise the most
818
significant sums covered by the order, but I will, of course, do my best to answer any questions noble Lords may have. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft Appropriation (No. 4) (Northern Ireland) Order 1978, laid before the House on 28th November, be approved.—(Lord Melchett.)
Lord SIMON of GLAISDALE: My Lords, I have a question to ask only about the second Schedule which deals with the repeal of provisions which are alleged to be spent. The normal way that your Lordships' House—indeed Parliament—deals with provisions which are thought to be spent is to include them in a Statute Law Repeals Bill which is sent then to the Joint Select Committee on Consolidation Bills, which examines the matter carefully. This is not mere formality. I remember on one occasion that that committee found a whole group of financial provisions which were not really spent at all, and indeed the Bill was withdrawn. When it was reintroduced in the next Session those financial provisions were not included in the Schedule. I presume from the fact that these provisions are in Schedule 2 that they have not been included in this Session's Statute Law Repeals Bill. Perhaps the noble Lord will confirm that. Perhaps he will also tell your Lordships why they are dealt with in this way, instead of in the way that, so far as I know, has obtained for very many years; namely, sending them to the Joint Consolidation Committee. That committee deals not only with Acts of Parliament, but also with measures and orders.
4.18 p.m.
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, no doubt the noble Lord speaking for the Government will reply in a few moments to the question of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale. I believe that a similar point was raised in another place when the order came before that House. The order clearly is necessary for the economy of Northern Ireland and I, too, have some questions that I wish to raise arising from the order.
Class II includes sums to be granted for industrial assistance; the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, mentioned £43 million in this respect. Also under Class II

819
we find a grant being sought for employment services. I wish to take the opportunity to ask the Government for the latest unemployment figures for Northern Ireland, together with the number of new jobs filled in the public and private sectors separately for that period of this year for which they are available.
I recognise that much has been done during this year to attract more industry to Northern Ireland, but if the noble Lord could also give the figure for additional jobs provided by the Job Creation Programme—I ask for that statistic as well, it if is possible—then I expect that the overall picture will continue to show great reliance being placed still upon the public sector and upon job creation in order to prevent unemployment rising. On 18th October, in the Belfast Telegraph, the chairman of the Economic Council in Northern Ireland, Sir Charles Carter, was reported as saying that Northern Ireland must be very close to the ceiling in investment grants; and he went on to identify the danger that Government can spend money for excellent purposes which, however, do not directly affect the Province's economic success. The ever present problem, I conclude, is how to transfer at least some employment from some traditional industries in Northern Ireland to new industries, and how those industries can be encouraged to flourish and, in time, to expand.
My Lords, if I may turn to a different topic, when this order was debated recently in another place almost all the speeches which were made referred to the continuing high costs of energy in Northern Ireland. A sum for that is also to be appropriated within Class II. Without repeating the views which were put forward in another place, suffice it to say that although in 1977, following the Shepherd Report, the Government provided massive economic aid for the Northern Ireland Electricity Service, none the less electricity is more expensive in Northern Ireland for the private consumer than it is in the rest of the United Kingdom; gas is the most expensive form of energy of all in the Province; and solid fuel suffers from the high transport costs.
In September of this year the Economic Council made a number of suggestions for energy policy. Among them were the possibility of some form of integration,
820
possibly, between the Northern Ireland Electricity Service and the Central Electricity Generating Board in Great Britain; and the possibility of electricity links with the Republic being re-established. Of course, they were originally established when my noble friend Lord O'Neill of the Maine met Mr. Lemass back in the 1960s. I think that was when the electricity link was established, although since, of course, it has suffered from terrorist damage and the link is no longer there. The Economic Council also raised the possibility of a natural gas pipeline to be laid from Great Britain. I am now asking which of these or any other options appear the most practical to the Government; because unless further thought and action can be brought to bear on this very difficult problem, high energy costs will remain a burden to people in Northern Ireland and could again become a considerable burden to industry and to commerce.
Finally, money for education is to be granted under Class VIII of this order, with, as the noble Lord mentioned, a considerable sum to be allocated for school building. I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, with his responsibility for education in Northern Ireland, has this year set up working parties on education to allow public discussion to come through to ministerial level from people who are involved or interested in the service. I hope that when the noble Lord receives recommendations from these working parties he will keep an open mind to any suggestions that comprehensive schools, when or as they are established in Northern Ireland, can develop their own particular specialities. I must say that I believe that in a few years' time people will look with astonishment at the rigidity of the 1976 Education Act, which prevents parents in England and Wales from choosing a school on any ground of ability or aptitude. In Northern Ireland there are large country areas where the size of any reorganised schools really would make it extremely difficult for every subject to be provided together with the best opportunities for the most able and for remedial teaching.
What I am saying is that I believe that to allow some parents some choice, on grounds of ability and aptitude, between one reorganised school and another is the way in which secondary education is going

821
to develop in the foreseeable future. But the question on education which I should like to ask (and I apologise to the noble Lord for not being able to give him notice of it) is this: How are the quotas decided which the noble Lord set last year and which, under what is known as the revised transfer procedure, the noble Lord is, I understand, setting again this year for secondary schools in Northern Ireland? The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, will be aware that the Secretary of State for Education and Science has an Education Bill which had its Second Reading in another place last week. That Bill, which deals only with England and Wales, proposes to set what are known as "planned admission limits" from year to year for schools in England and Wales.
Of course, on this side of the House we accept that the fall in the school population which is already beginning to happen must enable local education authorities to reduce maximum sizes of both schools and classes. It would be intolerable if this were not so. But if planned admissions and the noble Lords' quotas are going to follow the fall in the school population inexorably year by year, thereby removing from parents any increased opportunity which reduction in school numbers might provide for more freedom of choice, that process, I think, would take away from parents the opportunity to have as much choice as is reasonably practicable. If the Government policy of planned admission limits (or, in Northern Ireland, of quotas) is going to be as rigid as that, then I must warn the noble Lord that on this side we would oppose such a policy. With those few questions, I shall certainly support the passage of the order.
Lord HYLTON: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Belstead mentioned energy policy in Northern Ireland. I understand that exploration for coal reserves is being planned. I wonder whether the noble Lord is able yet to report any progress on that front.
4.27 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, again I am grateful to those noble Lords who have spoken of their support for the order. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, asked about the appeals which are listed in Schedule 2 of the order. The orders to be repealed are
822
those made either under the 1974 Constitution Act or as a measure of the Northern Ireland Assembly. As such, I am advised that they fall to be repealed by an order under the 1974 Act and not by a Bill which will appear as part of the United Kingdom Statute Book. They are, in other words, part of the separate Northern Ireland——
Lord SIMON of GLAISDALE: My Lords, the Joint Select Committee have repeatedly dealt with Northern Irish legislation in Statute Law Repeals Bills. It is two years since I left the Committee but my recollection is fairly firm on the point.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I would not pretend to be an expert in this field. I should prefer to take advice and write to the noble and learned Lord. As I understand it, those measures which are part of the Northern Ireland Statute Book, the separate book for Northern Ireland, do not go through the same Joint Consolidation Committee procedure as those which are part of the United Kingdom Statute Book. Some legislation which covers Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom Statute Book so that some of it would go to the Committee to which the noble and learned Lord referred. But if I may, rather than get it wrong, I should prefer to take expert advice and write to the noble and learned Lord either con firming what I have said or correcting the impression I have given.
Lord SIMON of GLAISDALE: My Lords, I am much obliged.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, turning to the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, he, first, asked about statistics on employment. I am glad to say that although the position is still extremely grim by comparison with Great Britain there has been some slight improvement. The number of persons registered as unemployed in Northern Ireland on 9th November was 57,040, not counting school leavers. There were 4,177 unemployed school-leavers, a decrease of 1,431 on the previous month. That gives a total of 61,217 unemployed which is about 11·2 per cent. of employees in Northern Ireland.
I do not have with me the figures on the effect of job creation measures although

823
the noble Lord may be interested to know that the slight fall in unemployment is accounted for by a growth in the service sector, where there has been a long-term growth in employment. In other sectors, particularly manufacturing and construction, there has continued to be a fall in employment. I shall get the particular figures that the noble Lord asked about and write to him.
Noble Lords also asked about the energy policy. It is too soon to say anything about explorations for coal. These explorations have only just been announced and are not even at an early stage as yet but are simply something which will be going ahead. On energy policy generally, as the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, will know, an urgent review is now taking place within Government. This is an extremely complicated field for Northern Ireland, where the problem is not only the very high cost of the existing sources of energy, but where there is also, if anything, a substantial over-supply of energy. Whatever policy is decided upon, it is going to have some ill-effects, not only as regards existing supplies but also in substantial costs to the United Kingdom economy. So the Government have been looking at this very complicated field for some time. However, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State has set up an urgent review. That is expected to report in the new year and he has said he will make the results of that known as soon as possible in the new year. I do not think there is anything very informative that I can say in advance of that review being received.
The noble Lord, Lord Belstead, also asked about education. First of all, the noble Lord touched on three working parties currently sitting to look at different aspects of education in Northern Ireland. One, under Professor Astin, is looking at school management. That is separate from the issue of secondary reorganisation. It has taken as a background the Taylor Report, which covered England and Wales. The Astin Committee in Northern Ireland goes considerably wider and covers both voluntary and controlled schools, primary and secondary. That committee is sitting and is expected to report some time next year. It is a small committee and obviously its report will be subject to the widest possible consultation
824
before the Government comes to any view about the recommendations that should be made.
The other two committees which arsitting under the chairmanship of Dr Dickson and Dr. Benn are looking at particular aspects of the planning for secondary reorganisation. They therefore have as their brief the Government's decision to eliminate selection at 11-plus in Northern Ireland. They are looking at particular aspects of the financing of voluntary schools and other matters. Dr. Dickson's committee is looking into questions such as the salary of teachers, the position of teachers in a reorganised structure and the position of preparatory departments, boarding schools and a host of other matters which are pertinent.
Again, both committees are expected to report next year. Maybe some recommendations from Dr. Dickson's committee will be available early next year. Those will be subject to widespread consultation, and both those committees are made up of people nominated by various organisations in Northern Ireland concerned with education.
On quotas, there is some link with this and what I have been saying about committees. The interim transfer procedure which has taken the place of the 11-plus in Northern Ireland and which is still a selective system, was actually recommended by an independent committee which, again, was made up of individuals nominated by all the main interests in education in Northern Ireland, including the grammar schools, teachers' unions, and so on. That working party recommended this new alternative transfer arrangement which has been used. The key point in the working party's recommendations, which was made with only one dissenting voice—from a member of a teachers' union—was that there should be a quota system set covering secondary schools in Northern Ireland; that this should be done with the agreement of grammar schools; and that the quotas should be set on the basis that the secondary, intermediate and grammar schools should continue under the arrangements to get the same proportion of pupils as they had under the previous 11-plus arrangements, where that proportion had in effect been guaranteed and where it could not be guaranteed under the new alternative transfer arrangements.

825
This was recommended by a working party representing all sectors of education. The recommendation was made on the basis that this would be agreed by the grammar schools which, as I have said, were represented on the working party that made the recommendation. It was accepted by all concerned that this was the best way forward. The quotas have subsequently come under some criticism. A valid criticism is that last year we did not get them quite right. Rather a higher proportion of pupils went to grammar schools last year than would have been the case under the previous system. That is where they went wrong last year, simply because we did not have the experience of running this scheme before. We hope to learn from that experience and to get the quotas right on the basis recommended by the working party for the coming school year.
I certainly accept what the noble Lord says, if one looks ahead: that this should not be a completely rigid operation. Of course, it is not intended to be. The transfer arrangement is in fact called the "interim transfer arrangement" and at the moment is only guaranteed to operate for next year. We are currently consulting with everybody to see what might follow it and whether it might be an adaptation of this. In the reasonably near future we hope there will be a completely nonselective system and the transfer arrangements will be quite different from those which are needed where there are selective secondary schools.
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, may I ask this: prompted by what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon, was saying about the seriousness of Northern Ireland legislation, would I be right in thinking, when the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, says there will be a completely non-selective system of secondary education in Northern Ireland, that this will be the subject of legislation?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, this is one of the points which one of the working parties has a particular remit to look at, so I would not want to pre-empt their report, as I think the noble Lord has already asked me not to do, by expressing an opinion on whether legislation will definitely be needed. I think it is an open secret that some legislative changes will
826
be necessary, but this is something that Doctor Dickson's working party will be looking at particularly and, hopefully, it will be reporting on it in the coming year.

NORTHERN IRELAND (EMERGENCY PROVISIONS) ACT 1978 (CONTINUANCE) (No. 2) ORDER 1978
4.37 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT Lord MELCHETT rose to move, That the draft Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1978 (Continuance) (No. 2) Order 1978, laid before the House on 28th November, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, the decision by the Government to recommend the renewal of powers provided by the Emergency Provisions Act for a further six months was not taken lightly. The Government have very carefully considered the balance between maintaining progress towards a normal life in Northern Ireland, and the police and Army's need for additional powers. The Government have no wish to see the emergency powers retained for any longer than is strictly necessary. The time will come when the Government will be able to recommend that certain provisions should be allowed to lapse as being no longer essential. We hope that this will not be too far off, since it can only happen because the improvements in Northern Ireland have continued. As my right honourable friend the Secretary of State has said, we shall be keeping this under the closest review in the next six months. In this review, each provision will be treated on its merits. If we consider that it is justified, the Government will not hesitate to recommend the lapse of particular provisions.
The latest wave of bombings in Northern Ireland is almost certainly an attempt by the Provisional IRA to restore its waning credibility and to stampede the smaller towns in Northern Ireland into calling for the reintroduction of the old security restrictions which have been lifted. These attacks should be seen against an overall continuing decline in the level of violence. Since last June, 27 people have died as the result of terrorist activity compared with 49 in the first half of the year and 30 in the same period last year.
Shooting attacks are down by 30 per cent. compared with last year. While bomb attacks are 25 per cent. up, the total number of cassette incendiary attacks is only 16 per cent. of the total for 1977.
Since last June 10 members of the security forces and their reserves have died as the result of terrorist violence. Members of the Prison Service, the Fire Service and Civilian Search Unit have also been murdered. The overwhelming majority of both communities in Northern Ireland are horrified by these pointless deaths, but the people of Northern Ireland have also shown again recently their determination to see their lives return to normal, and to look forward to a more hopeful future.
The foundation of the Government's security policy is the principle of fair and effective enforcement of the law, within the law, and the bringing of those who break the law to justice through the courts. Achieving the acceptance and increasing the effectiveness of the police in enforcing the law with the minimum of Army support remains a fundamental principle of our security policy. But we have never viewed security policy in isolation; our efforts there must be considered along with efforts to make political progress, and to work for the social and economic development of Northern Ireland.
The Regular Army and the UDR continue to provide valuable support for the police. Now that large areas of Northern Ireland are relatively peaceful, the Army has been able to concentrate its own efforts. The recent reorganisation in a number of UDR battalions is designed to make the Regiment more effective while continuing its build-up. The strength of the regular RUC in October this year passed the 6,000 mark, and a study will be made over the next few months to decide whether the present and anticipated demands would justify increasing the strength beyond the present ceiling of 6,500. Alongside its other work, the RUC is using its growing specialist skills to investigate sophisticated economic crime. The police also place particular emphasis on crime prevention, especially among young people. Co-operation across the border between the two police forces has continued to develop. Regular meetings are held between senior officers
828
to exchange information and co-ordinate their efforts.
The Government's policy is that all those convicted in open court by the due process of the law should serve their sentences in the same way. No one is sentenced to prison in Northern Ireland because of their political beliefs, and the Government are firm in their determination to phase out special category status. Considerable progress has been achieved in Northern Ireland, but the Government are certainly not over-optimistic. We believe that our policies are the right ones, and we look forward to the day when the police can operate without any need of support from the Army, and when this thoroughly distasteful emergency legislation will no longer be necessary. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1978 (Continuance) (No. 2) Order 1978, laid before the House on 28th November, be approved.
—(Lord Melchett.)
4.42 p.m.
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, the powers under the Emergency Provisions Act need to be renewed at six-monthly intervals, but I join with the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, in making it clear that we on this side of the House do not regard this as implying that these powers are taken lightly, or should ever be considered to be automatically renewed. However, during the past two weeks or so, tragically, the deputy governor of the Maze Prison has been murdered in his home, and only three days ago two prison officers were attacked with gunfire in Belfast. I give those just as two examples of attacks made on people whose work is to protect the safety of the citizen, and to guard the business and industrial community on whom the future of the Province depends. Of course, the security forces are in the greatest danger and, as I have shown, the Prison Service also. But the attacks of the IRA appear to be aimed at anyone who contributes to the running of the public services in Northern Ireland. Earlier this week, three people working in the postal sorting office at Lisburn were seriously injured by a time bomb. So that emergency powers which, as your Lordships know, include powers of search and arrest, remain, in my opinion, necessary.

829
Therefore, of course, from this side of the House, I am supporting the Government in the presentation of this order.
It is clear from the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, that the emergency powers are being used to considerable effect. Despite the intense bombing campaign in country towns in Northern Ireland during the month of November, the security restrictions, which the noble Lord mentioned—the barriers in town centres outside Belfast, which have been removed—have not reappeared, and I take this opportunity to say that I am sure that that is absolutely right. Clearly, the attitude of people in Northern Ireland to the IRA is increasingly one of rejection of the bombing and the murdering which they perpetrate for no cause but the IRA's own, and the more it can be shown that the people of Northern Ireland are determined to live as normal a life as possible, in which there is no path for terror and subversion, then the greater is the hope for the future.
There is just one question that I should like to ask. The noble Lord did not mention this in his speech, but I very much welcome the news which was given out last September that a fifth resident infantry battalion had been sent to Northern Ireland. May I ask whether it is the Government's policy to continue to replace the four-month tours with resident battalions? I believe that it is important that this process should continue. In reply to that question, the noble Lord might be able to give me some information about the building of new barracks in order for that policy to continue to be pursued. Clearly, it is a necessary part of that policy that the RUC should continue to be strengthened both in numbers and in influence. I very much welcome the information which the noble Lord gave in his speech, that the RUC has now achieved 6,000 Regulars and that a review as to whether the ceiling of 6,500 is right will shortly be undertaken.
Finally—I think it is important that this should be said in this House—may I say that I support fully the noble Lord's very brief statement about the phasing out completely of special category status. If anybody has any doubts about the lengths to which terrorists will go to try to gain their ends—the obvious example, of course,
830
is the desecration of "H" block at the Maze prison—let us reflect that the drying up of funds for the IRA from abroad during this year, which undoubtedly has occurred, has resulted in huge hauls being taken in robberies in the Republic to try to make up the IRA's depleted reserves. The fact of the matter is that the IRA owe allegiance to no one. Their method is terror and their objective is anarchy. Although we regret them, the powers which are continued in this order still remain necessary.
4.47 p.m.
Lord HAMPTON: My Lords, this is not, I believe, the time for a lengthy debate on Government policy in Northern Ireland, but I should like to make two points. First, the majority of my Parliamentary colleagues support this order. We feel that it would be disastrous at the present time to pull our troops out of the Province. It can be said that we are playing into the hands of the IRA when we too openly discuss the possibility. We regret this, but we believe that the indisputable necessity for the order remains.
Secondly, if he is prepared to give it, I should like an assurance from the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, regarding what is going on in the Maze prison. On two occasions recently I have read that we are being blackmailed over what is going on in "H" block—first, in an article which appeared in The Times a few weeks ago and, secondly, in a speech by the Official Opposition spokesman, Mr. Airey Neave, in the debate on this order in the other place. The Oxford dictionary defines blackmail, in current usage, as taking place in connection with the concealment of discreditable secrets. Therefore, I should be grateful if the noble Lord could confirm once again that we have nothing to hide and that the reputedly filthy conditions in "H" block are caused solely by the attitudes of the inmates themselves.
It is said—and the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, has referred to this—that funds from sympathetic quarters in the United States are still finding their way, even if in less quantity, to the IRA. Quite contrary to having anything to hide, can we not reaffirm that we are dealing with crazed fanatics who deserve no support from right thinking people?
4.49 p.m.
Lord HYLTON: My Lords, I am sure there is general agreement that this order is one which in no circumstances should go through "on the nod." It would be a very great pity if the House did not give the order as careful an examination as it gave earlier today to the question of the conservation of animals and wild plants and, later, to the question of street offences and loitering. We are dealing with matters of life and death and, naturally, one proceeds very deliberately.
I welcome the announcement that there will be a review during the coming six months of the emergency provisions legislation. I think that this will be particularly welcome to the Northern Ireland Peace Movement. For my part, I can see that the special powers of arrest and the suspension of trial by jury may well have to go on for some considerable time. Nevertheless, it is encouraging that there will be a review.
May I turn for a moment or two to the report published in January 1975 of the committee chaired by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, which considered measures to deal with terrorism in Northern Ireland in the context of civil liberties and human rights. The Committee made 47 recommendations and I should like to ask how many of those have by now been implemented or acted upon in some other form. Perhaps I may just quote from paragraph 21 of the report. The first two sentences state that:
"the continued existence of emergency powers should be limited, both in scope and duration. Though there are times when they are necessary for the preservation of human life they can, if prolonged, damage the fabric of the community and they do not provide lasting solutions".
Damage to the fabric of the community is what I think we are very much concerned about. I understand that under Section 11 of the emergency legislation arrests have been running at about the rate of 2,500 per year during the last three years, including 1978 up to date. Those arrested may be detained for 72 hours without being brought before a magistrate or a court and they may be kept isolated and without access by anybody during that period. I think that is what is liable to cause damage to the fabric of the communities and one can well understand the anxiety of parents whose children may
832
disappear in the middle of the night or at any time of the day, and they will be anxious because they do not know whether they have been kidnapped, whether they have been murdered, or what has happened to them.
There is a long-term question, to which I have referred, and there is also a short-term question which involves safeguards, both for individuals and for families. In February 1976 the International Commission of Jurists made a submission to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights and that submission contained 27 recommendations. I should like to ask the Government whether they consider that those recommendations are applicable to Northern Ireland. Eight of those recommendations have been picked out by the Northern Ireland Peace Movement as being important interim safeguards, likely to mitigate the problems that arise under the Act. The selected recommendations deal with access by families to arrested persons, access to legal and medical advice, questions about interrogation and confessions. Can the Government offer any hope of some improvements on these eight recommendations?
I should like to go on to welcome the detailed written reply made by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland on the 8th June of this year, at columns 229 to 234 of the Commons Official Report, but there are a number of questions which arise out of that. First, when do the Government expect to receive the report from the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, on the workings of the Prevention of Terrorism Act? This has an important bearing on the question of access to legal advice by arrested suspects. Secondly, following the submission by Amnesty International of 78 cases of alleged maltreatment of suspects, have complaints now been submitted to the Director of Public Prosecutions, and has the Director of Public Prosecutions reached any general findings and conclusions?
I go on to welcome the establishment of the Committee of Inquiry, under Judge Bennett, into police practices and procedures on the interrogation of suspects, and I would like to ask when the report is expected from that committee. I am very glad to know that the report will be published when it is available.

833
The next question concerns the Police Complaints Board. Has that Board reported any pattern of irregularity in arrest, detention and interrogation of suspects, since 1st September 1977? Another point mentioned in the Secretary of State's Statement concerns closed circuit television, which the Chief Constable of Northern Ireland was considering using in order to monitor interrogations while they were actually taking place. May I ask whether this equipment is now in service?
Finally, I come to the difficulties and problems that arise concerning persons aged under 18. They, as we heard earlier, are very much subject to unemployment. Their idealism can perhaps more easily be manipulated by terrorists and the advocates of violence. They are more likely to be subject to intimidation, and when they are arrested and held without communication the distress to their families is naturally greater than in the case of adults. Can we hope to see some special safeguards for the under-18s, particularly on these points of access to doctors and lawyers, and perhaps even to independent lay advice? Will it be made a practice that the families of the under-18s will be informed of their arrest and of where they are being held at the very earliest possible opportunity? If the Government can be forthcoming on some of these points, both long-term and short-term, I think they will be doing a real work of peace-making and helping forward reconciliation generally.
4.57 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, perhaps I can try to deal with the various points that have been raised. The noble Lord, Lord Belstead, mentioned the security barriers and the fact that in spite of the recent bombing campaign there has been no significant demand from local people that these should be reinstated in the towns affected by the latest round of bombing. I think it is particularly important to recognise, first of all, that the Government are very responsible to local people's views on these matters, and, secondly, the significance of the failure of the IRA to bomb people into taking a pessimistic view of the future, as was clearly their intention when they started on the recent wave of attacks.
834
The noble Lord also asked me about resident army battalions. As he may know, there are already six units in Northern Ireland serving 18-month tours and the Government intend to introduce a seventh as soon as suitable arrangements can be made for barrack accommodation and for housing the families of those concerned. Certainly, the Government's view is that there is a developing role to be played by army units staying in Northern Ireland for an 18-month period, although there will be a need for some other units to continue to serve four-month periods. The Government are still looking at the possibilities of barrack accommodation and housing in the Craigavon-Portadown area but no final decision has yet been reached. Whatever is decided will, of course, be discussed with those locally concerned.
The noble Lord, Lord Hampton, mentioned the Maze prison and the campaign by some prisoners there not to wear prison uniform and not to be treated in the same way as the majority of people in prisons in Northern Ireland. He referred to the use of the word "blackmail" which I do not think is a term which I, my right honourable or honourable friends have used. Certainly the Government have nothing to hide. The position is perfectly clear. The eight blocks comprise, in fact, very modern prison accommodation, certainly by the standards of many prisons in Great Britain. They provide extremely good accommodation for prisoners and the prison has many modern and well-equipped facilities.
Some of the prisoners have decided that they do not wish to make use of those facilities; that they do not wish to wear the clothing provided for them; that they do not wish to take the hour's exercise which is available to them each day and so on. That is entirely their choice. Of course, they have gone a great deal further than that in recent months and smeared excrement over the cells and made it extremely difficult to keep the cells clean or hygienic. However, the Government have done all in their power. I think that it is important that your Lordships should pay a tribute to the prison officers who have been involved in the work of cleaning the cells. They are now all regularly cleaned with modern high-pressure steam equipment. The information I have is that there are

835
currently no signs of any medical problems and that is, of course, watched extremely carefully.
The term "blackmail" is only appropriate because it is extremely difficult to persuade people throughout the world that this is simply a self-inflicted campaign by those concerned. We find that many people unfortunately believe the propaganda which is put out to the effect that this is being deliberately imposed upon them, by the British Government. That is where the element of blackmail arises. I am sure that all noble Lords would wish to ensure that at least people make a judgment on these very difficult issues on the facts as they actually are.
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, I should like to raise one question. I entirely agree with what the noble Lord has just said. I understood that in another place a factual account of what is provided in the prison Service—particularly the Maze prison in Northern Ireland—is to be placed in the Library of the House of Commons by the Government. I was wondering whether it might be possible for the same facility to be granted in regard to the Library of your Lordships' House.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, certainly I shall ensure that that is done, and I will let noble Lords who have expressed an interest during today's debate know when the document is available.
The noble Lord, Lord Hylton, asked me about the recommendations of the inquiry conducted by my noble and learned friend Lord Gardiner. I do not have the exact figures regarding all the recommendations which the noble Lord mentioned, but I can tell him that the majority of those recommendations were implemented by the Government. If the noble Lord were interested I could let him know which recommendations, if any, have not been implemented and the reasons for that.
The noble Lord also asked me about various matters connected with the questioning by the police of people whom they suspect of breaking the law in Northern Ireland and the procedures under which that is done, the conditions under which it is done and so on. As the
836
noble Lord will know, an independent committee of inquiry was set up following the report by Amnesty International about conditions in Northern Ireland. The inquiry is chaired by His Honour Judge Bennett and its terms of reference include consideration of police procedures and practices in Northern Ireland relating to the interrogation of persons suspected of schedule offences, and the operation of procedures for dealing with complaints against the police.
I think that it would be most sensible for me not to attempt to cover the ground which the inquiry is currently working on, but to give your Lordships the assurance, which my right honourable friend has already given, that the report will be published when it is received by the Government. I would suggest that that would be the time appropriate for your Lordships' House to consider the many very important issues which the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, has raised and which were raised in a number of previous reports—in particular, the report by Amnesty International which led to the setting up of this particular inquiry. The inquiry has been hard at work and the report is not now very far away. I should imagine that it will cover, if not all, almost all the particular points which the noble Lord raised with me. I should prefer to leave it that we would have that report and look at the particular points which the noble Lord has raised.
There is one point that I can cover now: it concerns the particular cases that were mentioned in Amnesty's report. The fact of the matter is that Amnesty has not felt able to furnish the Director of Public Prosecutions with details of the allegations which were made anonymously in the report. Therefore, it has not been possible to follow up those specific allegations. However, it is, of course, open for anyone to furnish the Director of Public Prosecutions with details of specific cases if that is their wish.
Baroness GAITSKELL: My Lords, I should like to ask the Minister why Amnesty has not been able to publish the results of its report, because this has occasionally happened before in the United Nations regarding other countries.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, Amnesty has told my right honourable friend the

837
Secretary of State that it does not feel able to furnish the details of particular cases because they were given to it in the first place on the basis that they would not be passed on to anyone other than those in the Amnesty organisation. I understand that that is the reason they have given.

PUBLIC HEALTH LABORATORY SERVICE BILL [H.L.]
5.5 p.m.
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, I understand that no Amendments have been set down to this Bill and that no noble Lord has indicated a wish to move a manuscript Amendment or to speak in Committee. Therefore, unless any noble Lord objects, I beg to move that the Order of Commitment be discharged.
Moved, That the Order of Commitment be discharged.—(Lord Wells-Pestell.)

SOCIAL SECURITY (CONTRIBUTIONS) (MARINERS) AMENDMENT REGULATIONS 1978
5.6 p.m.
Lord WELLS-PESTELL Lord WELLS-PESTELL rose to move, That the draft Social Security (Contributions) (Mariners) Amendment Regulations 1978, laid before the House on 5th December, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, these are extraordinarily complicated regulations—perhaps the most complicated regulations that I have had to put before your Lordships' House. Therefore, because of their complexity, I do not propose to go into great detail, but I shall try to indicate, briefly, what they are about.
Under the Social Security Act 1975 mariners on board merchant ships are, in general, liable for national insurance contributions in the same way as other employed earners. Because they serve at sea, sometimes on long voyages which may run into more than one tax year, the Act gives the Secretary of State power to
838
make regulations modifying certain provisions of the Act in their application to them, including those relating to contributions. Such regulations are subject to a draft having been approved by a Resolution of each House.
The main purpose of the amending regulations is to make provision—on a permanent basis—for the calculation of earnings-related contributions of mariners whose voyages fall in more than one tax year. Since 1975–76 it has been necessary to make amending regulations each year in order to take account of each annual change in contribution rates or earnings limits, but the regulations in draft make provision for such changes and remove the need to trouble the House with fresh regulations each year on this subject.
Put simply—if it is possible to put it simply—this part of the regulations provides the basis on which the amount of contributions is calculated in these circumstances. They set out the rules on which earnings and contributions should be apportioned between the different tax years. The result is a permanent arrangement which is administratively practicable and fair.
The main purpose of the amending regulations also bring within the national insurance scheme certain mariners not at present covered by it, thus enabling ratification by this country, as a member State of the International Labour Organisation, of the International Labour Organisation Convention No. 147. This convention lays down minimum standards for employment in merchant ships and embodies certain requirements as to social security, including a requirement that a mariner domiciled or resident in a member State and employed in a ship registered in the territory of that State should be covered by a compulsory scheme of sickness insurance.
As I said at the beginning, the draft regulations are, by their nature, highly technical. I do not think that I need trouble your Lordships with a detailed explanation of their contents. The essential point is that they have two functions. The first is to make a very modest extension to the categories of mariner who come within the National Insurance scheme. The second is to put on a permanent basis special arrangements for

839
calculating the contributions payable for the majority of mariners; that is, those who are paid by the voyage.
The provisions of the draft amendment regulations have been considered by the National Insurance Advisory Committee—an independent body that looks into these matters. Their report, in which they recommend that the regulations should be made, was laid before Parliament with the draft regulations. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft Social Security (Contributions) (Mariners) Amendment Regulations 1978, laid before the House on 5th December, be approved.—(Lord Wells-Pestell.)
The Earl of AVON: My Lords, we are very grateful to the noble Lord for his careful explanation of these regulations, and are grateful to him too for his attention to the approaches in this matter.