Lords Sitting of 17 July 1980

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock (Prayers having been read earlier at the Judicial Sitting by the Lord Bishop of London):
The LORD CHANCELLOR The LORD CHANCELLOR On the Woolsack.
The Lord Briginshaw—Took the Oath.

ZIMBABWE: MD FOR LAND RESETTLEMENT
Lord HATCH of LUSBY: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what answer they have given to the request of the Zimbabwe Government for special aid to assist in land resettlement.
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, we have confirmed to the Zimbabwe Government that we are prepared to contribute to a programme of land acquisition and development for resettlement from within the £75 million of aid which my noble friend announced on 15th April.
Lord HATCH of LUSBY: My Lords, is the Minister aware that his noble friend the Leader of the House publicly declared two weeks ago that the total amount that would be needed in Zimbabwe over the next three or four years was of the order of £750 million? Where is the rest of the 90 per cent. likely to come from and what are the British Government doing to secure it?
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, there are, of course, a large number of other aid donors in the world, including some of the institutions that are established for that purpose. I very much hope that large additional sums will come from those sources, but we have done as much as we can.
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, have the Government made any further progress in persuading our closest friends and allies to join in the very necessary operation of rehabilitating Zimbabwe? Would Her Majesty's Government agree that land settlement in Zimbabwe could make an extremely important contribution not only to that country's economic progress but to political stability generally in central and southern Africa?
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, I agree about the importance of land settlement in Zimbabwe. The noble Lord will recall that that matter was specifically referred to at the Lancaster House conference and special provision made there. As for persuading other countries to contribute to Zimbabwe's needs, the noble Lord will recall that the United States and a number of other countries have already announced aid programmes to Zimbabwe. Indeed, it is planned to hold an aid donors' conference later this year or early next, and we shall be actively encouraging donors to participate in that.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that it will seem unfair to some that the wider question should be tied to the specific Question on the Order Paper? The land settlement contribution was part of the £75 million that was agreed, and any other claims which may be justified no doubt can later be taken into con-consideration on their merit. However, is my noble friend aware that to tie the overriding general question to a specific one which has already been met is not, I think, in keeping with the spirit behind those who supported the agreement that was settled with Zimbabwe at the time of the talks?
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, I am not sure if I entirely followed the drift of my noble friend's question, but certainly I think the sum of money we have been able to make available for Zimbabwe is not ungenerous.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, may I be permitted to support what my two noble friends have asked for? The noble Lord the Leader of the House has made a remarkable contribution for which we would all congratulate him, but is the

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Minister aware that, without the necessary finance, there will be a lot of trouble there? There is already a great deal of unemployment, and I observe from the press—I do not know if it is accurate—that there has been some turbulence, and we must try to avoid that. Is the noble Lord aware that, if we can put Zimbabwe on its feet by land settlement, the necessary finance and whatever else is required, that will he a contribution not only to Zimbabwe but to all the African countries?
Lord TREFGARNE: The noble Lord is quite right, my Lords, but one should not forget that Zimbabwe is now an independent nation; it is up to us to do what we can to assist, but only with the knowledge and agreement of the new Zimbabwe Government. We have a large aid programme, to which I have already referred; we have a substantial training programme, a military aid programme, and there are other matters too. I think we have done pretty well.
Lord CARVER: My Lords, would the Minister perhaps ask his noble friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether one of the lessons he learned as a very successful Minister for the Navy and Secretary of State for Defence was that one should not spoil the ship for a ha'p'orth of tar? Would he agree that, after the remarkable success of the Lancaster House conference, for which the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs deserves enormous personal credit, it would be a tragedy if that were prejudiced as a result of, in this House I will say, apparently the less than enthusiastic attitude—I very nearly said mean—of the Government towards aid to lesser developed countries?
Lord TREFGARNE: I do not think that is true at all, my Lords. Our aid programme has to be tailored to our resources. The aid programme which we inherited from our predecessors could not in any circumstances have been sustained. What we have done for Zimbabwe, which comes not only from the margins that were available within the aid programme but additional funds that were made available by the Treasury, is very generous by any criterion and, indeed, will he one of our largest programmes in Africa. None of our expenditure programmes can be exempted
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from our policy of maintaining public expenditure generally.
Baroness LLEWELYN-DAVI ES of HASTOE: My Lords, if the noble Lord thinks he can substantiate that remark about the programme which this Government inherited from us not being able to be implemented, may I ask whether he is aware that it was very carefully planned and was by no means extravagant? Is he not yet aware of the need, for the sake of our own industry, to create places abroad which can buy from us what we have to sell?
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, the fact is that the programme we inherited from our predecessors could not have been sustained, as I said, because the money was simply not available.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, following the question asked by my noble friend Lord Goronwy-Roberts, may I ask the Minister whether he would agree that a major co-operative effort is now necessary in Zimbabwe in view of its strategic position? While welcoming yesterday's decision of West Germany, however limited, and that of the United States and the efforts of our own Government, may I ask whether they are not inadequate to deal with the war-torn situation in Zimbabwe? Would it be possible to get the European Community, our allies of the West, and perhaps even the Security Council of the United Nations, to take joint action in this crisis where immediate aid is needed?
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, we have of course made a certain amount of immediate aid available; £7 million of reconstruction aid, £500,000 for joint funding through the voluntary agencies and a number of technical assistance teams. At the same time, we are doing everything we can to mobilise international opinion and international donors generally to do what they can, as well.
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, with the indulgence of the House may I ask the noble Lord to draw the attention of his noble friend the Foreign Secretary—I am sure that it is not necessary to draw the attention of the Leader of the House—to the implications of these exchanges that this is not just a question

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of bilateral aid, important though that is? It is a matter of high policy in an area of the world whose stability is as important to it as it is to us in this country and in the West generally.
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, the noble Lord is quite right in what he says, but it is still necessary for us to tailor our aid programme to our resources.
Lord GLADWYN: My Lords, in view of the role played by the Commonwealth in securing the independence of Zimbabwe, would it not be possible now to have another small Commonwealth conference in order to obtain agreement on joint projects for securing the independence, politically and economically?
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, there are a number of international institutions which will, we hope, be providing aid to Zimbabwe, and of course the Commonwealth can play an important role in them.
The LORD PRESIDENT of the COUNCIL (Lord Soames): My Lords, in view of the fact that we have spent 10 minutes on this Question, I suggest that we move on; I am very sorry.

ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON PESTICIDES
3.11 p.m.
Lord DAVIES of LEEK: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will now transfer the functions of the Pesticides Advisory Committee to the Health and Safety Executive.
The MINISTER of STATE, MINISTRY of AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES and FOOD (Earl Ferrers): My Lords, Her Majesty's Government have no plans to transfer the functions of the Advisory Committee on Pesticides to the Health and Safety Executive.
Lord DAVIES of LEEK: My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for that precise and
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simple Answer. Is he aware that the motive force behind the Question is the fact that the Pesticides Advisory Committee does not include a representative of the National Union of Agricultural and Allied Workers, and that the committee treats in a rather off-hand manner the results of spraying what is known as 2,4,5-T weedkiller, which contains the poison dioxin? Consequently, the committee has taken an attitude which seven nations in the world have not taken. For instance, Sweden, Norway, the United States of America, Holland and other countries in the European Community have banned the use of this weedkiller. Finally, and without boring the noble Earl, may I say that there is a belief that the 200 children who were taken ill the other day may have been suffering from the effects of the spraying of weedkiller. The public should know the true answer.
Earl FERRERS: Oddly enough, my Lords, I was aware of what motivated the noble Lord to ask the Question. I can tell him that in the consideration of any pesticide, as with any chemical such as a medicine or a veterinary medicine, it is essential that the result should be scientific, unbiased and impartial, and should also be clinical. That is what the Advisory Committee on Pesticides does. As the noble Lord said, the advisory committee does not include any representatives of the National Union of Agricultural and Allied Workers, and indeed I think that it would he wrong if it did. However, the Health and Safety Executive is involved in it in so far as three members are on the advisory committee and one member is on the technical secretariat of the Pesticides Safety Precaution Scheme.
Lord HALE: My Lords, can the noble Earl say when the last report of the Advisory Committee on Pesticides was published? The noble Earl's predecessor was good enough to let me have a copy of the committee's report of March 1979. It was a very able report, on which I was able to raise a debate in this House in which due respect was paid to the eminence and the independence of the members of this committee.
Is the noble Earl aware that in the last month the international report on the explosion at Seveso has been considered

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at a meeting in Brussels and that France has announced that she will not follow the report, nor adopt any of the recommendations, nor commit herself to any action so far as she is concerned? Is the noble Earl further aware that the Forestry Commission, which can hardly claim to be unbiased in the matter, has published its own report? We are receiving a mass of paper, and nobody knows who is doing the monitoring and who is examining each of the many complaints as they come in. Is it not time that the Advisory Committee on Pesticides met urgently and considered the evidence that has recently come to hand?
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Hale, is perfectly correct; the last report of the Advisory Committee was in March 1979. My right honourable friend the Minister of Agriculture has asked the committee again to consider all the evidence, including the evidence of the National Union of Agricultural and Allied Workers where it is concerned. The committee is doing this at the moment, and it will make a report when it has concluded its investigations.
Lord INGLEWOOD: My Lords, does my noble friend agree that this advisory committee, which has done such good work over very many years, could well be taken by other members of the European Community as an example of how this task can well and inexpensively be carried out?
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, I entirely agree with my noble friend. I wish to add that in this scientific area, in which there is much concern felt by people, whether we accept or reject a product, it is absolutely essential that the decision be made on scientific grounds, not on grounds based on opinion or concern, no matter how strong they may be.
Lord DAVIES of LEEK: My Lords, finally, whatever the European Community or the European agricultural workers or others may say, the fact is that there are six or seven nations—
Several noble Lords: Question!
Lord DAVIES of LEEK: My Lords, is it not a fact—I had to turn around only one word—that even the United States
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of America has banned the use of this pesticide? We should be aware of that fact and do something more about it.
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, we are entirely aware of the fact that in this country we must decide matters on their merits. All I can tell the noble Lord is that all these matters are being considered. We have asked the advisory committee to consider all the evidence yet again, and I suggest that it would be quite inappropriate that the Government should accept or reject a particular product simply because there is what one might describe as understandable emotion building up about it. The matter must be decided on scientific grounds; and that is what we are doing.
Lord LEATHERLAND: My Lords, can the noble Earl tell us which particular kind of pest this advisory committee deals with?
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, the advisory committee deals with all pesticides, as opposed merely to pests.

MINIMUM LENDING RATE REDUCTION
3.18 p.m.
Lord BESWICK: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what new factors have appeared in the national economy which made possible the reduction of the MLR announced on 3rd July.
The MINISTER of STATE, TREASURY (Lord Cockfield): My Lords, the reduction in minimum lending rate was justified by the current and prospective trend of monetary developments.
Lord BESWICK: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that I for one greatly admire the zeal with which lie strives to defend the indefensible, but does he not sometimes lay himself open to the charge of self-contradiction? Has he not hitherto always maintained that it would be impossible to bring down the MLR except

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as and when the rate of inflation comes down? Can he tell us by how much the rate of inflation has come down since the MLR went up to its panic rate of 17 per cent.?
Lord COCKFIELD: No, my Lords; there was never any panic increase in minimum lending rate. The increase in minimum lending rate was necessary in order to curb the rise in money supply, which had got out of control during the period of the previous Administration. The reduction that has now been made in minimum lending rate reflects the success of the Government in bringing monetary growth back under control. The figures that were published a few minutes ago indicate that the growth in M3 in the four weeks to 18th June was 0·7 per cent., and that the growth in the money supply in the previous six months was 10¼ per cent. These developments are both a tribute to the success of the policy and a justification for the reduction in minimum lending rate.
Lord ALPORT: My Lords, will my noble friend agree that the country in general is well satisfied with this very small U-turn on the part of Her Majesty's Government?
Lord COCKFIELD: My Lords, there was no U-turn on the part of Her Majesty's Government. In fact, the reduction in the minimum lending rate indicated that the Government were proceeding straight ahead on the policy which they had so clearly laid down. So far as the rate of inflation is concerned, we hope that we are now at or near the peak in the rate of inflation, and that in a few weeks' time we shall see a fall in it.
Lord BRUCE of DONINGTON: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the miniscule decrease in the minimum lending rate has brought no relief to the smaller businesses in the United Kingdom; and will he give some indication as to the amount of additional unemployment and additional bankruptcies as a consequence of the Government's policies he requires in order that there may be a further and significant reduction in the MLR?
Lord COCKFIELD: My Lords, the reduction in the MLR will have brought
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relief to businesses of all sizes, large as well as small. The hope is that it will be followed in due course by further reductions in the MLR, but this must depend upon future monetary developments and future monetary prospects. So far as the level of unemployment is concerned, I have made it clear in every speech I have delivered in your Lordships' House since 19th June last year, when we debated the Government's Budgetary proposals, that a rise in unemployment is the inevitable result of excessive pay settlements. This is why we have endeavoured to drive this lesson home, and I hope we have the noble Lord's support in doing so.
Lord BOYD-CARPENTER: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that many of us feel gratitude for this first manifestation of the success of the Government's policy, but that our gratitude is subject to the classical definition of that word—"a lively anticipation of favours to come"?
Lord COCKFIELD: My Lords, I am most grateful to my noble friend, both for what he said in the first part of his question and for the good wishes contained in the second part.
Baroness GAITSKELL: My Lords, will this Government not go down as a Government of promises, and will they not be called the "this year, next year, some time, never" Government in the matter of reducing unemployment?
Lord COCKFIELD: No, my Lords. This is a Government which have a clear policy. They propose following that policy, and they propose following it to success.
Lord BESWICK: My Lords, may I refer the noble Lord to the Answer he gave me on 29th April, when I first raised this question of the MLR, in which he said, at col. 1131:
"Interest rates will come down only as and when we can reduce the rate of inflation".
The fact of the matter is that the rate of inflation has not come down; but may I ask him whether he is aware that I heartily support what has been said by his noble friends on the other side of the House? If we can look upon this reduction of I per cent. as an indication

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that they recognise it is a failure as a counter-inflationary instrument, then it will give much more encouragement to industry generally.
Lord COCKFIELD: No, my Lords. The reduction of 1 per cent. in MLR is a clear indication of the success of the policy, and not of its failure. It has produced the results it set out to produce, and it is this fact which has enabled the rates of interest to be reduced. So far as the rate of inflation is concerned, my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has made it clear in another place—and I repeated it here—that in the course of the next few weeks and the next few months we shall be seeing a significant reduction in the rate of inflation.
Lord JACQUES: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that we shall see a reduction only because the increase in VAT will no longer be in the index? Is he further aware that in maintaining high rates of interest for a long period the Government are going against what has been accepted as good economic sense over the past 20 or 30 years?
Lord COCKFIELD: My Lords, the first part of the noble Lord's question merely confirms what we said at the time; namely, that the increase in the VAT brought about a once-and-for-all increase in the retail price index, and that will be clearly brought home when the index for July is published in the month of August. So far as the second part of his question is concerned, I think the noble Lord is thinking in terms of theories of economics which, fortunately, have long since been discarded.
Lord SOAMES: My Lords, I hope the House will agree that we should move on to the next Question.

HEAVY TRAFFIC AND HISTORIC BUILDINGS
3.26 p.m.
Lord MONSON: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what encouragement they are giving to local authorities to divert heavy traffic away from cathedrals and other buildings of national and historic importance which are seriously endangered by traffic vibration, pending the completion of permanent by-passes.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, local authorities have adequate powers to divert traffic away from such buildings, and have been reminded of the need to use them where this is called for and is feasible in the light of local circumstances.
Lord MONSON: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his reply. Is he aware, for example, that according to reports from distinguished architects and consulting engineers the 13th century chapter house of Lincoln Cathedral is seriously endangered by vibration from passing traffic, and in particular heavy lorry traffic, despite which a temporary traffic ban has been withdrawn following complaints of inconvenience from certain local residents and heavy vehicle operators? Bearing in mind that the Lincoln by-pass will not be completed until 1985 at the earliest, would the noble Lord not agree that if the chapter house were to collapse in the interval because of a failure to reintroduce a traffic diversion, or at the very least a weight restriction, it would concern not only the people of Lincoln but the people of Britain as a whole, and indeed the entire civilised world?
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, with regard to the noble Lord's question whether I would regard the collapse of the chapter house at Lincoln as a calamity, the answer is, Yes, I certainly would, and I think we all would. But, as he has said, it is a 13th century building and it has been standing a long time. The Government have indicated that we are giving high priority to 13 by-passes to historic towns, of which Lincoln is one. When I tell the House that the work will probably begin in the first half of 1983, knowing how long it takes to get these things going your Lordships will see that it is positively galloping action. I appreciate that the dean and chapter are worried. I understand the city council, who are the

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responsible authority, are considering the diversion of through traffic before this by-pass is completed. This is a matter for them. The sooner they do something, if it is feasible, the better. But I suggest that in the case of something which has stood for 700 years, although deans and chapters and noble Lords, myself included, worry, the chances are that it will survive the next three years.
Lord STRABOLGI: My Lords, arising out of the Question, may I ask the noble Lord the Premier Baron what the Government are proposing to do about these huge continental juggernauts which are shaking our beautiful cathedral cities and villages to pieces?
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, let us not get emotional with the words "huge continental juggernauts". It is the axle weight that counts. Already most of the great cities of Britain, where the major cathedrals and historic buildings are sited, are by-passed. The next 13 are going to be commenced soon. It is up to the local authorities, which have the powers. There are very few places now where buildings of major importance are really in danger. We must keep a sense of balance in this matter. We are giving priority to these 13 other historic town by-passes, and I think it will help.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE: My Lords, the noble Lord's reply is very disturbing, for a number of reasons. May I ask him whether he thinks that, though the chapter house dates from the 13th century, there have been lorries running round it all that time? It is really a very odd reply. Will the Government recognise that they are—we have commended them strongly for doing so—putting aside large sums of money to preserve our heritage? Here is one of the most important parts of our heritage, according to the people responsible for it, being in serious danger of going wrong before the remedy which the Government speak of comes into operation, and I do feel further action should be taken.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, I have already told the House that the local city council can take action earlier to divert traffic. They have not
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done this yet. Vibration does not help anything, I agree, but there is no actual scientific proof that in itself it does destroy. It is only when structural difficulties arise that that danger is accelerated. Really, we cannot go faster. We are doing everything to encourage the city council and local authorities to divert. Occasionally, there are matters which make it impractical for them to do so. Within three years we will have got things going in a big way.
Lord GODBER of WILLINGTON: My Lords, can I make the point to my noble friend, as one who represented the area of Lincolnshire adjoining this chapter house for nearly 30 years—I have admired it for a long time—that it is totally impossible for large juggernauts to pass on the roads immediately adjoining?
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend for that observation.
Lord KILMARNOCK: My Lords, will the Government not agree that the bypasses referred to in the noble Lord's Question are an essential ancillary service to our present road network, and that once begun they should be completed before proceeding with any further major trunk road developments? I am thinking particularly of Buckingham, where there is a horrible snarl-up at the moment; and I have no doubt there are a great many other cases.
Lord DERWENT: My Lords, is it in order to read supplementary questions?
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, it is not really in order for noble Lords to read supplementary questions, as we all know, but occasionally we like to be reminded of certain facts when we are asking questions. In reply to the question by the noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock, I can say that we are worried about these matters. We are doing— I am sorry; I have forgotten, thanks to Lord Derwent's interruption. What was the main point?
Lord KILMARNOCK: My Lords, I am sorry that I incurred disapproval for reading, though in fact it is common practice in your Lordships' House. May I tell the noble Lord—
Several noble Lords: Ask him!
Lord KILMARNOCK: Is the noble Lord aware that my original question was whether the Government considered that it was extremely important to complete by-passes which are actually projected before proceeding with any further major trunk road development?
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, I apologise to the House. We are in a time of money constraint for the Government, as your Lordships are well aware. We have got to get the economy straight. So far as road transport is concerned, we have made absolute priorities which are in the interests of the economic survival of the nation. Our first priority, as your Lordships are also aware, is the M.25. After that, we have considered that these historic towns need and deserve the by-passes to preserve them, because this is part of our historic background and culture. I think that that explains what the noble Lord wanted to know.
Lord HOWIE of TROON: My Lords, in regard to structural defects in buildings, can the noble Lord tell us which structural defects he had in mind which are necessary, in addition to excessive loading, to bring a building down?
Lord SOAMES: Never mind. It is all right. My noble friend should say he agrees.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, my noble Leader indicates that he thinks I should agree with the noble Lord.

CRIMINAL APPEAL (NORTHERN IRELAND) BILL [H.L.]
3.35 p.m.
The LORD CHANCELLOR (Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a. —(The Lord Chancellor.)
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, I feel that it would be remiss of me if I did not take this opportunity to express from this side
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of the House our appreciation to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor and all those concerned for the very expeditious way that they have progressed this consolidation Bill. We feel that it should be warmly welcomed by all those in Northern Ireland who are interested in upholding justice and by those directly concerned with promoting community respect for law and order.
The LORD CHANCELLOR: I am very grateful indeed to the noble Lord, Lord Blease, for what he has just said.
On Question, Bill read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

PIER AND HARBOUR ORDER (BRIGHTON WEST PIER) CONFIRMATION BILL
Read 3, and passed.

APPROPRIATION (No.2) (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1980
3.38 p.m.
The PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE, NORTHERN IRELAND OFFICE (Lord Elton)The PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE, NORTHERN IRELAND OFFICE (Lord Elton) rose to move, That the draft Appropriation (No.2) (Northern Ireland) Order 1980, which was laid before this House on 19th June, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move the first order which stands in my name on the Order Paper. The main purpose of the order is to authorise the issue out of the Northern Ireland Consolidated Fund of a sum of £1,229 million and to appropriate this sum for the purposes indicated in the schedule. The £1,229 million represents the balance of the Main Estimates of Northern Ireland Departments for 1980–81. A sum on account of £770 million has already been appropriated for 1980–81 by the Appropriation (Northern Ireland) Order 1980, which was approved by your Lordships on 13th March this year.
Details of the provision being sought in the draft order are in the Main Estimates Northern Ireland Departments, copies of which are available in the Library. An appropriation order encompasses virtually every aspect of Northern Ireland

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departments' activities. It would clearly be wrong for me to attempt to cover the whole of this field, and your Lordships will, in any case, wish to take this opportunity to raise matters to which you attach particular importance. In my opening remarks I shall, therefore, seek only to deal with a few of the main issues which may be of concern to all of us. In the course of the debate your Lordships will direct our attention to other matters, and I will endeavour to respond to these points when I reply to the debate.
Let me first put this order in its proper context. Your Lordships will be aware of the importance which Her Majesty's Government attach to economic regeneration, not only of the Province but of the nation as a whole. We cannot secure for our people either a level of employment or a standard of living that is in any way satisfactory unless that regeneration takes place. In order to achieve it, we have to secure conditions in which investment is profitable. That depends in part upon conditions of world trade that are beyond our control, and in part upon circumstances within our economy upon which Government can exert effective pressure. A necessary part of our strategy to regenerate the economy is a commitment to restrain the level of public expenditure, and a necessary result of that restraint is that the uses to which those resources are put must be put under ever more rigorous scrutiny. When money is plentiful we can spend it on most things that appear to be both popular and attractive. When it is short we have to decide upon priorities, and we have to reassure ourselves continually that those priorities remain the right ones in changing circumstances.
Your Lordships will be aware that on 30th June my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland announced that Northern Ireland Government departments and, through them, other public spending agencies, were not to enter into any new commitments on capital or current account pending the result of a review of public expenditure policy in the Province. This decision to review the use of public resources was a part of the essential process of keeping our scale of priorities in line with a changing situation in which it is not open to us to respond to new or changing
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needs simply by expanding the volume of money to be applied to them. The review is a complex as well as an important exercise and it is not yet complete, but present indications are that it will be necessary to shift the balance of resources in the direction of economic programmes, including industrial development.
Although the review is in hand, services in Northern Ireland of all sorts must continue and public money has to be spent to keep them going. That is why it is necessary for the Government to come to Parliament with this draft order for the release for expenditure of the balance of the Main Estimates for the Province for the current financial year. The purposes for which the expenditure is earmarked are set out in the schedule to the order but it will be clear to your Lordships from what I have said that there may be some changes in these intentions resulting from the review of public expenditure at present taking place. The results of this review will he made known as soon as possible after its completion.
In addition, of course, your Lordships will have the opportunity to consider supplementary estimates later in this financial year which will reflect the results of that review. I indicated earlier the importance which Her Majesty's Government attach to the condition of industry, particularly at a time of high unemployment. Your Lordships will see under Class II, Vote 2, the provision of almost £78 million for the industrial development programme. This is one area where it is likely we shall wish to propose additional expenditure at supplementary estimate stage. The Government will continue to attach high priority to the encouragement of industrial investment in Northern Ireland and they will, if necessary, re-order priorities to respond to developing needs. I am sure noble Lords will be prepared to support any such proposals aimed at maintaining and creating employment particularly in the manufacturing sector.
This vote also makes provision for assistance, totalling £33 million for the shipbuilding industry, which noble Lords will know relates solely to financial support for Harland and Wolff Limited. The figure in the Main Estimates differs from the figure of £42·5 million which my

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honourable friend, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary announced in another place on 1st July 1980. This is therefore an area where it will be necessary to seek an adjustment at supplementary estimates stage. The level of support proposed is generous, as I think noble Lords will agree. It is a clear indication of the Government's commitment to preservation of employment in Northern Ireland at a time when public expenditure is already under severe pressure. It is, of course, vitally important that all concerned with the company grasp the opportunity which is being provided. In these days of vigorous international competition, companies of this sort can survive only by strenuous and committed effort at every level of responsibility. That applies to everyone, right the way from the yard to the board room.
Class II, Vote 3, is concerned with electricity tariffs. Provision is made for £18 million in respect of a subsidy to industrial and commercial electricity tariffs. Northern Ireland has no indigenous fossil fuels and no other readily available source of energy. Energy and, specifically, electrical energy, is therefore more expensive to deliver in the Province than it is elsewhere in the United Kingdom. The provision of £18 million reflects the continued efforts of Government to respond to the particular circumstances of Northern Ireland in a positive way and to reduce the impact of this cost differential. As noble Lords will be aware, the Government have also initiated a review of the longer-tern position of the electricity service.
Your Lordships will doubtless wish to raise other matters in connection with industry and commerce, and I await your comments with interest. Noble Lords will also wish to bring before the House matters from a wider field. Rather than trying to anticipate these matters, I will turn now very briefly to the subject for which I am myself primarily responsible, which is education. The need to achieve cost-effectiveness is as pressing here as anywhere, and it results in some fairly difficult decisions having to be taken. But it is a salutary thing to have to spend one's money carefully, and it can provide creative opportunities as well as the need for retrenchment. I hope that that is how, in the end, we shall come to see the interim report of the Chilver Committee.
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I called for this interim report, in advance of the main report, because it was becoming very clear that the decline in the number of children in our schools must mean a decline in the number of teachers we can employ and that that, in turn, must mean a decline in the numbers whom we could responsibly train to be teachers. In a perfect world, where money was no object, things might be otherwise. We could, for instance, keep the number of teachers constant and have steadily-reducing class sizes; and I have been advised by many that that is what we should do; but we do not live in a perfect world and, with teachers' salaries being already such a large proportion of the education budget, that solution simply is not available to us. We therefore have to consider whether training plant designed for 2,795 students can be kept running in its entirety for 1,623 students. The answer is that it cannot.
The remaining question is: What should be done about it? And the question is relevant today because, for as long as it remains unanswered, for so long will your Lordships be asked to vote more money for the training of teachers than the number of teachers being trained would seem to justify. So much apprehension was generated, even before the publication of this report, and there has been so much misunderstanding of it since, that I must give a word of reassurance. What the Government are categorically not trying to do is to remove from parents in Northern Ireland the opportunity to send children to schools compatible with their own religious convictions. We have said from the moment we took office that we did not intend to force integration, as it is called, upon anyone who did not want it. It is not our purpose now to change that policy by the back door.
My Lords, the focus of the interim Chilver Report was upon the three teacher training colleges in Belfast. Two of these are Roman Catholic foundations. I received many letters even before the report was published, rejecting a recommendation that they should be closed. Such a recommendation was never made and I would not have entertained it. What it has commended is consideration of ways in which these colleges can be brought into closer and more economical association with the third teacher training college and with Queen's University

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Belfast. The report recommends that St. Mary's and St. Joseph's should be amalgamated to form a single voluntary college which would co-operate with Queen's University and Stranmillis College to form a Belfast Centre for Teacher Education. Each of the three partners in the Belfast Centre would maintain a separate legal and administrative existence but would operate from a single site.
That is something we must look at. It is something upon which I am seeking opinions from the widest possible spectrum of those concerned. I have asked for those opinions by the end of September, but I understand that there may be real difficulties in meeting that deadline and I am at present trying to establish whether a very modest extension would make things easier. I do not want to have to set the time back too far because it will take me some time to analyse the very considerable volume of comment I am expecting, and I do not want the next stages of consultation and decision to be rushed. Equally, we must not find ourselves unable to reach a conclusion in principle in time to make any appropriate adjustment in entry levels in 1981 as a preliminary to any reorganisation we may agree upon. I use the word "agree" advisedly, because I shall do everything I can to reach agreement on this sensitive and important issue. I believe that solutions are available which will both preserve the traditional standards and ethos of training in the colleges as they are now organised and achieve a level to costs that will be acceptable to Parliament. I believe that if we go about it in the right way there may be other advantages to be had as well. I do beg all those concerned to consider the present position positively and constructively to see whether it does not present all concerned with very real opportunities to grasp advantages; not to destroy traditions but to enhance them.
My Lords, the schedule to this order contains 12 classes of expenditure and I have touched on only two. I think it is now time for noble Lords to speak to the matters that are at the forefront of their minds and I shall do my best to respond to them at the end of this debate.
Moved, that the draft order laid before the House on 19th July be approved—(Lord Elton.)
3.50 p.m.
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, I should like to take this opportunity to thank the noble Lord, Lord Elton, for the comprehensive statement on this appropriation order. Certainly I agree with a number of points that he has raised, particularly in respect to education, but I do not intend to go down the lengthy road that he has pursued in connection with education. I think that is a matter for another day dealing with educational policy. I think that today we are concerned with the industrial development of the Province and the votes for monies to maintain that development.
So I look upon this in the context of Northern Ireland's future for environmental, social and industrial developments. This appropriation order is of crucial importance in that respect. In order to consider the order effectively, I understand that two other documents are essential. The Minister mentioned one, the estimates of services. I would draw attention to another which is equally important if not more important; that is, the Government's expenditure plans for 1980 to 1984. In the draft order various sums are proposed for appropriation by the Northern Ireland Departments which, taken over a full year, approximate to over £2,000 million. Because of the current social and economic problems in Northern Ireland, and because of the distinctive financial relationships that exist between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, I consider it vital to the future progress on all fronts that information and debate about these financial matters should be as open and as widespread as possible. Whatever methods may be used to arrive at the sums to be appropriated, it appears to many in Norther Ireland that progress in tackling the social and economic ills of the Province in any serious way is postponed until national or United Kingdom economic recovery occurs. This has already been stated.
If this is true and is considered to be a reasonable strategy, we are entitled to ask whether Northern Ireland is bearing a disproportionate share of the economic burden and hardship? Will it reduce the ability of the Province to respond to an upsurge in economic activity, should and when this economic upsurge occurs? It would help considerably to assess the

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position if we knew what criterion is applied in determining Northern Ireland's financial needs. I mean "needs" in the context which was mentioned in the recent constitutional consultative paper.
How is Northern Ireland's share of the public expenditure arrived at in the Government's estimated plans? What criterion is applied when apportioning the sums among Northern Ireland Departments? I consider that it is essential to get the debate on these matters into the open and away from the exclusive domain of meetings of Ministers and permanent secretaries, however necessary these meetings may be in Treasury terms.
It seems inconsistent for this Government to be talking about the need for more local democracy when in fact so many of the decisions are first made known by the press, radio and television, and before any due consultation and debate has taken place. It has the essence of Government by edict, and edict which is unlikely to inspire productive motivation and responsible, informed co-operation.
The order is obviously most important not only for this year but in setting the pattern for future years. We have no accompanying explanatory notes. May I ask whether more explicit details will be provided than those already enunciated by the Minister? I consider that the public are entitled to have more information about these issues, and while Parliament are expected to inquire, debate and approve the sums to be appropriated, I feel that much more is required concerning the strategy, the plans and the programme on which this expenditure has been based.
I have quite a list of matters which have been raised with me directly concerning the No.2 Appropriation Order. It is not my intention to deal with these at length; indeed, I apologise to the Minister that I mentioned only two of these to him because we both had difficulties in communicating owing to business imposed on us today. Therefore, I am not proposing to argue these points through today. I raise them briefly and I will be satisfied if on some occasion the noble Lord can write to me or go into more detail about them. The first one concerns the Class I and Class VI votes dealing with manpower staffs. As I
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understand the estimates for services, they are already budgeted for 1,006 redundancies. While unemployment in any sector would not make me happy and I would not wish in any way to condone it, I should like to ask whether it is a fact that nine-tenths of the persons listed in the central services staff are manual workers, and are most of these persons employed on the Urban and Rural Improvement Campaign, better known as URIC?
The second point I wish to deal with is cross-border projects. An element of it comes up in Class I. I recognise that it is only one small element. In cross-border projects we are concerned with three major Governmental organisations—that is, the EEC, with the sovereign Parliament of the United Kingdom; the sovereign Parliament of the Republic and of course the devolved Government of Northern Ireland under the direct rule arrangement. I understand that under the Class I vote there were monies voted for cross-border research and promotion of mutal development projects concerning fishing. These have benefits both to fishermen in the North of Ireland and the South. Certainly, I welcome that and wish to encourage it.
I am concerned with the announcements that were made three years ago for the North-West and Derry-Donegal project, for the Erne catchment area announced on 9th June and the Newry-Dundalk infrastructure report announced on 14th February. These were launched with tremendous gusto, with glossy brochures and Press coverage. It raises the expectations of people in these areas and peoples in both parts of Ireland. They are subsequently bitterly disappointed if there does not appear to be any progress. First, will the votes continue for any feasible projects that might benefit in connection with North-South co-operation? Secondly, could we have frequent or half-yearly progress reports of these cross-border projects?
I was surprised when the Minister mentioned about the Government support for industrial regeneration. It is not consistent with the general position as presented in these estimates for services. I would wholeheartedly agree and give every encouragement to money being expended for industrial development. In

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the Class II vote I understand there has been a reduction in staff of 30 people, 20 from the Department of Commerce and 10 from the Department of Manpower, who were dealing directly with the industrial support and regeneration departments. Certainly this is linked with a considerable reduction in finance. Is it really in line with what the noble Lord said; that there is this great thrust forward or desire of the Government to help in every possible way for industrial regeneration?
The noble Lord mentioned electricity, which is on the Class III vote. I would prefer to deal with it in terms of energy because we are dealing with much more than electricity, and to the £18 million also could be added some matters of subsidy for electricity tariffs, and the discounting and other aspects. In trying to be brief, I think I can best deal with this by reading a statement about energy which was made by the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, from these Opposition Benches on 18th March 1979 at column 342 of the Official Report. He spoke as follows in connection with the appropriations:
"The second question I should like to ask is whether planning has advanced at all so far as the construction of a natural gas pipeline from Great Britain to Northern Ireland is concerned. Some months ago in your Lordships' House and also in another place the Government announced a substantial grant of financial aid which is to be given to the Northern Ireland electricity service. What concerns me is the position in which that rather piecemeal approach—welcome though it was so far as Northern Ireland electricity is concerned—leaves the Northern Ireland gas service; and what are the Government's intentions for the Northern Ireland gas service in general as far as the future is concerned?"
That statement made in March 1979 is good enough for me to present today to the Minister.
I should like to put two supplementary questions. Is Northern Ireland destined to remain a separate energy system or will electricity or gas connections with Great Britain be considered anew in the future? Will Northern Ireland consumers continue to bear the burden of the vast energy costs in the United Kingdom, if not in Europe, devoid of any opportunities for cross-subsidisation, while the British Gas Corporation, for example, makes enormous windfall profits?
I should like now to deal with the Class II vote; and I think it is Item 6 which deals
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with the youth opportunities programme. Any review of the public expenditure ought seriously to take into consideration what has happened to this programme. We have for 1979–80 £5,617,009, and for 1980–81 it has been reduced to £5,277,000. In real terms, one-fifth has been cut from the youth opportunities programme, and when we think of the terrible problems facing the youth of Northern Ireland—I do not want at this stage to go into the detail because there will be another occasion for that—I would say that the Government ought to give serious attention to the needs of this particular programme. I know that the record of some of these projects is tremendous in the sense of motivating people and helping them to see the responsibility of citizenship. In one youth opportunities project, 87 per cent. of the young persons participating have been placed in employment, and I think that is a record second to none.
I would also ask this question. Now that the programme has been going on for something like three years, is it not time that some research was done into the whole development and as to what can be done in positive terms for youth opportunities? The question of roads has been raised with me and also the question of concessionary fares, which have been considerably reduced on road passenger services. There is also the matter of capital expenditure for education and library boards for youth services—again there is a big question mark about the Government's intentions.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, I am sorry, but I did not catch what it was about the education and library boards that the noble Lord wished to raise.
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, I want to be as brief as possible. It is the Class VIII vote, Item 4, and the page number in the estimates is VIII (16), capital expenditure entailed by educational and library boards for youth services. That has been considerably cut from £2,789 to £1,861. These are education and library boards dealing with local areas and with the needs in some small rural and development areas. I should have thought that certainly capital development in this area was most essential.
I feel that I should stop there, because other speakers will wish to take part in

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this debate. I would say that certainly I support the order. I know we shall have an opportunity to come back to it, and I would hope that when the review has been undertaken by the Government perhaps there will be a brighter future for the people of Northern Ireland.
4.6 p.m.
Lord HAMPTON: My Lords, following the change of timetable for today at a fairly late date, I hope the House will excuse me if I cannot be present at the end of the Business for Northern Ireland. I, too, would like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Elton, for explaining the situation and I have listened with interest to what both noble Lords have said. I shall speak only briefly.
So often is the expression "vicious circle" used that I hestitate now to employ it, but I do so because it best sums up the problem faced by any Government who seek to bring to an end the unrest and unhappiness still experienced in Northern Ireland today. If housing, unemployment and general conditions of life were better in the Province, the terrorist grip would weaken, and if the terrorist grip failed this would make better conditions of life more easily obtainable. There still seems quite a body of opinion which is pessimistic of a breakthrough, and this makes all the more admirable the attitude of those who refuse to despair.
Perhaps I might follow on what the Minister has said about education. Looking back over Hansard for last July, I find that I then quoted from a speech by Mrs. Linehan, who was at that time chairman of the All Children Together movement. I should like here to repeat just one thought that she put forward. She said:
"If ever we are to reach real peace … we shall have to begin with children."
Two years ago Parliament passed the Education (Northern Ireland) Act to facilitate integrated education. It was repeatedly emphasised that this was only an enabling measure to make such arrangements easier. There was no question of compulsion. I here make some comments some two years later and then, if I may, I will put some questions to the Minister. I attempt not to criticise, but to discover the truth.
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First, I quote disturbing comments from the magazine Scope, the review of voluntary community work in Northern Ireland. The first is from the June issue, page 11, from a letter from Mrs. Benton, the present chairman of All Children Together. She writes:
"The churchmen seem to think that passing resolutions favouring integrated education is sufficient to keep their respective flocks happy This is not the case: far from it. As an into denominational movement in close touch whit the grass roots opinion, it is our duty to speak out and make the churchmen aware of the disappointments and frustrations of the laity".
She goes on to say:
"Ordinary people do not understand why their desire"—
I emphasise "their desire"—
"to have shared schools is studiously ignored".
Mr. Desmond Wilson claims:
"None of the churches wants integrated schools. They simply say they want it and make sure not to do it. … They will not help, they will wait".
Those are strong words. On the other hand, a Presbyterian minister complains that the churches were never properly consulted over the drafting of the Education Bill and seem unenthusiastic about its aims anyway.
It is of course clear that any major changes in educational arrangements will take time to work through the system and where there are segregated living quarters, the bringing of children together for schooling is obviously difficult. It is the old problem. Which is to come first—living or schooling together?
Therefore, I should like to ask the noble Lord the Minister whether the Education Act 1978 has in fact had any real success. Does he feel that church leaders are holding back against the wishes of the laity to have their children educated together? Does he not think that a working party could with advantage be set up to reconsider the whole matter? Finally on this point, does he agree that the desire for integrated education stems from a desire of Christians to get together, rather than a turning away from any real faith?
Another point on which I should appreciate clarification is this. At a time when the Province still has much bad housing and is going through a critical time of high unemployment, are the Government having any success in

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encouraging voluntary employment, particularly for the young? It is good, for instance, to learn that ICI is giving £25,000-worth of paint to voluntary groups, charities et cetera. If used wisely, such a scheme could surely help both the individuals concerned and the community in general.
4.11 p.m.
Lord MOYOLA: My Lords, I should like to address a few remarks on the subject of unemployment in Northern Ireland. I am told that, at the moment, unemployment is running at the highest rate since 1938 and to me, against the background of our already serious security problems, this is indeed a very serious matter. It seems inevitable that if there is no work and no money for people, some of them, at any rate, will get themselves involved in terrorism.
We have all talked about rent-a-crowd, and most people probably know that sums of money are paid to people in Northern Ireland by the godfathers of terrorism to shoot a soldier, a policeman or a prison officer. If we are going to have, or already have, almost mass unemployment, then, inevitably, some of the unemployed will get involved in this way. If we allow firms to go on laying people off, and in many cases continuing to close, then, inevitably, more soldiers' and policemen's lives will be put at risk. That is not taking regard of whatever costs there may be to the Exchequer in repairing the result of terrorist damage.
Those of us who live in Northern Ireland often come here to complain about security, and grouse about what is done or is not done by the security forces. In many cases, that is probably because we are dissatisfied owing to factors of which we are unaware, and of which, because of the interests of security, we cannot be told. But I do not believe there can be any dispute whatsoever about the dangers which I am outlining. If people do not have work to do, or do not have some form of occupation, some of them will become "hit" men and the targets will be soldiers and policemen. I know that wands cannot be waved and that employment cannot be provided overnight, but it seems to me that the
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moment has come for very urgent action to try to prevent unemployment from continuing to rise.
Our economy in Northern Ireland is traditionally dependent on three things. The first, is ships, which have already been mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Elton, and that industry has recently been promised very substantial aid, for which we are grateful, so I shall not dwell on that. The next is textiles and the third is farming. Perhaps here I should say that, while I myself have no direct interest, my wife has an interest, so I hear a lot about textiles and have an indirect interest in that way. Closures in the textile trade are becoming a regular event. Practically every night on television we now hear of either lay-offs or closures.
We are now in the period of what in Northern Ireland is regarded as the July holiday season. Traditionally, most of the firms close for a fortnight during this period, but there are very many of us who are wondering how many of them will be open at the end of this month. I am told that there are already something of the order of 12,000 to 15,000 jobs in the textile trade which have gone out of the window. So, if I am right, it is obvious that something needs to be done urgently to help that industry. We are always looking for new jobs and trying to get new industry to comeߞI have been doing it all my political life—but this is one of the times when what is most urgent is to try to help existing firms to stay in business.
I know that lots of people will say that some of these firms are lame ducks, that they cannot look after themselves and that we should not do anything about them. It is very easy to say that, but that does not take regard of the fact that very many of those so-called lame ducks have ploughed back an enormous amount of money into their industry, into new equipment and so on, often under Government pressure, and if they had not done that they might now have a nest egg which would carry them over the present very difficult period.
I can make only two or three suggestions which are probably very simple, because I am not involved in this kind of trade. But, obviously, the first one is about the old chestnut of the problem of imports. I am not one who wants to advocate

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import controls, but I am told—and I have no reason to believe that it is not true—that there are an enormous amount of cheap textiles coming into the EEC through the back door. I understand that they come in very large quantities from Poland and Czechoslovakia. It has always been my belief that once we were in the EEC we should be protected against that kind of thing, so I hope that something might be looked at in that regard.
Then—I hesitate even to mention it—something in the form of a subsidy, even if only of a temporary nature, is needed at the moment. I can only suggest that we go back to the temporary employment subsidy, of which I never really approved. But it is the case that needs must as the devil drives, and I do not believe that it would be necessary for it to last very long—probably six or nine months, which I hope would get us over the worst of the recession.
The third point which I should like to mention is that the textile trade has a form of assistance known as the short-time working scheme. It is a very well-intentioned scheme whereby, when a firm is on short-time, the Government make up the difference in workers' pay between the days actually worked and the days normally worked. There is nothing wrong with that, but it is of not the slightest help to any firm which is struggling to survive, except that it keeps its workers on the pay-roll until the time when conditions improve. But it is of no help to the firm itself, which still has all its commitments to meet, and I take the view that coupled with that there should be some help to keep firms in business. That is sufficient on the textile trade, except to say that the situation is extremely serious.
The situation in the farming world is also extremely serious. Here, again, I must declare my own interest as a farmer. The aspects of it with which I am concerned are pigs, poultry and eggs, all of which require imported feedingstuffs. Because in Northern Ireland we are a nation of small farms—in fact, one might almost say very small farms—and because we have a small population, and do not consume all that is produced, something of the order of two-thirds of our produce has to come over to Britain, to be sold here.
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That is fair enough—or would be if it were not for the sea crossing between our two countries. As I said, because of small farms we go into intensive farming, which means a lot of imported feedingstuffs, much of which has to come over the Irish Sea or maybe other seas and the product has to go out over the Irish Sea; so inevitably at all times Northern Ireland producers are at a great disadvantage from the point of view of price. If they are going to be competitive they must sell at the same price as all the rest, and therefore they have to accept a lower income than farmers in the rest of Great Britain. The situation has been getting worse and worse over the past few months, and although I cannot give the figures I am told that the situation is now so bad that something of the order of half the numbers of people involved in pigs and poultry may well decide to go out of business. That means something like 5,000 extra jobs needed, and in the present climate they just are not there.
I do not want to labour this particular point but I cannot over-emphasise the seriousness of the employment situation in Northern Ireland. Unemployment is terrifyingly high, and apart from the social problems and the cost to the Exchequer in unemployment benefit, as I said at the beginning there is the overriding security problem, and if more people are out of work there will be an increased security problem for the police and the army.
The last point that I wish to make about the situation is that, while of course we want and welcome new industry, it is at this moment that efforts should be made to try to keep in being those industries that have been established and have been there for some years. I hope that the noble Lord will be able to give me some help and hope on that point.
4.23 p.m.
Lord GREY of NAUNTON: My Lords, I seek to make two limited points, both of which arise within the field of the direct ministerial responsibility of the noble Lord, Lord Elton. The first is about university education, and here I declare an interest. I am privileged to be the very new chancellor of the New university of Ulster, in succession to the much loved and respected fourth Duke of Abercorn, the father of the noble Duke who is in his place in the House. I am

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informed that the vice chancellors of the New university of Ulster and of the Queens University of Belfast have received, as I think have the chief executives of other spending agencies, a notification from the Government that they should not commit themselves to new expenditure while consideration is given to the possible revision of priorities previously established for expenditure in 1980/81.
The plans of the universities for spending in the current year are of course related to the recommendations that have been made by the University Grants Committee, and I am told that that committee, in making their recommendations, took full account of the unhappy economic state of the country and the Government's desire to limit public expenditure. But I am told also that for, I think, 35 years it has been the practice of the Department of Education in Northern Ireland to give effect to the recommendations of the University Grants Committee and I content myself with expressing the hope, not just that the money will be provided but that the policy will be maintained and that effect will in fact be given to the recommendations of the University Grants Committee.
The second point I wish to make—and here again I have a very small interest to declare—relates to the provision for sport, or more correctly the manner in which that provision is to be used. My interest is merely that I am the patron of the Ulster Sport and Recreation Trust and I am told that patrons, like chancellors of universities, should exercise a benevolent influence and neither say nor do anything, but I trust that I shall be pardoned for this departure from the rule. The Ulster Sport and Recreation Trust has no direct responsibility for the Ulster Sports Council, but it has of course a very considerable concern and the answers given by the noble Lord, Lord Elton, to a question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Blease, on, I think, the 9th July, have caused some disquiet.
It is not that it is proposed to limit the amount of money that the Government devote to supporting sport and recreation. Indeed, it is unthinkable that a Government which necessarily spends many millions of pounds and a great deal of ingenuity in devising schemes for making
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the people of Northern Ireland live more happily together, should diminish rather than increase their support for one of the best ways of getting people to live happily together, which is by the encouragement of sport. That is a considerable, effective and, I should think, cost-effective way of bringing people together. But if, as I gather, the Government's decision is that the executive authority of the Sports Council should be removed and 42 professional staff should be made redundant one is bound to ask whether that is the best way of going about it.
It is never very easy, as the Government may have found, to please all of the people of Northern Ireland all of the time, but one of the most certain ways of displeasing almost all of them is to give the impression that the Government—and particularly the civil servants—know best what is good for the people of Northern Ireland. However well intentioned this may be—and I think it is what the noble Lord, Lord Blease, refers to as "Government by diktat"—it does have a disastrous effect. It may well be that there is room for economy in the working of the Sports Council and its professional staff, but was this the best way to go about it and is there not good reason to suppose that it would be helpful to have the independent, impartial inquiry into the matter which last week the Minister thought was unnecessary?
4.29 p.m.
Viscount BROOKEBOROUGH: My Lords, I should like to welcome this appropriation order, explaining as it does the use of money in Northern Ireland. I should like to begin by paying a tribute to the Secretary of State's team in their managing to achieve such tremendous industrial promotion. It may be inadequate but in the economic climate today, managing to trap Lear Fan into coming into Aldegrove with 1,200 jobs is a magnificent achievement, but all of that does not in any way detract from the very serious unemployment situation which we face in Northern Ireland. I should like to support my noble friend Lord Moyola in his plea that the question of unemployment should be given what would appear to me to be a higher priority than at present.
The noble Lord, Lord Blease, raised the question of the dismissal of URIC—

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which is the Urban and Rural Improvement Campaign—and I should like to ask the noble Lord whether he can say what the complete saving is from having dismissed 1,200 people, because as I understand it, if we take the wages of those 1,200 people and then take the unemployment benefit which would accrue to them when they are put on the dole, plus the social benefits to which they are entitled, and then add over £1 million of redundancy money to be paid, the answer will be a lemon. Really nothing goes so close to contributing to the suggestion made by my right honourable friend Sir Geoffrey Howe that there should be social work, than the operation of URIC in Northern Ireland.
I should like to ask two questions, the first about the Sports Council and the second about agriculture. It is right that we should get the Sports Council question into perspective. We are discussing very small sums of money, but we are discussing what people feel to be an injustice. Irrespective of whether the sum of money is great or small, the injustice is there and I feel that there should be some remedy.
May I begin by paying a tribute to the Northern Ireland Civil Service which I think is the best Civil Service in the United Kingdom. They have served the United Kingdom in the most difficult circumstances possible. I have found the Civil Service—and I pay tribute also to the noble Lord and his own Ministry—to be exceptionally available and to be exceptionally helpful to me. I certainly would not subscribe to statements which I think were implied, that they are anything but rapid in the attention that they give to anything which is put before them.
I should also like to pay tribute to the noble Lord and his staff in consultations. Nothing has demonstrated his care more than his description of how he wishes to go forward with the amalgamation of the teachers' training college. He takes infinite care. In Northern Ireland politics, we pay a compliment to a speaker before we tear him apart, so the noble Lord will realise what is about to come. He is about to be torn limb from limb! The noble Lord explained the care with which he and his Ministry have dealt with teacher training. He has been involved in open consultation, and the enormous amount of time he has spent on education
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leaves him open to the accusation of not proceeding in the proper way so far as the Sports Council is concerned. However, what I say now must not be taken as detracting from the tremendous qualities of the noble Lord and his staff in dealing with education.
May I tell your Lordships a little about the history of the Sports Council. It is about six years old, and from the very beginning there was a clash of personalities between people in the Sports Council and people in the Ministry of Education. Long before my noble friend the Minister was at the Ministry there was talk of abolition. At that time it had nothing to do with the economy or with the economics of running the Sports Council. It was a question of failure to operate in a co-operative manner. Since the formation of the Sports Council, the development of local councils has been immense. There ought to have been a review, but conditions between the two bodies were so bad that when the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, wished to change the chairman—he was a very eminent man, Donald Shearer, much loved by all sportsmen and a great rugby player—the changeover was carried out in a rather offensive manner. I discussed the matter with the noble Lord, Lord Melchett. So the difficulty which the Ministry of Education appear to have when dealing with the Sports Council is very deep-seated.
The Government have said—this is an executive decision, and I certainly do not question it—that there are 40 too many employees dealing with sport. It is open to them to sack 20 employees in the Ministry of Education and 20 in the Sports Council. It is a matter of balance. What is clearly unjust is that this was not done in an impartial manner. There is nothing secret about the running of sport. I must declare an interest here. I am a member of a governing body of sport. Therefore, I have been involved with one part of the Sports Council which is dealing with the governing body, but in no way have I been involved with a local authority.
The reason why I quarrel with the executive decision of the Government to economise is because what is at stake here is the employment of 40 employees of the Sports Council. The Civil Service Department which deals with efficiency

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carried out an inquiry and the result was that 40 members of the Sports Council should go. Nothing in the world can make me believe that the members of the Sports Council will consider that to be fair. I believe that the members of the Civil Service are so high class that they would not make any decision which they believed to be unfair. However, we are dealing with the general public. I thought we were in a period of open government. Therefore I feel that we should have an independent inquiry.
I should like to turn to agriculture. The noble Lord, Lord Moyola, spoke about morale in agriculture and said that our third largest industry is in a parlous plight. Although the milk industry in Great Britain knows the final price, in Northern Ireland we still do not know what the final price to be paid to the producer is. We are further on in the year. The Government must make up their mind about how much milk aid they are going to give. At the moment, the beef industry has to contend with an incredibly weak market. It is becoming weaker every day. There is no sign of that market strengthening.
May I turn in rather more detail to a subject which I have raised in debates in EEC Sub-Committee D; namely, the question of pigs, poultry and eggs. May I repeat in this House that this is an efficient industry. It is also an inventive industry. It has shown the way during the last 40 or 50 years. Its grain handling is efficient but is based on American grain, not upon the present EEC set-up, with grain coming from the eastern part of England and from France. As the noble Lord, Lord Moyola, has said, the problem is that two-thirds of its products are sold in Great Britain, with a transport barrier across the sea one way. Furthermore, the feedstuffs of its competitors in this country are between £12 and £15 a ton dearer. There is no doubt that without some form of assistance, 5,000 jobs will go. New jobs cannot be found. We know what it cost to bring in Lear Fan and DeLorean—£20,000 a job for DeLorean. The cost to this country of putting these men on social security would be far greater than it would cost to bring down the price of feed to approximately the level that obtained in the rest of the United Kingdom.
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The common agricultural policy has within it what is called a social element. I believe that the Government must press very hard, and very early, for the social element to be used in order to preserve our industry. My noble friend Lord Elton will say that FEOGA will come forward with a proposal to raise the level of grant which they provide from 25 per cent. to 50 per cent. But there is not a single person in trade or industry in Northern Ireland who believes that that is any use at all, because at the moment that that money is paid, in about three years, no pigs and poultry will be coming forward to be processed in these beautiful new plants which may or may not be built. The extra feed cost is £15 per ton. This aid must be paid to the producers to reduce the price of the feed, and not to the processors, or in two years' time we shall have no industry. I welcome this order.
4.39 p.m.
The Duke of ABERCORN: My Lords, I feel reticent about following in the slipstream of a former Prime Minister and a former Governor, and I believe that a further former Prime Minister will also be partaking in the discussion on this order. May I thank the noble Lord, Lord Grey, for his kind remarks. I can assure him that his recent appointment as chancellor of the University of Ulster has brought widespread happiness and pleasure to every section of the community in Northern Ireland.
I welcome this order, and I know that the Government are fully aware of and conversant with the economic situation at the present time in Northern Ireland, with almost daily announcement of factory closures. The situation is indeed extremely serious if not critical, and forceful opinions have been expressed in recent weeks recommending ways and means for the Government to alleviate the pressures of the current recession on the Northern Ireland economy.
I am going to raise two proposals for consideration by the Government. In evaluating our economic situation I believe it is important to remember that Northern Ireland has a microscopic consumer market, since the population of the island of Ireland is only 4½ million people compared with some 55 million in Great

1977
Britain and 260 million in the United States of America. Therefore, the vast majority of our manufacturing output has to be exported, thus incurring very considerable freight rates since the Irish Sea is an extremely expensive crossing. We have no raw materials, and our energy costs are higher than in any other part of the United Kingdom. Therefore, it is only through our brain power, our efficiency and technology that we can survive economically.
Although there is very considerable management talent in Northern Ireland, industry and commerce are in need, sometimes in serious and dire need, to recruit management from outside. Due to violence it is only too obvious that it is extremely difficult and sometimes impossible to recruit this essential management from outside. In the majority of instances industry is in fact seeking management to control enterprises which have received very considerable Government grant aid. Surely the Government could in fact alleviate this problem and thereby positively assist in ensuring that public money has been wisely invested by introducing a differential rate of income tax for management who are prepared to come and live and work in Northern Ireland.
It is accepted in the industrial world that the tax-free concessions offered by the Irish Government are the most effective inducement in attracting inward investment. Therefore, at minimum cost to the Treasury but to the maximum benefit of Northern Ireland, could not the Government implement a tax-free holiday to encourage management to move to Northern Ireland, and indeed other development areas of the United Kingdom? One can, of course, anticipate the reaction of those with inflexible, if not cynical, minds; but I have great respect for the Minister in charge of commerce in Northern Ireland, Mr. Giles Shaw, and I trust that this suggestion will meet with an in-depth consideration.
Secondly, as the noble Lord, Lord Blease, has already said, we have extremely high energy costs; and since the Government accept that energy is a national resource in the United Kingdom as a whole, surely there must he a strong case for equalising energy costs throughout the United Kingdom, thus ensuring
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that those located furthest from the source should not be paying more. This would of course be of tremendous benefit to Northern Ireland industry and commerce.
My Lords, the Government by now must be fully aware of the fundamental reason why the future proposed role of the Sports Council has met with such widespread resentment and criticism. As my noble friend Lord Elton said in the House last week, the reaction was not only general but also immediate. However, I should like to emphasise that this was not just a reflex reaction but much deeper, for the Sports Council is widely accepted throughout Northern Ireland, since the public genuinely believe that the Sports Council has done an excellent job in a comparatively short period of time. Again the public are only too aware that sport is one of the few aspects of life in Northern Ireland to stabilise our community. Although only in existence for some six years, the Sports Council has operated effectively and efficiently in very difficult circumstances, and at all times has succeeded in keeping sport outside the political arena. However, by involving local councils, sport will inevitably now re-enter the political arena, which I feel is a most unfortunate prospect.
Outside Government no one can accept the assertion that the expertise of the council will be preserved when this service will be provided by the Civil Service. Like my noble friend Lord Brookeborough, I have the greatest respect for the Northern Ireland Civil Service. I do not doubt the ability and indeed the enthusiasm of the Civil Service, particularly in the noble Lord's department. However, by training and nature they are responsive to circumstances, while an innovatory role in planning 10 years ahead is, I believe, vital.
Considerable emphasis has been made in regard to the possible saving of £200,000 per annum if these proposals are implemented. In isolation £200,000 appears to be a considerable saving, but in the context of the Northern Ireland Department of Education annual expenditure of £364 million, and since every man and woman in Northern Ireland is fully conscious of continuous bureaucratic waste, no one can be convinced that this saving will in fact be justified. Since no organisation is totally efficient or cost-effective, I believe

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the time is now opportune for the Government to reconsider these proposals and at the same time urgently consider how the existing framework can be improved upon.
4.49 p.m.
Lord O'NEILL of the MAINE: My Lords, I should like to make just a very few remarks, as I think we are probably coming to the end of this debate. The most heartening thing I heard from the noble Lord the Minister was that he hoped to be coming back to your Lordships' House to agree additional expenditure for industrial development. At a time when everything is being cut down everywhere I was heartened by those remarks.
I often feel, looking into the past, that the people of Northern Ireland have not sufficiently appreciated the marvellous work that the Department of Commerce, as it is now called—it used to be the Ministry of Commerce in my day—have done for the people of Northern Ireland, not least the Northern Ireland Development Office in New York. It may astonish some Members of your Lordships' House to hear that Duponts, one of the most famous American firms, made their first European investment in Northern Ireland, and this was directly due to the people that we kept in New York, naturally in close association with the British Consulate General but nevertheless civil servants from Northern Ireland. Once Duponts had decided to make Northern Ireland their place of work in Europe, then many other American, and in particular multinational, companies settled in Northern Ireland.
It would be hard for someone who did not come from Northern Ireland to understand the immense changes that the arrival of multinational companies created in Northern Ireland, because they did not in any way discriminate as regards employment. They did not care whether a man was a Catholic or a Protestant; if he was a good worker they were willing to employ him. It was no use a deputation going to the management and saying, "We shall go on strike if you employ any more Catholics", because the management could say, "Very well, we shall go back to Chicago" or from wherever it was that they had come. This has been one of the biggest revolutions in Northern
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Ireland employment history. I always visit the Northern Ireland Development Office whenever I am in New York, and I think that it is marvellous that it has been able to continue to attract industry at this time when the situation has been so difficult.
I should like to ask the Minister about a matter which seems to me to be so sad. One of the few things that emerged from my meeting with Mr. Lemass, the Prime Minister of Southern Ireland in the 1960s, was that there would be a connection between the Northern Ireland Electricity and the Southern Irish Electricity. That was a most important decision because in the summer time the South of Ireland lacked electricity and in the winter time—at that time—Northern Ireland lacked electricity. Therefore, the connection between the two electricity systems was vital. Needless to say, it has been blown up by the IRA, I think, five times. I should like to know whether there is any chance of reintroducing a connection with the necessary safeguards. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Dunleath, asked the other day about the possibility of a gas pipeline from Great Britain to Northern Ireland. That, I think, would be a marvellous thing; but it must be remembered that if it ever were to come about it would, of course, have to be protected.
I do not wish to weary the noble Lord the Minister and so I shall not repeat the remarks which I made when the noble Lord, Lord Blease, put down a Question about the Sports Council. However, I shall read out just one sentence which apparently, according to Hansard, I said:
"It seems quite wrong to me that a body which has worked extremely well on a non-sectarian non-political basis should be treated in this manner ".—[Official Report, 9/7/80; col. 1171.]
I should like to repeat that and to support all the other noble Lords from Northern Ireland who have raised this matter. I plead with the Minister that perhaps during the coming months he might look into the matter further to see whether in any way he can meet some of the objections which we have raised.
4.53 p.m.
Lord VAIZEY: My Lords, as the second Englishman to take part in this brief debate I should like to raise a number

1981
of issues. First, I should like to reiterate what my noble friend Lord Brooke-borough said about the quality of the Northern Ireland Civil Service. In so far as the Province has continued to function normally during this abominable campaign, it is fundamentally due to the extraordinarily efficient Civil Service in Northern Ireland. When we are thinking about the constitutional future of the Province it is very important that that matter should be borne in mind.
I was very impressed by something which the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, said: unless the social and economic conditions of the Province improve, the violence will probably become worse. With great respect, having since it began followed this matter with great interest and great personal involvement, I do not believe that that is true. I believe that the people who are involved in violence, psychopathic as many of them are, have become involved in violence because that is what they wish to be involved in—they want to bring the present structure totally to the ground. I believe that their involvement with violence is quite irrespective of the social and economic conditions which prevail in the Province.
It is a fundamental error to believe that the cause of the violence was the relative poverty of the Province as compared with the rest of the United Kingdom. I believe that the causes lie very much deeper in the history of Ireland and they lie much deeper in the human mind and the human soul. I wish that I could believe that by restoring prosperity or by achieving high prosperity in Northern Ireland violence would disappear. However, I honestly do not believe that the evidence supports that proposition for one moment.
I very much agree with the noble Lord, Lord Blease, that the United Kingdom should try to tackle the social and economic ills in the Province because they are social and economic ills, and not because that is an indirect way of getting rid of the violence. The only way to get rid of the violence is to eradicate it by using the police and the army, and I must say that they are doing a wonderful job.
I wish to raise two dilemmas because I do not know the answers to them and I do not, with respect, think that any of
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the best-informed people who have spoken this afternoon know the answers. They are interesting questions which I have been pondering for a long time and I cannot see my way through them. First, how are we to improve the economic condition of the Province? Compared with the rest of the United Kingdom and, indeed, compared with the rest of Europe, money has been poured into the Province to sustain industry and agriculture. Is the only way to achieve prosperity there to pour in more and more public funds? I raised that question a couple of debates ago in your Lordships' House. I remain to be convinced of that proposition. I do not think that we have yet succeeded.
I should have thought that if we look at the South, at the Republic, then what the noble Duke, the Duke of Abercorn, said is extraordinarily relevant. The Republic has been transformed in the past 15 or 20 years from an economic point of view, largely by the development of a completely new generation of business people. There has been an absolute transformation in the South. To some degree that is taking place in the North. It just is not true that the North is a complete sea of despondency. There are many very successful businesses there. The critical question is: how do we get more and better management into the -North, and get it in quickly? I do not think that we know the answer to that, but it certainly seems to me that that is where we should be looking for the answer. It is not just a question of public money. We have been told already that new jobs cost £20,000 a year each. I cannot help feeling that that is not necessarily the right road to go along.
Secondly—and this is the last point that I shall make in this brief intervention—I should like to raise a matter as regards education, something which I have studied a great deal and with which I have been very much involved in Ireland. Is it true that the opposition to the Chilver Report is opposition to the minimal integration of the religious communities? One could not do it in a more tangential, delicate fashion than is proposed in the report, but oh my dear! the uproar that that report has created. In view of the uproar that has arisen, one would have thought they had proposed that they should all be merged and be compulsorily baptised in some new faith. It is neces-

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sarily true to say that the right path to peace in Northern Ireland is by some degree of common education of children from different religious communities? I used to think that that was probably the answer. However, the depth of conservatism, the depth of prejudice or perhaps, to put it more politely, the strength of feeling which is revealed every single time one tries to take a tiny step along this line, convinces me that it does not offer any solution, at least for this generation and probably not for the next.
It seems to me that change must come about within each religious community and that we shall not get anywhere by changing the structures of education in order to find some degree of common education going across the communities. I cannot help feeling that the Chilver Report is in some sense going along the wrong lines, taking the view, very minimally, that the right solution is some degree of integration of education across the religious communities. I cannot believe that within the realities of Northern Ireland that that is a practical solution. I think that we must look elsewhere for a broadening of attitudes within each religious community. It is a rather difficult and complex matter, but is I think the more realistic one. I cannot help feeling that in some sense we have to recognise, first, the reality of violence in Northern Ireland—that the only way to get rid of violence is to tackle violence itself. Secondly, we have to recognise the realities of the division and the strength of the feelings, and work within the communities and not try to merge them.
Lord PLANT: My Lords, I did not intend to intervene in this debate, but as I was chairman of the Human Rights Commission in Northern Ireland until the end of last month, I thought that I ought to do so on this occasion. I am particularly glad that the Government have accepted one part of the advice that the Standing Advisory Committee has given; that is, not to renew Section 12, dealing with detention without trial.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, if the noble Lord will forgive me, I believe that he is speaking to the next order, which is the extension order. We are still, I regret to tell the noble Lord, dealing with the first order on the Order Paper.
Lord PLANT: My Lords, I apologise, but now that I have said it, I cannot withdraw it.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, if the noble Lord will forgive me again, if he feels so inclined there will be an opportunity for him to say it again in the proper debate, which is the next order on the Order Paper. Otherwise I think that it will extend the debate and take our minds off financial matters when what I believe he wishes to talk about is security matters, which come next.
Lord PLANT: My Lords, in that case, I shall leave it.
5.2 p.m.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, I do not wish to appear before your Lordships as a censor; I shall, of course, he most interested in what the noble Lord, Lord Plant, has to say; indeed, I had in any case intended to refer to him during the coming debate, even had he not intervened.
Perhaps I could begin by responding to the first intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Blease. He asked for a greater clarity of understanding and a greater involvement of the population of the Province of Northern Ireland in its own financial affairs. If the noble Lord and his colleagues are not in receipt of copies of the Explanatory Memorandum on Appropriation Orders, I shall be happy to see that that is remedied. They are available, and I shall ensure that in future they are sent to the noble Lord as soon as they are published.
As regards the general public of Northern Ireland, who will no more than the general public of this country get themselves involved in the technicalities of finance to that extent, we are talking about public discussion about public money and about the effects of public opinion upon the expenditure of public money. The noble Lord and I are absolutely 100 per cent. together on this matter, as is the whole of Her Majesty's Government. Are we not bending all our efforts in this direction? Did I not say this last week? Does the House not accept that a principle and overriding aim which Her Majesty's Government are pursuing is to achieve greater participation of the people of Northern Ireland in the conduct of their affairs?

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The shortcomings of which the noble Lord, Lord Blease, quite understandably complains are the shortcomings, not of the system that we should like to run, but of the system which circumstances mean we have to run. Therefore, I welcome his expression of a wish to produce institutions where it will be possible for a budget, which is the proper concern of a Northern Ireland body, to be dealt with. We want to see that body constructed. I hope that the noble Lord will use his considerable influence, wherever it can be brought to bear, to encourage those concerned—even if they do not share his political views in the Province; and I hope that other noble Lords will do likewise—who bear political responsibilities and leadership in the Province to partake in this process of true leadership, which is bringing the Province to a position where it can have its own governing institutions.
The next focus of the noble Lord's remarks was quite understandably and properly on the levels of unemployment in the Province. Indeed, his concern was echoed fortissimo by my noble friend Lord Moyola. Indeed, as the debate has progressed I have been feeling increasingly humble in coming at the end of such a distinguished list of ex-governors, ex-Prime Ministers and, indeed, Chancellors. I am very much on my best behaviour, which is by no means the way of exacting one's best performance.
My noble friend Lord Moyola directed our attention to specific matters in the field of industry. By way of introduction, I told your Lordships that we are—and I shall now re-emphasise this—in the process of reviewing the apportionment of Government funds between projects in the programmes before your Lordships. That has been the subject of polite but genuine complaint from, for one, the noble Lord, Lord Grey of Naunton. If I may, I shall come to his point a little later. But I say to all your Lordships as the preface to what I have to say on specific issues, that we are concerned to see that all the money we have is used to the best effect to generate employment.
On the specific question of textiles and clothing which my noble friend Lord Moyola raised, the Government are conscious of the very important place which these industries occupy in the economic
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structure of the Province and of the difficult trading environment in which they are at present operating. Recognition of the significance of employment in the manmade fibre sector in Northern Ireland was an important influence in the Government's decision to press for restraints on the entry into the United Kingdom of disruptive imports of polyester filament yarns and of nylon carpet yarn. Government support is available for the re-equipment and modernisation of textile and clothing companies to help them to improve their competitive position. If I may be specific, the Department of Commerce can provide 30 per cent. capital grants towards re-equipment and modernisation projects designed to make production facilities more efficient, and a number of companies have made use of this aid. However, I believe that there continues to be considerable scope for increasing productivity levels in many of our clothing companies.
The noble Lord specifically said that we should spend money to keep existing businesses in operation. That is exactly what that aspect of Her Majesty's Government's policy is directed to do. Northern Ireland cannot be insulated from developments in the world trading situation, but the Government's policy is directed towards assisting firms to meet the challenge. I do not wish to go on too long in view of the fact that there are a good many more orders on the Order Paper. I think that perhaps the House would wish me to write to the noble Lord about the regulation of imports and quota restrictions on imports to the European Economic Community.
I am still in the realm of what people do when there is an insufficiency of employment—and we all know the adage, and how well it is borne out, that the devil will find mischief yet for idle hands to do; and if the devil has the shape of a godfather, that is not in any way surprising. The noble Lord was talking about the Youth Opportunities Programme, which I believe is very relevant in this context. I can give him a little more information on what is going on. In March this year my honourable friend the Minister for Manpower Services announced a 25 per cent. increase in the number of places available to young people on the Youth Opportunities Programme for the current financial year. The number of places made available was

1987
increased from 6,000 in 1979–80 to 7,500 in 1980–81; that is many pairs of hands. Expenditure on training has to take account of the present constraints on public expenditure, to which I have already referred, but strict economy on the operational and capital costs of the training will, it is hoped, minimise any reduction in the overall training programme. I think that this is perhaps an answer to the charge of an overweaning and expensive bureaucracy, which was made earlier. I shall return to the subject.
The Government are concerned to maintain at an increased level the opportunities for training young people, particularly school-leavers, so far as is possible. Two-thirds of the places at the 13 Government training centres in Northern Ireland are taken up by young people, and these will not be reduced. I hope that the noble Lord will find some reassurance in those words.
We then turn to the matter of the Sports Council of Northern Ireland, a matter which, even if it was not close to my heart, would have been implanted there as a pacemaker many months ago. Indeed, I have been in Northern Ireland long enough to become anxious and indeed deeply worried when anybody of the political finesse of my noble friend Lord Brookeborough starts being as excessively complimentary about me as he was at the opening of his remarks. I was in no way surprised by the polite but firm wish to assassinate me which he later expressed. Of course he used the term figuratively. At least, I hope he did.
As has already been announced, the Government have made clear that they propose to introduce amending legislation by order to deprive the Sports Council of its executive functions. This will make it unnecessary for the Council to have its own paid staff and premises but will leave it in existence as a purely advisory body. It is proposed that the functions already exercised by the Council in providing financial support for the governing bodies of sport in Northern Ireland should be transferred to the Northern Ireland Department of Education, while the task of providing grants to voluntary bodies for sports equipment and for local schemes will cease to be done by the Council and instead district
1988
councils will be encouraged to use their existing powers for this purpose.
Informal consultations with those concerned are already in progress. We shall of course listen with particular attention to the considered opinions. Noble Lords have already referred to the fact that the opinions I have so far received have been immediate and reflex, and I think in one case I was told they were instinctive. I would wish that the brain as well as the instincts of many concerned could be given longer to operate on this problem. I shall listen with particular attention to the considered opinions of the Northern Ireland Council for Physical Recreation and of the Association of Local Authorities, both of which are bodies closely concerned and who have yet to give me their considered views.
I ask noble Lords to remember that we are not proposing the abolition of the Sports Council. I add that we do not presume to know best, as one noble Lord suggested we thought we might, and that is why the Sports Council for Northern Ireland will continue as an effective advisory body. What we propose is a change in the way in which it is serviced. Contrary to what some noble Lords seem to expect, this will not result in the ending of any major support service at present received either by the public or by the governing bodies of sport.
The planned savings will be made out of the administrative and staffing head of the Council's budget. The grants which enable governing bodies of sport to employ full-time development officers, for instance, will therefore continue. That may reassure some noble Lords who are familiar with this contentious and complex problem as to the fact that the large body of expertise available in the Province is not going to be dissipated to the four winds as people are suggesting.
I cannot at present say when the draft order will be laid. This is a slow process and it will not be this year, and prior to that, and after the publication of the proposed draft there will be a period during which representations can be made to the Government. These will be given careful consideration, and not least the remarks which your Lordships have made.
Viscount BROOKEBOROUGH: My Lords, would the noble Lord give way? This is the assassination about to take place. Would the noble Lord accept that the real feeling—and I think throughout this House—was that you have these two bodies, the Civil Service and the Sports Council staff, and the Sports Council staff and the general public feel that this has been done in a very unfair and undercover way? Personally, I accept the administrative decision. I find it difficult to accept that it was done fairly for the 40 people who are about to be axed. That is the major issue. I do not think I raised the question about the administration of sport not continuing. It is a question of fairness.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, it is perhaps agreeable to be shot with a honey-covered bullet, but I had not reached the point on the road at which the noble Viscount was aiming. I am seized of the point which the noble Viscount has made. I am aware of the criticisms. I am very gratified by the way in which noble Lords have removed the imputations which appear to have been made earlier against the Civil Service. I think on their behalf I should acknowledge that the things that have been said are generous, though they are not unmerited. But what I must say, and was in the process of saying, was that the order will not be published this year. If it is this year it will not be until December, but I would not expect it until January. I have not yet received the considered opinions of two of the most important bodies concerned. I have reviewed the way in which the decision was reached in regard to the advice I have received, and I am satisfied that it was properly given. Due weight will be given to everything which is said when the document is published. I do not think that any Government could go further than what I have now said.
May I move on from that subject. The noble Lord, Lord Moyola, raised a point, and he was joined by others, on matters of agriculture. I realise the importance of what was termed this afternoon, "The Province's third industry". The principle concern of the noble Lord, and indeed of the noble Viscount, Lord Brookeborough, was over the question of animal feeding-stuffs and the effect that this might have on the animal population of the Province.
1990
I cannot speak at length on this subject, but I would say that the European Community Commission have proposed a new scheme to come into operation in 1980 which will replace the feed price allowances scheme. Under this scheme, an extra £4 million will be made available over a four year period by means of an additional 25 per cent. FEOGA aid to assist capital investment in processing and marketing in the poultry, pigs, and feedingstuff industries. Your Lordships will be aware of the niceties of the consideration of additionality. That being so, I cannot at this stage give a clear commitment to the forward programme, but your Lordships may find this a grain of comfort.
The Government accept that some form of aid is essential to avoid a dramatic contraction in the poultry industry in which the noble Lord, Lord Moyola, has an indirect interest and the noble Viscount, Lord Brookeborough, may have an interest. He apparently does not have an interest. We recognise that aid of some sort is essential to avoid a dramatic contraction and a subsequent reduction in jobs. Current employment is about 5,500 and the prospects of alternative employment for anyone displaced are not good.
Relating to the whole question of the economy—and I am going to take only two more points—the whole question of the economy is of course the question of the cost of energy. I alluded to this (and the Government are aware of this) in my opening remarks. There was a plea for an interconnector. The intention is to restore the interconnector as soon as possible. The damage caused by terrorists to the interconnector with the Republic is imposing additional costs on the electricity undertakings in Northern Ireland and in the Republic. It is damaging to both economies, and both Governments have stated their determination to restore and maintain the link as soon as possible. Reference was also made to the possibliity of a gas pipeline under the sea. I spoke at some length about this last week. I would only therefore remind your Lordships of the conclusion of the very heavy expense and continuing loss that this proposal appears to us to be certain to engender.
Finally, on the matter of education, it was interesting that the debate almost

1991
started on one foot with the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, advocating integrated education on the assumption that if children could be brought together in the same schools they would get to know each other, and if they were taught history by the same history teachers they would get to recognise each other, It concluded on the other with the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, wondering whether this was any way to conduct a progress towards peace, and whether it should not be done with a direct assualt upon terrorism.
I have been at pains to say from the outset of this Administration's assumption of power that I do not think—I now reiterate it—enforced integration will work. I do not want to go into the technicalities, but those of your Lordships who have, for instance, seen the bussing experiments in the United States will recognise that where you have communities of different persuasions living in nuclei round their schools, the only way to get children of one persuasion into schools of a different sort is to bus them, then noble Lords will realise that this is a dangerous road to pursue.
The noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, suggested that Chilver was an oblique approach to integration. Perhaps he did not take on board my references at the outset of the debate to the fact that we are not trying to use Chilver—and I do not think Chilver intended the report to be used—as a road to integration by the back door. It may be that it results in students who are being trained to teach in the two different kinds of school being on the same campus, but there is no threat that I detect that their training institutions shall have merged legal identities and that their students shall be forced together. That is a matter which no doubt will be raised in discussion which I shall look at, but people should not regard the report as a threat: nor should they think that I or Her Majesty's Government wish to use it as a threat.
The road towards peace is a great deal longer than people seem to think in some places. Some people think there is no road at all. I believe there is a road there. I think it can be pursued very slowly by getting the confidence of the people who have to walk it together. But we are now talking about money and we cannot
1992
walk anywhere unless we can pay for our shoes. I am grateful for the way noble Lords have received the order and I trust it w ill receive the agreement of the House.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

ROYAL ASSENT
The LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, the the Queen has signified her Royal Assent to the following Acts:

Coroners Act,

Social Security (No. 2) Act,

Licensing (Amendment) Act,

Films Act,

Pier and Harbour Order (Brighton West Pier) Confirmation Act,

Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Act,

Friends Meeting House (Reigate) Act,

Clifton Suspension Bridge Act,

British Olivetti Limited Act,

Eagle & Globe Steel Limited Act,

Yorkshire Woollen District Transport Act,

Standard Life Assurance Company Act,

Edward Berry and Doris Eilleen Ward (Marriage Enabling) Act.

NORTHERN IRELAND (EMERGENCY PROVISIONS) ACT 1978 (CONTINUANCE) ORDER 1980
5.24 p.m.
Lord ELTON Lord ELTON rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 8th July be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the purpose of this order is to extend for a further period of six months the powers conferred on the Government by Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1978, and the other provisions therein,

1993
rendered necessary by the terrorist emergency in the Province. When that Act was passed, Parliament recognised that the powers it conferred on the Government were exceptional and that they could be justified only by exceptional circumstances. Every six months, therefore, the Government are obliged to return to Parliament and to show that these exceptional circumstances continue to exist.
Anyone who reads the papers, let alone anyone who lives in the Province, is well aware that circumstances there are still exceptional in that terrorist organisations are still seeking to pervert justice and the overthrow of the state, and I doubt if any of your Lordships would suggest that these provisions were no longer necessary. But to say that and add nothing more would, I think, be to give a misleading and unduly depressing impression of what the Government and the security forces between them have achieved since I last came before the House for an extension of these powers.
During this year, until yesterday, there have been 181 explosions, but 90 explosive devices have been neutralised; 115 illegal weapons have been taken; 1,2708 rounds of ammunitiion, 1,445 lbs. of explosives and 203 detonators have been seized by the security forces. During the same period, 289 persons have been charged with terrorist offences, including 37 for murder and 28 for attempted murder. Convictions for scheduled offences up to the end of June numbered 363, including 13 for murder and two for attempted murder. I should explain that the apparent discrepancy between the last two sets of figures results of course from the fact that convictions during the period relate for the most part to charges brought earlier.
If we are engaged in a war of attrition, that suggests to me that it is the forces of violence that are being eroded. But there has been a price to pay. So far this year, casualties among the security forces have amounted to 124; seven have been killed and 65 wounded in the RUC and RUC Reserve. For the UDR, the figures are five and 12 and, for the Army, four and 31. I cannot stress too highly the courage and devotion to duty of the full-time armed services and of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, and this is a proper
1994
occasion for me to place on record the Government's gratitude to them for all they have done.
It is also a proper time for me to remind your Lordships of the loyal and invaluable services of the Ulster Defence Regiment and of the exceptional devotion to duty of the part-time members of that regiment, who combine very exacting and often night-long tours of duty with the conduct of their normal civilian jobs. The 10th anniversay of the foundation of the regiment was marked by a garden party at Hillsborough at which their Royal Highnesses the Duke and Duchess of Kent were able to mark, in a most gracious and welcome manner, the high regard in which the service of all members of the regiment is rightly held.
It has for long been the declared aim of Her Majesty's Government to return the maintenance of law and order in Northern Ireland to more conventional methods. We are all working for the day when policemen will again be able to keep the peace unaided. In October 1979 the permitted maximum strength of the RUC was increased from 6,500 to 7,500. Since then, there has been a net increase in strength to 6,773, and the Government remain committed to transferring control of security increasingly to the police force.
If the terrorist assault on society was an honourable affair, it would be directed only against those equipped to defend themselves. However, it is not, and I ask your Lordships now to consider the prison service of Northern Ireland. Prison officers do not arrest terrorists or other criminals; they do not try them or convict them; nor do they fix their sentences. Their duty is merely to keep them in their care for as long as the courts direct. Nor are they an armed military force; they are civilians. In the last year, eight prison officers have been killed by terrorists, callously murdered, often in their own homes. I believe it does enormous credit to the prison service that its members continue steadfast in their duty and that they have not been provoked by these assaults, nor by the propaganda attacks made against them, into improper conduct towards their charges.
Your Lordships will have noted with satisfaction, though not with surprise I think, that the European Commission of Human Rights recently dismissed as

1995
inadmissible the complaints of four prisoners engaged in the "dirty protest" at Maze Prison. They claimed they had been subjected to inhumane or degrading conditions. The Commission explicitly recognised that the conditions they complained of were self-inflicted and could be remedied very swiftly by the prisoners themselves, who persist in rejecting measures aimed at improving them.
I have spoken of the casualties in the struggle against terrorism. I should not like to leave the subject without a word of sympathy to those who have been bereaved and a word of gratitude to those who steadfastly support their loved ones in this long and vital struggle. They too are an essential part of the strength of our society. They stand very high in our regard and sympathy. One cannot in a speech offer any tangible comfort to those from whose lives a son or a husband has been snatched by the bloody hand of masked injustice, but at least one can offer recognition and sympathy, and that I am sure your Lordships will wish to do. In this context I must tell your Lordships that 29 civilians have been killed and no less than 248 injured by terrorist action up to 16th July this year.
I am very much aware that some of your Lordships support the Government's intention of returning the keeping of the peace to normal methods, and feel that we have clung for too long to some of the exceptional powers conferred under the Act. For these Section 12 of the Emergency Provision Act has in some way become symbolical. Section 12 is the section under which the Secretary of State has power to detain suspected terrorists without trial. It is a power that has not been exercised since 1975, but I recall that the noble Lord, Lord Plant—whom I am glad to see in his place for this part of the debate—for one has urged that it should not be renewed. I am happy to tell your Lordships that Her Majesty's Government do not now propose to renew this power. However, I must add that, while I hope that this gesture will be welcomed, it is in itself to some extent symbolical, since the statute does provide for its reinstitution should the need arise.
A moment ago I referred to the noble Lord, Lord Plant, and I should like to
1996
take this opportunity to pay tribute to the noble Lord, who, for the past three-and-a-half years has presided over the work of the Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights. I should also like to extend good wishes to his successor in office, Mr. David Bleakley, who took up his post at the beginning of this month. This is an important role, and our gratitude to both the noble Lord and the gentleman in question is in order.
I return to the principle consideration before your Lordships, which is that terrorist violence continues, though it continues somewhat abated, and that for that reason it is necessary to extend the provisions of the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1978 for a further period of six months. Last week your Lordships took note of the steps that the Government are taking to return the government of Northern Ireland to normality.
This afternoon I have indicated some of the steps that we are taking to restore peace-keeping to normality. I would add one gloss to what I have said already. The statistics that I have quoted, and the policies to which I have referred, relate to the Province as a whole. Now that is all very well for your Lordships sitting in a comfortable Chamber, and it gives a fair, overall picture of what is going on, but, if the picture is to have a proper perspective, I must add this: general statistics and broad policies seem remarkably irrelevant when your house has just been demolished by a bomb, or your friend or a relative has just been shot down on his doorstep. The noble Lord, Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridae, made the same point last week. Terrorists are aware of this when they select their targets and they are aware, also, of the pyschological effects of either concentrating targets in a particular area, or moving the focus of their attention from one district to another.
It would be quite wrong therefore to suppose that the whole population of the Province feels a hundred per cent. secure, and it would be even more misguided to believe that Her Majesty's Government are complacent about the current state of affairs. Her Majesty's Government are indeed aware of the stress generated by terrorism and of its other effects. I hope that I have said enough to show that they

1997
are resolute in their intention to defeat terrorism, and that that resolute determination is producing results. But it will also be clear to your Lordships that the powers to continue the struggle conferred upon Government by the Act of 1978 must be extended. My Lords, beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 8th July be approved. —(Lord Elton.)
5.34 p.m.
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Elton, for the warm way in which he has paid tribute to the security forces and to the police in Northern Ireland in his remarks in introducing the order. Without any reservation I wholeheartedly join with him in what he said regarding the security personnel, as well as the industrial security personnel who do a terrific job. I am sure that we all join with the noble Lord in recognising the terrible strain imposed on the families of prison officers and members of the security forces who behind the scenes experience much suffering in trying to keep up morale.
I also wish to associate myself with all those who from time to time have publicly expressed dislike of this legislation, and to welcome the Government's decision to lapse Section 12 and Schedule 1 to the Act. As I understand it, while the section is not in fact being taken off the statute book, the lapsing will have an important consequence in that, if it were to be used again, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland would have to justify his actions before Parliament, albeit retrospectively. This aspect of the matter introduces an important new element of democratic control, which we wholeheartedly welcome.
Sometimes the legislation has been used to greater effect to attack the interests of the people of Northern Ireland, rather than to defend them. I should like to say much more, but I know that the noble Lord, Lord Plant, wishes to take part in this debate on the order. I wish to pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Plant, for his work as chairman of the Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights. I had the pleasure of working with him on that commission for a number of years, and I know how much effort he put into
1998
trying to achieve some stability and dignity in Northern Ireland affairs. Certainly this side of the House joins in welcoming Mr. David Bleakley, whom we all know, to the position of chairman of the Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights. Mr. Bleakley will certainly have the support of this side of the House for all the objectives that he might wish to pursue in order to uphold his remit as chairman of the commission. I consider that this legislation is long overdue; the reform is supported from this side of the House.
Lord RAWLINSON of EWELL: My Lords, it was with great satisfaction that I heard that Her Majesty's Government had decided to bring to an end detention without trial, at any rate for an experimental period. When I first went to Northern Ireland with the present Home Secretary, who was then First Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, we encountered there the need felt for the system of detention without trial. I then thought that it was a great trouble. It was a blunt instrument, sometimes alas! indiscriminately, used and sometimes illegally used, as a result of which many claims were made by persons of little merit. Because there had been illegal use of the power, the Treasury had to make very substantial payments to persons who were completely worthless, but who were able to bring their claims because of the illegal operation of the power.
On other occasions I felt that there had been too blanket an approach to the use of detention, and therefore I felt that persons had been recruited to the forces of the terrorists by the uses of that power. Not for one moment do I suggest that that was done other than with the greatest integrity; but I think that that was a consequence, and I am very glad that the Government and the Secretary of State, Mr. Humphrey Atkins, have now felt strong enough to renew this particular provision.
As I have understood it, there has always been a great problem in the Province with the security forces on the one side facing incredible danger and hardships, while on the other being frustrated by the law when they thought that they had caught people when involved in terrorist activities. We have always caught to operate the rule of law, even under those terrible conditions in the

1999
Province, because martial law, which is the only alternative, is in fact no law, and we have always resolutely put our faces against it.
It has been difficult for the security forces, but it has been even more difficult for those who are responsible for the administration of justice. My noble friend paid a well deserved tribute to the security forces—the Army, and the police. I should like to pay a tribute to those who are responsible for the administration of justice in Northern Ireland: first of all, to the judges, under the Lord Chief Justice, my noble friend Lord Lowry, who throughout these years, with great courage and enormous integrity, have carried out their duties. They have had to carry out their duties at trials without juries, because the circumstances have made it impossible to have juries. They have carried out those duties with great skill and, as I have said, with great integrity.
Secondly, I should like to pay tribute to the Director of Public Prosecutions, Sir Barry Shaw, and his deputy Mr. Barney McCluskey. The difficulties of their task should not be underestimated, because many a time, it may be, when the security forces have felt that prosecutions ought to be brought, the Director has had to make his decision applying the rule of law. I believe their contribution to the maintenance of civilisation in Northern Ireland, in the face of these psychopaths and terrorists, has been a very important one, and I am sure my noble friend would want to join me in paying tribute to them.
That we have progressed to the stage where we have managed to eliminate that which is alien to the philosophies of all of us in this House and elsewhere is, I think a great tribute, not only to Mr. Humphrey Atkins and his Ministers, but to their predecessors for what they did in Northern Ireland. I think that on this occasion, in thanking this Government for being able to remove this section, even if it is only temporarily, we should also recognise the work which has been done by their predecessors.
5.42 p.m.
Lord PLANT: My Lords, I apologise for intervening in the discussion on the last order. I wanted to say something
2000
about the economic situation in Northern Ireland, but on this order I will deal with it very briefly. Let me say first how grateful the Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights is to the Government for their having accepted one of our recommendations; that is, not renewing Section 12. I am firmly of the opinion that neither the threat of the exercise of the power of detention without trial, nor the exercise itself, has deterred any terrorism. I am glad that section has gone for many reasons, the most important being that it is another example of the attitude of the Government in going along the road to peace little by little. I believe that this patient approach will shorten that road considerably, by giving the people of the Province to understand that the Government are prepared to take decisions and to repeal certain parts of the emergency legislation.
On three previous occasions the commission made recommendations, both that the power of a judge to grant bail should be looked at again and concerning the admissibility of statements, Section 2 and Section 8. But so far the Government have not accepted those recommendations; neither have they in relation to Section 11 and Section 14. But our point of view has been put very clearly on paper, and the Secretary of State has replied at very considerable length giving detailed reasons why he could not accept the proposals of the commission. However, I believe that what has been done, little as it is, will have a considerable effect.
I was interested that the noble Lord, Lord Elton, mentioned the Strasbourg decision. I have always said that the prisoners in Long Kesh, in H block, are bringing about the difficulties themselves. They are making their own problems. They never have any chance of winning a human rights issue at Strasbourg. But it would be wrong of me not to say that the issue of H block has not concerned me very much on the human rights side. I say that for this reason. There are some prisoners who are in prison in their own clothing. Others, after a certain point in time, have been taking this action of "going on the blanket". Why? Because they lose rights and privileges—and we should not overlook, as I am sure the Government will not, the privilege of remission

2001
of sentence. In England and Wales, remission of sentence is one-third, but in Northern Ireland the remission is one-half. So they are giving up a great deal in denying themselves that privilege of remission; and, therefore, something is driving them on. Of course, it may be that it is right what some people tell me—that they want political status because when peace is declared they will then get out of prison, even though they have been convicted of murder.
These are the issues which are at the back of the minds of so many people in Northern Ireland. It is a festering sore. I do not know whether the Government could look again at the question of Long Kesh in the light of the rider from Strasbourg—because it was not a straight rejection. It said that the British Government should try to examine the problem to see whether there was not some way of overcoming the difficulties. I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Elton, with his overlordship of education, is tackling the problem there in the right way. I am glad, too, that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson, has mentioned the judiciary, and the part that they are playing in this fight against terrorism. I join with him in paying tribute to the judiciary.
I also join with my noble friend Lord Blease and the noble Lord, Lord Elton, in paying tribute to the security forces. I have seen at first hand the tremendous work that they are doing. They lean over backwards to see that human rights are not infringed. But, of course, people are human, and when a friend is killed by their side then sometimes tempers get out of control. We have to understand that; but there is no doubt that the security forces in Northern Ireland are, as I believe, an example to security forces facing similar problems elsewhere in the world. I believe that the appointment of Sir Maurice Oldfield did a great deal to help the situation, and I regret that he had to resign.
I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Elton, has paid tribute to the prison officers. I have seen some of the families of prison officers who have been shot. The wives of these officers have told me how they are fearful during the whole of the day, with their husbands away, but, sadly, how they are more fearful when their husbands are at home, because it is
2002
then that most of the killings take place. These are problems which are of tremendous difficulty. What you do to give extra morale to the prison officers, I do not know. It is a thankless job. There are as many officers in the prison service who have been killed as there have been in the police force, and this is something which the Government will have to examine with a view to seeing what extra protection can be afforded to the prison officers.
The economy in Northern Ireland—I shall be very brief on this issue—is being studied at length by the Government, but the question of low pay is one of the problems that is bedevilling all the Government's efforts. It has been admitted by the Northern Ireland Office that infant mortality in Northern Ireland is the highest in Europe. That of itself must do something to excite opinions among the working class in Northern Ireland. They feel helpless; but I am sure that Parliament has always given a great deal of help and comfort to the people in Northern Ireland, who are struggling along this road to peace.
Finally, I would say this: I had great comfort and help from the trade union movement in Northern Ireland. It is one of the movements that has created a bridge between the two sections of the community and I hope that it will continue its battle to bring about peace. After three-and-a-half years, having had the opportunity of talking to a wide range of people in Northern Ireland, I am now firmly of the opinion that the road to peace is now shorter than it was when I first went to Northern Ireland.
5.51 p.m.
Viscount BROOKEBOROUGH: My Lords, I should like to start by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Elton, for his introduction of the continuation order. I should also like to say how pleased I was, and how pleased the people in Fintona were, when the noble Lord went down to Baronscourt after a huge bomb had been exploded in Fintona. He jumped in his car and went off to see them and talk to them.
I mention this, not only because I want to congratulate the noble Lord on what regard as a very true and proper reaction, but also in slight contrast to problems

2003
which we have had in Newtownbutler. For 12 months we have had a most vicious campaign to eliminate a population of Protestant people in that area; it has been absolutely nothing else. For 12 months I have brought people down to see, and to try to impress upon them, the increasing dangers involved in security, as was obviously going to be the case. Really, it has not been easy to get Ministers to come down to make clear how much they care. It is a question of caring when, among a population of a few thousand, 10 people are killed. The feeling that people are caring is of great importance, and I think that now, if the noble Lord is correct, the security situation has improved, our Ministers should get out and come down to these areas which are under very vicious attack to reassure the population that the Government do in fact care. Certainly the noble Lord showed that he cares.
The Criminal Jurisdiction Act, which passed through this House in 1977, has at last been used in the Irish Republic. There are at least two warrants there. One was executed and three very dangerous men were apprehended. My noble friend Lord Vaizey said that the people who are committing these acts are beyond reform. In one case a man is wanted for 15 murders and 25 attempted murders. The staggering total that these people on the wanted list carry to their names is unbelievable. They do it for kicks; they are beyond all reasons. There are many such people living in the Irish Republic, and when I spoke to Mr. Haughey I promised that I would make clear that the people of this type who are living there by and large are Ulstermen making use of the South as a safe haven. Can we get the Government to encourage our police to issue as many warrants as they can under this Act now that it is beginning to be used? I would certainly endorse all the congratulations which have been passed to the various forces, the judiciary and members of the public.
I should now like to strike a slightly unusual note in saying that I personally deplore the removal of the power to detain. I deplore it because the whole attitude of Government on the will to win is the most important factor in beating the terrorist. This is an illusory removal, in that the power is still there, subject to a
2004
positive order, and I believe this is the wrong way to do it. If it is unnecessary to have detention, we should not have detention or the power to have detention. I believe it is still necessary to have detention. What are we trying to do when we remove this power? At the present moment we are trying to satisfy two political parties—the DUP, whose leader disapproves of detention, and the SDLP who disapproved of detention. So for a political end we are carrying out, or semicarrying out, the task of removing the power to detain.
The other reason I disapprove of it at this moment is that there is rising violence in the Irish Republic, and it is not beyond the bounds of possibility—because they still retain that power—that if two more lots of two garda were tragically shot they would use their power to detain. And if that violence then spread to us it would be right and proper for us to re-use the power to detain. When one has suspended a freedom it is always difficult to know exactly when one can put it back. I recognise the dilemma, but I believe that this is the wrong moment to do this. If we were going to do it, we should have done it properly and removed it altogether.
5.56 p.m.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate. I welcome the general acceptance and, indeed, the general welcome which has greeted the lapsing of the Section 12 power. I think the noble Lord, Lord Blease, referred to Sections 1 and 12; it is actually Section 12 to which I refer. There are reservations held, and the noble Viscount, Lord Brookeborough, has alluded to them. I do not think it is necessary for me to go further than mention the very cogent speech made by my noble and learned friend Lord Rawlinson to show that there are overbearing reasons why it is a good thing that this power should be treated as it has. To those who are in doubt I can say that there is absolutely no slackening of the will to win, and I think that I have already given evidence of the fruits of that will when I introduced this debate.
In concluding it, I would perhaps reassure my noble friend Lord Brookeborough by saying that the Government

2005
are in the position of somebody who has not discarded a weapon but has laid it down. In order to take it up it is necessary to go through a democratic process. Since a great part of what we are trying to do in the Province is to reactivate democratic processes I think that that is something which one should not regret. But I do urge my noble friend Lord Brookeborough that he will not see this as a weakening of will; nor is it a giving in to some subversive and subtle pressure not apparent on the surface. Quite simply it is my right honourable friend the Secretary of State's assessment of the situation that we have reached a position where this weapon does not need to be in his hand. We are fighting a very strong campaign against terrorism. We are making progress. We have not won it, but we do not need this particular provision immediately available. I am sure that that was the right decision.
The noble Lord, Lord Plant, then came into the debate, and I really must apologise to him for having dissuaded him from inserting into the earlier debate the economic part of the remarks he had to make. I am sure the House was correct in being indulgent in listening to them at this stage. He also welcomed the lapsing of Section 12 but regretted that Sections 2, 8, 11 and 14 had not also been allowed to lapse.
Section 2 deals with the limitation of power to grant bail. This really is a necessary provision because without it, as I understand it, courts are not in a position to take into account the likelihood of somebody who is charged going out and committing crimes similar to those with which he is charged, when they come to consider whether or not he should have hail. While I sympathise with and deeply respect the noble Lord's views on these matters, I think your Lordships will agree that under present circumstances it is not sensible to allow on to the streets people who are charged with terrorist offences if there is a likelihood of their going to do the same thing again. Section 8 deals with the admissions by persons charged with scheduled offences. Again, I feel that the implementation of the Bennett Report as well as the recent judgment given in the European Court give one grounds to feel that the miscarriages of justice which it is alleged might take
2006
place under cover of this section are not taking place. Section 11 is not lapsing. I do not think I can expand on that.
Section 14 relates to powers of arrest by security forces. I wonder if we are clear on this. We are talking about the Emergency Provisions Act which is a Northern Ireland instrument. Some of your Lordships may feel that the limitation of powers of arrest and holding before charging, which are commonly talked about in Northern Ireland and which are of much longer duration than this, are now in question. The noble Lord will know—and I will remind the rest of the House—that we are not here discussing the Prevention of Terrorism Act which is the Act under which these prolonged periods of arrest for interrogatory purposes are permitted. I will not follow that further. The noble Lord made a plea, which in this debate I can only take delivery of, on the subject of the economy and of low pay—which are the subjects I addressed in the last debate and in answer to a question by the noble Lord, Lord Blease, earlier. To that he added the consideration of infant morbidity. I will draw his remarks to the attention of my honourable friend in another place who is responsible for health and social services. That is the proper place for those comments to be delivered.
I thank again my noble friend Lord Brookeborough for his kind remarks to me. On this occasion, they were not followed by the expected onslaught, so that he has now got me thoroughly confused about how things are conducted in Northern Ireland, after all. I take his point. He wishes members of the Government to be out and about and in touch. I do not have to hand a record of the extent to which I and my colleagues have been out and about and in touch. I have made formal visits to 11 district councils and, apart from that, to a very considerable number of institutions. I think that that is the proper thing to consider, as well as visits to places which have been recently assaulted and which he was kind enough to say that I did right to visit. I think that it was a good thing that I did for not only would I like to hearten anybody who it is in my power to hearten under tragic circumstances, but I learned a great deal about the astoni-

2007
shing resilience and the courage of those in the Province and of people suffering in both communities. There was a commonality of suffering—which is something which one does not always see in this problem. I was deeply moved and learned a great deal. That is probably as much as your Lordships would like to take from me at this stage when we have live more orders to go, not all as long as this. If there is any point that noble Lords have raised and which I missed, I shall write to them on the subject.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

DRAFT ROADS (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1980
6.3 p.m.
Lord ELTON Lord ELTON rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 25th June he approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, our next item of business is the Draft Roads (Northern Ireland) Order 1980. I beg to move that this order, which was laid before Parliament on 25th June 1980, be agreed to.
My Lords, this is in part an item of consolidation and in part a piece of modernisation. The law on roads in Northern Ireland has until now been widely scattered. It is now concentrated into 64 articles and 9 schedules. This has been rendered easier by the fact that there is only one road authority in the Province. I shall not take your Lordships through all the provisions: I shall merely highlight a few of the principal items which may be of interest to your Lordships. If any noble Lord wishes to raise any other points, or pursue further anything I have mentioned, I shall be glad to deal with such matters to the best of my ability. But it is a large and complex document that we are looking at and your Lordships will bear with me if I take the process of reply steadily.
Article 11 provides that responsibility for all bridges carrying publicly-maintained roads over operational railway lines passes from the railway authorities to the Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland. This is already the case with bridges carrying motorways
2008
and trunk roads over railway lines, and so this is a logical extension of those principles. Bridges carrying railways over roads will, of course, continue to be the responsibility of the railway authorities, so this is an equitable division of responsibilities and moreover is in accord with an EEC regulation on this subject.
Articles 25 and 27 contain revised provisions regarding the drainage of roads, which will bring the law into line with that in Great Britain. Article 41 again brings the law in Northern Ireland into line with that throughout Great Britain, this time in authorising the closure of potentially dangerous private accesses, either by agreement with the owner and occupier, which of course would be the aim, or by order made after opportunity of objection and hearing had been given. Schedule 3 sets out the details. If an access is necessary, the department may provide an alternative and reasonably convenient, but safer, means of access, at its own expenses.
Article 42 deals with the protection of public roads and traffic from unauthorised works on or close to roads and is based on existing roads law. It would remain an offence for a person without consent to carry out the building or excavation works specified in paragraph (1) of the article, and it would remain an offence to erect a structure actually within the boundaries of a road. On the other hand, control over the erection of structures beyond road boundaries would no longer be exercised under roads law, but would be subject to planning control. As I am not aware whether any noble Lords here have planning or roads interests, I will not dilate further on that unless my attention is drawn to it during discussion of the order.
Turning to Article 48, this modernises a number of offences of causing danger, obstruction or annoyance to road users, and makes it a clear offence for a person to offer for sale or to sell anything within the boundaries of a road. There is existing statutory provision for the issue of "street trading licences" by district councils and anyone holding such a licence and trading within its terms would of course be exempt from prosecution under this article.
I would draw the attention of your Lordships to Article 50(1) which contains a new offence of allowing mud or other

2009
material to drop from any part of a vehicle on to the carriageway of a road so as to cause danger or substantial inconvenience to other users of that road. Your Lordships will be familiar with the annoyance not only during the sugar beet harvest but also when a construction site in wet weather abuts on to a road. It is already an offence to overload a vehicle in such a way that part of the load falls off and would cause danger or nuisance. This provision strengthens the law and makes it specific to that sort of fouling of the road. Article 55 concerns powers of entry, which your Lordships may wish to revert to, but I merely draw attention to it.
In Article 60, noble Lords will have noticed contains the requirement to consult and take account of the views of district councils. This article contains identical requirements to those already placed on the department in connection with its functions as water and sewerage authority for the Province. This requirement to consult, and pay due regard to the views of, councils makes a statutory obligation of the practice which began in 1973 when all road authority functions in Northern Ireland were transferred to central Government. The schedules contain the necessary procedures, amendments and repeals. The procedure in Schedule 5 for compulsory acquisition of land is slightly different from the existing provisions, and equates with that used for the acquisition of land for local government purposes in the Province.
My Lords, this is an important order in Northern Ireland legislation because it contains a convenient, comprehensive and clear statement of the law relating to public roads. It not only consolidates the law but it brings the law up-to-date and I am sure that it will be welcomed on its merits, and particularly by those who have to pursue questions of law through the existing forests which this is designed to simplify. I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 25th June be approved.—(Lord Elton.)
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, I simply wish to thank the noble Lord for the detailed explanation of the order which was discussed at some length in another place on 8th July. If I may anticipate his introduction of the Private Streets
2010
Order, I should also like to give a welcome to that. These are two useful orders which will help to serve Northern Ireland in good stead. Therefore, we are giving them wholehearted support.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, I am grateful. It is not necessary for me to say more than that.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

PRIVATE STREETS (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1980
6.11 p.m.
Lord ELTON Lord ELTON rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 25th June be approved. The noble Lord said: The noble Lord has reversed the order of "batting" and has already welcomed this order. I beg to move this order formally, but I cannot be as brief as the noble Lord because there must be something on the record, although it will not be very much. This order was also laid before the House on 25th June 1980. Your Lordships will have noted that its principal purpose is to consolidate the existing legislation in Northern Ireland governing the laying out and the construction standards of streets. This legislation is in the Private Streets Act (Northern Ireland) 1964. That Act has been substantially amended, particularly in 1973 when the functions of town and country planning, road authority and private street matters were transferred to the former Ministry of Development. As a result it is somewhat obscure.
The nature of the subject means that the draft order now before your Lordships is necessarily a complex measure. Part II deals with the layout of new streets in planning terms and with the detailed way in which they are to be constructed. Part III deals with the adoption of streets into the public roads system. Part IV sets out the procedures for departmental action either if there is default in new development, or if older streets are needed to be made up to standard. Part V ensures that before new buildings are begun there is a legally-binding assurance that the streets will be provided. All the provisions follow the long-established principle that streets which are to be adopted into the public road system

2011
should be provided at the expense of the developer or, in older streets, the frontagers. At the same time, there are opportunities for appeal at various stages.
My Lords, although the order is mainly a re-enactment of existing law, the opportunity is being taken to reword a few provisions for the sake of clarity, and to include some other amendments, the necessity for which has been indicated by experience. I shall mention only two of these. First, there is Article 5(1)(e). This is new and would permit regulations to be made to allow samples to be taken of materials (for example, of bitumen) to ensure that streets are properly constructed. Regulations would also provide that the department may recover the cost of taking those samples and testing them and, under Article 5(1)(g), may forbid work starting before plans are approved and any dispute resolved. Article 5(1)(h) would also allow regulations to be made for the recovery of the cost incurred by the department in making good a defective street in the event of default by the developer.
Secondly, your Lordships may be interested in Article 24 which requires developers to give a form of guarantee that streets will be provided at their expense and not at public expense. Article 24(8) lists the cases where this requirement does not apply. Subparagraphs (a) and (b) are new and would exempt buildings proposed to be erected in the grounds of existing buildings and would also exempt buildings on land belonging to a public body. Subparagraphs (g) and (h) are also new and would exempt streets which will remain remote from public roads and streets which, having been substantially built-up when the Private Streets Act of 1964 came into force, have only had space for in-filling development.
My Lords, this order, will, I think, be welcomed not only by those who press for consolidation of legislation generally, but those who need to refer to the law in an up-to-date form on this subject. I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 25th June be approved.—(Lord Elton.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

SOCIAL SECURITY (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1980
6.15 p.m.
Lord ELTON Lord ELTON rose to move, That the order laid before the House on 2nd July be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this order has been made under the Northern Ireland Act 1974, and I will have to spend rather more time on it than I have on the two preceding orders. The Act of 1974 empowers Her Majesty to make laws for Northern Ireland by Order in Council. By reason of urgency, the order has been made without a draft having been approved by a resolution of your Lordships' House; but if it is to continue to have effect, it must now receive Parliamentary approval. Its essential purpose is to maintain parity with Great Britain in the cash social services.
The order contains provisions corresponding to those recently enacted for the rest of the United Kingdom in the Social Security Act 1980 which, as your Lordships will recall, has among its objectives re-structuring of the supplementary benefits scheme, conferring of powers to extend equal treatment for men and women in social security, and the making of a wide range of miscellaneous amendments affecting the social security system.
That Act has two other main objectives which require a special word of explanation in the context of Northern Ireland. First, it changes the provisions relating to the up-rating of basic retirement pensions and other long-term benefits by linking them to prices rather than earnings. Secondly, it replaces the Supplementary Benefits Commissions for Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the National Insurance Advisory Committee with a Social Security Advisory Committee. Let me say something about both these objectives.
Noble Lords will wish to know why amendments relating to the review and up-rating of benefits provided for by Section 1 of the Act do not appear in the order. The omission of these provisions does not mean that Northern Ireland will be out of step with the rest of the United Kingdom. The explanation lies in the principle of parity with Great Britain in the cash social services to which I have

2013
already referred. This operates to ensure a virtually uniform system of social security throughout the United Kingdom, and provision already exists in the Social Security (Northern Ireland) Act 1975 for the Department of Health and Social Services in Northern Ireland simply to make an up-rating order corresponding to any similar order made for Great Britain. It follows that the effect of the amendments in Section 1 of the Act will be reflected in future up-ratings of benefit in Northern Ireland without any change in present Northern Ireland law.
The new Social Security Advisory Committee will have a United Kingdom remit and so for the first time an advisory committee will have direct responsibility and functions in relation to the social security system in Northern Ireland, to the same extent as the rest of the United Kingdom. The committee will be in a position to advise the Northern Ireland Department of Health and Social Services on matters relating to supplementary benefits, family income supplement, child benefit—and national insurance benefits, other than those for industrial injuries and diseases. Additionally, the department will be required to seek the views of the committee on proposals for regulations on any of the matters for which the committee has an advisory responsibility. I am sure that the fact that one member of the committee will be appointed from Northern Ireland will be welcomed.
The committee will assume the advisory responsibilities of the Northern Ireland Supplementary Benefits Commission, and since provision is made in the order for its executive functions to be taken over, the commission, like its Great Britain counter-part, is to be abolished. I take this opportunity to pay tribute to the chairmen and members of the commission, past and present, and to the excellent work they have done during an extremely difficult period in Northern Ireland.
I now turn to the substance of the order and to its main objective, which is to reform the supplementary benefits scheme. These reforms are provided for in Article 7 and Schedule 2 and, as in the rest of the United Kingdom, the changes are not intended to increase net expenditure. The pressures on the supplementary benefits scheme in Great Britain are just
2014
as real in Northern Ireland and the Government's proposals for reform in the recent White Paper just as urgently needed.
The keynote is simplification. The new legal and administrative framework will ensure that the emphasis of the scheme is shifted from discretionary payments to payments under clear rules of entitlement. That is an important departure. This framework will set out a claimant's entitlement and obligations in full in the form of regulations, and these regulations will be explained in every day language in a new version of the supplementary benefits handbook to be published by the Department of Health and Social Services for Northern Ireland. Other changes include provision for individual benefit claims not to be determined by the Supplementary Benefits Commission but in future by "benefits officers", whose decisions will be subject to a right of appeal to a supplementary benefits appeal tribunal, and from that tribunal, on points of law only, to a social security commissioner. The main benefit changes consist of the alignment of long-term supplementary benefit scale rates with corresponding national insurance rates, the reduction of the present two years qualifying period for the long-term scale rate to one year, and the reduction of the present five scale rates for children to three.
These improvements reflect the most important trend, which is the direction of resources to families with children. The reduction in the long-term scale rate qualifying period from two years to one year will benefit some 8,000 claimants in Northern Ireland, 20 per cent. of whom are single parents. The reduction of the present five scale rates for children to three will benefit some 20,000 families in Northern Ireland, with 28,000 children in the existing age bands under five, and 11 to 12. These families will qualify for up to an extra £3.20 weekly for each child within these age bands. The alignment of long-term scale rates will not take place until the general up-rating of benefits in November, and will mean that for some people the up-rating will be marginally less than it would otherwise have been.
I now turn to another main objective which is to take powers for Northern Ireland to meet the EEC Directive on equal treatment for men and women in

2015
social security. Schedule 1 to the order provides for the removal of discrimination in two stages. As a first stage from November 1983, a married woman will be able to claim an increase in short-term benefits for her husband and any dependent children if the husband's earnings are less than the increase of benefit being claimed for him.
The second stage under which married women will be able to claim for children irrespective of the husband's earnings will be implemented from November 1984. Article 8 of the order makes provision for the inclusion of family income supplement in these equal treatment measures. From 1983 it will be possible for the family which has to depend on the wife's earnings from full-time work—because, for example, the husband is a chronic invalid—to have her earnings supplemented.
The order also makes a number of minor, technical and tidying-up changes in social security law. For example, amendments to the Social Security (Northern Ireland) Act 1975, will result in maternity grant becoming a non-contributory benefit, subject only to satisfaction of conditions as to residence and presence in Northern Ireland. In order to reduce frivolous or vexatious appeals to a social security commissioner from decisions of a local tribunal, no appeal will in future lie to a commissioner from a unanimous decision of a local tribunal except with the leave of a tribunal chairman or a commissioner.
Finally, there are a number of small amendments which have no counterpart in the Social Security Act. These are mainly of a minor nature and I will only mention the two most important. Article 5(6) inserts a provision in Schedule I to the Child Benefit (Northern Ireland) Order 1975 to the effect that in paragraph 1 of the schedule to that order a reference to a child in the care of the Department of Health and Social Services includes a reference to a child in the care of a Health and Social Services Board. The background to this perhaps surprising technical amendment is that in the course of a recent child benefit decision, the Northern Ireland Commissioner commented that he would find it difficult to construe the existing paragraph 1(f) of Schedule 1 (which refers to a child in the care of the department) as if it applied to a
2016
child who had been committed to the care of a board. The proposed amendment puts beyond all doubt that, in the context of child benefit, reference to a child within the care of the department includes reference to a child within the care of a Health and Social Services Board which, in this, as in other respects, acts as an agent of the department under delegated authority.
The second of these amendments, contained in paragraph 16 to Schedule 1 to the order, deals with medical appeal tribunals established under the Social Security (Northern Ireland) Act 1975, to hear appeals arising under the industrial injuries scheme. This provides that certain medical appeal tribunals appointed or recognised by another Government department may, if necessary, be regarded as appeal tribunals for the purposes of the Social Security (Northern Ireland) Act 1975. The background to this amendment is that there exists a right of appeal or reference to a medical appeal tribunal appointed by the Department of Health and Social Services against a decision of a medical board on any question of diagnosis in respect of pneumoconiosis, byssinosis or diffuse mesothelioma. But, as the incidence of these diseases in Northern Ireland is relatively slight, the medical appeal tribunals there do not include among their members specialists with the necessary expertise in those fields. This amendment will, therefore, mainly be used to enable the medical appeal tribunals established by the Department of Health and Social Security in Great Britain to decide questions in respect of those diseases on behalf of the Department of Health and Social Services.
Apart from the minor amendments, the order, in sum, enacts legislation for Northern Ireland corresponding with or complementary to that recently enacted for Great Britain. It maintains the principle of parity between the cash social services in Northern Ireland and those in Great Britain. I commend the order to your Lordships, and beg to move that the order be now approved.
Moved, That the Social Security (Northern Ireland) Order 1980 laid before the House on 2nd July be approved.—(Lord Elton.)
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, the noble Lord has indeed given the House a very comprehensive and detailed explanation of this order. What he has stated underscores the numerous points made in a very helpful explanatory document issued some six weeks ago by the Department of Health and Social Service for Northern Ireland. The noble Lord's statement confirms a very important point made in the explanatory document; namely, that the order enacts the first stage of a major reform of the supplementary benefits scheme; and I would emphasise the words "major reform".
I want to say at the outset that I am opposed to the order, and for at least three reasons. First, I am convinced that the legislation will create greater hardships and difficulties for the disadvantaged, the sick and elderly people throughout the United Kingdom. The order embraces the Social Security Act which was bitterly opposed by my noble friends in this House and by my right honourable friends in another place as being a deliberate policy to undermine the principles that laid the foundations of our welfare state in 1948—principles which contribute much to promoting social justice and the happiness and wellbeing of the citizens of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
I think I could legitimately use this order to re-open the matters raised during the passage of that Social Security Act, especially as these matters affect the people of Northern Ireland. I do not propose to do that, but I think I must refer to at least a few relevant points. Naturally, along with many in Northern Ireland, I am opposed to the Government's decision that retirement pensions in future should be operated in line with prices rather than wages. I am also opposed to the up-rating date for pensions and other benefits that will mean that a married couple on pension will lose at least £12.30 this November.
I am also opposed to the continuing exclusion of the unemployed from the long-term rates. The justification for this discrimination has always been obscure in Northern Ireland, where unemployment is involuntary for so many people and where the rate of unemployment continues to rise. It seems indefen-
2018
sible to me that the long-term unemployed and their families should be permanently excluded from the higher benefits offered to other groups.
I am also opposed to the order because of the basic right of Northern Ireland people to have an opportunity for their difficulties and needs in social welfare matters to be effectively heard and considered by Parliament. On 19th March 1980 this point was raised in another place during the debate on the Social Security Bill. The Minister of State for Northern Ireland, Mr. Rossi, stated at column 557:
"I urge the House to do nothing in this Bill to change what has been so far the recognised way of dealing with these matters, because such things can he readily misinterpreted across the water. The last thing I want to do is to create a situation in which an Act of this House, in all innocence, creates difficulties for us in Northern Ireland".
Who he meant by "us" is open to question. That is the end of the quotation. Quite a number of persons who are much more knowledgeable than I am about parliamentary procedures and constitutional matters, did not then, and still do not, agree with the validity of the reply of Mr. Rossi.
In this House on 22nd April, I unsuccessfully moved an amendment to the Social Security Bill, now the Act, which, if it had been adopted, would have enabled wider discussion regarding the implications of this legislation for the people of Northern Ireland. In his reply opposing the amendment, the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Cullen, were similar to Mr. Rossi's. He stated at columns 691 and 692 of Hansard:
"… the Government have made clear their intention of bringing an end to this unsatisfactory state of affairs.…We propose therefore to deposit the reports and regulations in the Library of each House. I hope your Lordships will accept this as a solution which preserves the complex constitutional requirements of the Northern Ireland situation".
Honestly, my Lords, neither of those two arguments convinced me in the least that there ought not to be an opportunity, even under the 1974 Act, to deal with this matter in a much more thorough and sympathetic way so far as the people of Northern Ireland are concerned. If there is a constitutional difficulty, I am not at all convinced that sufficient consideration and attention have been given to reasonable ways of overcoming any difficulties in the best interests of the people of Northern Ireland.

2019
My third reason for opposing this order is that it abolishes the Northern Ireland Supplementary Benefits Commission, and seriously precludes the people of Northern Ireland from having an effective voice concerning their social needs, as they arise from time to time. The proposal to replace the Northern Ireland Commission by a single Northern Ireland representative, under a United Kingdom Social Security Advisory Committee, is the cause of great concern. There is a benefit in having Northern Ireland representation at national level, particularly in view of the continuing policy of poverty benefits. Yet something more is required in recognition of Northern Ireland's special circumstances, including its special constitutional position.
As we have already heard, the recent constitutional talks indicate a willingness on the part of the Government to arrange for a form of devolved government, if agreement can he reached between the political parties. It therefore seems illogical, at this juncture, to abolish the Supplementary Benefits Commission and not to replace it with a separate Social Security Advisory Committee for Northern Ireland, which is concerned with the individual needs and problems arising in the Province.
Apart from this consideration, there are other reasons why Northern Ireland needs a separate body which is capable of considering the operation of statutory schemes. So many of our people are dependent on benefit, for Northern Ireland is the most poverty-ridden area in Western Europe; a larger number of people than elsewhere in any EEC country depend on state benefit; we have the highest unemployment rate; our household earnings are the lowest in the United Kingdom, despite our larger families; our housing record is poor and our cost of living high, and present forecasts indicate that our position will considerably worsen in the coming years.
I suggest to the Minister that a Northern Ireland Advisory Committee should be established, and that a representative of the national advisory committee should chair that committee. At this late hour, I do not want to go into the details of the setting up of a particular body, but it would have additional benefits
2020
to the people of Northern Ireland and to the Government. I should like to join with the noble Lord in his tribute to the various chairmen over the years, and particularly to the one presently occupying the position, as well as the various members who have given admirable service to the people of Northern Ireland on the Supplementary Benefits Commission.
So I wish to put forward a proposal, about which I have already spoken to the noble Lord, for the establishment of a Social Security Advisory Committee for Northern Ireland. This is no dangerous constitutional matter; indeed, I believe that many constitutional advantages would be gained if it were established. I shall wait to hear the noble Lord's reply in respect of the proposal that I have put forward, and the remarks that I have already made in connection with this order.
6.35 p.m.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, when the noble Lord speaks with such conviction, he carries great weight. However, a great deal of what he said relates to the philosophy upon which the order rests, which is the same as the philosophy upon which the Bill which he discussed earlier rests. As he rightly said, he adduced his arguments in that debate and, in so far as they were embodied in an amendment which the House rejected, the House would not wish me to take up again the cudgels which he has so recently laid down.
There were a number of items within what the noble Lord said which I should like to take up. The principal one, with which he concluded, was about a separate advisory committee. However, before I come to that, I should like to mention that the qualifying period for the long-term rate is being reduced from two years to one, but, regrettably, because of financial constraints, it is not yet possible to extend the long-term rate to unemployed claimants. We touched on this very genuine difficulty in the last debate but one.
I think I can best reply to the noble Lord's principal theme, about which he has been in touch with me, by saying that since the Government's proposals were announced several representations have been received in favour of maintaining

2021
a separate body for Northern Ireland. These have been based principally on the important role which has been played by the Supplementary Benefits Commission for Northern Ireland, and I should like to take this opportunity of again acknowledging the value of the commission's work.
After careful consideration, however, the Government remain of the view that this is not the best approach. The social security systems in Great Britain and Northern Ireland are, in all major respects, identical, which is a primary indication that the new committee should have a United Kingdom remit. The proposals recognise the special position of Northern Ireland by reserving a place on the committee for a Northern Ireland representative, and I think that Northern Ireland will derive considerable benefit from having such a voice at the centre.
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, is it not a fact that there is considerable public confusion about the No. 1 Act and the No. 2 Act, in so far as attempts were made to amend the No. 1 Act even before it was on the statute book? There is public confusion concerning the whole range of legislation which is very comprehensive, and there is a very radical change in many respects. Have there been any attempts to inform tribunals and tribunal chairmen of the implications of the Act which will be implemented in November? Have the Government attempted in any way to contact the 400 or so tribunal chairmen and representatives in Northern Ireland with information about the way in which this Act will be administered and implemented?
Lord ELTON: My Lords, the noble Lord has the advantage of me on this matter, but I hope that I shall be able to reply to that point when I have finished answering the point to which I was addressing myself, when he asked me to give way. In the debate in Committee in the other place, my honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State made it clear that the new committee will have considerable flexibility in the way it operates. It will be up to the chairman and members, when they are appointed, to decide what special arrangements, if any, are necessary to ensure that the special circumstances of Northern Ireland receive full recognition.
2022
This is the point which the noble Lord is pursuing. It is one of which the new committee will be seized, and it will be up to them to find structures which will reflect his concern. I think it would be a good thing to see whether they are able to do it, before it is assumed that they cannot. The Northern Ireland representative will be free to seek assistance in the performance of his or her duties from official and unofficial sources, so that he or she can contribute fully to the committee's deliberations. It is not a question of a lone voice in the wilderness. This is going to be an informed and weighty opinion, backed up by both official and unofficial assistance. So I hope that the noble Lord will be a little less hesitant in his welcome—I cannot say that, because he has not welcomed it. However, I hope that he will be a little forbearing while he watches what happens. The Government see potential difficulty in having two separate bodies concerned with the same subject. The network of the payments is very closely similar across the water. This in itself guarantees, does it not?, parity of help, because the scales are all related to the conditions of the recipients. In so far as the conditions of the recipients are harder in the Province than they are in Great Britain, so that will be recognised in the cash help which they get. So again the machinery is not quite so soulless or inflexible as the noble Lord perhaps fears.
There is a danger that the Northern Ireland representative would be regarded as a delegate from a local group if we resorted to the pattern which the noble Lord has suggested, but if the constitutional position changes, or if experience of the new arrangements, which I urge the noble Lord to watch closely, suggest the need for a separate Northern Ireland body, the Government will re-examine the situation. So while I cannot encourage the noble Lord to expect us to change the policy at this late stage, I can say that in the light of experience it may be that it would be a good thing if he returned to the charge, as it were, when we have seen how it goes.
I had better deal with the last point to which I was going to address myself by sending to the noble Lord a message through the post, unless he wishes to bring me to a direct consideration of any further point.
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Lord for giving way. I am bitterly disappointed that there was not a much more ready response to the representations which have been made by various bodies. The weight of that evidence indicates that there is serious concern in Northern Ireland about whether one person sitting on an advisory body over here for one day a month can bring forward views and opinions. How is that person going to have those views translated to him over the water and back again?
Turning to the point about anyone from Northern Ireland feeling that he is obliged to be a delegate, I know many people in Northern Ireland who sit on advisory bodies, and in no way do they act simply in a delegate manner. So again I wish to press the Minister to give me something a little more precise concerning the setting up of an advisory body. Would not the Minister be prepared to take it back again and have a look at the position so far as Northern Ireland is concerned?
Lord ELTON: My Lords, I appreciate the noble Lord's concern. He will appreciate the constraints which operate upon me, but in fact the Government have been a little more forthcoming than he suggests. Many Governments would say: "We have reviewed the policy. This is the right policy. We are convinced that it will work, and we are now going to work it". I have said that the Government are aware that either the constitutional position may change, which would be a dramatic change in the context of the ground which we have already covered this afternoon, or, if experience of the new arrangements suggests the need for a separate body, we will re-examine it. We shall try it. If it does not come up to expectations, then we shall look at it again. And the noble Lord is invited to give his views then.
The noble Lord is discontented because he is convinced that it will not work. I am not so convinced as he is. If you have the right person on a body of this sort, and if it is not a shy and retiring person in a large body but a forceful and well-informed person in a small body, that is much the most effective way of running anything. The smaller the committee the better it is. Of course, I speak without knowledge. It may be a very
2024
big committee. However, I am quite content that my honourable and right honourable friends who have gone into this matter in some detail are not suggesting that there should be a suppliant coming from the Province to the United Kingdom body, cap in hand, and saying, "Can't we have more?" We shall have a person of standing who will be listened to and who will be properly briefed and who will come to the committee and say, "These are the circumstances, and this is what we feel will meet the circumstances". Whether that committee is to sit in Belfast or elsewhere in the Province, or whether it is to sit in London or elsewhere in Great Britain does not make a tremendous amount of difference.
I cannot be fairer to the noble Lord than I have been. I have given an undertaking that this will be reviewed in the light of experience. Your Lordships are already aware that we have adopted a very swift procedure, so we are not going to be hanging around for a long time waiting for it to happen. I trust that we shall have the benefit of the noble Lord's advice when it has happened and when it is running. And let him not hesitate to suggest not merely any structural changes which he thinks ought to be adopted when we have seen it running for a time, but let him come and say whether there are any practical ways in which it can work better as soon as it has begun. I invite the noble Lord's assistance. I respect his concern. We are all aware of his specialist knowledge of this sort of thing. I am not brushing him aside. I am making him the most generous concession that I am able to make.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

TREATMENT OF OFFENDERS (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1980
6.45 p.m.
Lord ELTON Lord ELTON rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 3rd July be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move the penultimate order standing in my name on the Order Paper. I beg to move that this order, which was laid before the House on 3rd July 1980, be approved. It may be for the con-

2025
venience of the House if I also outline the provisions of the Criminal Justice and Armed Forces (Northern Ireland Consequential Amendments) Order 1980 which is consequential upon this order and which will be moved immediately after it.
The Treatment of Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order will make provision for the abolition of borstal training in Northern Ireland. The opening of the new young offenders centre at Hydebank Wood last year has enabled us to review our sentencing arrangements for young people in the 19 to 20 age group. The young offenders centre has very good facilities for 300 young people, with first class provision for education and training, including fine workshops, playing fields and a gym. The régime at the young offenders centre is very similar to that at borstal, and it caters for roughly the same age group. A borstal sentence is therefore much the same as a young offenders centre sentence except that it is indeterminate, subject to a maximum of two years. This produces some anomalies. The abolition of borstal will obviate these anomalies and will give greater flexibility in the use of accommodation. It will mean that in future all custodial sentences will be determinate. The courts will be able to fix the length of the sentence in relation to the seriousness of the offence, subject to a maximum of three years which, with full remission, would mean 18 months in custody.
The Criminal Justice and Armed Forces (Northern Ireland Consequential Amendments) Order will amend first the provisions of the Criminal Justice Act 1961 and also those of the Army Act 1955, of the Air Force Act 1955 and of the Naval Discipline Act 1957 so that young offenders may be transferred between young offenders institutions and borstal institutions in Scotland, or borstal institutions in England, and the young offenders centre in Northern Ireland.
I commend these orders to your Lordships as a necessary and desirable rationalisation of the custodial provisions for young offenders in Northern Ireland. I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft Order laid before the House on 3rd July be approved.— (Lord Elton.)
Lord BLEASE: My Lords, I understand that the Treatment of Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order considerably improves the situation in Northern Ireland. I understand it to be somewhat in advance of the situation over here. Therefore, I wish it well. I hope that these young offenders centres will contribute towards making reformed and good citizens in Northern Ireland. Therefore, the order has my approval.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND ARMED FORCES (NORTHERN IRELAND CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS) ORDER 1980
Lord ELTON Lord ELTON rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 3rd July be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move that the last order standing in my name on the Order Paper be agreed to. The order in question was laid before this House on 3rd July and I have already spoken to it as consequential.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 3rd July be approved.—(Lord Elton.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

DEER BILL
6.51 p.m.
Lord NORTHFIELD: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be read a second time. Your Lordships will remember that my original Deer Bill obtained a Third Reading as long ago as July 1977 and again in February 1979. So, my Lords, we have been here twice before and we are hoping that this third time we shall get a very important small piece of legislation on to the statute book. On each of those previous occasions the Bill was blocked in another place because it had to try for its place at the end of Private Members' business, as is often the case with such small reforms. Happily, at the beginning of this Session Mr. John Farr won a place in the Ballot for Private Members' Bills and took up the Deer Bill, re-presenting it in fact in the same form in which it left your Lordships' House early last year.

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However, as the months passed it became clear that due to the large number of Private Members' Bills which had precedence over Mr. Farr's Bill, the only chance of his Bill completing all stages in another place this Session lay in its going through, as they say, "On the nod", and certainly for Report and Third Reading. So a choice had to be made. How much of the Bill could we so get through on the nod by the abbreviated procedures in the Commons? It remained abundantly clear that as deer poaching had become even more prevalent than when we discussed it first it was more urgent than ever that Parliament should take steps to curb it with the least possible delay.
For those reasons and because of opposition by certain deer farmers to other parts of the original Bill, it was decided to trim the Bill back to those parts that are fundamental in combating poaching and to leave the other provisions for a future day, for a future Bill, in a future session. This abbreviated Bill then had its Third Reading in another place on 4th July, thanks to the efforts of Mr. Farr. Here I want to thank the Government on behalf of Mr. Farr and all those who have been behind this Bill, for their support for the amended Bill and particularly, once again, as I have had the pleasure of doing on previous occasions, I want also to thank the Minister and to ask him to pass on my thanks to the Home Office officials who have helped in advising, redrafting and finally shaping this Bill.
Before I come to this Bill, what have we lost of the original Bill? We have lost things like the definition of close seasons for muntjac and Chinese water deer; we have lost restrictions on killing deer in the close seasons; we have lost much needed restraints on the use of shotguns and restricting the use of shotguns to genuine and serious cases of damage by deer; we have lost the extension of prohibited articles and firearms; we have lost provisions to prohibit the taking of live deer and the undesirable trade in live animals and we have lost certain exemptions to all these things for veterinary surgeons. So we have lost some things of some importance and I will return to that at the end.
At least we have now a Bill which is very important in the most important offence that is growing in this country; namely, the
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mass poaching of deer by the most undesirable methods. So it is an anti-poaching measure that I now present to your Lordships for Second Reading. All organisations that we know of, including the British Field Sports Society, bodies like the Forestry Commission, the Wildfowlers Association—all such bodies support this Bill. As to the detailed provisions of the Bill, your Lordships will see that the wording of this shortened Bill is virtually the same as in the equivalent parts of the Bill which we approved last year.
Clause 1 makes it a criminal offence to be on land without authority in search of deer—in other words, to poach deer. Done on today's scale, deer poaching is big business—and very nasty business at that. Venison fetches very high prices. I checked the prices last weekend and the price is 70p to 80p per pound now; £30 for a roe carcase to well over £100 for a red deer, and there is no sign that these high prices are falling. As we have all agreed on previous occasions when I have had the pleasure of introducing this Bill, many of the methods used by poachers are barbarous in the extreme; they are carried out with most offensive brutality and appalling cruelty on a scale which the very pictures and photographs make one almost ashamed to be a countryman.
Clauses 2 and 3, in conjunction with Schedule 1, establish an ordered procedure for transactions in venison, thus enabling the police to trace venison from deer killed illegally. Clauses 1, 2 and 3 hang together as, we hope, an effective method of, first, making poaching a criminal offence and then establishing methods for the control of the sale of venison, so that the origins of such venison can be traced as a further weapon against the poacher.
Under the law as it is today the police are severely handicapped when dealing with poaching and poachers. Indeed, it is often said that the law almost favours the poacher. Clause 4, backed up by the court powers in Clause 5, seeks to remedy these deficiencies. It is to be hoped that the courts really will use the powers that will be available to them if this Bill becomes an Act. The reasons for Clause 6 dealing with offences by corporate bodies, are self-explanatory and do not call for comment.
Perhaps I should say a word about Schedule 2. When the Deer Act 1963

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passed into law, the whole climate of opinion with regard to deer was completely different from what it is today: poaching was much more limited and somewhat localised; deer poachers were not the organised gangs that they are today, travelling considerable distances, using sophisticated and often cruel and expensive methods; venison prices were low; very much less was known about the management of deer and the techniques of dealing with deer damage to crops and trees. While therefore the 1963 Act was undoubtedly a great step forward at that time, much of it is now out-of-date. Schedule 2 is a first attempt—and only a first attempt—to provide a more realistic framework in which to operate the provisions of the Act. It increases the powers of search now also to examine vehicles, weapons and so on; it gives increased powers to detain things used in committing the offences, and it increases penalties so that there may be an extra penalty according to the number of deer taken instead of one single penalty for one deer.
So this is now a very simple Bill, to which I am speaking as briefly as possible. But, in conclusion, in moving the Second Reading there are three points I should like to make. The first is that, as will be noted, the Bill does not cover the areas of land owned by the Crown. In the case of the last Bill, we did not put in such a provision because the then Minister my noble friend Lord Wells-Pestell wrote to me in April 1977 in the following terms:
"There can be no question of the Crown instructing any of its servants to carry out their function in such a way as to contravene the provisions of this Bill if it becomes law. To put the matter beyond doubt I give you an assurance to this effect".
I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, who I understand is to speak in this debate, will feel able to confirm the continuation of that assurance about the areas of land owned by the Crown.
My second point is that one other inevitable casualty of pruning the original Bill is its application to Northern Ireland, the only country in Europe where deer are without any protection whatever under the law. I am therefore delighted to inform your Lordships that, as far as I understand with general agreement, deer legislation in Northern Ireland is now being incor-
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porated in a new draft comprehensive wildlife order. If the Minister can confirm my understanding of that matter, I am sure your Lordships who watch the affairs of Northern Ireland will be much relieved with that information.
My final point is to look to the future. What is the future if we can get this limited Bill on to the statute book? I think we must then consider what steps we can take to achieve fully comprehensive legislation for deer in England and Wales. Much will depend on whether the Government have plans to introduce legislation to deal with deer farming, because some of the opposition, vociferous opposition—I am not complaining about it—to the provisions that we have abandoned for the time being has come from those who are now setting up in deer farming. I understand that the Government are considering legislation on deer farming.
A further consideration in looking at the future of legislation in this field must be how the Government intend fully to implement the advice of the Farm Animal Welfare Council that the harvesting of velvet from live deer should be prohibited in relation to all deer, not merely deer which are livestock on agricultural land. The orders which the House passed recently are incomplete in coverage, and perhaps in a future Bill we can complete that job as well. So I am looking to a future, perhaps in the next Session, when we will have another Deer Bill which will perhaps deal with some of the things we have for the time being put aside, when we shall be dealing, I hope, with deer farming, and when we shall be dealing also with the final provisions concerning the harvesting of velvet from live deer. So there is work ahead besides the immediate job of moving this Bill today.
I hope very much that your Lordships, in giving this Bill a Second Reading, will also feel able to apply a self-denying ordinance and not move amendments to it when we get to Committee stage and beyond. The reason is that, although the Government have kindly indicated their support for the Bill, they have given an indication that there may well not be time to consider in another place any amendments that might be moved and carried in this Chamber. As I say, we have been here twice before. We have refined and changed and adapted, and

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finally pruned back to a core of a Bill which I think has general support.
I hope very much, therefore, that we can now complete the work on this limited statute and pass it into law before the House goes into recess for the summer. For that purpose we shall need, as I say, to refrain from amending it, and I hope that that is a course which the whole House would approve, because I have sensed in the years that I have been associated with this measure that there is widespread support in this House for a Bill of this kind and, indeed, enthusiasm that it should be carried into law as soon as ever possible. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Northfield.)
7.5 p.m.
Lord BEAUMONT of WHITLEY: My Lords, the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, very much regrets that he is unable to be here today. He has already been down, as your Lordships know, for the Scottish housing Bill, and he was not able to be here today. I am to a certain extent speaking on his behalf, although not as eloquently as he would.
It is a rather emasculated Bill that we are contemplating today—in fact not so much emasculated as properly gralloched. We have lost, as the noble Lord says, many clauses dealing with various matters, and not just ones which impinge on the deer farmers, either. In losing the clauses dealing with, for instance, firearms and matters like that, we have possibly suffered a loss which it is difficult to see how it may be recovered. I entirely agree with the noble Lord's suggestion that possibly we should encourage the Government, if they are going to do something about deer farming, to incorporate as many of the lost clauses as they possibly can, but it is difficult to see how these important clauses about firearms et cetera could be included in such a Bill. In fact, what one really has to mourn more than anything else is that the Government have not seen fit to take on board a Bill which is not very large, which does not have very many opponents, although owing to the customs of Parliament they have had a disproportionate effect, and into which Government resources, includ-
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ing the work of draftsmen over a period of time, and a great deal of help have gone. Perhaps it may be that the Government will repent about that.
We must all congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, for ploughing doggedly on into this, his third attempt. I do not wish to detain your Lordships long tonight, except to ask the noble Lord about one matter which the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, has asked me to raise, and of which I have given Lord Northfield notice. It was a matter which also was in the previous Bills. We are not entirely certain about the various clauses which talk about "the owner or occupier" giving various consents. The question I should like to ask Lord Northfield is whether this use of the phrase, "the owner or occupier" in fact makes any change in the law as it at present is, except in so far, obviously, as it is dealing with a new matter. Does it establish rights for either landlord or tenant which did not exist before and which can be upheld as against any agreement which they may privately have entered into? That is the question that we ask. Apart from that, we welcome the Bill and hope that it will speedily become law.
7.9 p.m.
Lord DULVERTON: My Lords, I would like to add my voice to that of the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, in expressing gratitude and congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, for the persistence with which he has engineered this Bill through your Lordships' House twice already, and now, though in truncated form, we hope for a third time. We who are interested in the welfare of the deer of Britain are immensely grateful to Lord Northfield for this, and we must express our gratitude also to Mr. John Parr who has been steering this Bill through another place, not without considerable work and great difficulties.
We have a great many regrets that so many of the good provisions worked out so carefully and debated in this House have had to be cut out, but Lord Northfield has hinted to your Lordships, if he has not fully described, why it has been needful to truncate the Bill into its shortened form. But we must all now hope to see the Bill on the Statute Book as soon as ever may be.

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I do not know whether I should declare an interest in this matter, but, speaking as I do, I am proud to be the president of the British Deer Society which has all the interests of deer and their welfare very much at heart. We continue to hear horrifying stories and information on the increasing intensity and professional cunning of these poaching gangs, accompanied often by cruelty which would, I think, curdle your Lordships' blood if I were to recount some of them.
The new phenomenon of deer farming—and it is a fairly new phenomenon in this country—was an unexpected complication to the passage of the Bill. I would echo the words of the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, because there is a need now for the Government to give their minds to drawing up proper regulations governing the conduct of deer farming. I understand that the Scottish Office has had a working party in being for some little time now which has been looking into the problems of deer farming and what regulations might or should be applied to that practice. I hope very much that that will lead to legislation. But, I should like to add that I hope that it will be regarded as a United Kingdom matter and not simply as a Scottish matter, although we must welcome the initiative of the Scottish Office in setting up this working or examining party.
I shall not detain the House any longer except to echo again the words of the noble Lord, Lord Northfield: I hope that we shall not attempt to alter the Bill's present phraseology before sending it back to another place, because it really is urgent—I repeat "urgent"—that we now get the legislation on to the statute book and into operation. I shall simply add one further thought which my noble friends on the Front Bench connected with the Scottish Office may well have thought of; namely, that when, hopefully, the Bill becomes law there is every good reason for hoping that the Government will take a look at the Deer (Scotland) Act, as it now exists, to see whether the provisions against poaching and the fines and forfeitures there should not be brought into line with the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Northfield.
7.14 p.m.
Earl FORTESCUE: My Lords, I too am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord
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Northfield, for introducing this Bill and I admire his persistence in the matter. I welcome the Bill in so far as it goes, and in particular I am very glad to see that the maximum fine of £500 per animal is a realistic fine. Clause 5 gives the courts power to order the forfeiture of weapons and vehicles, and that is a very real deterrent. Also, the cancellation of a firearm or shotgun certificate is again a realistic punishment and a real deterrent.
It must be agreed that all forms of poaching are dishonest. The poacher is helping himself to something which does not belong to him. Many modern poachers operate on a large scale and make a great deal of money by doing so. Some are very sophisticated villains and some operate in gangs. I do not seek to add the poaching of game to the Bill, but I ask the Government to review the existing penalties under the Game Act and to increase the penalties to a realistic and modern level. Most poachers of game birds are charged under Section 30 of the Game Act and the maximum penalty is now a fine of only £20. A poacher must be a very bad poacher and, indeed, unworthy of the name "poacher", if he cannot get away with enough pheasants to show a handsome profit, even if the court imposes the maximum fine.
7.16 p.m.
Lord TRYON: My Lords, like most other noble Lords taking part in this debate tonight I have become something of a veteran speaker on Second Readings of Deer Bills. But, in common with everyone else who has spoken, I should like to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, on appearing yet again, on a third occasion, with a Deer Bill, albeit a rather shrunken version of the ones which we have considered here previously.
Tonight I shall try to shrink my speech in proportion to the amount by which the Bill has shrunk. That should not be too difficult because, looking back to my remarks on previous Deer Bills, I see that the minor reservations that I had before were confined to those parts that are no longer present in this Bill; and in anything that I have said previously my strongest support and encouragement has always related to the overwhelming need for some anti-poaching legislation for deer in England.

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I never think that it is a very good thing to quote oneself, but as recently as 1st July, when we were debating the order relating to cutting off deers' antlers in velvet, I said in some despair, thinking of this Bill:
"We have tonight saved deer from having their antlers cut off while in velvet, but we are really no nearer to preventing other, arguably worse, abuses whereby they are almost daily being killed, particularly by poachers employing the most inhumane methods".—[Official Report, 1/7/80; col. 311.]
I am thrilled that such a quick result has emerged to that rather despairing cry, with the appearance of the Bill in this House far sooner than I had dared hope.
I hope that there are no doubts in your Lordships' minds that a really serious evil does exist here. Perhaps I should declare a slight interest. I have a small estate in the South of Wiltshire where deer are present and I have almost day-to-day experience, and so do my neighbours, of the poaching of deer, particularly with dogs and snares, leading to very considerable cruelty. I wish the Bill the very best of luck and can assure the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, that I shall do nothing to rock the boat this time.
7.19 p.m.
Lord DORMER: My Lords, owing to the special circumstances surrounding the Bill I shall be brief. I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, for reintroducing the Bill. I admire his persistency, as I think does everyone else. I believe that it will command support from all sides of the House which will welcome its contents and its timing.
Since the last Bill was introduced in your Lordships' House there have been many suggestions inside the House and outside that a simpler Bill, embodying certain provisions upon which there was general agreement, could be introduced. This Bill will be exactly that. I welcome the legal definition of "poaching", and still more the heavy fines which will now be imposed for so doing. Up to the present day the fines for poaching have been insignificant and of no deterrent effect whatever; they could easily be paid for out of the proceeds of the sale of the deer. The new penalties proposed are heavy and, if properly enforced in the courts, will act as a deterrent.
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The provisions for the sale of venison to anyone other than a licensed game dealer are welcome and will, I believe, curtail this very undesirable traffic which has been growing considerably in recent years. The similar provisions for illegally taking deer should, if properly enforced by the courts, put an end to the also very undesirable traffic on the black market. In Clause 4 the very considerable powers now given to the police to stop and search an individual are most welcome and very necessary. Also, the power now proposed to seize and detain any vehicle or weapon, or both, for the purposes of proceedings, are most salutary and should give the police ample powers to prosecute in these cases.
Although short, the Bill very effectively includes the more important clauses of the previous Bill, without those clauses which gave rise to controversy. I believe that in its present form it will deal effectively with the widespread practice of poaching, which I know has been of very real concern to landowners and to all those who value the presence of deer in these islands, and they are very many in number. Deer are part of our national heritage and wildlife. Properly managed they provide employment and interest to a great many people in these islands. They deserve protection, and this Bill will provide it. Without contention and in simple terms it provides a new basis for legislation which I believe will stand for years to come as a means of protecting deer. It now deserves to pass into law in its present form, and I very much hope without amendments. I welcome this Bill and I hope that your Lordships will give it a speedy and effective passage in its present form through all its stages, and thereby help to preserve what is, I think, in the opinion of most people, the finest example of our wildlife.
Lord NUNBURNHOLME: My Lords, I too should like to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, on his Bill and to give him my assurance that I shall in no way hinder the Bill or put forward any form of amendment. I had two small questions for him, one of which has already been asked by the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, which concerned the words:
…without the consent of the owner or occupier".

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I felt that this might be slightly ambiguous and that an occupier may give consent when he may not have the legal power so to do However, that has already been dealt with.
The Bill is excellent in so far as it attacks where the venison goes rather than getting at the poacher, because the poacher poaches to sell. Clause 2(2) says:
"If any person sells or offers or exposes for sale or has in his possession for sale"—
and this is the important part—
"or purchases or offers to purchase or receives, any venison which comes from a deer…he shall be guilty of an offence".
Does that mean that hotels and restaurants may not purchase venison which has been poached? In which case, are there any penalties in this regard?
I should like to raise one other point. Clause 1(4) says:
"If any authorised person"—
that is, a landlord or his servants—
"suspects with reasonable cause…he may require that person—

(a) to give his full name and address; and

(b) to quit that land forthwith".

In other words, he may ask for the name and address of anyone of whom he has reasonable suspicion of being a poacher.
It has already been pointed out that we are dealing with armed gangs. I am not talking of the poacher who takes a pheasant for his Sunday dinner. He is quite different; we all know how to deal with him, and that is quite another matter. I am talking about dealing with armed gangs. There is also the question: when is it poaching and when does it become armed robbery? Sir Winston Churchill once said that there is nothing more exhilarating than being shot at and missed. I do not mind admitting that I disagree with the great man. I believe that being shot at and hit is even worse—it is most unpleasant. At what time does plain poaching become armed robbery, when perhaps a return of fire can be considered? What methods may be used forcibly to arrest the gentlemen who are armed?
There is also the question of vehicles being taken away as a penalty. Therefore, we are not talking of a £500 fine; we may be talking of a £10,000 confiscation, particularly if a vehicle such as a Range Rover is involved. A landlord's servant,
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who is an old keeper, may suddenly find himself confronted by three or four armed men who may consider—I think unwisely—that murder is better than losing their Range Rover. It is just a thought that I put to the noble Lord.
Lord NORTHFIELD: My Lords, I apologise for interrupting the noble Lord, but will he repeat that last point because I did not quite understand what he was saying about the Range Rover?
Lord NUNBURNHOLME: My Lords, I was merely saying that if a gang of three or four armed poachers have a Range Rover in which to take the deer away, it may be worth £10,000 or more; and if an old man, such as a gamekeeper, discovers them in the act of poaching, they may possibly commit murder rather than have their Range Rover taken away. I put that forward as a possible occurrence. The fine is a considerable fine. It does not affect the Bill; it is just a possible side effect. Apart from that, I think that the Bill is excellent and I entirely support it.
7.28 p.m.
Lord WYNNE-JONES: My Lords, as has been pointed out by several of your Lordships, the Bill is a truncated version of the original Bill that was brought forward. We all warmly congratulate my noble friend Lord Northfield for the tenacity that he has shown in bringing this Bill through three Second Readings. We have no doubt at all that it is worth while, because although the Bill has been cut down—although it is not the same Bill as came forward originally—it still achieves a very important purpose, and it would be madness to risk the Bill simply in order to reinsert any of the various points which many of us feel perhaps ought to be in a Bill of this type. But it is so important that the Bill should go through, that I am sure we shall all agree that the Bill ought to be passed without modification.
Those of us who are not familiar—and I am one of them—with the methods of poaching that have been described are frankly horrified. The poacher is often thought of as a single figure lurking around and catching perhaps the odd salmon, perhaps a hare, perhaps a rabbit, and perhaps a pheasant. But this is not that sort of poaching at all: this is mass

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slaughter. It is something which is organised villainy on the most atrocious scale, and something which has nothing to do with a person taking a single creature for the family pot. It has nothing to do with that at all.
Because of that, we must all feel that this must be stamped out: that if it continues it will have irremediable effects. Therefore, I am confident that all of us in your Lordships' House will agree that this Bill ought to go through. We wish it good luck, and I hope that we shall do our best to expedite it. I once more congratulate my noble friend Lord Northfield on the way in which he has stuck to his guns and has got this Bill to the present stage. At the same time, as my noble friend Lord Northfield said, the Government and all associated with it deserve great credit for having played such an active part in enabling the Bill to reach this point.
7.32 p.m.
The PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE, HOME OFFICE (Lord Belstead): My Lords, this Bill started its journey in another place in this Session in very much the same form that was approved by your Lordships' House towards the end of the last Session of the last Parliament. We have a great deal for which to thank the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, in respect of that legislation, and, I am certain, for a great deal of the work which has been done upon the present Bill.
On the Second Reading of the Bill in another place, my honourable friend the Member for Harborough, Mr. John Farr, referred to the concern of those engaged in deer farming who were understandably anxious that their livelihood and the development of deer farms should not be hindered; and those with a legitimate scientific interest in deer who sought appropriate provision in the Bill for suitably qualified persons, in addition to vets, to undertake research on deer.
I think it is fair to say that the outcome of the discussions on those issues was the realisation that in order to make progress, the contentious issues, as they were seen by some, to which no satisfactory solutions were readily forthcoming, should be dropped from the Bill so that it
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could concentrate on its essential element—which has received support from all parts of your Lordships' House this evening; namely, to provide for more effective action to be taken against poachers of deer.
I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, for his thanks to the Home Office for the help which it has been possible to give in the redrafting of the Bill. The outcome is a Bill which builds on the basic structure of the 1963 Act and strengthens the law against poachers by extending the range of offences, stiffening the penalties, and increasing the powers of arrest and forfeiture. In addition, by requiring in Clause 3 the licensed game dealers to keep records about the purchase and sale of venison, the outlets for poachers in disposing of their illegally obtained gains will be restricted.
The noble Lord, Lord Northfield, gave a vivid account in his speech, which has been echoed in other speeches of your Lordships and finally in the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Wynne-Jones, about the poaching of deer, which has increased in recent years as the value of venison and the number of deer have risen. The Government welcome these further steps in the Bill in the greater protection to be given to deer.
The noble Lord also referred in his speech to the position of the Crown in relation to the Bill. It is the fact that neither this Bill nor the 1963 Act binds the Crown. There can be no suggestion, however, that Crown servants would be encouraged to ignore the law. It is a matter of public policy that Crown servants in their official capacity should observe the spirit and the letter of the law, even though not legally bound by it, and they will do so in this case. I am glad to have the opportunity to give this reassurance in very much the same terms that were given in writing by the noble Lord, Lord Wells-Pestell, to Lord Northfield in the time of the previous Government.
The noble Lord asked about the protection against the taking of antler velvet in the same way as protection is afforded by regulations made by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food for farm deer. This would require primary legislation, and this evening I can only

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say that we shall keep this matter under review. Similarly, both the noble Lord and my noble friend Lord Dulverton referred to deer farming. My noble friend gave his opinion that a further look needed to be given at regulations in this respect. I shall certainly draw to the attention of my right honourable friend the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food the remarks made by my noble friend.
The noble Lord, Lord Northfield, also asked about the situation in Northern Ireland. I must apologise to the noble Lord that I do not have an answer for him about this. I feel that it should be confirmed to the noble Lord, and I feel sure that the Northern Ireland Office would be happy to do this in writing to the noble Lord. If it is acceptable to him I shall make sure that a letter comes to him in order to make this clear beyond any misunderstanding.
Finally, my noble friend Lord Fortescue welcomed, as the rest of your Lordships have, the penalties in this Bill for the protection of deer. He expressed the view that it would be a good thing if the general poaching laws could be brought more into line with the provisions of the Bill. I take very much the same view as my noble friend, because in common with many other noble Lords in this House I am aware of what happens with poaching. As some of your Lordships have said, it is not a case of somebody who wants something for the pot, but people who are doing it in a cruel and much more organised way. A review which my noble friend asks the Government to undertake, and which he and I have discussed on other occasions, remains as part of the programme of work for the Law Commission. Much as I should like to give my noble friend a more definite reply this evening, we really must await the conclusions of the Law Commission on that particular matter.
As I have said, the Bill is now in a much slimmer form than that which was before your Lordships' House in the last Session and that which started its journey in another place earlier in this Session. None the less, it represents a broad and well considered consensus on the essential measures which should now be taken to provide deer with additional protection from poaching. The Government believe that the Bill is a real step forward and is certainly to be welcomed. We would
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therefore wish to support the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, in his efforts to ensure that it makes progress towards the Statute Book.
7.39 p.m.
Viscount MASSEREENE and FERRARD: My Lords, will the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, allow me to intervene for one minute before he replies? As I introduced the original Act in this House and I have spoken on every Deer Bill here, I feel that I cannot let this occasion go without saying a few words. Like everyone else in this House I welcome this Bill, and I hope your Lordships will not hold it up in any way.
I have in my lifetime witnessed many deer that have been poached and been mutilated in the process. One of the cruelest aspects of poaching is that these ignorant louts—I can only call them that—will shoot a doe or hind which has a young calf, or they may wound the doe which may then die and make her leave the calf, and then the calf will starve to death. That is only one of the cruelties of poaching, and I have witnessed some really repulsive sights.
As have other noble Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, on his persistence in this matter; he has been like a terrier with a rat, never letting go. It is magnificent the way he has got the Bill to this stage, with the backing of the Government, and that is not an easy thing to obtain for a Private Bill. I hope my noble friend Lord Belstead will take note of what my noble friend Lord Dulverton said about deer farming and the sale of velvet. I believe I first brought this matter to the notice of the House when I tabled a Question about the sale of velvet. That, too, can result in the most appalling cruelty. At present it is not allowed, but I hope that in the near future we shall have another Bill which, apart from anything else, will bring in regulations to protect fully farmed deer. I give this Bill my heartiest welcome, especially the clause concerning the sale of venison, which will make it far more unremunerative for gang poaching.
7.42 p.m.
Lord NORTHFIELD: My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate and who have been so kind

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about the Bill and our persistence. It has been not just my persistence; Mr. Farr and bodies like the Deer Society have really been the motivators of the Bill, and I want the thanks of your Lordships to be conveyed to them as well. While, of course, I thank the Government, I hope the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, will take back the message that we hope this is only a beginning and that the Bill will not be the end of the road on deer legislation.
The previous, longer Bill, very nearly got through. Indeed, it was blocked in the other place in the final stages of last summer only by one Member, who acted almost under a misapprehension. It had a great chance at that point in getting through totally without emasculation. Thus, there is wider agreement than perhaps he realises on a good deal on the rest of the original Bill. That is why, as the deer farmers have come forward with opposition—which may not be well-founded in particular cases; it has been doubt rather than opposition—and as their position has been clarified, we hope that in the process of clarifying their position the Government will see the need for the wider powers and measures that were in the longer Bill. Perhaps they will make it a Government Bill next time so as to clear up all the remaining points of deer legislation, particularly in England. The Government have their foot in the door, if I may put it that way, as a result of the wide consultations with the deer farmers, and I hope that will lead to the introduction of a Government Bill in which there will be room for miscellaneous provisions that go beyond deer farming and into some of the matters we have temporarily shelved in order to get this shorter Bill through.
I will try to deal with the four points that were raised. The noble Lords, Lord Beaumont of Whitley and Lord Nunburnholme, asked about the words "owner or occupier" in Clause 1 and elsewhere. I understand that those words appear in other legislation concerning the protection of animals and so on, so this is nothing new and, in my view, does not create any new confusion. Why are those words necessary? Consider, for example, the Forestry Commission. The commission is growing trees on a lot of other people's land, but the owners of that land retain
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the shooting rights. In such a case it would be the owner of the land who must give permission for people to go on that land to shoot or take deer.
Equally, the other way round, the Forestry Commission owns a lot of land on which it is growing trees and lets out the shooting rights. In that case it might be the occupier of the land—this may be covered by another phrase in the subsection—who has the right to allow someone to come on to the land to shoot at and take deer. It is therefore essential to leave the words "owner or occupier" so as to cover the individual cases that will arise according to where the shooting rights rest. No new rights are created because the only person who can allow anyone to come on the land with a view to taking deer is the person who possesses the shooting rights in that case. The clause is drafted in this way to enable it to bite where the rights exist.
Lord BEAUMONT of WHITLEY: My Lords, I do not want to make heavy weather over this, and in any case there is nothing we can do about it. I accept the noble Lord's assurance, which deals with the reservation I had, but it does not actually appear in the Bill; it does not say it is the owner or occupier with shooting rights. What will happen if an occupier—say, the Forestry Commission, which was instanced by the noble Lord—who does not have the shooting rights gives the kind of permission envisaged in the Bill? Is there any reason why he should not? The statute law says he may. Perhaps the noble Lord will write to me if he does not have an immediate answer. As I say, it is an academic point at this stage of the Bill, although it might be as well to clear it up.
Lord NORTHFIELD: My Lords, I can go some way to reassuring the noble Lord right now. The clause must be read as a whole. It says:
"Subject to subsection (3) below, if any person enters any land without the consent of the owner or occupier or other lawful authority…".
In other words, the persons concerned—all of them—are covered by the word "lawful"; it is the person who has the "lawful authority" to allow that person to enter in pursuit of deer. My advice is that the word "lawful", in that context, means it is securing the clause to apply to

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the person who has the legal and lawful right to grant permission. If I am wrong about it or if my explanation is incomplete, I will write to the noble Lord.
The noble Lord, Lord Nunburnholme, asked about Clause 2(2) and whether an hotel, for example, which purchased deer or offered to purchase it might be caught and fined. I think the answer is, Yes, provided—as is clearly stated in the subsection—"he knows or has reason to believe" that that venison has been poached. The position is rather like that of the receiver of stolen goods. A person can be prosecuted if he knows, or has reason to believe, that the venison was poached. That is carefully set out, since paragraph (a), relating to the offence, is followed by the word "and", after which we read,
"(b) which he knows or has reason to believe to have been so taken or killed".
So the hotel would be prosecuted if it could be proved that they knew, or had reason to believe, that the venison that they were purchasing had been poached.
Lord NUNBURNHOLME: My Lords, that is the way that I read it; I merely wanted confirmation.
Lord NORTHFIELD: My Lords, I cannot be very helpful on the other two points. I do not know the answer to the question as to when poaching becomes armed robbery. All I can say is that the penalties in the Bill are substantial, and probably the difference does not mean a great deal; but if I am wrong I shall gladly write to the noble Lord.
Finally, with regard to confiscation, given the fact that poaching is now so highly organised and is carried out by gangs with weapons, searchlights, Land Rovers and everything that one can think of, and given the fact also that the carcass is so valuable, it is important that full confiscation of all the weapons, vehicles and so on by the court should be possible. I must point out that it is not absolutely certain that the court will always impose such penalties; the court may impose them.
However I think it fair to say—and I accept the point that the noble Lord was making—that some people may resist even more firmly, given the high penalties now contained in the Bill. But are we not on the horns of a dilemma? If the penalties
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are not great enough, we shall not deter the poachers, and perhaps we have to take the risk in order to ensure that the deterrent effect is strong enough. Having thought very quickly about the point that was raised, I cannot say more at this stage, but I feel that what I have said is the basis of explanation about the penalties.
I think that I have dealt with the four detailed points. I was relieved to hear the noble Lord, Lord Tryon, say that the points that he had picked out on a previous occasion all related to clauses that have now been abandoned. That gave me at least a slight hope that I was on a good wicket in terms of not having to say too much in winding up the debate, since the noble Lord had been most penetrating in his criticisms of the Bill in its previous form.
I again wish to thank noble Lords who have so kindly both welcomed the Bill and indicated that the important thing is to pass it without amendment. I hope that in those circumstances we can now give the Bill a Second Reading—
Lord DULVERTON: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down may I take him up on one point that he mentioned earlier? He said that the British Deer Society was the main promoter of the Bill, and was behind it. The society is a charity and it is conceivable that the Charity Commissioners would think that we in the society had been acting improperly in dabbling in political affairs. Will the noble Lord accept that in fact the situation is that a number of people who probably have been members of the Deer Society have been considerably active behind the scenes in assisting him in preparing the Bill?
Lord NORTHFIELD: My Lords, I would say anything in order to help the noble Lord on this point, and if I have trespassed in regard to this matter, I readily apologise. The Deer Society was kind enough to make me an honorary member and after receiving such a great honour I should hardly wish to land it in trouble. I say to the noble Lord that members of the Deer Society concerned have inspired me in preparing the Bill and have been stalwart in helping me during the various stages of drafting and re-drafting and in mobilising support. I hope that that is a happy note upon

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which to end this brief debate about the Bill. I hope that we can put it on to the statute book before we adjourn for the Summer Recess.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

LONDON THEATRE PROBLEMS
7.55 p.m.
The Earl of KINNOULL The Earl of KINNOULL rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are aware of the present difficulties faced by the London Theatres, and what assistance or advice they can render in order to safeguard a unique part of the national heritage and an immeasurable asset of the tourist industry.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, the subject of the financial problems facing London theatres is of course not new to my noble friend or indeed to the House. I have put down this Question this evening not only in order to express a very deep-rooted concern about the welfare of one of our priceless national assets, which enriches our culture and heritage, but also to seek from my noble friend information on what further positive steps the Government are considering taking within the limits of their public expenditure policy to create a climate within which the battle for survival and viability can be won.
My Question covers basically three streams of London theatreland, each of which is important and involves slightly differing problems. The first stream comprises the four subsidised theatres which the Arts Council monitors, supports and nourishes. The second is the fringe theatres, which form what I would describe as a very important element of seed corn within the London theatreland. The third stream comprises the commercial theatres, of which I understand there are 40, and to which I am limiting my remarks. Perhaps before doing so I may in anticipation and in advance thank those noble Lords who have indicated that they wish to take part in the debate, of which there has been relatively short notice, and which is coming on at a relatively late hour. Their interventions will no doubt make the debate much more worthwhile. I
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hoped that the noble Lord, Lord Miles, with his unrivalled knowledge and experience of the practical problems of the acting profession and theatre management, would be able to take part. I now see in fact that he indicates that he will be able to take part, and I am delighted about that.
The general financial climate of the 40 commercial London theatres is already well known to my noble friend. Personally, I doubt whether one should accept the degree of gloom and doom, that one gleans from certain reports in the media, to the effect that we are in sight of the end of a golden era for London theatres. I have great faith in the ingenuity, resilience, determination and will to survive of the London theatre managers. Coupled with that is the fact—and it is a rather fascinating one—that one successful production can turn dark moments into a bright new dawn.
Nevertheless, these London theatres at present face a massive task of remaining viable, and indeed remaining open. Inflation has pushed up production costs to gigantic proportions. I believe that the cheapest play costs at least £50,000 to produce, and recently the cost of the most expensive has been over half a million pounds; and that is before the curtain has gone up and even a single member of the audience has seen the play. My noble friend will know that the running maintenance costs are very high. But coupled with the cost problems has been the very worrying factor of a downturn in ticket sales to both overseas and home markets. I am told that last year £10 million worth of tickets were unsold.
All that has led to a quite natural nervousness about investment in new productions and indeed the "angels", or private backers—I believe that they are now called "saints"—consider with great caution the possibility of supporting any new production. In consequence, we now see seven theatres in darkness, and there is always the added fear, bearing in mind the very fabric of these theatres, that if they remain unused for any length of time, they consequently fall into disrepair, and then become targets for redevelopment schemes or for conversion into cinemas or bingo halls.
Of course, none of these points will be new to my noble friend or, indeed, to the

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House. Nor, I suspect, would my noble friend disagree with the proposition that the London theatre world still retains its premier position as the most varied selection of talented professional productions anywhere in the world—and that is quite a unique cornerstone of our very culture and heritage. Its value is inestimable, and in the eyes of the British Tourist Authority, who play a very active and valuable role now in support of London theatres, it is one of the jewels that London has to offer overseas visitors. In 1978, 31 per cent. of all overseas visitors enjoyed a London theatre production. In commercial terms, that amounts to £19 million worth of tickets.
I do not expect my noble friend to disagree with the value of London theatres, and perhaps the most important part of his brief, when he comes to reply, is what positive steps can be taken to assist in the present difficult climate. Certainly his right honourable friend's decision to provide £5,000 towards an experimental ticket booth in Leicester Square, to be set up in November, is a very valuable move. Clearly theatre managers have to win back a stronger home market, and indeed the overseas market, by means of more aggressive sales campaigns; and my noble friend will know that the Society of West End Theatres, the trade body of the West End theatres, is actively advising on this at the moment, with such innovations as a rail club package, a ticket and meal package and so on.
My Lords, what are the other measures on which the Government could help? I do not advocate that one should go for a big dip into the public purse, as obviously this is unrealistic; but I do advocate the Government taking further action to help create a climate of confidence, within which this cultural jewel can retain its sparkle. The first and perhaps obvious measure is either to reduce or, indeed, eliminate the VAT on ticket sales. My noble friend knows these arguments so well, but I would tell him that the price of tickets today is a dominating factor in winning back audiences and so ensuring the life blood and the future of London theatres. A gesture by Government would go a long way to restoring confidence. It is time, I believe, that the Treasury removed their dark glasses and accepted in their hardnosed way that the offset gains of a thriving London theatre world
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well outweigh the fairly paltry returns they at present receive from VAT.
The second measure I would submit to my noble friend is assistance with the "angels". These are individuals who are indeed the lifeblood of new productions. At present, they receive no tax concessions on losses; and when one sees that the odds are getting longer and longer against picking a winner, it is vital to retain their confidence and support. There is an old saying, "No feet, no horse". Indeed, I think the "angels" are very similar in the theatre world.
The third measure I would put to my noble friend concerns the Theatre Investment Fund. The noble Lord, Lord Goodman, among his many other good works, steers this fund, and indeed had hoped to take part this evening in this debate if it had not come on at so late an hour. My noble friend will know that the trust has been active now for four years. I believe the previous Administration were responsible; indeed, perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson. It is a most valuable organisation. It has in a very short time supported over 90 productions. It plays an invaluable role in supporting new productions, in stimulating and fostering new blood and, indeed, in encouraging other private investment. Its capital structure is very modest—only some £250,000. It is a successful mixture of private and state capital. Clearly its capital structure requires to be widened, and I hope my noble friend can say that Her Majesty's Government value this fund and will support it further, particularly on the basis of a mixed economy injection.
The fourth point I should like to put to my noble friend—and this is another avenue which I hope the Government will examine—concerns Independent Television. Independent Television—indeed, television generally—to a large degree feeds on the back of live theatre. Independent Television offers very little in return. It is an obvious avenue which the Government could look at, as to whether some of the sizeable IBA levies should find their way back into the live theatre.
My last suggestion to my noble friend may have an added attraction in that it requires no Government money. It is that the West End at night often appears rather inhospitable to those theatregoers

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who wish to use private transport. At present there can be an enormous, expensive hassle in parking, and this often leaves an unfavourable memory on what should have been a delightful evening. I hope my noble friend will be able to see whether the GLC could perhaps assist in the way of parking facilities in the West End in the evenings.
My Lords, the value of this debate will be what others who follow me have to say, as they indeed speak with far greater experience. I hope my noble friend will accept, though, that there is a very deep concern about the welfare of the London theatres, their future existence, their value in the widest sense and their importance to our cultural life in London. I hope his reply tonight will give a positive encouragement of Government support for their continued existence.
8.7 p.m.
Lord BEAUMONT of WHITLEY: My Lords, I know that the whole House will be extremely grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, for having asked this Question. I am sure that everybody here in what looks a rather slim House, unfortunately, will be wholeheartedly grateful to him, because the theatre is not only one of the great glories of Britain's culture these days; it is also an immense fund of satisfaction and help to a great many of your Lordships and a great many people in Britain today. I think we must try to do as much as we can to keep it that way, because, as the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, said, our theatre is probably the best in the world at the moment, and the most diverse. It is also a great earner of money, both in tourism and in what it sells abroad by way of the prestige it gives to the kind of plays which are now being written for television by some of the playwrights who have served their apprenticeship in the theatre, which plays, again, are sold abroad. The profits to this country—not just monetary, but monetary as well—are enormous.
I think we must not underrate, either, the importance of art in a country which is going through, and will continue to go through, a very difficult economic period. I am not pretending for one second that what happens to the West End theatre is going to affect very much the dole queues
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in Wigan, but what I do say is that unless you show a healthy art at the top end you do not have a healthy art at the bottom end, and vice versa. The thing is a seamless robe, and we must cultivate the high culture as well as the low. If we allow the theatre life of this country to suffer in any way through the results of inflation, by any means which we could have controlled, then we—and by "we" I mean all of us, including the Government as a right and proper body to intervene—will have a very great deal for which to answer.
The noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, has itemised a number of things which are already being done, and this is very important because the theatre is attempting to help itself, and is trying to do so extremely vigorously. It is up to the rest of us to try to see, given this effort by them, what we can do to meet and to help these efforts.
I think there are two primary aims. The first is to get a general acceptance of the real assets that the theatre brings us, such as I have already outlined, and the second is to try to get a number of outside bodies to co-operate with the theatre in producing something which will be of mutual benefit to themselves, because what the Government so often do not seem to realise is that we are not back in a 19th century situation where a single industry or a single firm could produce the results, depending upon what had been put into it.
We live in a much more complicated, symbiotic world where what we need is help to try to put together packages of various industries which will help lead to the solution that we want. I think that the ticket booth which has been set up is a very good idea. The move towards one-price theatres, the move towards series sales—though so far that is mainly concerts and operas, but nevertheless, I suspect that with repertory theatres that is something which can happen—are important and worthwhile steps. But they will not be enough in this period unless the Government are prepared to help a bit more.
Several suggestions have been made by the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, as to what that help should be. I should like to mention just a couple of them. One is the high level of VAT. We all know how great parts of the entertainment industry

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were in fact crippled in the period after the war by the entertainments tax. We did very great harm to a lot of our entertainment industries at that time, and I think that is now accepted. We are in danger of doing the same now. There are a number of people who are in favour of zero VAT on the theatre. I must confess that I am not. I suspect that VAT is a tax which should be applied at some rate or another to everybody, but there should be differentials and I think that for the theatre it should be considerably lower than this. That is something the Government could well do; and do extremely soon; and I hope that they will.
The second thing which the Government can do is help the "angels" or "saints" in giving them tax relief from their losses, because, after all, they are taxed on their gains. If this could be done—certainly it should be done and I am sure it could be done—it would be an immense incentive. It is very important that we concentrate to a certain extent on the commercial theatre, not because it is necessarily doing as important a job as our very fine subsidised theatre, though I would hate to make judgments one way or another. But one cannot afford to let the two drift too far apart. The point about the subsidised theatre at the moment is that not only is it subsidised but on its subsidy it does not have to pay VAT, and the thing that VAT is doing to the commercial theatre is spreading further and further the gap between the two sides of the theatre industry. I think that is something we should aim away from.
The third thing the Government should do—it is the last thing I am going to mention—is one that the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, has also mentioned; that is, investment in the theatre investment fund. Public funding of the TIF would be tremendously important, I would remind this Government, not just in stimulating art but in stimulating imports of foreign currency, in stimulating one of the things in this country which quite genuinely pays profits, although the profits do not always go to the people who put it on, which is why we are in the position that we are in. But quite definitely it brings profits to this country in every kind of form.
The noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, said that he was not going to ask for a big dip into the purse. All of us feel very frightened
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of asking for big dips into the purse, but I must say that with the theatre investment fund I should have thought that a once-and-for-all dip for investment purposes, such as has been made for the film industry, is something which ought to be discussed very seriously at the moment. We are very grateful for what the Government have done. They have put up some money; they have helped with the ticket-selling scheme. We know that in the Minister for the Arts, as with the previous Minister for the Arts, we have someone who very much cares about the whole matter, but it is very important that it should be brought home to the Government how important this is, not from the point of view of highbrows or people who are just interested in airy-fairy things like art, though that is important in itself, but because it is something that can be seen to do this country good, and to pay.
8.17 p.m.
Lord ELWYN-JONES: My Lords, the Bard of Avon has told us, "All the world's a stage". The question we invite the Government to consider tonight is: What is the use of a stage without a theatre? I am very happy indeed to follow the two noble Lords who have raised the plight of the theatre and asked the Government to help with regard to it. The enthusiasm of the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, was so great that, having come in second on deer, he was obviously quite determined to come in second on the theatre, on the dears and darlings of the theatre.
Lord BEAUMONT of WHITLEY: My Lords, I humbly beg the noble and learned Lord's pardon. It was totally inadvertent and I apologise profusely.
Lord ELWYN-JONES: As I agree with every word that the noble Lord mentioned, I do not hold anything against him, save that he has denied me the pleasure of making some of the points that he made himself. We are particularly grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, because this is the second time this year that he has very properly drawn attention to the plight of the theatre. The last time was in February, when he made a plea for the elimination or the reduction of VAT. On that occasion I fear that the

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Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Cockfield, hardly gave us cold comfort—no comfort at all. Indeed, he said that as income tax had been so singularly relieved there were plenty of rich members of the public longing to flock to the theatre. It is not a very accurate picture of the situation either of the public or of the theatre. The fact is that since that debate the situation in the theatre has worsened somewhat for the reason which has been pointed out—that the cost of production increases all the time because of inflation. Indeed, I am told by my friends in the theatre who have spoken to me today that the cost of mounting a play has doubled in the last two years through the increased costs of materials and salaries, inadequate as the salaries of most actors may be.
The result of these pressures, as the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, said, is that tonight there are seven theatres in the dark. Seven theatres are dark. It is a horrid thought. Theatres are the place of enlightenment, of enjoyment. They are a crucial part of our own culture in which we have indeed excelled, and a theatre in the dark is a tragedy. It is something that I fear will tend to increase. At least, up till now, permanent closures have been stopped, but we cannot and ought not to tolerate dark theatres, in a city and community that needs more than ever the enlightment, cheer and encouragement of an active theatrical life. Of course, the financial burden of maintaining a dark theatre, an empty theatre, is considerable. I am told that the cost of salaries of theatre staff and maintenance can range from £2,000 to £5,000 a week; so there is a need for help in this situation.
Various valuable suggestions have been made already in the course of the debate. The most oppressive burden is VAT. VAT costs the theatres £20 million a year; yet the theatres contribute substantially to the financial wealth of the country and to that of London, in particular. It is a great inducement to tourists to come here. How the calculation is arrived at I know not, but I am informed from a good source that in 1977, 4 million tourists attended our theatres, mostly the London theatres; and, of course, most of those were Americans, devoted, as they are, to our theatre, devoted, as they are, to the English language. I remember the American
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Congressman who is supposed to have said, "If the English language was good enough for Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, it is good enough for me". They come, and have come, to the theatres and they bring wealth to the community as a result.
My Lords, there is no time—for I am only an interloper in this matter; but permitted to interlope with the permission of the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley—to go into what the theatre is doing to improve its own position with various methods of self-help; but perhaps we may hear something about that from the noble Lord, Lord Miles, whom we are delighted to see again among us and to hear. I will not go over again the specific suggestions that have been made—VAT, theatre investment fund and the half dozen more suggestions—but I enthusiastically support the plea to the Government now to do something to save the live theatre.
8.23 p.m.
Viscount MONTGOMERY of ALAMEIN: My Lords, my thanks are first due to my noble friend Lord Kinnoull for introducing this subject. Quite apart from anything else, it is very refreshing to talk of something more esoteric than the deluge of legislation which has been the fare of late. It is also a great privilege to follow the noble and learned Lord, Lord Elwyn-Jones. He said that he was not a man of the theatre but from what he has said it is clear that he is. I must start by declaring an interest, a double interest. First, I am the president of the Redgrave Theatre Trust. The Redgrave Theatre is a provincial theatre in Farnham, named after the distinguished actor, Sir Michael Redgrave. We are a very small part of the subsidised theatre, and I will not refer to it again, because we receive subsidy from the Arts Council for which we are grateful and which enables us to put on a great variety of different types of production. If we did not have that subsidy, we should have a more straightforward commercial type of production in the catchment area that we serve—and that would be a loss to the community. Secondly, I am what has already been referred to in the theatrical parlance by Several noble Lords as an "angel", sometimes referred to nowadays as a "saint". Perhaps other people with a more economic frame of mind might refer

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to one as a damned fool. But there it is. One is involved in this activity because one believes in it; and I am gratified to hear that there may be some encouragement for those of us who indulge in this particular type of foolishness.
There is no doubt—and noble Lords who have spoken have brought this out already—that there is a real danger that the independent commercial theatre in London could go down. If it did go down—and the noble and learned Lord referred to various theatres which are dark—it is very unlikely that it would return in a hurry. Therefore, it is important (and the Question has drawn attention to the fact that it is part of our national heritage) that we consider this problem seriously. The problem is temporary. The problem is the economy, the lack of tourists coming here, and the multiple effect of the costs of production and the costs of an evening out in the theatre. A large number of the British public who go to the theatre do not go only to the theatre but to the theatre and to dine out also. They must be transported there. It is this multiple effect which has had a damaging impact on the theatre.
Obviously, the theatre public is very much a part of the users of discretionary income. When there is a period of recession it is the least crucial element in their life which tends first to be liquidated and shelved. This crucial part of discretionary income has affected the theatre seriously not only in the United Kingdom but abroad. We are all delighted to have a strong pound, but this has had a detrimental effect on the US tourist trade coming to London; and a very large part of the London theatre is dependent upon the US market. It is a sad fact that fewer people come into London from outside to the commercial theatre than heretofore.
I suspect that one of the reasons why there is less demand inside our own country is the reason given by my noble friend Lord Kinnoull: the problem in the West End itself, the lack of parking. There is no doubt that Soho and the area round Shaftesbury Avenue, which is a major area for the independent commercial theatre, is not as so salubrious as it was. It has a distinctly disadvantageous position compared with other theatres, and not
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only those in London which, like the National Theatre, have parking and dining on site. Provincial theatres such as those with which I am associated, or at Chichester, or the Yvonne Arnaud at Guildford and many others, have good parking space and eating facilities as an integral part of the premises. That is not the case in London's commercial theatres. If they had access to the buildings to which they are adjacent and if every theatre had a building next door available for dining and other club facilities, that would change the situation.
My Lords, it would be improper to have a debate such as this without mentioning briefly Equity. Equity, the actors' union, has done a great deal for the acting profession in raising standards and raising salaries, and it helps the industry as a whole; but there are two negative points that I should like to mention. One affects production costs. In many small productions today, one set and three actors is the order of the day, but the Equity rules demand that a greater number of people are utilised. This raises costs and restricts production. Of course, one must realise that the acting profession is one of those areas of activity where supply vastly exceeds demand and therefore the natural forces should be allowed to have greater interplay. Secondly, there is no comparable industry where market forces are more apparent in the matter of productivity nor more readily accepted. A case in point is the recent large musical, "Chicago", in which all the people concerned offered to reduce their salaries in order to keep the show going; but there was a certain amount of resistance by Equity. This is perhaps less satisfactory than it should be.
Finally, VAT has been mentioned and, of course, VAT will naturally continue to exist. VAT is an indirect tax and must be more sensible than direct taxation. There is one aspect that has not been mentioned—and I entirely agree with what noble Lords have said—and that is, if one comes from a theatre one can go to a bookshop and buy a magazine, books or pictures of the theatre, or other pictures—whether pornographic or not, depending where the theatre is—and these are not subject to VAT. Therefore, we have a state of affairs where there is a distinct prejudice against the spoken word in favour of the written word. I am sure

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that this is something which needs to be considered by the Government. As has been mentioned, the London theatre is a great part of our national heritage. There is no substitute for the living theatre.
My Lords, that is all I want to say, except that I can think of no greater honour, having followed the noble and learned Lord, Lord Elwyn-Jones, than to give way to that great tyro of the theatre, the noble Lord, Lord Miles.
8.31 p.m.
Lord MILES: My Lords, I thank the noble Viscount and the three noble Lords who preceded him for a delightful though ill-deserved tribute. We are talking about a very deep malaise in our country, and it is a matter of language. We speak the widest and most varied language in the world—a language gathered in from Rome, Greece, Scandinavia, the Low Countries, Germany, India, Africa, China and Malaysia. The other day I read that in 1699 there was an advertisement which said:
"For tee the Chineans say 'cha'. The Indians say 'tee'."
Anyway, we have "cha" firmly nailed down to 1699 and coming from China. Only Russia has a larger vocabulary.
This language has been spread all over the world by soldiers, sailors, merchant adventurers and tourists. It is the lingua franca of science. At conferences in Athens, Istanbul, and Tokyo the language is English. Russian theatre folk, Japanese, South Americans, people from all over the world, write to me and they ask for the paperback copies of plays by our modern dramatists: they would like John Arden, Bob Bolt; have we any Wesker? Are the Stoppard plays printed? They ask for Peter Nicholls, and so on. They only wish that they could get to England to see and hear some of our theatre.
England is the greatest museum in the world. Do not think that I am trying to divert your Lordships from the subject in mind, the theatre. People come from all over the world to see our castles, cathedrals, churches, museums, our great country houses, our libraries and to enjoy our landscapes. All our labelling, our guide books, are in English. So far as possible
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they comprise a list of Britishness. That Britishness reposes, I believe, largely and most powerfully inside our language.
It has a wide variety of dialect and regional speech. There are 30 or 40 beautiful differences, in one of which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Elwyn-Jones, is a master from birth, as well as having gathered in elements on the way of other dialects. There is Geordie, Yorkshire, Lancashire, Black Country, East Anglian, Cockney, West country—you name it, my Lords, and we have it. It is well known that the Elizabethan seamen, Raleigh, Hawkins and Drake—these boys who came up to the Court from the West country—were the people who implanted phonetically into the English language West country sounds which remained in it for many, many years.
So I believe this linguistic richness finds its sharpest form in the theatre; not only in serious theatre but in common, run-of-the-mill, farce, pantomime, and so on. The Elizabethan dramatists—the province of our classical theatres, our subsidised theatres—are packed with it. Shakespeare, Middleton, Dekker, John Ford, Marlowe and the Restoration also; onwards to Christopher Rich, the pantomime tradition, Joe Grimaldi, Marie Lloyd, George Robey, Dan Leno, Syd Field and Henry Irvine. One cannot separate them, they are talking the richest, most varied and most expressive language that has ever been created since language began.
It is a long, unbroken line of performers speaking English; tragical, historical, comical, pastoral; comical, pastoral, historical, tragical—these are the men. On to "Charley's Aunt". My wife and I were in Spain a little while ago and owing to fog we could not get home. We had to stay the night because the 'plane was not flying. Walking along a street in Barcelona we saw billed in enormous headlines on a theatre: "El Tia de Carlo". We passed it and I stopped my wife and said: "'Tia', that is 'Tio Pepe'. That is uncle. So 'Tia' must be aunt". My wife said: "What is 'Carlo'?" I said: "'Charles'—The aunt of Charles". They are performing: 'Charley's Aunt' here". A great Spanish comedian was appearing—the only man dressed in Victorian clothes. The others were in

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mini skirts and what they had with them. I throw that in as a makeweight, my Lords.
Only a year ago I was invited to go to the Waldorf Hotel to address some ladies who had flown over to England to see our theatre. It appeared that they had come on a 10 day trip and were going to see 14 theatres. I was only a lunch-time makeweight before they went off to have a sleep before going to a 5 o'clock and then an 8.30 performance. At the end I had a note from their guide saying that they had indeed seen 14 British theatres in 10 days—and had survived it!
I think in brief that the theatre can be said to express our natural heartbeat more powerfully than any other means. We look to the Greeks and the Romans; Plautus and Terence; the Moliere; Spain's Calderon; Lope de Vega; Ibsen; Strindberg. Always one keeps finding that what we know of a country is concerned with names. Names like Alexander the Great and Hitler disappear. Names of dramatists, great composers and artists turn up as the prime expression of great countries and their individuality.
However, one could say that much of this—one could say most of it—is available in printed form. This is indeed true. But the bringing it to life for searching its depths, for laughter and tears, for making it sparkle with wit and enchantment, there is the theatre. In the world today there is no theatre like English and no actors better than the British. There are the great Russian actors; but they begin to grow old and they keep them playing Juliet into their 'seventies, and those things which belong to tradition. We do something different in a marvellous way. We do not rehearse for 10, 12 or 20 weeks. We do not rehearse for half a year. In four weeks a play is put on as a result of blinding hard work, discipline, application, marvellous diction and a range of technical ability unrivalled in any country in the world.
Now, for one reason or another, the theatre is going through a hard time. Diminished tourism, inflation and crucifying rising costs have affected the theatre. Our own tiny Mermaid Theatre, which had 500 seats, incurred overheads which multiplied nearly three times in the final five years before we closed. We had customers whom we knew well, who came
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as they would have gone to see Henry Irving, and whom he and his managers knew. They would come six to eight times a year and then they began to restrict themselves to four, and finally they came twice a year. In the end quite a number of people were bringing their own lunch and dinner packs in greaseproof paper, and were eating sandwiches in our foyer instead of going to the theatre restaurant. So we saw this decline at first hand and in a very, very tragic way.
It is a very high risk business—there is no higher risk business in the world. You take a quite unpredictable dive into the deep end and hope for the best. There is no production line, with other cars being made, taking out one model or two and feeding in other models in order to sustain the whole operation. Every theatre production, certainly in the West End commercial theatre, is a life or death matter; a complete production line in itself; a beginning and an end—and all too often an end.
I do not think there are any simple remedies. Your Lordships, between you, have discussed a number of remedies, all of which have relevance and all of which could provide a pool of ideas for discussion. I will not enlarge on those or duplicate them, but in the end I think we have to face what amounts to a real weakening and erosion of the greatest asset this country possesses: its astounding language, its value and its uses, how they come to life in our most renowned theatre and what can be done to rescue them from their present parlous state. I hope that steps will be taken and that wiser heads than mine, both here and in the other place, where I am told they proliferate—perhaps I should not have said that—will find solutions.
I shall give only one tiny note of cheer, which is that at the moment my wife and I and our group of trustees are in the middle of an appeal to collect half a million pounds in order to give a face-lift to our Mermaid Theatre, which was built in an old warehouse and which it was really impossible to leave there in its present state. By an arrangement with a prestigious finance house, we have managed to get £2 million, but half a million pounds still had to be found for the fittings, furnishings, carpets, new seating, restaurant equipment, refrigera-

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tors, heaters, tables, chairs, tablecloths and so on. So my wife and I have been out begging—and there is no happier job than going round the City of London.
We have restricted ourselves to just the square mile for the moment, which is perhaps why your Lordships may not have heard of us yet! But I will tell you that the five clearing banks have shown an understanding and a generosity quite unprecedented in our 40 years' experience of the theatre, and have made a substantial contribution towards this half a million pounds, which is now already nudging 50 per cent. of its total. There is one hank in particular, one of the giant banks. If you can get in—and in the end you can get in, with courtesy, great persistence and humour—and if you can make an incision and get your hand in and gently massage, you will find a heart beating and it beats even more strongly as you go on.
In the bank of which I am speaking (one of the Big Five), the chairman and general manager will ask you to tea—I commend this to your Lordships—and he will go to the cupboard and get out a giant home-made fruit cake and will hand you the knife to cut a slice for yourself before sending for the chequebook and sending you home with a handsome contribution towards the fund for which you have come seeking support. I need say no more except to thank your Lordships for such a patient and gentle hearing.
8.45 p.m.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE: My Lords, we are lucky in this House, are we not? There are only half-a-dozen of us here, but we have had a delightful talk from somebody who really knows what he is talking about and, what is far more important, knows how to talk about it. I was rather surprised at the idea of the five banks being generous: this is something quite new to me. I have not experienced it. In fact I had a go not long ago and failed dismally; but perhaps that was because I am not as plausible and attractive as the noble Lord who has just spoken.
He spoke about language. I agree, and I think the glory of our country is the variety of language. I must tell your Lordships what happened to me after I
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had been abroad in the war for four-and-a-half years without seeing my family. I came back to Birmingham and I had got a Russian medal in Tehran. My daughter, Rose, aged five, was brought by my wife to meet me at Birmingham and as she came in she said, "Is that the Russian 'un?" That is the way our language varies. In those days she spoke pure Birmingham from beginning to end. Now she speaks "Oxford English" which is not really so attractive.
I must begin what I have to say tonight by declaring an interest. I am the executor of the estate of the late Frederick Lonsdale. He was a playwright of some distinction and one of his plays has just had an enormous success in Chichester—"The Last of Mrs. Cheyney"—which broke all records there. It is coming on again in London. Having declared my interest, your Lordships cannot grumble if I give it a little plug, which I have now done!
There are two problems in the theatre: one is the subsidised theatre and the other is the unsubsidised theatre. There is a little friction between them. The unsubsidised theatre thinks it is rather rot that the National Theatre should put on things like "Plunder", which they think is the sort of thing they ought to put on themselves. But things change so fast that you never know where you are going to be. For example, 20 years ago I do not think you could possibly have made a commercial success of either Ibsen or Strindberg. Now, if you do it well enough you can; and it has been done recently. So it is a very difficult line to draw.
Regarding the subsidised theatre, I should like to put a question to the Minister, which I hope he will answer if he can. The noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, said they paid VAT. I always thought they did, but I spoke to the Arts Council this morning and they told me they did not pay VAT. I should like to be clear about that, because it is an important point. In any case, I am absolutely in favour of subsidising the theatre as well as having a commercial theatre. They are two quite different things and they both have to co-exist. There will always be rows and jealousies and that is what makes the world go round, so I do not grumble at that.

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One of the problems of the theatre today is caused by television, which is that people get to want "stars". Although the noble Lord, Lord Miles, is a star, and I do not object to that, a number of performances are very good without great stars; and the local, smaller companies—the kind with which the noble Viscount, Lord Montgomery, is concerned—cannot afford great stars. That is a great problem. The best things do not draw without names, and that is a sad situation, I think.
The local repertory theatres in all parts of the country, and not only in rural areas but in towns, are what I am most worried about. These are the areas from which young men emerge with special talent, and they are suffering very badly at the moment. The position is that the Arts Council has not cut subsidies, but it has not increased them to anything like the level of inflation. So all these companies are in difficulties.
In my opinion, the most important thing in the theatre, from the point of view of creating a new theatre here, is the people who want to get started. I was talking this evening to a girl who wants to get started as a producer. I asked "Where are you going to go?" She said, "I shall have to go outside. I shall never get started in London". These people depend on the success or the stability of the local repertory theatres. There are a good many examples, but I shall quote only one which is the Roundabout Company and which is attached to the Nottingham Playhouse. That has now lost its subsidy from the local authority; and so the Theatre in Education, which they do and which I think is one of the most valuable things in the whole theatrical world, properly done—because it is dealing with the young—is suffering.
As for the National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company, they are not too bad. They have been reasonably supported this year. They were in some trouble last year, and they may be next year when the RSC moves to the Barbican in May. God knows what will happen then! I hope that it will be all right. Trevor Nunn says that he can do it, and I only hope he can. But, on the whole, they have not been too bad. But the £.8½million, outside of the two big theatre companies, which the Arts Council gives to the repertory companies and the
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local theatres is very near the bone, and there is real trouble there.
If I may turn now to the unsubsidised theatre, in a different sense exactly the same thing is happening. Tourism is down by 40 per cent.—this is terrific—the pound is up, VAT is 15 per cent., transport is more expensive than it has ever been and it is not surprising that the unsubsidised theatre is having a very difficult time. Mind you, my Lords, good stuff still works. "The Dresser" is making money, but I do not know what other straight play in London is making money—probably one or two, but jolly few. I was talking to a theatre manager this evening and I mentioned a particular play. I said that it is doing 50 per cent., but he said that "It is doing 50 per cent. only because we make up 20 per cent. of it". That is the kind of thing that is going on.
It is very difficult, but one must admit that it is not all the Government's fault. I like to think that most of these things are the Government's fault, but it is not all the Government's fault. One of the difficulties is that there is a very serious lack of good stuff. The theatre managers have difficulty in finding things which they think will make money.
I do not want to go over what has been said before, because the three remedies that I was going to discuss have all been raised not only by the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, who asked the Question, but by the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, as well. There are only three things you can do at this moment to help the theatre. The first is VAT. I fought for three years to try to reduce our VAT of 8 per cent. and failed. But that is no excuse for making it 15 per cent., and I think that in a situation which is really critical the Government could consider taking a risk and saying, "I know that all the football clubs will be very angry, but people are getting very angry with us"—and I can assure your Lordships that they are—"and a little more rage won't hurt." They would be able to save the theatre, if they put the rate down to what it was in our day. This is something which a courageous Government—and I think we have a courageous Prime Minister, even if somewhat wrong-headed—could afford to do.
The next thing you can do, as has been suggested, is to do something for the

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"angels". I do not think they are saints, but it is a shame that they should be gamblers on a large scale, whom we need—the fact that they are gamblers is all right; they do it to make money, but they do it also for certain other pleasures—and should have to face their own losses, but be taxed on their own profits. I had a chance with the play that I was advertising earlier on, "The Last of Mrs. Cheyney", of putting some money into the London performance which is coming on in October—I hasten to inform your Lordships of that, and I hope you will all come—but I decided not to do so. It is not my business. I do not know enough about it. The London critics are very difficult to please. Provincial audiences are much more sensible. Anyway, I did not. But I think that that is something to go for.
The third thing which has also been mentioned is the Theatre Investment Trust of the noble Lord, Lord Goodman. It is a splendid concern. I went to see them when I was a Minister, and they are a most impressive lot of very sober theatre people who know their stuff. They have had great success with what they have done in the first three years, and if you could give them £2 million or £3 million now that would enable them, instead of putting 5 or 10 per cent. into a new play, to put in 15 or 20 per cent. which would make the whole difference to the theatre. So those are the three things which could be done. I wish to say categorically that I do not believe this Government will do any of them.
I wish to end by saying that I deeply regret it, because I believe, as my noble friend Lord Miles and others have said, that the English theatre, the British theatre, is one of our most important and most triumphant assets. We are not allowing the seed corn—that is to say, the young people who start in the provinces—to get a start. This is the kind of short-sighted thing that Governments who are keen on monetarism are apt to do. I only hope that what this debate will have done is to make a dent in the rigidity which the Government show to this and to the arts in general.
Viscount BARRINGTON: My Lords, before the noble Lord, Lord Mowbray, answers—
8.57 p.m.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, with the greatest respect, we have had the main speakers and the final Opposition speaker. It is not customary at this late hour to have additional speakers. I hope your Lordships will forgive that jarring note. Where else, other than here, could we have possibly found such splendid theatre as we have just heard? I really do congratulate my noble friend Lord Kinnoull on his most distinguished contributors to the discussion this evening, who have raised matters of very considerable topical interest and have put many important questions and proposals. The health of the theatres in our capital city must be a matter of concern to all who are jealous of our cultural heritage, as well as to those who seek no more than a respite from the workaday world and the pressures of modern life. I therefore wish to be as helpful as I possibly can in dealing with the problems that have been ventilated this evening, within the limits of my knowledge of the situation and the powers of the Government to intervene.
I say straight away to the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, whose love of all the arts is so well-known, that this Government would do willingly everything that he would do, if we had the finance. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Elwyn-Jones, asked: what is the good of a stage without a theatre? All I can say to him is that, wherever he is, he needs no theatre or stage. Your Lordships will understand, however, that this Government are in a rather detached position relative to the London theatres, of which your Lordships have spoken; namely, the commercial West End theatres.
My right honourable friend the Minister with responsibility for the Arts has a general responsibility and interest in the whole of the theatre, but is, of course, more directly concerned with central government funding of the subsidised theatre. The Arts Council is the agency through which this support is distributed, and it is very gratifying when people such as my noble friend Lord Montgomery express gratitude for this help.
Apart from grants totalling, as has been said, nearly £19 million last year to the four national companies—the Royal Opera House, the English National Opera, the

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National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company—the Arts Council, as the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson of Kings-bridge, correctly said, distributed over £9 million to other drama activities in England, such as regional theatres and touring. I accept that it is near the bone. The commercial West End theatre operates, at least in its management structure and finances, largely independently of this state supported sector, although, as I shall show, they have a good deal to give one another.
But the difficulties which have been referred to are not just those of the subsidised theatre, which for the most part is in new or renovated premises and enjoys a reasonable degree of financial stability. The commercial London theatre, however, is housed in older buildings where security of tenure is by no means guaranteed and where programmes and finances must suffer from a considerable degree of uncertainty. The noble Lord, Lord Miles, referred to it as a high risk business, and my noble friend Lord Montgomery of Alamein said that he thought that people who went into it were not so much angels and saints as perhaps stupid fools.
The Government and the Minister for the Arts do understand this and are concerned with the general cultural standards and health in the theatre, of which the commercial London theatres are a key feature. Therefore, although this is the private enterprise sector, I take the liberty of offering some observations on the various points which have been raised this evening.
The present difficulties have been attributed, quite correctly, partly to inflation, resulting in high production costs, which of course include recent minimum wage increases for performers, and also to high prices for those accompaniments of an evening out to the theatre, such as travelling, whether by public transport, car, or taxi, and meals and drinks. These high production costs, I appreciate, cannot be offset by increases in productivity, for one performer cannot play two, at any rate major, parts, and there are limits to economising by presenting two-hander plays.
The high price of tickets has also been blamed, and in this connection VAT on
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theatre tickets has several times been mentioned. I shall come to that point later in my speech. Then again, the haphazard and frequently frustrating business of trying to book and buy theatre tickets, particularly over the telephone, must arouse its own customer resistance. Falling audiences are attributed to a dropping off of tourist custom, not only in numbers but also in their willingness to spend freely on going to the theatre, while the family audiences, which can no longer afford to attend, are not being attracted back to fill the gap. Marketing and publicity have also been mentioned as less than satisfactory and, finally, I would suggest that the quality of the shows offered—the "product" as it is referred to in the business—has come in for some criticism. I have identified these in order to consider more effectively whether the Government can offer any assistance or advice, as my noble friend has requested.
Let me first turn to the matter of assistance. It seems to me that the first thing which has to be attended to is the product which is put before the public, and the Arts Council has increasingly subsidised productions by the national companies or in regional theatres which are able to enjoy an extended life by going on to runs in West End theatres. I have in mind the recent National Theatre production of Alan Ayckbourn's "Bedroom Farce" which, a little while back, transferred to the Prince of Wales Theatre before going on to America; the Royal Shakespeare Company's "Once in a Lifetime" and "Piaf", which are currently playing at the Piccadilly Theatre. From the fringe theatre came Belt and Braces' "Accidental Death of an Anarchist", which is now playing at the Wyndham's Theatre, and from the regional theatre, the Leicester Haymarket Trust's "My Fair Lady" which has been an enormous success at the Adelphi, and their "Oklahoma", at present on tour and likely to come into the West End soon.
Equally basic input by the Arts Council into the theatre are the personnel. The noble Lord, Lord Donaldson of Kings-bridge, quite rightly drew attention to the plight of young people wishing to gain production experience. This is where the Arts Council are able to help personnel, who are trained under various schemes

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funded by the council. There are advanced training schemes and bursaries not only for performers already showing promise but also for designers and directors and for skills in particularly short supply—arts administrators trained on courses funded by the Arts Council at the City University, theatre technicians trained at Arts Council expense by the Association of British Theatre Technicians.
Furthermore, the Arts Council funds various theatre writing schemes, such as bursaries and royalty supplements, by which writers are guaranteed a minimum return in royalties to encourage playwrights and to give them the opportunity to develop their professional skills. All of these trainees are available to the commercial theatre, as to any others, and your Lordships will find that many of these—indeed, I would hazard most—who later make their name in the theatre will have started in the subsidised theatre or have received some support from the Arts Council. Last year the council spent some £350,000 on various schemes of training for the theatre.
In other directions, too, the Arts Council has provided some of the initial funding for schemes designed to assist the commercial theatre—not London theatres solely, it is true, but most of it is concentrated there. I have in mind the Theatres Investment Fund, about which noble Lords have spoken, which was created in 1976 to provide investment for productions that might not otherwise get sufficient hackers. My noble friend Lord Kinnoull in particular and other noble Lords were worried about this. The Arts Council provided £100,000, and £150,000 was raised from private sources. Over the years, it has invested in over 80 productions, including such diverse presentations as "Sleuth", "Once a Catholic", "Side by Side by Sondheim" and "Toad of Toad Hall". It is now run down, I regret to say, to rather less than half of its original size and the chairman, the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, is anxious to recapitalise it. However, I regret to say that any increase will have to be found from private investment or from a further contribution by the Arts Council. I am disappointed to have to tell the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, that a once-and-for-all further dip is not at this moment "on".
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Since my noble friend Lord Kinnoull referred to the London theatres as "a unique part of the national heritage", I am reminded that the Theatres Trust, which has also been referred to tonight by noble Lords and which is also chaired by that most splendid colleague of ours, the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, and which exists to safeguard theatre premises from demolition and change of use, has recently received a grant from the Government to enable it to continue its work. Most recently, my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has announced that the Government will provide financial help with a major research project into London theatre audiences which is to he undertaken by the Society for West End Theatre.
Finally, I should like to mention that an extremely successful and much appreciated feature of the London theatre scene is the student standby scheme run by the Society for West End Theatre in collaboration with the National Union of Students and funded with an initial grant from the Arts Council. This scheme whereby students may purchase cut price tickets during the last hour before the performance starts, attracted 70,000 student attendances in its first six months. This surely points the way to ideas that might be developed further in the future.
Apart from schemes run or funded by the Arts Council, other branches of Government are looking at provisions which the theatre might take advantage of, and the clause in the Finance Bill at present under consideration in another place, (which my noble friend Lord Kinnoull and other noble Lords mentioned) whereby investment losses by shareholders may be set off against income tax, may be of benefit to backers of theatrical productions. I understand that discussions about this are shortly to take place between officials of the Office of Arts and Libraries and of the Inland Revenue, with representatives of the commercial theatre. Another provision benefits contributors to charities by the shortening of the covenant period for donations from seven years to four years and allows payments to charities to be deducted from the higher rates of tax up to a maximum of £3,000. Although I imagine that the London commercial theatres are not charities, some subsidised

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theatres are, and may benefit from private or business sponsorship encouraged by these new measures.
This will give your Lordships some idea of the positive assistance that is already given by the Government, which I hope can be accepted as being substantial and diverse. Assistance on this scale will, I trust, continue to be available; my right honourable friend has been very successful in maintaining until now the level of support for the arts and will use his not inconsiderable advocacy to keep this up. There cannot be more support from the public sector and any development of existing schemes, or any new ones, will need to depend on more contributions from the private sector, and I look forward to a ready response to my right honourable friend's campaign to encourage more business sponsorship of the arts, to assist here. Only last night I went to a party at which he was launching this scheme in front of a goodly array of learned, artistic and financial gentlemen.
The question of VAT was raised this evening and I know this is a matter on which all your Lordships feel strongly. My noble friend Lord Kinnoull, the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Elwyn-Jones, the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, and my noble friend Lord Montgomery were all worried about this. We were told that the spoken word is discriminated against in favour of the written word. I do not know what would happen if we were to discriminate in favour of the spoken word against the written word; that would be awful.
To the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, I would say that theatres do not actually pay VAT; it is the customers who pay it. The box office gets the VAT from the customers and passes it on to the Customs and Excise authorities. It does not pay it initially.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE: My Lords, may I just clear my mind on this. The subsidised theatre behaves in exactly the same way as the unsubsidised, is that not right?
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: Yes, my Lords.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE: My Lords, I think the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, suggested that that was not so. In my opinion it used not to be so, but it is now.
Lord BEAUMONT of WHITLEY: My Lords, perhaps I may clear this up. Of course it pays VAT in the same way. The point that I was making was that a larger proportion of its income comes from grants, therefore it sells at lower prices and it does not pay VAT on the portion of its income that it gets from grants. That was the point that I was making.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, I take the point made by the noble Lord. On the question of VAT, I am afraid that I cannot bring your Lordships much comfort. Of course we should like to see the level of taxation on theatre tickets and on the arts generally, and indeed on all of the accompaniments to an evening out at the theatre, reduced, and I understand the concern of those connected with the theatre about this issue. However, I think the concentration on this point, fanned by some popular, perhaps slightly emotive agitation and fed by some rather unreliable information about the situation elsewhere in the European Community, and about the options open to the Government here, have been more symbolic than real, and this is being used as an excuse for more fundamental difficulties. The problem is that VAT was designed as a broad-based tax on consumer expenditure generally and there are many other candidates in the queue for relief from VAT, who regard themselves as equally deserving as the theatre.
After giving the matter careful and serious consideration, my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has decided to adhere to the policy of giving reliefs only where there are compelling social reasons, and limiting them to those items which are the subject of significant and continuing expenditure by ordinary families, such as food, domestic fuel and children's clothing. In the light of this, the theatre therefore cannot be treated as a special case because the pressure from other candidates, would, despite what has been said about the limited effect of relief for the theatre,

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result in the loss of considerable revenue. Moreover, harmonisation with rates in other community countries, which has also been advocated, cannot be seriously in prospect; apart from the fact that the rates vary in other Community countries, that for the theatre is actually higher in some countries than here. I know that some of your Lordships will be disappointed about this, but it is unrealistic for the theatre to press for exemption or reduction at a time when an essential element of our strategy, which is designed to create a healthy economy, is the shift from direct to indirect taxation.
My Lords, advice is certainly easier to give than assistance, and I do not want to appear irresponsible or to stray into areas where others are more expert than I am, but I have been invited to offer some thoughts by my noble friend in his Question and I do so, drawing to some extent on my own personal view of the situation. The first thing that I would say is that, while problems can never be tackled until they are identified, we should not harp too much on the difficulties and shortcomings of the London theatre. There has been a sense of shock following a number of recent failures of shows shortly after their opening, and at others which are hanging on rather precariously. But shows do come to the end of a natural life, and "Ipi Tombi", for example, closed shortly after moving to the Astoria only after having had long and successful runs at the Cambridge and Whitehall theatres. And the theatre is known, as has been said by my noble friend, to be a risky business in that it is exceedingly difficult to judge the mood of the public, and I am afraid of the critics also, and sudden deaths have always been with us. It is just that they come sooner and more expensive nowadays.
But my first piece of advice would certainly be for the London theatres not to lose hope. We have got to keep up our courage. The well-written, well-presented and publicised, and well-performed play or musical or other theatre presentation will always find an audience, and it is the selling of it rather than the basic product that probably needs more attention. It will not surprise your Lordships to hear that my second piece of advice, in the light of Government assistance that I have already outlined,
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and consistent with our political philosophy and its encouragement of private enterprise, is to adjure the London theatres to help themselves. My Lords, I thought the wise words of the noble Lord, Lord Miles, about what he and his wife had done was absolutely admirable, and if every theatre offered plum cake and then a cheque book afterwards, how much better they would do!
Lord ELWYN-JONES: My Lords, the noble Lord received the plum cake as well as the plums.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Miles, has not yet asked me if I would sample his plum cake; no doubt after this he may do. Then not only Government but also, I hope, business and the public will be behind them. Thus it is that I am encouraged and heartened to learn of the initiative of the Society of West End Theatre in developing their plan for more effective marketing of the London theatres announced last week.
Referring to some of the difficulties that I identified earlier, rising costs of production and the complexities of buying seats, these should to some extent be countered by the society's plan for a half-price central ticket booth which is to be opened in the autumn, as my noble friend Lord Kinnoull said, possibly in Leicester Square; that is, of course, provided it can get planning permission from the authorities. If all the seats can be filled, even by selling the balance at reduced prices, this will not only increase takings but, what is probably just as important, provide the incentive for the presenters and performers to give of their best and to enjoy what they are doing, with the hopeful result that the show will receive the kind of publicity from both critics and audience that will get it off to a good start and keep it going.
In the longer-term the society's second project, an in-depth survey of audiences and box office statistics, should prove valuable in tackling the problem of identifying the audience to which the theatres may most successfully address their marketing strategies. If the custom from tourism is falling off, theatres need to be considering what they can do further to encourage domestic audiences. The noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, quite

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rightly mentioned the temptation of TV keeping families in. The "family audience" has an old-fashioned ring about it, but it is surely, as he suggested, most important to capture the interest and imagination of the young if a continuing audience for the live theatre is to be guaranteed. At the very least, taking the children to the theatre avoids the baby-sitting problem, and at best the enthusiasm of the parents may produce a lifelong future follower. Such audiences, however, will not be attracted unless there are suitable presentations, attractive prices and better booking arrangements. The students standby scheme to which I have referred points in the right direction and again can no doubt be developed.
The noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, referred to the London theatres' immeasurable assistance to the tourist industry. The British Tourist Authority survey for 1979 indicated that, unlike New York, the theatre is not the primary attraction for visitors to London, since, while it is important, it is only one of the many points of interest for the tourist. The survey shows that the theatre is very low on the list of attractions mentioned by their sample of overseas visitors, since only about one-third of them said that they had been expecting good theatre in London before they arrived. The moral of this surely is that better publicity and marketing abroad must improve the visitors' knowledge and better publicity and marketing at home will get the visitors into the theatre, even though they have come here for other reasons. The good news should then get back home, and so the accelerator effect is started.
Another encouragement, both to domestic and family audiences and to visitors, is the "package" deal whereby the various elements of a visit to the theatre can be rolled up into a more attractive financial deal. Again, I therefore welcome the Theatre Rail Scheme newly introduced by British Rail, whereby travel and admission to a theatre are combined at advantageous prices; this should substantially expand the catchment area for the London theatres. I hope it is successful and that further development on these lines, involving, say, London Transport, and restaurants and stores and so on, will help with another of the problems I have identified—the total cost of the outing.
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And, finally, advertising and publicity. I know the London press, and particularly the evening papers, give the London theatres good coverage. I think the radio and television programmes could do more, although there are notable exceptions, such as the BBC's excellent nightly Kaleidoscope programme and Capital Radio's nightly announcement of a selection of theatres offering student standby tickets—mention of which reminds me of Capital Radio's most welcome excursion into theatre management with their taking over the Duke of York's Theatre and the very successful presentation of Rose, their first play in the refurbished premises. If more radio and, particularly, television companies could thereby recognise and acknowledge their debt to the live theatre, it would indeed contribute substantially to the revitalising of the West End theatre.
I have offered a number of thoughts, which I hope your Lordships will not think too trite; a lot more could be said, but the hour is late, and these are some of the important points, as I see them. In conclusion, may I again exhort the London theatres not to lose their confidence. There is no doubt that London is still the theatrical capital of the world, as the noble Lord, Lord Miles, so vividly in his splendid speech-which I hope will be read by a far wider audience than is here tonight—brought out.
Although New York has, over the last five years, come over the hump largely thanks to a massive investment by the Schubert Organisation and modern marketing, Broadway is still heavily dependent on us for plays. We have spent this evening discussing some of the problems of the London theatres, but we must not overlook that the theatre, like so many activities nowadays, is multinational and it is sustained by exchanges of both product and ideas; Evita goes to Broadway, Sweeney Todd comes from Broadway. The New York theatre has lessons which we can learn; I suspect they have learnt quite a lot from us.
We must not be too insular; we must recognise that the theatre is only one means of communication and that all are mutually dependent. Given better publicity throughout the media—press, television, radio—and encouragement from those influential in these areas and from

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the Government, and given the measures of self-help which are now being developed, there is no reason why the London theatre scene should not be transformed, as the New York scene has been over the last five years; and the help which your Lordships have given in bringing this to public notice will, I am sure, have made a valuable contribution. This evening's discussion stands, to my mind, as an object lesson to the live theatre itself and I wish the London theatre scene an extended and successful run.

BRITISH TRANSPORT DOCKS BILL
Reported from the Unopposed Bill Committee with amendments.