Lords Sitting of 23 July 1980

Preamble
(Sitting in the Royal Gallery.)
The House met at a quarter-past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Exeter.

LORD MARSHALL OF LEEDS
Sir Frank Shaw Marshall, Knight, having been created Baron Marshall of Leeds, of Shadwell in the City of Leeds, for life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord Thorneycroft and the Baroness Young.
LORD MATTHEWS
Victor Collin Matthews, Esquire, having been created Baron Matthews, of South-gate in the London Borough of Enfield, for life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord Westbury and the Lord George-Brown.

COMMERCIAL CO-OPERATION: EEC AND COMECON
2.46 p.m.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what were the conclusions of the conference between the EEC and COMECON on European commercial co-operation which met at Geneva on 16th July.
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, we understand from the Commission that at the talks between the Community and the CMEA from 16th to 18th July no substantial progress was made on the text of an agreement, though the talks did serve to help clarify the position of the two sides.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, while thanking the Minister for his audible
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statement in these difficult conditions, may I ask this? Does he not agree that economic integration between the West and the East is, as Basket 2 of the Helsinki Agreement emphasised, the basic foundation towards co-operation and towards détente and ultimate disarmament? Did not the problem at this conference arise between those who wanted separate agreements with different countries and industries and those who wanted a co-ordinated agreement between the two agencies? Will this matter be discussed at the Madrid Conference, regarding the Helsinki Agreement, and what will be the attitude of Her Majesty's Government?
Lord TREFGARNE: No, my Lords; the main problem was the CMEA's reluctance to engage in detailed discussions or indeed even to allow sufficient time for these during the meeting. They declined to hold extra talks either on the evening of the 17th July or on the afternoon of the 18th July, so making it impossible to discuss the whole of the draft agreement. On that basis and in those circumstances, I do not see much prospect of progress on these matters at Madrid.
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, may I ask the Minister whether the chief difficulty here is still the different interpretations on both sides of the structure and therefore the economic validity of the two organisations; that is to say, the EEC take a different view as to how they should deal with their regional counterparts in the East from the view of the East, and the question of bilateral agreements is therefore still very much in the balance?
Lord TREFGARNE: Certainly, my Lords, it is the case that we would prefer to develop our trade relations by bilateral agreement with the countries of Eastern Europe, and it may well be that the CMEA members see it differently. But there was none the less almost total inflexibility on the CMEA side.
Lord CHELWOOD: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that there is considerable evidence that most of the Soviet satellite countries of Europe would greatly prefer to enter into bilateral agreements with Community countries

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rather than be subject to the dictates of the Kremlin? Would he also agree that therefore the policy of Her Majesty's Government seems to be supported commercially and politically by the Community and appears to be the right one?
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, certainly, as I said earlier, we prefer to deal in these matters on a bilateral basis, and that was the core of our position during these talks.

PUBLIC ADDRESS SYSTEMS
2.51 p.m.
Lord FERRIER: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether, in view of the large number of tourists and inexperienced holiday travellers at this time of year, they will urge British Rail and airport authorities to improve the intelligibility of public address announcements in stations and airports.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, this is a matter for management. It is up to the British Railways Board and individual airport authorities to decide whether they need to improve their public address announcements.
Lord FERRIER: My Lords, while thanking the noble Lord for that reply, which I was unable to hear, may I ask whether he is aware that, in the absence of up-to-date equipment, it is the skill of the operator who can best make intelligible announcements on the public address system?
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, British Rail, like your Lordships in this Chamber, are trying constantly to improve audio communications; but it is difficult for them to overcome such problems as bad station acoustics and background noises from trains. The British Rail announcers usually work from standard scripts which are specially prepared to give information clearly and concisely. The Transport Users Con-
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sultative Committee for London recently published a report on London's terminii which concluded that the public address announcements were reasonably satisfactory. They did consider, however, that such announcements should be more regular and less formal.
Lord MAELOR: My Lords, may I ask the Minister whether he will correct the language of these announcements? For instance, they say "The buffet carriage is at the centre of the train." But a train has no centre. Only a circle and a square have a centre. Then they go further and say, "This train will terminate at Wolverhampton." Surely the train does not terminate. It is high time to correct the language of these announcements.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, I am very relieved. I thought that the noble Lord was going to address us in Welsh. But Hansard is read by British Rail, and I will make sure, anyhow, that the noble Lord's comments are brought to the attention of the British Railways Board.
Lord THORNEYCROFT: My Lords, would the Government stop harassing these great public corporations, and concentrate on the intelligibility of the address system in your Lordships' House?
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, the boards which run the great airport authorities and the railways have people who are called acoustic consultants. Perhaps, if the ceiling in our Chamber takes much longer, your Lordships may need to go to these acoustic consultants as well.

TRAWLER CONVERSION: COSTS
2.54 p.m.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they have estimated the expenditure involved in converting several modern deep-sea trawlers as a supple-

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ment to our naval strength, and how such an estimate compares with the cost of constructing new vessels.
Viscount LONG: My Lords, our investigations show that the capital costs of second-hand vessels, including the costs of refitting and conversion, tend to be somewhat less than new construction. However, the experience of much higher support costs and greatly reduced life expectancy of second-hand ships greatly outweighs the initial cost advantage and leads to higher through-life costs.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, is the noble Viscount aware that I regard that Answer as indicating undue complacency? Does he realise that some of us are not critical of the Government's defence policy, but are trying to be helpful? Does he not realise that these very modern trawlers are very adequate, with remarkable speed? All require armament equipment, which can be provided at no great cost. Is it not far better, from a maritime point of view, in the event of an emergency affecting some part of our oceans, that we should have a fairly large number of small vessels of modern type, rather than rely on some large carrier built at huge cost which could be blown up in an instant or two? Why do the Government not realise that we are trying to do something to supplement our naval strength, which is far from satisfactory at the present time?
Viscount LONG: My Lords, I appreciate what the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, has said, but the cost of second-hand vessels would depend upon their age, condition and other relevant factors. Clearly, the older and poorer the quality of the second-hand ship, the greater would be the cost of conversion. However, we would expect the combined purchase and conversion costs of secondhand vessels to be a little less than the capital cost of new purpose-built minesweepers. Many of these trawlers that, unfortunately and regrettably, are now lying idle in ports around the British Isles are fairly old and in not very good condition after the hammering that they have taken from their sea fishing projects in the North Sea.
Lord SHINWELL: My Lords, does the noble Viscount realise that, when he
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mentions age, I regard that almost as a personal rebuke? Age has nothing to do with it. What matters is whether it has viability, and whether the Government are prepared to inject the necessary armaments. I am almost beginning to believe that the Government do not even understand the nature of the problem and that worries me, just as the defence position worries me. Will he convey to his noble friend, for whom I have a very high regard and who, I think, is doing his job very well, the fact that I will not be content with that kind of Answer?
Viscount LONG: My Lords, it is very difficult to help the younger generation of your Lordships' House or to please them, but the noble Lord is quite right. He wants to help and he is doing just that. I will convey to my noble friend Lord Strathcona what he has said, and no doubt my noble friend will also be reading the report of what the noble Lord has said. Nevertheless, there is a problem with these vessels. They are not in a very good condition and would cost a certain amount of money to convert, in order for them to be efficient, which might out-balance the cost of the new vessels.
Baroness HORNSBY-SMITH: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that hundreds of trawlers from Eastern European countries are fitted with the most sophisticated detection equipment which not only can detect missiles, submarines or mines, but are so advanced and sophisticated that they can differentiate between one species of fish and another? If they can do that as an ancillary, possibly, to using them with additional armaments, could we not consider this proposal a little more carefully?
Viscount LONG: My Lords, I am afraid I must say to my noble friend, that her question relates to fishing and not to the conversion of these vessels, which is what the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, originally asked about.
Lord BLYTON: My Lords, is the Minister aware that in the First World War trawlers were used with great efficiency in minesweeping. They were ordinary wooden vessels. We called it Harry Tate's navy. Does not the Minister think, in the present context, that we

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ought to be protecting our fishing industry within a 20- or 50-mile radius of our shores and that therefore we ought to take these big trawlers and man them to protect our shores?
Viscount LONG: My Lords, I am still on the same Question regarding the conversion of trawlers. I am afraid that I have to stay on that Question.
The Earl of KIMBERLEY: My Lords, could I ask my noble friend whether the Government would consider, as a guideline for all future merchant ships and trawlers that are launched, that they should have the necessary reinforcement built into them so that they could be armed very easily in the future?
Viscount LONG: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for that question and no doubt it will be looked at. However, I do not see that it is relevant to the Question which I have been asked.
Lord HARMAR-NICHOLLS: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that my noble friend Lady Hornsby-Smith asked: if other countries have found it possible to convert trawlers and make it worth while, why cannot we? There may be a good answer. The question that my noble friend asked is relevant and I think that it deserves an answer.
Viscount LONG: My Lords, I come straight back to the Answer which I gave originally: it is far too costly to convert some of these trawlers which are in a very bad way. No doubt the Government would very much like to convert them, but they would be sinking rather than swimming.
Lord MISHCON: My Lords, is the Minister informing the House of the result of a survey and an analysis of this problem, or has he merely been guided in general terms? If the latter, does he not think it worth while that there should be a more detailed examination before the House drops the idea, which seems to be extremely sound to most of us?
Viscount LONG: My Lords, I must apologise to the House if I conveyed that message. In fact, the Government are
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looking at some of the ways of using these trawlers and considering whether it is possible at all; but it is in balance at the moment.

DIEGO GARCIA: OAU RESOLUTION
3.2 p.m.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what has been their response to the unanimous demand of the Organisation of African Unity that the island of Diego Garcia should be returned to Mauritius and that bases and military installations in the Indian Ocean be removed.
The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN and COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS (Lord Carrington): My Lords, Her Majesty's Government are aware of the resolution on Diego Garcia passed by the Organisation of African Unity on 4th July. They have received no representations from the organisation.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, may I ask the Minister whether or not the agreement for Britain to acquire the island was made before Mauritius had independence and whether or not there was a clause saying that when it was no longer needed it would be returned without compensation? Is not the need now the American base? And have not only the Organisation of African Unity, representing African countries, but all the border states of the Indian Ocean, except Oman, demanded that the Indian Ocean should be neutralised?
Lord CARRINGTON: My Lords, I think that the facility on Diego Garcia contributes considerably to the maintenance of stability and security in the Indian Ocean, and that is to the benefit of the states in the area.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, is there not a very dangerous situation now arising in the Indian Ocean? Was it not reported

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yesterday that the Soviet Government are now securing naval facilities in the Red Sea ports of Ethiopia? And has not the United States sought them in Somalia and North Kenya? In view of this very dangerous situation, will the Government give support to the French suggestion that there should be an international conference to consider the whole situation?
Lord CARRINGTON: My Lords, the noble Lord will of course know that discussion is going on at the moment in the United Nations ad hoc committee about the feasibility of an Indian Ocean peace zone. We are discussing whether it is feasible in the circumstances. However, the noble Lord will realise that the base in Diego Garcia is very largely a response to what has happened in Afghanistan. The Soviet forces in Afghanistan are a much greater threat to peace in the area than the base in Diego Garcia.
Lord GEORGE-BROWN: My Lords, may I ask the Foreign Secretary whether or not the advance of the Soviets in the way of acquiring offensive facilities in this area is so terrifying that it would be absurd for the West to deny to itself the very limited and inadequate resources that we are acquiring for defence against the acquisitive and offensive operations which the Soviets have been carrying out for some time now?
Lord CARRINGTON: My Lords, I agree wholly with what the noble Lord has said. I think that most of your Lordships would accept, as do the Government, and welcome the United States proposals that lend strength and stability to the area.
Lord PAGET of NORTHAMPTON: My Lords, does not the failure of this organisation to interfere in Diego Garcia provide Her Majesty's Government with one of the rare opportunities of congratulating them on minding their own business?
Lord CARRINGTON: My Lords, in so far as this matter is concerned, they have minded their own business. We have had no representations.
Lord ALPORT: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend whether any thought has been given, in addition to the activation
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of the Diego Garcia base, to reactivating the Gan base?
Lord CARRINGTON: No, my Lords.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, the noble Lord referred to the Geneva Committee on Disarmament. Is not one of the items on the agenda the securing of regional areas free from nuclear arms? Will the Government give support to that proposal relating to the Indian Ocean?
Lord CARRINGTON: My Lords, I think that the Government must always, as their first priority, think of our own defence and the defence of the West.
Lord HATCH of LUSBY: My Lords, can the noble Lord the Foreign Secretary tell us whether it is still the case that the Americans are not allowed to use this island for military purposes without consultation with the British Government?
Lord CARRINGTON: My Lords, the agreement which was published is still in force.

NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE: ORGANISATION
Lord DENHAM: My Lords, with the leave of the House, my noble friend Lady Young will repeat, at a convenient moment after 3.30 this afternoon, a Statement that is to be made in another place on changes in the organisation and management of the National Health Service in England.
FALMOUTH CONTAINER TERMINAL BILL
Read 3a, with an amendment, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

AIR FARES IN EUROPE: ECC REPORT
3.9 p.m.
Lord BOYD-CARPENTER Lord BOYD-CARPENTER rose to move, That this House takes note of the Report of the European Communities Committee on European air fares (49th Report, H.L. 235).
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the sub-committee, of which I have the honour to be chairman, was set up towards the end of last year to consider, in accordance with the now well-established procedure of the Select Committee on the European Communities, Community Document No. 8139/79. If your Lordships will allow me, I should like first to say, as one who previously had no particular contact with the Select Committee on the European Communities and as a stranger to their procedures, how impressive I found the glimpse that I was then given of the work which the main committee does on behalf of this House and of this country in considering the documents and other matters which emanate from the Community. It is a major public service performed by this House to a far greater extent than is possible in the other place, something which on the whole receives very little public recognition and yet is one of the major public services which this House renders.
I hope I shall not be thought presumptuous if I pay tribute, from this brief glimpse that I have had of its work, both to the former chairman of that select committee—I was going to say "my noble friend" but I have to correct that; to my Balliol friend Lord Greenwood of Rossendale—and to the present chairman, the noble Baroness, Lady White, who do an immense amount of largely unheralded, unannounced public service.
The sub-committee which was entrusted to my chairmanship was instructed to examine Document 8139. We immediately took a decision to concentrate our examination on only one of the matters dealt with in that document. As noble Lords who have studied it will be very well aware, the document deals with a whole variety of matters affecting civil aviation, such as the right of establishment, safety, technical harmonisation, air traffic control, working conditions, and the subcommittee came to the conclusion that, if we were to do a worthwhile job on behalf of the House, it would be necessary to concentrate on one particular aspect, since investigating all these matters would probably have taken us to about the end of this Parliament.
Therefore we decided—I hope your Lordships will think rightly—to concen-
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trate on the level of air fares in Europe and matters directly related to that. In making that selection, we had in mind the quite basic importance to the Community of air travel. It seemed to us that, if the Community is to be anything other than perhaps a large greenhouse for the protection of an overgrown French and German agriculture, it must be a Community in which citizens of the Community countries can move about, do business with and meet each other, and that, if it be the case that the fares charged for air travel in the Community are excessively high, that purpose must in considerable degree be frustrated. If it is too expensive to travel, then one of the major purposes of and basic reasons for the Community will have been frustrated, because citizens of the different countries in the Community (unless they happen to be the small minority who are very well off) will be inhibited from travelling about and meeting each other.
Lord ARDWICK: My Lords, I wonder whether I may interrupt the noble Lord for a moment. May I ask him to speak a little closer to the microphone. What he is saying is most interesting, he has beautiful diction and a very good voice, but we are losing about one word in ten.
Lord BOYD-CARPENTER: My Lords, I am greatly indebted to the noble Lord. I moved back from the microphone because I had the impression that I might be blasting the House. As the noble Lord was kind enough to say, I have quite a powerful voice so that if it was unduly amplified it might be extraordinarily disagreeable to noble Lords. But I hope that if, in response to the noble Lord, I "switch up the power" he will equally indicate to me if I have overdone my response to his request.
As I was saying, my Lords, it was for that reason that the sub-committee decided that they would concentrate on the level of air fares; above all on the level of the standard economy air fare in the Community and matters directly related to that. Because of that we were able to produce our report early this summer and it became possible for this House to debate it this afternoon.
We came to two clear-cut conclusions. The first was that the level of air fares, especially the standard economy fare and

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especially on the medium and longer haul routes in Europe, was too high and we came to the conclusion that, though not the sole cause, a major cause of that was the lack of competition in European civil aviation. Our report really stands or falls by those two conclusions.
I should say that we extended our examination outside the Community. As noble Lords familiar with the problem will know only too well, there are 22 countries which are members of the European Civil Aviation Conference as compared with only nine at present in the Community, and some of the remaining non-Community countries are major aviation powers. Therefore it was quite impossible to confine ourselves entirely to the Community but, since the air lines of non-Community (ECAC) countries overlap with those of Community countries, the sub-committee had various advantages.
We had the advantage of a number of members with great experience of these matters. The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, who is to speak for the Opposition, was of course himself chairman of, I think, the English Tourist Authority and saw a great deal of aviation in that connection. We had a former Permanent Secretary to the Treasury in the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, and we had the great advantage of the presence of that indomitable champion of the airline traveller, the noble Baroness, Lady Burton of Coventry, among others. We were served by a brilliant young clerk, Mr. Hawkings, who I venture to prophesy will have a great future in the service of this House. We also had the advantage of bringing in a specialist adviser, Mr. Robin Goodison, a distinguished former civil servant from the Department of Trade, the last five years of whose service was as deputy chairman of the Civil Aviation Authority. So we did not lack advice.
We were also fortunate in the supply of evidence. We heard evidence from the Minister responsible for civil aviation at the Department of Trade, Mr. Norman Tebbit, the Civil Aviation Authority, the Air Line Users' Committee; from British Airways, British Caledonian and, in highly entertaining form, from Sir Freddie Laker. We had much evidence from Europe: Herr Hoffmann, a German Member of Parliament who is rapporteur
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of the Air Transport Committee of the European Parliament; Herr Björck, a Swedish Member of Parliament who has a similar role in the European Assembly; Mr. Le Goy, the Director-General at Brussels responsible for air transport; Mr. Knut Hammarskjold the Director General of IATA, the Trades Union Congress and many other witnesses of great authority. So, my Lords, if we got it wrong it was our fault and not theirs.
I think I can summarise our conclusions very quickly. In our view, the fares are too high and the competition which would reduce them is inhibited because of the system under which air fares are now fixed. Under that system the air lines concerned negotiate them first in IATA— the International Air Traffic Association. Now IATA has a bad reputation as a rather restrictive cartel, but it is only fair to say that I think it has very much grown out of that and modified its approach. Some of your Lordships familiar with it in the past know that it once concentrated its attention on the important question of how many square inches of canapé served before a first class lunch on an airline could be covered with smoked salmon. IATA has grown out of that but it has still something of its restrictive background.
Then, any fare has to be approved by the Government or authorities at each end of the route. This means, of course, that it is extraordinarily difficult to change a fare, particularly to reduce it. We had evidence that in this country the Department of Trade and the Civil Aviation Authority in their respective spheres took advantage of any application made to increase a fare to refuse consent, with the result—because consent at both ends was needed—that the fare increase could not be made, and this has been a useful policy. But it is not open to any individual Government authority to dictate that a current fare should be lower; in default of agreement the current fare remains.
That system has been made very much worse in its operation because of the administrative structure of civil aviation administration in most of our European partners' countries. In several of them—and I recall my own experience when I was involved in these matters—it is very difficult with the naked eye to distinguish

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between the governmental civil aviation authority and the directorate of the state-owned flag carrying airline.
They are hopelessly intermingled, with the inescapable result that the interests of the national flag carrier obviously loom very large indeed in any governmental decision. And the interests of that flag carrier—particularly because in some cases they are not very competitive commercially— are, of course, restriction: restriction of competition.
This has sometimes produced some really entertaining, though sometimes perhaps tragic, results. We heard during the course of our inquiry—not, I hasten to say, in formal evidence—the happy story of the German boy who asked his father where New York was. The father scratched his head and said, "Well, son, I don't quite know, but judging by the air fare somewhere between Stuttgart and Hanover". It is not wholly beyond reality, if you compare the levels of air fares which have resulted from this system with the air fares in other areas, such as the North Atlantic, where a high measure of competition now reigns.
The obvious comparison that we had to make, in deciding whether the level of fares was right or not, was with routes of similar length in the United States. If one takes that crude comparison there is no doubt at all that the European fares look very high indeed on a seat-mile basis. It is not, however, fair to make a crude comparison. It is in fact cheaper and more economical to operate short-or medium-haul air services inside one huge country than across many national boundaries. There are complications of air traffic control; there are high charges at airports; there are diversions for military reasons—a whole score of considerations which make a flat comparison quite unfair.
Having said that, the disparity is so large that my sub-committee came to the conclusion that the European fares, judged on that criterion with all necessary adjustments, were in fact excessively high. If that be so, and if, as it seemed to us, competition would be the best solvent of the issue, that leads one straight to the question, What do we do about it? We have the highly restrictive European
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system I have described. There is that cosy protection of vested interests in a good many European countries where the only aviation interest is in fact the national flag carrier. The fact is that there is no law of nature that every country should have a national flag carrier, even though it be a small country with very little air space. But it is not always easy to persuade the country concerned of that.
One of the things that have bedevilled civil aviation, not only in Europe but, for example, in Africa, has been this curious attitude of Governments that possession of a national airline is a kind of virility symbol and that, unless you have a national flag carrier with your national colours painted on the fuselage, somehow you are not a completely effective country. This is a pity, because the economics of specialisation do not suggest to anybody that every country should carry out every economic activity, least of all activities such as civil aviation where long distances and a great deal of space are highly relevant considerations. The problem is how we are to handle this.
If the object of the exercise be the introduction of competition, there are none the less various approaches which can be made, and which I am glad to say are being made. The evidence we had of the efforts of the British Government was very considerable. At the European meeting of the Council of Transport Ministers on the 24th of last month our representative put forward a strong paper urging action in this direction, and although the outcome of that council's deliberations is wrapped in the terrifying language which the European Community organisations always for some occult reason seem to prefer to adopt, the word "competition" does occur at least once, which suggests that the idea may be being insinuated. It is certainly the fact that the European Commission have a draft directive in preparation urging each of the member Governments to set up a consumer organisation for airline travellers, although no one has quite suggested to them how they find a Lady Burton of Coventry or a Lady Trumpington, who in my view are essential to any such system of consumer representation.
There are all these things on the move, but we have to decide as a country what line we are going to take. The sort of

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natural instinct of my committee was that the whole system was so restrictive that we ought to go all out for breaking it up, and if we were to do so there is a possible weapon to hand. That is the competition clauses of the Treaty of Rome. They are applied at the moment to ground transport but they are not applied to civil aviation. The advice that we had in law is that they do apply. But if they are to apply effectively it is necessary for the Commission and the Council of Ministers to introduce regulations to put them into effective operation.
Our sub-committee looked at the question as to whether we should go for operating those very drastic competition clauses. We came, rather regretfully, to the conclusion that this was not the wisest course; that we ought, on the contrary, to concentrate on a step by step approach. Basically we felt the reality of the matter was that the European states, with their non-competitive national flag carrying airlines, would not willingly, whatever the Treaty of Rome said, take steps that would in a quite short time drive some of these airlines out of business. It did not seem to us to be in the area of reality. Nor would it necessarily be in the interests of air travellers to have, even temporarily, the dislocation which would follow from that. Our sub-committee therefore recommends, as your Lordships will have seen, the step by step approach.
We were very conscious of the dangers of this. With the European system one can so easily become enmeshed in technicalities, in commissions, working parties, inquiries—and awfully little happens as the years pass. We addressed our minds to the question as to how it would be possible to get a step by step approach, involving real and successive steps fairly steadily taking place. The objective is clear—greater competition. I think greater competition means three things. It means competition between the airlines in the quality, character and frequency of their services; that is a matter for the airlines. It means competition in the sense of the admission of new operators on to existing routes. And it means securing acceptance of lower fares offered by existing operators. British airlines have been in the forefront of offering these lower fares: British Airways with their Channel Hopper, British Caledonian with their Mini Prix and Sir Frederick
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Laker with his low fare services. They have had, on the whole, a very disappointing response from Europe. British Caledonian, it is true, have got the Mini Prix system on, I think, half-a-dozen routes and at the moment they have a proposal forward for a £l5·50 fare to Brussels and Amsterdam, on which, so far as I know, a decision has not yet been announced.
On the whole, the response has been disappointing, so I can only say that we would urge Her Majesty's Government to give British airlines encouragement and support in putting forward these proposals and press, either in the Council of Ministers or direct with the European Governments, that it is really quite unreasonable, when responsible airlines offer reasonably low fares, which passengers would be anxious to take, for them to be refused simply on the old-fashioned grounds that they might affect the vested interest of that country's national flag carrier. That attitude rather recalls for me the remark attributed to a former Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury, when he said—I believe it was in this House—on one occasion,
"Heaven forbid that I should ever touch a vested interest".
That is the approach of some of the European Governments, and it is, let us face it, a somewhat archaic one on which they must be pressed.
But what a committee of this House and what a debate in this House can do, above all, is to actuate what is the most powerful factor of all in this matter—public opinion. All the European countries concerned are democracies, with Parliaments, and in such countries, however slowly, the weight and pressure of public opinion tells. If public opinion, particularly among our friends and neighbours in Europe, can be drawn to the realities of this matter, to the opportunities which are round the corner, then it may become quite difficult for Governments—Governments dependent upon legislatures—to go on resisting. If we are to draw this aspect of the matter to the attention of our friends in Europe, there are two sentences from our report to which I should like to invite your Lordships' attention. They are, respectively, the concluding sentences of paragraphs 64 and 65. The first one says:
"The level of American air fares shows what it is possible to achieve through competition in air transport. Europe contains a large potential

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market of air travellers who are at present prevented from travelling by the high level of many fares".
The other sentence, at the end of paragraph 65, is even blunter. It says:
"The interests of consumers appear to be sacrificed to the prestige of flag carrying national airlines and the protected environment in which they operate".
I cannot help feeling that, if public opinion in Europe gets these ideas, the effect on the Governments, and therefore on what happens, might be very considerable. Indeed, I venture to suggest that it might be helpful if voters in those countries were to ask of their rulers one very simple but quite unanswerable question: "Why are you denying us opportunities for cheaper travel which many airlines are only too eager to offer? ". I beg to move.
Moved, That this House takes note of the Report of the European Communities Committee on European air fares.—(Lord Boyd-Carpenter.)
3.35 p.m.
Earl AMHERST: My Lords, I should like to be the first to thank the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, for providing this opportunity for us to discuss the vexed question of air fares in Europe. I should also like to offer my congratulations to him and his committee for turning out this excellent, long, detailed and very interesting report. I think all concerned must have been involved ill a great deal of hard work in getting it out.
If I were to try to go into the many details of this report, I should be involved in far too long a speech, so I want to draw the attention of the House to a few salient points and the recommendations. At the risk of repeating what the noble Lord has already said, I think it is safe to say that the position at the present moment is complicated, untidy and restrictive. It gives Governments power to block the filing of new fares aimed at a reduction in prices so as to give European citizens a better chance of travelling between their cities at a price they can afford. As the noble Lord has said, the majority of these fares are far too high. Briefly, the procedure at present in force is that if an airline wants to file a fare, first it has to agree the fare with IATA. Then it has to go through the CAA, and then it has
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to negotiate with the airline which is operating as a designated operator reciprocal to it on the particular route. If, after that, all is agreed it is still subject to ratification by the Governments concerned. If it is not agreed, the airline which objects can ask for the support of its Government in not ratifying it.
All, or nearly all, the foreign airlines who operate in Europe in reciprocity to the British are national flag carriers owned by their Governments and often heavily subsidised by them, and so all too often such Governments have supported their flag carriers and refused to ratify for financial or prestige reasons. Even when the thing is successful, this procedure involves a lot of time, a lot of patient negotiation and a lot of staff costs. Quite recently, there were two cases in point. British Airways filed a special fare of £20 to Paris. It was quickly turned down by the French, saying their usual "No" in the interests of Air France. I am told that in the interests of KLM the Dutch Government are going to turn down a fare of £15.50 which British Caledonian have filed to Amsterdam.
If I have read the report correctly, the conclusion is that the Government should press on with the policy for lower fares and hope that this will lead to a consensus of opinion, at least among the Nine for a start, with a view to determining a flexible machinery which will permit the forces of competition to come into full play, which, it is calculated, can only result in a general reduction of air fares. But the report does point out that the analogy of the American scene and the Atlantic scene is not a good analogy in that the conditions in Europe are totally different. The report also makes mention of the desirability of reducing the number of special charter promotional fares, et cetera, to a much smaller comprehensive list that can be more readily published and readily understood by the general travelling public, the travel agents, and, indeed, the airline staffs who have to administer them. It is currently said that it takes two or three times as long for a booking clerk to explain a charter or special fare to a customer over the telephone as it does to sell a single ticket for an ordinary airline regular service. To bring about all that it seems to me that it will be necessary to modify or even devise a completely new form of bilateral Bermuda Agreement as

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far as this impinges on fares and rates. The report also makes it clear that it does not consider that any general agreement can be brought about overnight, so to speak, and that—as the noble Lord has emphasised—it would have to be undertaken slowly, a step at a time and, as a start possibly an approach to the Council of Ministers would be a useful step.
We on these Benches very much support the report and its recommendations. Now that we are in the Common Market it may not be too much out of line if, while reviewing the fares condition in Europe, at the same time we take a hard look at the current fares for air services to and from and within Scotland. I am told on good authority that these are now the highest in the world. For instance, for a short flight of some 20 minutes or so between Aberdeen and Wick, a single fare of £29 and a return fare of £58 is demanded and with probably a security charge in addition. Mention of these high rates has also been made in the evidence given to the Select Committee. On the face of it, these fares seem little short of scandalous.
I hope that when the Minister comes to reply he may be able to tell us what further plans the Government have to implement the conclusions of this report and when they expect to be able to start the ball rolling and with whom. I must make an apology to the House because, due to a previous engagement, I may not he able to be in my place when the Minister conies to reply.

NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE: ORGANISATION
3.42 p.m.
The MINISTER of STATE, DEPARTMENT of EDUCATION and SCIENCE (Baroness Young): My Lords, with the leave of the House, I will now repeat a Statement on changes in the organisation and management of the National Health Service in England, made in another place by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Social Services. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Wales is announcing his proposals for Wales today; and my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Scotland will be announcing his
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proposals next week. The Statement is as follows.
"My department has received over 3,500 comments in response to last December's consultative document, Patients First. I have had an analysis of these comments prepared and a copy is in the Library; copies will be available in the Vote Office in a few days. There is considerable support for our proposal that the organisation of the National Health Service should be streamlined. I am, therefore, today issuing a circular to health authorities on the changes to be made to achieve this. Copies of this and of my Statement are in the Vote Office.
"On structure, we have decided to remove a tier of administration. Instead of 90 area health authorities administering 199 districts, we will create a single tier of district health authorities. Each will serve a population of, generally between 150,000 and 500,000 I have asked the regional health authorities to make recommendations to me on the boundaries of the new authorites by the end of next February after full consultation with interested bodies. I have told them that in order to minimise upheaval, the new district health authorities should as far as possible follow the boundaries of existing health districts (including single district areas) because this should in most cases provide a satisfactory pattern.
"I want the new authorities to enjoy considerble autonomy in managing their affairs. Greater freedom should encourage a greater sense of responsibility; and smaller authorities, closer to the communities they serve, should be more responsive to local needs.
"With a view to enhancing local autonomy still further, I intend, later on, to review the role of regional health authorities. Regions' responsibilities for strategic planning, the allocation of finance to the districts and the maintenance of financial discipline will remain. Talks will be held between representatives of the doctors, my department and the National Health Service on the future management of medical staff contracts, with a view to seeking a way of reconciling my desire for more autonomy at the local level

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with the doctors' genuine concern that the benefits which have resulted from the existing arrangements should not be lost.
"There is also strong support for our other main proposal—to strengthen management at the local level and remove the intermediate tier between the district and the local unit. Each district health authority, which will be served by a single management team, will therefore arrange the district's services into defined units, appoint senior people to manage them and give those people their own budgets. As far as possible, support services will be organised at that level. My objective is to get decision-making down to the hospital and the community level. In order to give authorities greater flexibility on this, I am cancelling most of the existing instructions which require them to appoint specified officers to a substantial number of posts. District health authorities will decide for themselves what posts to create.
"I attach high importance to effective collaboration between the National Health Service and local authorities. I propose, therefore, to retain the present statutory requirement for joint arrangements for collaboration. The creation of new district health authorities will however mean that in many parts of England, health authorities and local authorities will no longer have common boundaries on a one-to-one basis. It is my hope that in most cases two or more district health authorities will make up one complete non-metropolitan county. I am proposing, in line with many views put to us, that health authorities should average around 16 members—significantly fewer than existing area health authorities. Within this total, I propose that local authorities should appoint four nominees.
"There has been considerable support for community health councils; they will be retained in the new structure, with one community health council for each district. Later this year I will issue a consultative paper seeking views on their membership, role and powers. When, after a few years, we have had experience of the working of the more
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locally-based district health authorities, I will review the longer term case for retaining these separate consumer bodies.
"As foreshadowed in Patients First I intend to retain the structure of family practitioner committees, but I shall wish to study all the suggestions that have been made to improve collaboration with health authorities, especially in the planning of primary care.
"I attach importance to close working between the National Health Service and universities with medical schools. I will discuss with interested bodies the present arrangements for designating some health authorities as teaching authorities, taking account, for instance, of the extent to which medical students are now taught in hospitals run by non-teaching authorities.
"The changes I have announced imply no criticism of health service managers. They have had to work in what turned out to be an unduly complicated structure. It is much to their credit that the service has achieved what it has. However, staff at all levels will be affected by the changes, and there must be full consultation with staff interests on the ways in which change takes place. Staff must know that they are going to be treated fairly. We have put forward what I hope are seen as fair proposals for the filling of posts in the new authorities, for staff protection and for early retirement and redundancy compensation. These proposals are being discussed with the staff sides and I hope that satisfactory agreements can he reached soon.
"The 1974 reorganisation represented a major step forward in the integration of hospital and community health services, including primary care. It is the Government's policy, like that of our predecessors, that people should receive care in the community wherever possible. Further, the National Health Service is often criticised for neglect of prevention and of the more positive aspects of health promotion. The changes I am announcing in structure and management will, by making the Health Service much more a local service serving local communities, reinforce this priority for community care, and should lead also to the closer involvement of the

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public with policies to promote good health. In this, the role of the relatively new medical speciality of community medicine will be of increasing importance.
"The main purpose of the changes I am announcing is to provide a health service which is better and more efficiently managed, and where local decisions can be taken more quickly by local people. At the same time, I am confident that it will be possible to make significant reductions in management costs, and I have told the health service that I expect these to be reduced, after a transitional period, by some 10 per cent., equivalent to about £30 million a year at present costs. This will release resources which could be used for patient care.
"Mr. Speaker, management and structure, though important, will not solve all our problems. The Government have aready embarked on a number of initiatives designed to get better value for money, improve links between the health service and local communities, and raise standards. In the autumn, I intend to issue a document outlining the Government's strategy and priorities for health. The proposals I am announcing today will, when carried into effect, help to achieve what we all seek, a better service for our people".
My Lords, that is the end of the Statement. I am placing copies of it, together with copies of the circular to health authorities, in the Printed Paper Office. I am also placing a copy of the analysis of comments on Patients First in the Library, and further copies will be available in the Printed Paper Office in a few days.
3.51 p.m.
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, we, on this side of your Lordships' House, should like to thank the noble Baroness the Minister for making this Statement. It is a very important Statement and has a large number of implications which are by no means clear as to the ultimate outcome. Perhaps this Statement is much more significant for what it does not say rather than for what it says. Before saying any more, I should like to congratulate the Government on doing what we wanted to do prior to 1974, which was to remove the area health authorities. I say that because
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we are in complete agreement on the desirability that this should be done and we are glad that this Government will do it.
I should like to comment on the fact that the noble Baroness the Minister said, with regard to structure and management, that a circular will be issued to health authorities today on what is implied in that. We have been rather puzzled as to why, in certain Bills that have come before your Lordships' House, the Government have been resistant to any change. That resistance is to be found today in the Health Services Bill, which is still before your Lordships' House and which has only completed its Committee stage. We question the advisability of the Secretary of State sending out this structure and management document to local health authorities when the Bill is not yet on the statute book; it is not completed. It quite clearly shows that the Government are quite resistant to any suggestion of change. By doing this I think that your Lordships' House has been quite badly treated.
Several noble Lords: Hear, hear!
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, I want to ask about the considerable autonomy as regards the management of the affairs of the new health authorities. In point of fact, we on this side are glad that there will be considerable autonomy in the management of the affairs of the new health authorities, but we would ask the Government—and I do not ask for a reply to this now—to have regard to the fact that this can only be done if, on the district health committee, there is a sufficient number of people who have a working knowledge of the National Health Service and who are in a position to make objective judgments on what the service needs. I am thinking of those who work at the grass roots of our National Health Service—the employees. If I may say so, we are much too fond of appointing to authorities and to committees the great and the good. What we need are fewer great and fewer good people, and far more committed and concerned people. I hope that the Government will go in for the committed and the concerned, and not the others.
I am a little puzzled by what is said at the end of paragraph 6:
"In order to give authorities greater flexibility on this, I am cancelling most of the existing

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instructions which require them to appoint specified officers to a substantial number of posts. District health authorities will decide for themselves what posts to create".
Are we really to understand that that is the intention of the Secretary of State? Will he not put a limit or a reservation on the number of people to be appointed and the amount of money that will be spent in consequence? I cannot believe that there will be that sort of unrestricted freedom given to the DHAs, and I am not so sure that I would welcome it if it were true.
With regard to paragraph 7, we support the first sentence which says:
"I attach high importance to effective collaboration between the National Health Service and local authorities".
But it goes on to say that the membership of the district health authorities should average around 16, four of whom will be appointed by the local authorities. If—and I address this remark to the Minister—there is to be effective collaboration between the National Health Service and local authorities, I should have thought that there ought to be a representation of more than just 25 per cent. If my memory serves me correctly, on the area health authorities there are a third. Although I am not suggesting that the district health authorities should be inundated by local authority representatives, I shall ask the Minister to bear in mind that perhaps four is not adequate.
The same paragraph deals with the question of common boundaries, and quite rightly points out that this may not always be possible. However, I would ask the noble Baroness the Minister to ask her right honourable friend the Secretary of State to bear in mind that where it is not possible to have a district health authority that covers, shall I say, one or two local authorities, if it has to spread over into another local authority, that it will be on a district basis and not just on a small area basis. All local authorities are divided into districts. They have their district social work teams, as the noble Baroness knows better than anyone else. It ought to be clearly understood that if it has to go to another local authority area, it should take in a complete district so that there could be a working arrangement with that district's team.
With regard to paragraph 8, I note that later this year the Secretary of State
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will issue a consultative paper seeking views on the membership, role and powers of the community health councils. I want to ask the noble Baroness the Minister to indicate to her right honourable friend that the community health councils are, in fact, serving a very valuable purpose and that the consultative paper ought not to go only to a select member of people, but ought to go to a large number of organisations that are in touch with the consumers of our National Health Service —namely, the patients—and get their point of view.
I come to paragraph 11 because I think that this is a matter of some concern. The Secretary of State recognises that the staff must know that they will he treated fairly. But what bothers me is that he goes on to say:
"We have put forward what I hope are seen as fair proposals for the filling of posts in the new authorities, for staff protection and for early retirement and redundancy compensation".
I know that these proposals are being discussed by the staff side, but can the noble Baroness the Minister say that the hospital staffs are really satisfied with that arrangement? My understanding of the situation is that while they are prepared for the Whitley staff side to deal with the question of posts, shall I say, they do ask for a health service staff protection commission to watch and oversee the transfer, and the effect that such transfers are going to have upon the staff.
I am very worried about the use of the word "redundancy" The Statement does not qualify it in one single instance. It does not say whether the redundancies are to be compulsory. It does not even say whether they are to be voluntary. I do wish to have, if it is possible this afternoon, an answer to that particular question.
My last word is that in paragraph 13 we come back to the saving of about 10 per cent. The noble Baroness and I have been over this ground before, but I feel strongly that we need a full explanation as to how this £30 million is going to be saved. I understand that the Secretary of State made a Statement some time ago to the effect that £45 million would be saved; that £15 million of that would be required for adjustments on the administrative side. If that is so, does it mean that the other £30 million is going

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to be saved as the result of people losing their jobs, either by redundancy—voluntary or compulsory—or by being discharged?
4.2 p.m.
Lord WINSTANLEY: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friends on these Benches, I should like to join with the noble Lord, Lord Wells-Pestell, in thanking the noble Baroness for repeating this important and interesting Statement made in another place.
May I ask the noble Baroness at the outset whether she will accept that the word "reorganisation" in connection with health services is calculated to strike terror into the hearts of doctors, nurses, administrators, patients, and indeed all those with connections with the health service? However, that having been said, the extent to which this Statement indicates a genuine attempt to move control and management of the health services closer to the grass roots and the people who really matter in the locality, the patients, it will be warmly welcomed on these Benches, and very fully supported.
Perhaps the noble Baroness will note that we warmly welcome the clear intention to retain, for the moment at least, the community health councils. However, with regard to the mention in the Statement of the possibility of a review of the longer-term case for retaining these separate consumer bodies, I would ask the noble Baroness to accept that until we have evolved some really democratic machinery for controlling the health service at local level, there will always be a need for a body to represent the needs and the wishes of the patient.
Finally, I would say we would wish to study this Statement more carefully before taking up detailed points. There is, however, one question I should like to put to the noble Baroness. The Statement refers to proposals for Scotland being announced next week. In so far as those proposals appear to indicate a move in the opposite direction, that is away from the grass roots towards regions rather than the reverse, may I express the hope that perhaps your Lordships' House may get an opportunity at some particular stage to discuss these proposals collectively rather than piecemeal.
4.4 p.m.
Baroness YOUNG: My Lords, I am most grateful to both the noble Lord, Lord Wells-Pestell, and the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, for their general welcome of this Statement. May I begin my reply by assuring the noble Lord, Lord WellsPestell, that paragraph 1 of the circular clearly states,
"subject to the enactment of the Health Services Bill".
Of course, there will be opportunities at Report stage and Third Reading for further debate on the Health Services Bill, which is still before your Lordships' House.
The noble Lord, Lord Wells-Pestell, also asked me about the composition of the new district health authorities. He asked whether they would in fact include representatives of the employees. I would assure him that the membership will include a consultant, a general practitioner, a nurse, a nominee of the appropriate university, a representative of the trade union movement, and four members appointed by local authorities. The rest of the members will be generalists appointed for the individual contribution they can make to the management of the service. He asked me also about community health councils and said that the consultative paper ought to go to the consumers of the National Health Service. I certainly will note this point and pass it on to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State.
On his points about the staff side, we have, of course, as he will know, debated this matter at considerable length in Committee on the Health Services Bill. The staff side have agreed the general arrangement for discussing the important arrangements which must be made for them in this reorganisation. We believe that the fall-off in the numbers of staff will be very largely achieved by natural wastage and early retirements. Of course, we must also look at the opportunities which can be afforded by redeployment and retraining. It would not, however, be right for me to give a guarantee that there could be no compulsory redundancies at all, but we hope that these will be the absolute minimum and we hope that most of the changes will take place in the way that I have described.

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Finally, the noble Lord asked me about the calculation of the 10 per cent. saving. As he will know from our discussions before, we believe that £30 million will be saved at today's prices after the transitional period of four to five years. It certainly will not happen immediately. We estimate this to be about 10 per cent. of the management costs.
Turning to the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, I am glad of his general welcome of this Statement. I certainly take his point about the community health councils and his support for them. They will remain as they are. The further consultations will not take place for some time yet. I am quite certain that through the usual channels an opportunity can be given to debate this whole subject, including the proposals for Scotland.
Lord WELLS-PESTELL: My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Baroness the Minister. I do not know whether we have the same copy of the Statement: I can see no reference in mine to, "subject to the Bill becoming an Act of Parliament." Also, I note that, although this is a Statement made by the right honourable Patrick Jenkin, Secretary of State for Social Services, it starts off, "My Lords".
Baroness YOUNG: My Lords, I find it rather difficult to comment on what the noble Lord, Lord Wells-Pestell, has in his hand. Perhaps this is a matter we might resolve another time.

AIR FARES IN EUROPE: ECC REPORT
4.8 p.m.
Debate resumed.
Baroness BURTON of COVENTRY: My Lords, I have the feeling that our report has arrived at the right moment, certainly for the travelling public and probably for some airlines, and I would hope as ammunition for our own Government to end what really has become a scandal; namely, the jungle of air fares in Europe.
Before going on, I should like to say something about the noble Lord, Lord
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Boyd-Carpenter on two counts. Quite apart from his speech this afternoon which set the background so admirably for our debate—as this House will always expect him to do—there are two counts which I would like to comment on to the House. All Members of the committee would like the House to know how much we enjoyed serving under Lord Boyd-Carpenter, how much we appreciated his knowledge, and what a first-class job we think he did in producing what we regard as a very good report. The second point I want to make is a more personal one. I want to thank him for his kindness, his generosity and his forbearance to a most recalcitrant member of the Airline Users' Committee during his period as chairman. That is appreciated too.
I came into this particular area a long time ago and with very little encouragement. Starting on 18th February 1971, I raised what was to me a very obvious fact—that European air fares were far too high. I think the House agreed but, as is so frequently the case, not those in authority either on the ground or in the air. We all know that being right is not enough. You have to be right at the right moment! Hence my opening comment today.
Anyway, in December 1976 the Airline Users' Committee entered the fray. We —that is, the AUC—published a report in depth entitled European Air Fares. From it I wish to quote only two main conclusions which are particularly relevant to the debate today. Paragraph 7:
"As there is no tariff competition on scheduled services and there is limited entry into the market due to licensing requirements, it is essential that governments and regulatory authorities should take a strong interest in passenger fare levels".
The second one at paragraph 10:
"The present European fare structure is not simple; we concur with the Authority's"—
that is, the Civil Aviation Authority's opinion and—
"description of it as 'a jungle'. On one route, there are 25 different fares, plus six categories of discounts, and even on much less complex routes agents do not always know or sell what is available. The IATA 'mileage scheme' adds further to the range of charges".
I do not recall the Government being enthusiastic about that report. In January 1977—one month later—British Airways issued a publication entitled, A Reply to the Airline Users' Committee Report

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on European Air Fares. There was no doubt at all about their reaction, and I quote from page 17 of their reply:
"AUC has been led, through a complex piece of faulty reasoning, to make proposals which pose a serious threat to the economic health of the British airline industry. They fail, even, to serve the interests of normal fare passengers, with whose welfare AUC seems most concerned".
And so, my Lords, neither welcome nor encouragement for myself in 1971 or for the AUC six years later. Why should I feel that 1980 might be better? I think it might be better because, with tiresome persistence I admit, I believe that the conclusions in the report that we are discussing today are the right ones. I think the public is now well seized of the fact that they have been overcharged in the past and indeed in many cases today. I think the airlines realise, at last, that something will have to be done about it. I say to the Minister replying to this debate, and I hope correctly, that I believe the Secretary of State for Trade will also do something about it.
So, my Lords, if we proceed from there, what did our witnesses tell us? What conclusions did we draw from their evidence? And, most important of all in so far as my remarks today are concerned, what do I feel must, can, and should be done? To save time and to ensure continuity, I would prefer not to weary the House with reference numbers, but all the references are available if any noble Lord cares to ask me.
There is no doubt that scheduled air fares are arranged between airlines and governments. In other words, governments, airlines, and IATA are indistinguishable. Only the air traveller, the consumer, and the would-be consumer, is excluded. National airlines spheres of influence are maintained to the detriment of healthy competition, service to the consumer, and an economical fares structure. Agreements between most countries, except for those in the United States of America and in some cases between the United Kingdom and France, provide for only one national carrier from each country. In no case within Europe is there open entry to an international route, and competition is frequently limited to the two national carriers. Competition on fares is restricted in many bilateral agreements. That is a crushing indictment, my Lords, and it is true.
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One of our witnesses said that coming from Stockholm to London he was paying three times more per flight kilometre than if he were flying from London to New York. He realised that he was flying probably the most expensive airline in the world—more or less—and he also understood that there must be a difference in fares. What he could not understand was the very high difference.
We on the Committee were well aware that sweeping generalisations cannot be made about the American and European markets, or about the level of fares. However, the disparities between the European and the American fares are so great that the conclusion that scheduled European air fares are too high is unavoidable. But it is not only the Stockholm, or Scandinavian, route. Other witnesses said that air fares on scheduled routes in the Community were far too high. They were concerned that vested interests, within both the member states and the national carriers, would prevent the air traveller being given a better deal.
To conclude this section on fares, although I contend the case is made, I must say that I personally agree with the feeling held by independent airlines; namely, that trends in licensing policy have been anti-independent and anti-competition, and I would support their calls for a review of basic principles underlying that policy.
Surely there must be more scope for more competition and lower scheduled fares in Europe without going to the extreme of the United States domestic deregulation. Obviously this leads us to the area of why fares in Europe should be so high. Here we had a remarkable consensus of views. Leaving aside efficiency and overmanning—both arguable subjects—let us look at security charges, landing fees, and air traffic control. The House knows my views on security charges—views shared by the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, and the airlines. Contrary to both Front Benches in 1978, here and in another place, we believe that national security should be the responsibility of the Crown and not of the individual citizen.
When this House discussed the matter in March 1978, I said I believed it to be

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true that the United Kingdom was widely regarded as one of the few states whose aviation policies were trend-setting. Unfortunately we set a trend on national security charges, against the wishes of the European Civil Aviation Conference and to the surprise of our partners in the Community, none of whom dealt with its security in such a way.
That was in 1978. What is being said today in 1980? There is widespread resentment that the charge has been increased recently from 85p to £1·65. This charge is made on each arriving passenger, which suggests that we are paying for the passengers to be searched abroad, rather than on outgoing passengers who are checked here. That has always been difficult for the general public to understand, and it seems a most peculiar arrangement, I must agree.
One group of witnesses told us that they had tentative information to the effect that, since the British Airports Authority took over security at Gatwick, the number of persons involved in the security industry has risen from 80 to 340. That interview was in February, yet only last month, in June, I was informed personally that numbers were to be cut drastically, so drastically that the unions involved felt that security was seriously impaired; but the charge per passenger was to remain. The airlines feel, and I agree with them, that this whole area of security charges, and the cost and competence of the operation should be reviewed.
What about landing fees? IATA told us that landing fees in the United States represent between 10 and 30 per cent. of European levels. When asked why European levels were so high, the answer was that in the United States the airports were put on a commercial basis and run commercially, whereas in Europe the airports were government organisations. The British Airports Authority has recently added very considerably to landing charges. British Airways told the committee that they were greatly concerned at this recent demand for a considerable increase in what the airline termed "government charges"; namely, route navigation, airport and security charges, which will average 40 per cent. for them in the year ahead. They emphasised that that was an increase of 40 per cent. over the level of charges paid last year.
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British Airways have suggested to the British Airports Authority and to the Civil Aviation Authority that they should do something about their own productivity improvements and not just say that these total costs should be passed on to the consumer. When I heard them make that remark I said, "Good for British Airways", for that seemed a most robust and pertinent rejoinder.
I believe that air traffic control is one area where we in this country lead Europe. Many of our witnesses were of this opinion and agreed it would be beneficial if we could take the initiative in the co-ordination of air traffic control in Europe. A witness from the trade union side suggested that the TUC might help by raising the matter through the International Transport Federation. If you are flying from Brussels to Zurich, you are flying a distance which is 43 per cent. greater than the crow flies. These distances may arise because of the necessity to avoid military areas or areas of acute traffic congestion. This witness thought we needed co-operation between the Common Market and the Council of Europe.
IATA told us that one of the cost elements which differentiate United States operations from European operations is the fact that on any route between two points in Europe, the actual distance flown, on average, is 15 per cent. longer than it need be, and what was said next should be on record. We were told that in America, one country with one administration, the tolerance was between 2 and 3 per cent.; in Europe it is 15 per cent., and that is on average. Governments in Europe have drawn up the air routes which result in such deviation, and surely the cost of energy alone today should enforce some drastic reconsideration.
A Member of the European Parliament said it was absolutely vital that action was taken on this issue. The problems revolve very much around those countries with national air traffic control organisations not fully co-operating with their opposite numbers. We were told that the agreement on Euro-control expired in 1983 and that there did not seem to be any firm policy about either the control or what should happen to it. Surely member states must make up their minds as to what they want done with the European organisation.

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Those are my three main points where I suggest action must be taken—security charges, landing fees and air traffic control —all of them valid comparisons between America and Europe, all of them adding greatly to high fares in Europe. A further point, smaller maybe, but of benefit to travellers, concerned the desirability and possibility of passengers knowing what fares are on offer, not only the travellers but the agents who offer the goods for sale. British Airways believe it is possible and desirable that there should be notices or lists in airlines' and agents' offices saying what fares are available. They argue that simplification in fares enables airlines to do far more to communicate in advertising and promotional material, and to ensure that agents understand it and can answer quickly.
Another witness told us there was growing criticism from consumers because they did not know how much they should pay for an air ticket. Indeed, he went on to say that, going into a travel agency, you can more or less negotiate the price because of the many different fares and discount fares available. Obviously this is far from satisfactory. But our witness stressed, and I think he was right, that it is a problem not only for the Common Market countries but one needing a common European approach; for example, in the European Council there are 21 member states. The Civil Aviation Authority state that what is required is a system where fares are formally filed so that everyone knows what they are and they can be made available to the public. They have done this for the United States and are in the process of introducing it for Europe, which is in terms of members the next most important area. The Civil Aviation Authority file covers only scheduled fares, of course.
That is my list of suggestions—security charges, landing fees, air traffic control and fares lists where tickets are on sale—and I want something done about consumer representation. In this country we have our AUC; we need either general European representation, which might be too large or unweildy, or AUCs in all the countries concerned. We now know that, following an initiative from the United Kingdom the Council of Ministers has asked the Commission to examine scheduled air fares charged in the Community. But we need to examine not
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only what I would term the high fares in Europe but what causes them, and additionally we need to examine the basic principles plus present trends in the existing licensing policy. Certainly our report has arrived at the right moment.
4.29 p.m.
The Earl of SELKIRK: My Lords, I very much agreed with what the noble Baroness, Lady Burton of Coventry, said. I enjoyed sitting on that committee. I found it extremely stimulating, as one might expect with the combination of Lady Burton and my noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter. This is a short survey of a very complicated subject. It is couched in courteous language, but it is really fundamental and radical in its implications. We have had to absorb a great deal in the 20th century, be it motor cars, television or nuclear physics, and this is another subject into which we must bring greater harmony than is the case at the present time.
Aviation as a conventional means of transport has been with us for barely 50 years. It was of course enormously boosted and distorted by the war. Thereafter there set in a phase which I describe as the prestige phase, which is really the dominant factor of the last thirty years or so. If anybody doubts that, I ask him to take a walk from Piccadilly Circus to the Green Park, and he will see just on 20 different airline offices. Two-thirds of that total, I am sure, are there for prestige reasons rather than commercial reasons. I do not say that that is a bad thing, but I should like to read a passage from the report relating to evidence given by the Commercial Director of British Airways. This appears on page 46. He was asked: "Who decides fares?". He replied:
"I think that the key authority in the whole operation is really the two governments concerned".
He was further asked what would be the position if the airlines themselves came to an agreement. He said:
"There was a time when they did but it is certainly not the case to-day. There are many examples where governments all over the world will say that they do not agree with the levels proposed".
That is the situation that we are in today. I would not say that it is by any means wholly unsuccessful. After all, business-

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men and politicians are able to travel all over the world, and there are certainly plenty of conferences of one kind or another. It may be worth remembering that it was only in 1917, when Mr. Balfour went to the United States, that a Cabinet Minister visited that country for the very first time. We do gain.
But the fact remains that the fares are substantially set, and the licences are given, by two Governments, two airlines, and IATA—a committee of five. This is not a commercial arrangement. As my noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter said, IATA is not exercising the dominant action of a cartel which it did immediately after the war; if I may say so, a cartel which would never have been allowed to arise had it not in fact been run by substantially Government-organised airlines.
I do not think that one can ever cost what it takes to run an airline between one point and another. That is a pragmatic problem which does not submit wholly, or indeed very far, to any theoretical solution. May I give three examples, quite simply? When one buys an aeroplane, one has to consider whether it will be obsolete in the year 2000; by that I mean whether or not by that date someone will produce a more efficient and useful aeroplane. Secondly, one must keep an immensely complicated piece of mechanism punctual and clean. If there is a delay due to mechanical reasons, it is in fact an organisational failure of one kind or another. I am not going to say that it will not happen, but it is an immensely skilled task.
Thirdly, one has to guess that passengers will want to fill the aeroplane, or at least that they will do so. These questions all involve demands for the highest skill, which I do not believe can ever be submitted to a theoretical calculation. On the other hand, it is quite clear that aeroplanes can be filled, bearing in mind the fares offered by charter companies. These have shown that, given certain specialised circumstances, quite different fares can in fact be charged.
I must mention one particular point. Throughout our discussion there was never any question of reducing the safety standards, which would remain absolutely rigid. This question was never discussed;
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it was quite unnecessary to discuss it. However, I believe that it is necessary to remind the House (as the noble Baroness, Lady Burton of Coventry, has), that there are many expenses which, strictly speaking, lie outside aviation fares. The noble Baroness has referred to them. The cost of security is certainly a difficult question, and we have a specialised way of dealing with it. But I wish to mention landing fees. I am informed that it costs seven times as much to land a 707 in Manchester as it does to land it in Dallas. I know that it is easy to take specialised cases, but it is a slightly sharp differentiation. I also wish to mention the restriction on night flying. If we are to open a new airport in this country, let us try to ensure that it is unrestricted as regards night flying. This would bring about considerable economy in the operation of aviation in this country.
I believe that in many ways the airlines must be congratulated upon finding their way through the political and economic maze which now surrounds the aviation industry. I believe that in many respects they have done well. However, the answer to the problem lies in the world of politics. Of course, our Government, from whom we always expect much, will not necessarily be able to solve it by themselves; of course they cannot. But we are asking them to give a lead which could point the way to a radical change and to far-reaching consequences if in the next 20, 30, 40 or 50 years we are to obtain the best and the most useful employment of this wonderful development. If the matter is left in the hands of Government, we shall still have fares that will range very much too high. It is for that reason that all members of the committee wish to press the Government to take as strong a lead as they can, not only in the European Community, which can never in itself he a unit of aviation control, but also in the wider field. I believe that great benefits would flow from that.
4.37 p.m.
Lord SHERFIELD: My Lords, as a member of the sub-committee on air fares, I should like to join previous speakers in paying tribute to the outstanding contribution of our chairman, whose profound knowledge of the subject, and expertise in the chair, enabled us to digest nearly 200 pages of evidence and yet

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produce a reasonably concise and, I think, lucid report. Unlike the chairman, I had virtually no knowledge of the subject prior to the hearings, and I should not care to sit for an examination on it now. I doubt whether I should satisfy the examiners. But I believe that I grasped one or two basic elements in the situation which led the sub-committee to resist the temptation to recommend a dash for freedom and to put this realistic and soberly-worded report before the House.
As has already been said, the fundamental obstacle in the way of rapid lowering of air fares in Europe is the national airline, Government-owned and subsidised, and, in degrees varying between countries, not efficient enough to survive the blast of free or even freer competition without increasing the subsidies by a large amount or putting the airlines out of business. As the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, said, national aviation, as we know to our cost, is one of the most important prestige symbols, and there is more than a trace of ambivalence in our own official position over deregulation in the quite natural desire to have regard to the interests of British Airways.
It is not easy to get over or round this obstacle; so what can be done? It was suggested by some of our witnesses that one avenue could be pressure from the European Parliament, and we heard from two Members of that Parliament about the moves that are being made there. Other witnesses thought that better publicity, with figures of comparative costs, would help to build up pressures. Others, again, favoured more agitation from the consumer in Europe. But, as the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, has suggested, there are apparently very few people about on the Continent like the noble Baroness, Lady Burton, to keep the Governments, the airlines and everybody else concerned up to the mark. Others, again, favoured action through the European Civil Aviation Conference; but that body, though a useful forum, has no executive powers and can proceed only by consensus. The responsible Minister, who gave evidence, adopted a very cautious approach and felt that the best course was to move by slow steps in the Council, proceeding by consensus under Article 84, Section 2, of the Treaty of Rome. The Commission's initiative itself, which led to this report, is really to
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set out objectives and to stimulate discussion, rather than to secure action on specific measures; and the implication of all the official and semi-official evidence was that the regulatory system must be continued, and can be liberalised only very slowly and cautiously.
My Lords, in the end, as so often in these Community affairs, it all goes back to Governments, who could quite quickly alleviate the situation if they had a collective mind to do so; for example, in correcting the rather horrifying statistic produced by Mr. Knut Hammarskjold and quoted by the noble Baroness, Lady Burton, that air routes in Europe are on average 15 per cent. longer than they need to be. It is the case that, as stated in paragraph 60 of the report, the European Court of Justice has already decided that the general rules of the Rome Treaty on the rules of competition apply, outside Title IV, to air transport. But the position does not seem to be quite clear-cut, and the Commision, in the absence of any regulation on this subject, cannot do anything much to give effect to this ruling.
Some further action by the court might help, and this reinforcement may come if the redoubtable Sir Freddie Laker carries out his announced intention to go to the court for a ruling. But, as things stand, my conclusion is that unless it is unequivocably established, either through decision by the Council or by further rulings by the European Court, that the rules of competition apply to air transport as well as to other forms of transport, any progress will amount only to nibbling at the fringes of the problem. The Community Governments will continue to support relatively inefficient national airlines by the continuation of subsidies and by declining to accept proposals from other Community airlines for lower fares. This action was clearly illustrated, as the noble Earl, Lord Amherst, suggested, by the refusal of the French Government to accept British Airways' recent proposals for the London-Paris route.
My Lords, I do not see any escape from this rather pessimistic conclusion. No doubt the various forms of pressure—from the Commission, from consumers, from the European Parliament in the ECAC and through other action referred to in the conclusions of the Committee, including bilateral negotiation—should be

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continued and, indeed, stepped up; but until some legal or political sanction is in existence, whether or not it is actually invoked, progress, either by bilateral negotiation or by consenus in the Council of Ministers, is likely to be at a snails' pace. If the Minister who replies to this debate can take a more optimistic view, I shall be delighted, but surprised.
4.45 p.m.
The Earl of BESSBOROUGH: My Lords, I feel that, speaking for the first time in the Royal Gallery, I should tell your Lordships that my noble forebear, who is also that of my noble kinsman Lord Ponsonby, trembled in his grave when the incident occurred in your Lordships' House the night before last, for it was he who, as First Commissioner of Works, and Lord Duncannon, in the lifetime of his father, who commissioned Sir Charles Barry to rebuild the Palace of Westminster, and Mr. Pugin to design the interior. I only hope that your Lordships will not hold the noble Lord opposite, nor your humble servant, in any way liable in so far as damages are concerned! But I look up to this ceiling too, perhaps, with some concern.
There is not a great deal of room in these Benches, my Lords, and I am having a little trouble standing up straight, and I have to remain by the microphone none the less. I am very glad indeed to support my noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter in his Motion today. He was, as other noble Lords have said, a most admirable chairman of our sub-committee—a most appropriate one in view of his former appointment as chairman of the Civil Aviation Authority. It is not, I think, in the least disparaging to our distinguished witnesses to say that my noble friend sometimes knew more about the subject under discussion than they. I do not think any of our witnesses would object to my saying that.
If it is not impertinent or irrelevant, may I also take this opportunity to congratulate him on the quite excellent reviews of his book Way of Life. I may say that I am in the process of reading the 21st Chapter, which is entitled, "Very Civil Aviation", and am reading at this moment that particular bit about watching a harassed Lord-in-Waiting reading the
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brief which my noble friend himself had drafted as chairman of the Civil Aviation Authority.
My only regret as a member of his subcommittee, on which I had the honour to serve, was that other parliamentary duties prevented me from attending the meeting when Sir Freddie Laker gave evidence. He was, as expected, a most attractive witness, it appears, as well as, of course, being the famous pioneer in cutting air fares across the Atlantic. I only hope he will succeed in doing so in Europe, too. For six and a half years as a Member of the European Parliament—one of those described yesterday by Mrs. Barbara Castle as "homeless tramps often thought that I was spending almost half my time either at airports or in aircraft flying back and forth to Brussels, Luxembourg, Strasbourg and, indeed, at one time or another, all the capitals of the Nine, and indeed elsewhere in the world. My colleagues and I flew virtually every week, sometimes two or three times a week, and were critical of what we considered to be in some cases grossly, even grotesquely, inflated fares. It was no real consolation to us to think that the money did not come out of our own pockets, but was paid for by the European Parliament; that is to say, by the taxpayers of the nine member states of the Community.
I need hardly add that I fully endorse all that my noble friend said in introducing his Motion, and, indeed, what other noble Lords and the noble Baroness have said, and I want, if possible, to try to avoid too much repetition. It is most regrettable that the consequences of the existing system of allocating routes, fixing fares, pooling revenue and so on has resulted in the virtual elimination of competition. Your Lordships may have seen from the report that the committee noted that the Civil Aviation Authority had been criticised for excessive caution. As the report says, had the CAA always been so cautious it is unlikely that the existing independent airlines could ever have been established in the United Kingdom.
I recognise that by relating fares to the long-run costs of the most efficient operator, the policy of cost-based fares can be expected to improve airline efficiency, to push down the costs of inefficient operators by encouraging them to match the performance of the most

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efficient airline and thus lead to lower fares. But I also recognise that even if this policy was implemented, the general level of fares in Europe might still remain higher than in the United States if the level of costs outside the control of the airlines—that is, as the noble Baroness has said, airport and security charges and air traffic control—remains higher in Europe. The noble Baroness made very good points on this and I agreed with all of them.
I should like to say, as did my noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter, something about the legal implications referred to in paragraphs 58 to 62. I think that ultimately the Council of Ministers should adopt a regulation for the application of the rules of competition to cover air transport in the same way as such regulations cover other branches of transport and economic life. The noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, I think, agrees with this. In my view, unless the Community's competition policy covers all sectors of the economy, I do not believe that we shall have a true European Economic Community. As the report says, if the competition rules were effectively applied, market sharing and fare-fixing arrangements could be outlawed. That is why I say that the full competition rules of the treaty should also apply to air transport and I am glad that the European Commission agrees on this point.
I think that paragraph 73 of the report is very important and that the Council of Ministers should agree to operate a more flexible regulatory system and also enforce the competition provisions in the treaty. A combination of the two procedures might well (as the report indicates) provide the best solution even if we do not all consider that it would be appropriate at present to adopt a regulation applying the full rigour of the treaty's competition provisions. I, personally, should like to see them applied but I understand the problems involved.
Another important issue, in my view, is that competitive conditions should be fair and that competition cannot be efficient if one Government subsidises a national airline to maintain its competitive position against a foreign competitor. Like the noble Baroness, I think that another important point is that airlines and air travel agents should be encouraged
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to display notices listing the fares available. Obviously, as witnesses from the Civil Aviation Authority said in reply to one of my questions, in so far as the tariff field is concerned the best way of proceeding is by persuasion rather than regulation. But if persuasion does not succeed, what next?
In so far as the evidence from British Airways was concerned, I was a little unhappy to hear Mr. Draper's answer (in paragraph 209) that British Airways took a very parochial view and not an EEC view. He said this twice. Obviously, British Airways must put British Airways' interests first; but I should have liked to hear some remarks which might also have given a high priority to the interests of the European Community as a whole, including Britain. As Mr. Anders Björck of the Assembly of the Council of Europe said, what they have done in the United States is to "open the sky". I agree with him; but I dare say that at this point in time we have to be realistic and we cannot yet expect the Community to go quite that far. But that would be no problem if the political will or, as the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, described it, the collective will, existed in Europe to do so. In my view, that political will should exist.
My Lords, hope it is true that the EEC may have more political elbow and more political influence than the European Civil Aviation Conference—known as ECAC—composed of 22 countries. Perhaps the Community might have more influence and therefore be more able to achieve the ends which we are looking for in reducing fares generally than has ECAC itself. I was glad to hear Mr Hoffmann (who my noble friend mentioned and who is the rapporteur in the European Parliament) say that he thought that in the long term there was a possibility of granting greater powers to the European Commission. It is most distressing, as my noble friend Lord Kinnoull said in Committee, that European air fares are at the moment the most expensive in the world.
Your Lordships may have been interested in an exchange (in paragraph 394) with Mr. Moorhouse, a Member of the European Parliament, when he said he felt rather embarrassed about the French announcement that the French Government were going to subsidise flights to Strasbourg. Obviously, MEPs must,

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individually, have welcomed this. On the other hand, as Mr. Moorhouse said, this may have turned out to be against the best spirit of the Community. As your Lordships may have observed, there was a good deal of discussion about over-manning. Certain European airlines are, I think, somewhat culpable in this respect. Some European carriers may perhaps be over-administered and I hope that they are pondering this problem deeply. In so far as the £20 flight to Paris is concerned, with Mr. Thomas of the TUC (who was a most interesting witness) I think that it is regrettable that Air France turned this down. I was glad to hear that the TUC supported the £20 fare quite unequivocally. Finally, my Lords, I should again like to congratulate my noble friend on the admirable way in which he conducted the proceedings of his sub-committee, and I hope that the Governments of the EEC member states will take our conclusions to heart.
4.59 p.m.
Lord GREENWOOD of ROSSENDALE: My Lords, I shall not delay the House for more than a couple of minutes, but some of your Lordships may recall that until I resigned at the end of last year I had been for two years chairman of the Select Committee on the European Economic Communities. I now, therefore, do not take part in general in debates on the European Economic Communities but I was a member of the sub-committee whose report we are discussing this afternoon. I should like very sincerely to join in the praise which has been given to the noble Lord and his colleagues. I hope that it will not seem immodest if I say that to have this sub-committee was my own idea and that I was in the seventh heaven when we persuaded the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, to take the chair. I have never worked under a better chairman; from time to time I felt sorry for the witnesses, whose agony was assuaged only by the invariable courtesy that the noble Lord showed. I agreed with everything he said in his speech this afternoon, not least in his tribute to the staff of the Select Committee who really are incredibly talented, unbelievably hardworking, and serve your Lordships' House in a way which leaves nothing at all to be desired.
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Apart from myself, it was a star-studded sub-committee. It would be true, if perhaps trite, to say that there is no other legislative assembly in Europe which could have fielded so strong and so experienced a team, and produced so excellent a report. That is why the standing of your Lordships' House in Brussels, Strasbourg and Luxembourg is so high. It commands tremendous respect and it is good to feel that that respect will have been further enhanced by our discussion today.
The discussion is a very topical one. I read a few days ago suggestions by a fairly senior member of my own party that in some way this House was failing in its duty. I think that the report that we are discussing today gives the lie to that criticism. It would be a pity if such a simplistic attitude were to become part of the commonplace of inter-party political cut and thrust. It would damage the structure of our legislature; it would create bitterness and frustration; and I hope that my friends, and the critics of this House, will weigh their words very carefully before they indulge in such recriminations.
Perhaps I could say this in conclusion: The way that your Lordships have voted in the past few days, and the positive and the constructive work which the Select Committee does, show that this House commands both wisdom and compassion and, at times, a spirit of true independence in the work that it does. The report introduced by the noble Lord is a work on which the noble Lord and the whole House can congratulate him and itself.
5.2 p.m.
The Earl of KINNOULL: My Lords, I must apologise for not adding my name to the official list of speakers. I rise briefly to support my noble friend's Motion. As one of the less experienced members of the fairly strong sub-committee, and therefore perhaps more baffled than others with the thick spider's web of the complexity surrounding the European air fares structure, one experienced and appreciated even more the skill, knowledge and mastery of my noble friend's chairmanship.
He led us, as we have heard, with panache and with typical humour. He

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fired piercing questions at unsuspecting expert witnesses, always with exquisite courtesy; and most of us, as my noble friend Lord Bessborough said, guessed that he already knew the answer. I should also like to add my praise to our extremely hardworking clerk of the subcommittee. He persuaded such a wide range of experts to attend that this is really what gave the great value to the sub-committee, and I hope, the report.
My simple judgment on the state of the European air fares structure, their high cost, their general lack of competitiveness, the over-protectionism of their national carriers, is that if we achieve any measurable progress over the next 10 years to lower fares to a reasonable figure, we shall have done extremely well. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, shared that view. Of course, controlled liberalisation is the right and proper course for improving the system; but it is no good, indeed it is unrealistic, to eye with envy the United States domestic air fares system, their de-regulation policy and their very competitive level of fares that they have achieved. One would add this rider: the meagre profits that some of the US air carriers have to survive on make one question whether the pendulum could go too far to the detriment and safety of the consumer. Their system is under one authority. The European system is under 22 Governments, as my noble friend has said. It is under 22 air transport policies; under 22 tourism policies; 22 travel policies and with that different laws and cultures as well. Harmonisation of this system, even with the guiding hand of the EEC, must take decades rather than years to work out.
The second factor which particularly struck me on the sub-committee, listening to our witnesses, is that Britain is way out ahead with its carriers in their competitiveness, their ingenuity, their skill in marketing and indeed the investment risks that they are prepared to take to grasp the market. We heard from British Airways, British Caledonian, Laker and Dan-Air. They all had their eyes on this vast undeveloped European market. All could see the value of lowering fares to provide a travel service within reach of the many thousands—indeed, possibly millions—of Europeans who have never flown before. All have produced appli-
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cations and all have been frustrated. The trouble is that they are too good. The European competitors—mostly national flag carriers—with direct lines of communication to their Governments, do not want to know; they do not want to expose their heads above the ramparts. I suspect that they do not feel that they have the experience to compete. It is truly a somewhat depressing picture because air travel within Europe is perhaps one of the best ways to achieve European togetherness and understanding.
My Lords, I saw three glints through the clouds: first, the heartening evidence given by Her Majesty's Government and their positive determination to seek a greater competitiveness within Europe; secondly, the vigorous support that our European members give; thirdly, the undoubted determination of our carriers to expand their influence into Europe. Those glints in the clouds in time will surely turn to sunshine as the case is undeniable. Based upon this and on the progress of public opinion—and my noble friend based his case on optimism although he did not say how soon he saw real progress, and perhaps he is wise in that—I wish Her Majesty's Government well in their endeavours. I wish our European Members of Parliament well in their pursuits, and I trust that this report will have done some good to stimulate action in what is rapidly becoming a scandalous situation.
5.8 p.m.
Lord PONSONBY of SHULBREDE: My Lords, first of all I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, for introducing the debate this afternoon. I should like to join with him and other colleagues on the Committee in the remarks that have been made about the staff of the Committee, and particularly the Clerk, who enabled the Committee to carry out its business in a very efficient and expeditious manner.
I should also like to join with other noble Lords in paying a tribute to the noble Lord's chairmanship of the Committee. This has been spoken about eloquently by many noble Lords, and, in particular, by the noble Baroness who was the first this afternoon to voice the unanimous view of the Committee. Unfortunately, because of business in the

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House the noble Lord had to miss one meeting of the Committee. This was most unfortunate in a sense because it was one of the most stimulating meetings of the Committe at which the principal witness was Sir Freddie Laker. I must say that I enjoyed the opportunity of chairing that meeting. May I also say that I am the former chairman of the London Tourist Board and not the English Tourist Board.
The noble Lord said that the committee started off with a unanimous view that the scheduled fares in Europe were far too high. That is absolutely correct. By the time the committee had finished its deliberations, it was still—as has been shown this afternoon by a number of noble Lords who were members of the committee and who have contributed to the debate—of that view, although much wiser about the constrictions in the way of doing anything about it.
In referring to fares being too high, my noble friend Lady Burton used what might be a more appropriate word in saying that the airlines had overcharged for too long. Obviously the ultimate of efficient operation of any airline is that each aircraft flies to full capacity all the time and, if airlines were able to achieve such a situation, it would obviously be very easy for the level of aircraft fares to be reduced. In fact this could work only at very great inconvenience to passengers and therefore over the years a very complex situation, described as "a jungle" by my noble friend Lady Burton, has grown up in the whole field of air transport. It is interesting to notice that the success of British Rail over the past year or two in trying to persuade people to come back to the railways has been accompanied by a vast variety of special offers on the railways—aimed, as the airlines aim, at operating to full capacity at times when people do not normally want to travel. Also, in so far as the railways are concerned, it has induced a great deal of additional travel, particularly by old people and students.
The position, as your Lordships well know, is that a seat, like a hotel bed, if not sold for a particular flight or a particular day, is a complete loss so far as the operator is concerned, and if that operator is only able to receive a mere pittance for the sale of that seat or that
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hotel bed, it is still much better for the operator than not selling it at all. Indeed we know well that if one is prepared to suffer the inconvenience of booking a flight at a very late date one is going to get one's ticket for a mere fraction of what one would have to pay if one booked some considerable time ahead for a particular date.
The committee felt, as has been mentioned already, that air fares in America showed what it was possible to achieve through competition in air transport. Certainly I would support the view that Europe contains a large number of potential air travellers who are prevented from travelling by the high cost of fares; and certainly the view that the committee had, that the interest of the consumer was being sacrificed to the prestige of the flag-carrying national airlines, was one that was supported. The problem, which has already been mentioned this afternoon, is that Europe is not a homogeneous unity as is the United States and that each nation has to support its own national airline, as the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, pointed out. It is impossible to envisage a situation where the national airlines would amalgamate with each other and work in larger units than they work in at the present time. Indeed it is also difficult, I think, to envisage cross-border amalgamations of private airlines in Europe; but in the United States this is going on all the time and one wonders whether airlines could get together for more sensible working arrangements and whether there could be more efficient use of aircraft at lower fares.
Competition, of course, is one way of producing that, and a number of views have been expressed this afternoon about the competition provisions of the Treaty of Rome. The view was expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, that it was not within the area of reality to think that these were likely to be enforced in the near future. I tend to agree with the sentiments of my noble kinsman Lord Bessborough that the competition rules will ultimately be enforced, although this may be some way ahead.
The view has also been expressed that one of the effects of the present methods of operation in Europe is that the airlines have managed to create a dense network of services throughout Europe, which is of

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convenience for the consumer, and that if one had a greater element of competition than one has at the present time this would have the effect of leading to airport and airload saturation. I do not think that that view is necessarily right. One of the effects of more competition would be not to lead to over-saturation of airports and airloads but, over a period of time, to lead to the cutting back of the size of the network of European airlines. It is difficult to say whether or not that would be in the interests of the consumer—lower fares or more convenient services. It is necessary to strike a balance on them.
My noble friend Lady Burton raised the matter of security charges and handling fees. I know this is a matter which she has raised in your Lordships' House a number of times previously. I happen myself to think it is right that security is handled by the British Airports Authority and not by individual airlines.
On the question of landing fees, one is well aware that the British Airports Authority have for some time been trying to persuade airlines to switch their operations from Heathrow to Gatwick and that for some time they have had a price incentive in the shape of much lower landing fees being charged at Gatwick than at Heathrow. The question of differential landing fees was highlighted by the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, who pointed out that Dallas is seven times as cheap as Manchester. One might say that, in a sense, is a question of competition in operation: Dallas is very desperate, as are a number of other cities in the States, about trying to persuade airlines to operate out of their airport, because they realise the benefits this brings to a particular community. One can envisage a situation in this country that a local authority would feel that in fact it would be for the general benefit of the people of an area if this sort of inducement was introduced.
So far as London is concerned, there has not been this concern to attract additional airlines into the London area, although I have often warned in the past, and warn again, that the pricing adopted by the British Airports Authority for London airports, the difficulties at London Airport and the difficulties operators face in landing in the London area could have the effect of driving airlines to use
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nearby international airports on the Continent, which could have a very detrimental effect on this country. Therefore, this is something which has to be kept very closely under review, and it is something in which the Government should not hesitate to help the British Airports Authority, if there are signs that airlines are operating in a way which is taking traffic away from these major international airports.
It has been said that there was a wealth of experience on the committee, and that is so. I look forward very much to hearing what the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, who has unique experience in this field, has to say. One of the things which one has to remember is that the Government are not their own master in this field. They are in a sense at the mercy of fellow members of the European Community. They are at the mercy of the air traffic control operations in overseas countries, which will decide whether or not particular flights can take place. Finally, may I once again thank the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, not only for introducing the report this evening but also for chairing the Select Committee.
5.22 p.m.
Lord TREFGARNE: My Lords, I want to start by a confession, or at least a disclaimer, which was put into my mind by my noble friend Lord Bessborough when he was recalling the words of my other noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter, who was once watching a harassed Lord-in-Waiting delivering a brief which he himself had prepared. Today, so far as I know, my noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter has not prepared this brief. But I am a trifle apprehensive about saying that, because I must confess to your Lordships that an envelope from the officials reached me via the hand of my noble friend. I think I had better inquire further into that at some future moment.
The Government welcome the subcommittee's report, as we did the European Commission's initiative in submitting its Memorandum on the Contribution of the European Communities to the development of air transport services. My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary—that is, Mr. Tebbit—has recorded the Government's welcome for the Commission's initiative during discussions in the Council of Transport

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Ministers, and the United Kingdom has taken the initiative to ensure that the memorandum is considered with all the priority which the subject matter requires. The memorandum covers many aspects of civil aviation, but the most important, from the public point of view, is the question of the level of air fares. It was entirely appropriate, therefore, that the sub-committee, under Lord Boyd-Carpenter's chairmanship, decided to concentrate on this aspect.
Efficient and low cost travel within the Community, for both businessmen and private travellers, is important in achieving the Community's economic objectives and in demonstrating that the Community has very much in mind the interests of consumers throughout the member states. The very high level of some normal economy fares in Europe has become a matter of widespread and active public and political concern in the Community. In the Government's view, the European air traveller is entitled to a better deal, and the Community has a responsibility to see that within the Community he gets it. We are, frankly, not satisfied with the present tightly regulated international civil aviation arrangements, and believe that a more liberal market environment would provide airlines with the ability to offer a wider range of air services at lower prices to satisfy all types of consumer demand, and would allow the airline industry to continue to grow and develop to the benefit of both Governments and consumers.
The question at this stage of the development of European civil aviation is whether the consumer and more general economic interests of individual European states would be better served by a freer market—approximating more closely to other commercial markets—than by continuation of the present highly regulated civil aviation operations. Aviation is, of course, as the sub-committee's report recognises, a high cost, high risk industry. Enormous sums are involved in the development of airports, in the acquisition of aircraft and, in recent times, in the purchase of aviation fuel. At the same time, the nature of the industry allows no compromise on safety standards. A continuing and stable level of profitability is, therefore, not easy to achieve in a competitive environment and, with the
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high level of public ownership of airlines, the industry has become one of the most regulated in the world.
The responsibility for the present system must, of course, to a large extent rest with Governments. Many Governments have very large financial commitments to their airlines which they seek to protect. Moreover, the industry is frequently motivated as much by considerations of prestige as by commercial forces. This has been mentioned by several noble Lords this afternoon.
These factors work against free market competition, and as long as Governments allow fare fixing by airlines at levels aimed at viability for the least productive, it will not be possible to speak in terms of unfettered competition in civil aviation. Opening up civil aviation in Europe to a normal commercial competitive régime is not, therefore, an achievable objective in the short term.
The Government nevertheless believe that steps can and should be taken to produce evolutionary and well-managed changes in the present régime. With some exceptions, most bilateral agreements do not rule out the conditions for genuine competition. Some competition arises, for example, when more than one airline of a particular state is allowed to operate on the same, or closely adjacent, routes. There is also a degree of competition between scheduled and non-scheduled services. But the tight restrictions on entry to routes and agreements by airlines collectively on fares before submission to Governments for approval, plus especially the negative attitudes of the majority of European Governments towards innovative fare proposals in defence of their own airlines, all go to prevent such competition as exists from being adequately effective.
Ministers in Community states are fond of stating their support for open trade, but seem to have a blind spot when it is convenient and particularly in relation to civil aviation. For example, we freely allow imports of cars and apples from the Community in fierce competition with our own industries, but our airlines are not allowed to compete freely in providing airline seats in the Community. The Government consider that competition is needed and welcome the stimulus that British airlines have already given.

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The Government's support for a better deal for the air traveller in Europe was reflected in the Conservative Party Manifesto for the European elections and in previous statements in both Houses. The European Parliament has given strong support and will be shortly publishing its own comments on the Commission memorandum. The Council of Europe has also called on member states to pursue the aim of more competition. The United Kingdom has a well-developed and innovative air transport industry, which has for many years been in the lead in pressing for new services and fares in Europe. Although the price of air fares is lower in the United States than in Europe, the air fares element of package holidays, pioneered by United Kingdom airlines, is probably the lowest cost air travel anywhere. We therefore need to achieve lower fares in Europe for straightforward travel, without losing the present advantages of low cost travel included in package arrangements.
The primary anti-competitive element is Governments' regulation followed by inter-airline commercial arrangements. It is not Her Majesty's Government which stands in the way of loosening up the market. For example, what can we do about the French blocking of British Caledonian's "Miniprix" and British Airways' £20 "channel hopper" fare to Paris? All we can do for the moment is to keep on trying to persuade them that there is a specialised but untapped market which would open up at such a price. This we are doing. We believe that the European Commission's initiative can be an important factor in this process and we are also attempting to influence European Governments in discussions in the European Civil Aviation Conference.
Her Majesty's Government have already implemented the Civil Aviation Authority's recommendation, referred to and supported in paragraph 40 of the sub-committee's report, and have presented formal proposals to liberalise charter rules to the European Civil Aviaton Conference. They will shortly be considered by the new high-level policy group which ECAC has set up, as a result of pressure by the United Kingdom, to parallel developments in the European Community. In due time we shall also consider raising the matter in the European Community.
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The United Kingdom has already taken the lead by suggesting an urgent review of the regulations governing intra-Community regional services and the Commission's proposals in this area are expected in September. We believe that the vast majority of restrictions on such services can and should be swept away in order to lead to new and innovative ideas from the airlines for the profitable development of such services. We have also taken the initiative for a study to make freely possible the express carriage by air of small packages. But, of course, the most important factor is the level of fares and again it is the United Kingdom which sought a council agreement for this to be the next item for urgent study. I am very glad that, at the end of last month, the council agreed, and invited the Commission to examine the question in consultation with states' experts and to report the results of its examination to the council as soon as possible. We shall do all that we can to see that the examination is not a long-drawn-out duplication of ground already covered and that it leads to firm proposals,
The Government will be seeking agreement that the airlines should be allowed the opportunity to develop innovative fares of all types. As the sub-committee notes in paragraphs 50 to 54 of its report, the commission memorandum suggests some ideas on fares. Her Majesty's Government fully support the committee's conclusion in paragraph 57. In a move towards more commercial freedom in air transport the Government are certainly not willing to exchange control by national administrations for control by the Commission which, apart from anything else, has little background or skills in these complicated matters. The Government entirely agree with the sub-committee when it says in paragraph 72 of its report that the Community should not seek to prescribe in detail what airlines should do.
In all these matters we have so far met, with one or two notable exceptions, with a very unresponsive reaction from the other member states. But the Government hope that by the time these matters again come to the Council of Ministers later this year, or early next, we shall have persuaded our colleagues in the Community to go along with sensible measures of liberalisa-

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tion. We are not seeking overnight revolution in European air transport, but we do need to move towards our objective with an opportunity to monitor progress—and, if need be, to modify our approach as we begin to see the results. This would be good for both European airlines and the travelling public. It is this Government's contention that increased competition—fair competition—will lead to a more vigorous airline sector and to more opportunities for the travelling public. We shall be prepared to take vigorous bilateral action with European Governments in an effort to secure new routes or fares approved by the Civil Aviation Authority.
May I turn now to a few of the specific points which have been raised this afternoon. The noble Baroness, Lady Burton of Coventry, asked me a number of questions, and three in particular I shall endeavour to deal with. First, she asked me about security charges. The noble Baroness, my noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter and I have exchanged views, shall I say, on that matter on several occasions in your Lordships' House, but the Government's view remains that these security activities must be arranged to pay for themselves. That is why the charges had to be raised as they were. The noble Baroness raised this matter with my honourable friend Mr. Tebbit when he gave evidence before the sub-committee, and on that occasion the Government's position was put quite clearly by my honourable friend.
A similar philosophy applies to the question of landing fees, a question which has been raised by several noble Lords. It is indeed the case that the British Airports Authority are required to earn an adequate return—currently 6 per cent.—upon their assets, and that they are doing. As for the differential in landing fees between Heathrow and Gatwick, to which the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, referred, that is part of the policy to persuade airlines to move their services, or at least not to initiate new services from Heathrow. But the general level of fares remains the responsibility of the British Airports Authority.
The noble Baroness also referred to the question of air traffic control, and I think that the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, also
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referred to it. The difficulties in other countries are a matter for those other Governments, but the difference between the situation in Europe and the situation in the United States is very sharp. There are, for example, many more military areas in Europe which have to be avoided by civil aircraft. One of the matters which is particularly applicable in a small, densely-populated country like ours is that of noise routeings which cause aircraft to fly round built-up areas rather than across them, for very proper and understandable reasons. Having said that, we are not inflexible in these matters and we as a Government remain ready to talk with other Governments with a view to improving the situation to which several noble Lords have referred.
The noble Baroness, and indeed my noble friend Lord Bessborough, also referred to the desirability of having more information on fares freely available at travel agents and other places where tickets are sold. This is primarily a matter for the airlines and agents, but I can say that the Civil Aviation Authority are currently introducing a new fare filing system with the aim of making much clearer what fares are available, and under what circumstances. I hope that in future these new arrangements will help to overcome the problems, which I understand and acknowledge, to which the noble Baroness has alluded.
My noble friend Lord Bessborough also referred to the question of competition. Indeed, it is often asked why, since the Treaty of Rome provides for competition in the supply of goods and services, it is not applied to civil aviation so as to allow for free competition between the Community airlines. The Treaty is a complicated document, and as there have been no cases concerning civil aviation before the European Court, nobody can be absolutely certain of the effect the Treaty has in this area. The competition articles distinguish between their application to "undertakings" and to Governments. Because of Governments' involvement in civil aviation, in the ownership of airlines, the granting of access to routes and the approval of fares, nobody can be certain as to the question of application of the Community competition policy.
Because of the international character of civil aviation, we have to bear in mind

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also the question of Community external competence. When the Community adopts internal rules on a given topic, provided that such competence is necessary for the attainment of Community objectives, external competence also passes to the Community. Because of our wider international interests, we do not see that it is either practical or desirable for the Community collectively to have any role in bilateral air service negotiations with third countries. Nor do we necessarily want an expanded Community role in multilateral bodies which might create a reaction towards "regionalism" in other parts of the world. The application of the competition articles has therefore to be considered with some caution, and other member states share this view.
The Government would therefore prefer to take innovative, well-managed and agreed steps under Article 84.2 of the Treaty. It is under this heading that we have made our proposals on intra-Community regional services, high speed cargo services and air fares. We agree with the sub-committee's conclusion in paragraph 73. Progress by agreement under Article 84.2 of the treaty is the aim of Her Majesty's Government. But there must be practical progress in a reasonable time. We shall continue to seek to persuade other member states of the need for action in response to public opinion and for the benefit of the European airlines industry.
But if sufficient progress is not made then, of course, it will be necessary to consider what other steps might have to be taken in order to make reasonable progress. The Government are committed to a more liberal regulatory régime in European civil aviation, to allowing airlines opportunities for innovative ideas in a more commercially oriented market and for a better deal for air travellers. We welcome the Commission's initiative as a good start while noting that we do not necessarily agree with everything in its Memorandum and the Government also welcome the support to their efforts which the sub-committee's report will provide. The sub-committee under the chairmanship of my noble friend has done the House a considerable service in preparing and presenting this report. I hope that my remarks today have shown clearly that the Government largely if not wholly agree with the sub-
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committee's conclusions. Only good can flow from the clear expression of views in today's debate.
5.41 p.m.
Lord BOYD-CARPENTER: My Lords, one of the advantages which this House has in dealing with civil aviation matters is that the reply comes from a Minister who not only speaks, as he pointed out, on behalf of his department but also with very great practical experience of civil aviation in which, before his promotion to his present post, he played a very prominent part. Indeed, those of us who have just listened to his speech realise that it was a great deal more than just the kind of speech to which my noble friend Lord Bessborough referred in a quotation from a work which of course I am inhibited from referring to!
My noble friend Lord Trefgarne made a very important speech. Like many Members of the House, I shall want to read it in Hansard in order fully to assess its significance, but it seemed to me to convey a very clear impression of Government policy and, from my point of view, very satisfactory Government policy. The House will have noted that he said bluntly that the Government view was that the air traveller was entitled to a better deal and that the Government were not satisfied with the present system. Those were very strong words from the Box and I welcome them very much, as indeed I welcomed the whole of my noble friend's speech.
I will only comment on one further aspect of it. He referred, rightly, to the success of the package charter development by British civil aviation and I referred to it too because it is perhaps an example and an encouragement to those of us who want to liberalise the scheduled services. As the noble Lord knows—although I am not certain whether the House as a whole knows—some years ago the Civil Aviation Authority had to consider imposing prices and fare control on charter flights and decided quite firmly not to do so. I have always believed that the subsequent growth and development of the charter side of the airline industry has owed a good deal to what at the time was regarded as a rather difficult and awkward decision. I am greatly indebted to all those who have taken part

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in the debate. The noble Earl, Lord Amherst, I think, was the only one of them who was not a member of the sub-committee, apart from my noble friend the Minister, and I think he must have felt almost that he was in a closed-shop situation. Perhaps he will allow me in his absence, which privately as well as to the House he has explained as being due to an important engagement outside, to say that he made a most helpful speech with which I think the House found itself in general agreement.
I am most grateful to all my noble friends on the committee who spoke, not only for their speeches but still more for the help they gave during long months of work in the handling of a great deal of evidence. I must apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, for having translated him from the London to the English Tourist Board. I suppose in my case that was a Freudian slip. I sat as a London Member of Parliament for 27 years and we were always accused of mixing up London with the whole of England. It may be that caused me to misapprehend for a moment the important function which the noble Lord, if he will allow me to say so, so well discharged. I am very grateful to him for his help on the Committee and for the fact that, as he told us, he took the chair at an epic meeting when Sir Freddie Laker was a witness. He did not tell the House, no doubt because it was too bitter a disappointment, certainly to Sir Freddie, that the arrangements made by the BBC to broadcast those proceedings failed, for the very simple reason that the recorder did not record. I am greatly indebted to all the noble Lords who have spoken, not least for their excessively kind personal references to myself and, as I have already indicated, to the noble Earl, Lord Bessborough, for what I can only describe as a "commercial break".
Finally, I should like to pick up what was said by the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, when he said so well that with British airlines we are very well placed; I think his phrase was that we were "well out in front." That is true. As noble Lords know, the United Kingdom is the second largest civil aviation power in the free world. We have the advantage of airlines both in the public and in the private sector which are full of enterprise and energy
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and which are pioneers in the promotion of cheap fares, concessionary fares and all those interesting developments.
Indeed, it is this which causes us perhaps a little embarrassment vis-à-vis our European friends, because it is so obviously in the interests of the United Kingdom civil aviation that matters should be liberalised, that it perhaps makes the representations that we make a little less acceptable and a little more suspect when we talk to our European friends. They are inclined to say, "What you say is true, but if it is accepted will it not benefit you more than us?" The inherent difficulty is that the strong are always in a better position in a deregulated and liberalised situation than the weak. Therefore, we only have to fall back on fundamental economic reasoning that it really is in the long run doing no good to anybody to inhibit the free operation of efficient airlines in order to maintain in business airlines which, on a commercial basis, have very little justification at all for their existence. Given the whole ethos of the Community as it is today, the emphasis which, excepting of course the subject of agriculture, is on competition and freehold throughout the rest of the Community strengthens the hands of Her Majesty's Government, despite what I said a moment ago, in pressing steadily, as they have indicated they will, for greater freedom. Happily, this is not one of those Motions in which the noble Lord who has proposed it has at the end to go through the slightly degrading process of asking to withdraw it. The Motion asks the House to take note of our report and I hope it will.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMPULSORY ACQUISITION BY PUBLIC AUTHORITIES (COMPENSATION) (REVOCATION) ORDER 1980
5.49 p.m.
Lord MOW BRAY and STOURTON Lord MOW BRAY and STOURTON rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 9th July be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move that the Compulsory Acquisition by Public Authorities (Compensation) (Revocation) Order 1980 be approved. This revocation order is simply a minor

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consequence of the Government's decision to repeal the Community Land Act. Under the Community Land Scheme, local authorities and certain other public bodies acquired land at a price net of the vendor's liability to Development Land Tax. This was part of arrangements designed to lead eventually to authorities acquiring all land for relevant development at a price net of all development gain—in effect a 100 per cent. local tax on such gain.
The ending of the Community Land Scheme removes the rationale for these arrangements, and they will cease to have effect after 5th August this year. Development land tax will become an ordinary tax on development gains collected wholly by the Exchequer. The main legislative provisions which established these arrangements were in the Development Land Tax Act which, along with the Community Land Act itself, provided the legislative framework for the Community Land Scheme. The relevant provisions of the Development Land Tax Act are being repealed, with effect from 6th August, in the current Finance Bill.
The Development Land Tax Act, however, only covered cases where public authorities were acquiring land from private vendors and other bodies who were liable to the tax. Special arrangements had to be made for transactions between tax-exempt bodies, so that any net-of-tax advantage was passed on to the final acquiring authority. This was done by means of an order under Section 26 of the Community Land Act, which changed the normal rules for assessing compensation in such cases. This revocation order will simply restore the compensation rules to those which operated before the Community Land Scheme was introduced. The original 1976 order would fall in any event when the Community Land Act is repealed. But it is necessary to revoke it now to synchronise with the Finance Bill. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 9th July, be approved.—(Lord Mowbray and Stourton.)
Lord PONSONBY of SHULBREDE: My Lords, may I thank the noble Lord for explaining the order. I am sure your Lordships will realise the necessity for the order in view of the repeal of the Com-
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munity Land Act. This is not something with which we agree, but I am sure the House will give approval to the order.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

MOTOR VEHICLES (INTERNATIONAL CIRCULATION) (AMENDMENT) ORDER 1980
5.53 p.m.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 26th June be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move that the House should resolve that this order be made under the Motor Vehicles (International Circulation) Act 1952. This Act enables Her Majesty to make Orders in Council, subject to the approval by each House, to give effect to any international agreement concerned with the movement of motor vehicles or their drivers to which the United Kingdom is a party. The main purpose of this draft order is to amend the order of 1975 to enable the United Kingdom to ratify—with certain reservations on some of the provisions to safeguard our particular needs and customs —the Convention on Road Traffic and the Convention on Road Signals drawn up under the aegis of the United Nations and signed by countries, including the United Kingdom, in Vienna in 1968, and the supplementary European agreements made in Geneva in 1971.
Broadly speaking, the conventions and their supplementary agreements may be said to serve as an "International Highway Code". States ratifying the conventions agree to have a common set of traffic rules, and to permit the free passage through their territories of drivers who hold suitable driving licences, and of their vehicles, provided they meet specific technical and other requirements. The two previous conventions of 1926 and 1949, to which we subscribe, have broadly similar aims without being nearly so comprehensive. The European agreements are intended to achieve even greater uniformity in the rules governing road traffic, signs and signals in Europe. The United Kingdom already conforms with most of the provisions of the 1968 conventions, and the making of this

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order before you now, together with a complementary order for Northern Ireland, which I understand is to be laid shortly, will enable us to ratify them. The harmonisation in Europe (and elsewhere) of traffic rules, signs and signals must have a beneficial effect on road safety. Moreover, as a full party to the conventions, we shall be better able to promote concerted action on further improving road safety internationally. This, then, brings me to the amendments which it is proposed to make.
While there are many countries which recognise the British domestic licence for visiting drivers, some do not, and, in these cases, an international driving permit in the form provided for in an international convention recognised by that country is necessary. The provisions in the 1968 Convention on Road Traffic, relating to the issue of international driving permits for drivers visiting countries adhering to that convention, require us to issue a new form of permit and to restrict its issue to motorists who hold a valid United Kingdom full licence; and to recognise the new form of permit held by visiting drivers from those countries.
The amending order therefore provides for the issue of a permit under the 1968 convention, but will continue to provide for issue of international driving permits under the 1926 and 1949 conventions for use in those countries not parties to the new convention. The 1975 order allows special tests of competence to drive for applicants for international driving permits who have not passed the driving test required by the Road Traffic Acts. These special tests, the conduct of which has been delegated to the motoring organisations—the AA, the RAC, and the Royal Scottish Automobile Club—are not recognised in the new convention, and it is proposed, for consistency, to discontinue the power to carry them out as a qualification for an international driving permit issued under the 1926 and 1949 conventions. In practice, these tests are rarely given.
It is necessary also to clarify the minimum age requirements for visiting drivers. As a party to the 1926 and 1949 conventions, we are obliged to accept a minimum age of 18 instead of 21 for drivers of large
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passenger and heavy goods vehicles brought temporarily into this country from countries which are parties to these conventions. By ratifying the 1968 convention, we will no longer have to accept these drivers where their country is also a party to the 1968 convention. Moreover, Community regulations and the European Agreement concerning the Work of Crews of Vehicles Engaged in International Road Transport—commonly called AETR—to which the United Kingdom is a party, further curtails our 1926 and 1949 convention obligations, where they apply to Community and AETR countries, by requiring a minimum age of 21 for large passenger vehicles, and young heavy lorry drivers to hold an internationally recognised certificate of profesisonal competence issued by their country of origin. The provisions as reflected in these amendments to the order mean that the great majority of visiting drivers to Great Britain will not now be able to drive over here in circumstances which require us to relax our licensing laws. It is proposed also to take the opportunity to make the forgery or misuse of a United Kingdom international driving permit or the obtaining of it by fraud an offence, as it is in the case of a domestic driving licence.
The final amendment proposed relates to the fees charged for the issue of international driving permits; and also for the international certificate for motor vehicles, which is usually required only when the normal registration document is, for some reason, not available. The powers to charge fees for these documents derive from paragraph (6) of Article I of the 1975 order. The function of issuing these documents has, for many years, been delegated to the motoring organisations. This is, of course, a convenience, since many motorists travelling abroad already utilise the services of one or other of these organisations in arranging their travel. I would stress, however, that it is not necessary to be a member of any of these organisations in order to obtain one of these documents from them. The present fee for either document is £1·50. It was fixed at that level in 1975. Since then, of course, costs have unfortunately risen, and a new fee of £2 is proposed to become effective as soon as administrative convenience permits. I am satisfied that this modest increase is no

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more than is necessary to cover increased administration costs.
If I may sum up, the main function of the order before your Lordships is to enable us to ratify the 1968 Conventions on Road Traffic, and on Road Signs and Signals. Ratification will be to the general benefit of those who wish to travel internationally with their vehicles. It also provides for a modest increase in the fee payable for two documents which are sometimes needed for international motoring for strengthening the law relating to these documents; and makes some tidying up amendments to take account of changes in the driver licensing law since the last order was made. Once the order—and the separate order I mentioned for Northern Ireland—have been approved, the instrument of ratification of the conventions and agreements will be deposited with the Secretary General of the United Nations. They will actually enter into force for the United Kingdom 12 months after that date, and the relative provisions of the order will then be operational. My Lords, I recommend the order to the House.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 26th June be approved.—(Lord Mowbray and Stourton.)
6 p.m.
Viscount SIMON: My Lords, I just want to ask two questions of the noble Lord, although I believe he may have answered one of them already in his Statement, which I shall read with care. The first question I want to ask relates to paragraph 1(b) of Article 3, which refers to the issue of licenses to persons for the driving of motor cycles or invalid carriages. It ends with the words, "or both." Apart from those words, it reproduces in different words what appears in the present order of 1975. But the 1975 order suggests, as I should have thought was right, that a certificate of competence to drive an invalid carriage is an alternative to a certificate of competence to drive a motor cycle. I should not have thought one could imagine a case where somebody who needed a certificate to drive an invalid carriage could properly have a certificate to drive a motor cycle.
I apologise to the noble Lord for not having given him notice of this, but I wonder whether he could say how the
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words "or both" were brought in. In fact, I would go a little further and suggest that the words "or both" are in any case quite unnecessary, because the clause says that a permit shall not be issued to any persons under 18 years of age unless the permit is restricted to the driving of motor cycles or invalid carriages. So I should have thought that, if there was a person who was going to drive both, that would already be covered. My second question relates to Article 4. According to the explanatory note, this in fact removes from the Minister and his agents the function of carrying out tests of competency. Perhaps it is in relation to that that the noble Lord was speaking of tests being carried out by the motoring organisations, and it may well be that when I read what he said, that answers my question.
6.3 p.m.
Lord UNDERHILL: My Lords, first of all, I should like to thank the noble Lord the Minister for outlining so clearly the provisions of the order. In general, we welcome this order, as it is a preparatory step for the United Kingdom ratifying yet another convention to which it is a party.
I should like to ask the Minister two or three questions. Is it the position that the three alternative permits—A, B and C—will cover the majority of countries? No doubt there are countries which are not party to any one of the conventions of 1926, 1949 or 1968. If that is so, what is the position of persons from those countries who may seek to drive a vehicle while visiting the United Kingdom?
One of my other questions relates to the question that has just been asked in regard to the test of competence. Am I to assume that the deletion of the reference to the test of competence in Article 4 of the order now brings us to the position that anyone with only a provisional licence will not be issued with a permit unless he or she has passed the normal official driving test and is awaiting a full driving licence?
My other question relates to the proposed reduction of age for drivers from 21 to 18. Incidentally, that point is not mentioned at all in the explanatory note on page 9 at the end of the order. When your Lordships were discussing the Transport Bill reference was made to the

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position of drivers of public service vehicles. Such drivers will be permitted to drive public service vehicles at age 18 only if the route is 50 kilometres or less. This is in accordance with the EEC regulation, and reference is made to the same regulation in the order.
Therefore, is it not the position that we have a situation where, under this order, a visiting driver could drive a heavy goods vehicle at age 18, whereas he could not drive a public service vehicle at age 18 unless the route was below 50 kilometres? That would appear to me to be an anomaly. Also, am I correct—the noble Lord will put me right if I am not—in thinking that the law in this country is still that a person cannot drive a heavy goods vehicle unless he is 21? I may have slipped up, but I looked hastily at the Road Traffic (Drivers' Ages and Hours of Work) Act 1976 before I came into the Chamber and I was under the impression that the age is still 21 for a driver of a heavy goods vehicle. If that is so, then there is another anomaly, in that a visiting driver could at the age of 18 drive a heavy goods vehicle whereas a home-based driver could not. I should be pleased if the noble Lord could answer those three questions.
6.6 p.m.
Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTON: My Lords, these traffic orders are extremely simple in themselves but they refer to three different conventions and two supplementary agreements, and when one goes into the whole they become totally complicated and involved. I should like to read what the noble Viscount, Lord Simon, said because I did not hear it completely. I will undertake to write to him on his points. I think that, rather than dart about, I might help both noble Lords—and I thank both of them for their welcome for this order—with reference to documents going abroad by reading quickly the background note about Article 3, which amends Article 1 of the 1975 order. This is to enable the Minister to issue for use outside the United Kingdom an international driving permit, in the form set out, to a person who holds a full driving licence issued in Great Britain or Northern Ireland or who is entitled to hold one or to obtain one where he surrendered his licence for change of
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address reasons or has passed a driving test but has not yet applied for the licence. These criteria are applied for consistency to the issue of international driving permits in the form set out.
On the question of qualification for issue of international driving permits, this article was abolishing the special driving test given by the motoring organisations, under delegation, as evidence, in the absence of a driving licence or other acceptable evidence, of competence to drive, because the 1968 convention does not recognise any alternative to a full domestic licence. To be consistent, therefore, power to carry out tests as a qualification for a 1926 or 1949 convention permit is discontinued. But, in fact, these were so rarely given, as I said, that the motoring organisations welcomed their abolition. I must apologise to your Lordships. I am reading these background notes because some of the questions are quite complicated, and it so happens that the Government's advisers have been held up going round the Palace, no doubt finding their way in.
Dealing with the matter of visiting driving permits, which I was asked about, I can say that this forbids visitors to Great Britain to drive or be employed in driving under the age at which a United Kingdom resident would be permitted to drive a similar class of vehicle. Exceptions to this rule are made for the driving of heavy goods and large passenger vehicles in circumstances where the United Kingdom's international obligations require different minimum age rules to be applied. Section 96 of the Road Traffic Act 1972, which was amended by the Road Traffic (Drivers' Ages and Hours of Work) Act 1976 in order to give effect to the minimum age rules contained in EEC Regulation 543/69, expresses minimum age rules for Great Britain for holding or obtaining a British driving licence.
The most important of the relevant age limits are 17 for the drivers of motor cycles, motor cars up to nine seats and good vehicles up to 3·5 tonnes; 18 for the drivers of good vehicles between 3·5 and 7·5 tonnes; 21 for the drivers of goods vehicles over 7·5 tonnes and passenger vehicles having more than nine seats. Article 5(1)(b) of the Community Regulation 543/69, to which I have referred,

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permits goods vehicles over 7·5 tonnes to be driven by 18-year-olds, provided—and I stress, provided—they hold a certificate of professional competence issued by the authorities in their member state.
Section 96 of our Road Traffic Act 1972 allows this option to be exercised in Great Britain by registering under the young heavy goods driver training scheme and obtaining a young heavy goods vehicle driver's licence. Under the Community regulation, to which I have referred, no exception can be made to the 21 years minimum age limit for drivers of large passenger vehicles on international journeys.
We have an international obligation to recognise the heavy goods vehicle driving licences of 18- to 21-year-olds, driving temporarily imported vehicles, who do hold these certificates of competence, granted in other countries. The number of cases arising out of the 1926 and 1949 Geneva Conventions will get steadily less as more countries join the Vienna Convention. Many countries have not yet signed. We have been 12 years in getting round to doing so. Some countries have signed, but others will take longer than we have taken.
I am quite certain that there are other points which I have not answered in the questions raised by the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, and the noble Viscount, Lord Simon. However, if they will forgive me I shall undertake to look very carefully at what they have said and write very fully to them. If any other noble Lord indicates that he would like to have the information, I shall see that he gets a copy of the letters.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

CARRIAGE OF PASSENGERS AND THEIR LUGGAGE BY SEA (INTERIM PROVISIONS) ORDER 1980
6.12 p.m.
Lord LYELL Lord LYELL rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 14th July be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move that the Carriage of Passengers and their Luggage by Sea (Interim
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Provisions) Order 1980, a copy of which was laid before your Lordships' House on 14th July this year be approved.
Last year's Merchant Shipping Act included various provisions to give effect to the 1974 Athens Convention relating to the carriage of passengers and their luggage by sea. This convention, which is set out in full in Part I of Schedule 3 to the Act, sets out the circumstances in which a carrier is liable for death of, or injury to a passenger, or for the loss of, or damage to his luggage, and it also specifies the monetary limits which will normally apply in the various circumstances. In the case of death or personal injury this sum will be over £27,000. The United Kindgom ratified the convention in January of this year, but we are only the fourth country to do so and 10 ratifications are needed before the convention comes into force. It will, therefore, not be possible to give full and immediate international effect to this convention. However, in the interim period before full international recognition, the House will appreciate that the Government are anxious to apply as much of the convention as is possible in the United Kingdom and have therefore decided to introduce the interim régime which was envisaged in Section 16 of the 1979 Merchant Shipping Act. That, in in general terms is the objective and reason for this order.
This order, made under Section 16 of the Merchant Shipping Act 1979, therefore gives effect to such provisions of the convention as can appropriately be implemented in the United Kingdom without delay. It applies the convention (with necessary modifications) to international carriage if the contract is made in the United Kingdom or if, under the contract, the United Kingdom is the place of departure of the passenger or the destination to which the passenger is going. Domestic carriage to or from ports in the United Kingdom and the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man is also to be included. In all cases the carriage in question is that covered by contracts for reward only, as specified in the Act.
The proposed interim régime will replace that which is currently in force under Section 28 of the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977. This temporary régime

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was necessary so as to provide quickly a safeguard for the interests of passengers, and the Unfair Contract Terms Act provided a convenient opportunity to take initial action. However, the new régime offers important advantages over the present situation, and I hope that the House will bear with me while I briefly outline these advantages. The first, and major advantage is that the current régime only applies to aspects of the Athens Convention which are the subject matter of contracts made between the carrier and the passenger. It does not deal with matters such as the liability of the person who contracts for carriage but does not himself actually perform the carriage. The new régime will deal with this situation. For example, it would cover the position where a contract is made through a tour operator or indeed an agent. Similarly, servants and agents of the carrier will be brought within the ambit of the new régime whereas at present they are not covered.
The second advantage is that, there will be wider geographical coverage under the new régime since, as I have already mentioned, it will cover domestic as well as international carriage. The third advantage is that the order will enable effect to be given during the interim régime to certain other provisions of a clarificatory and supplementary nature, as contained in Part II to Schedule 3 to the 1979 Act. One of these supplementary provisions is particularly worthy of mention in this context. This is the provision in paragraph 11 of Part II enabling the Secretary of State for Trade to make an order requiring notice to be given to passengers of the main provisions of the convention so that they may make whatever arrangements for personal insurance they wish. It is the intention of the Secretary of State to make such an order to take effect simultaneously with the order before us today. In most cases, in future passengers will have their attention drawn to the application of the convention on the ticket they receive before departure, as is now the case for air tickets where the relevant international convention is the Warsaw Convention.
The actual limits of liability which are expressed in the convention in terms of what are known as gold francs will be converted into sterling equivalents by
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means of periodic orders by the Secretary of State, as is already done for the Unfair Contract Terms Act and certain other Acts where a similar situation applies. In due course the gold franc limits will be replaced by limits expressed in terms of the IMF special drawing right, but the relevant international instrument for this is not yet in force.
The order that I have set before your Lordships' House is fairly detailed, but I think that it is uncontroversial. As I have said, it is a second interim step to implement various provisions of the Athens Convention into United Kingdom law. We believe that it will enable us to meet more and more of our international commitments and, in addition, it will have useful advantages to passengers travelling away from the United Kingdom, to the United Kingdom and indeed within the United Kingdom. For that reason and for the others which I have enunciated, I commend the order to your Lordships' House. I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 14th July, be approved. —(Lord Lyell.)
Lord UNDERHILL: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, for his explanation and particularly for outlining the advantages of the order. No one reading the order would have any idea of the advantages and therefore his explanation has been most helpful.
I understand that the organisations representing the interested parties—that is the shipowners, the insurers and the consumers—were consulted fully prior to the introduction of the Merchant Shipping Act 1979 which as the noble Lord has said, covers the terms of the 1974 convention which paves the way for this interim order.
I should be obliged if the noble Lord could confirm that the same organisations have been fully consulted about this order and whether they generally approve of its contents. I also understand that the General Council of British Shipping has intimated that some of its member companies have expressed a view that a longer period would have been preferred before the order came into force for the reprinting and distribution of tickets. I do not know whether or not the noble Lord is aware of that; and, if so, whether he has any idea that there is still a problem on that matter.

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Thirdly, is the position that the liability of a carrier will be limited to the amounts specified in the convention, or is there to be some provision for inflation and rising costs?—particularly, of course, since the convention was agreed; never mind what may happen in the future. Lastly, I am concerned to note that although only 10 contracting states are required to enable the 1974 convention to come into force internationally, so far only four states have ratified the convention. Can the Minister give some indication as to why that is so and whether it is possible for any steps to be taken to increase the number from four to 10?—because a considerable number of states must have been represented at the Athens Convention and presumably approved its terms. With those questions, generally we approve the order and welcome it.
6.22 p.m.
Lord LYELL: My Lords, we are very grateful for the kind reception we have had from the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, to the order presented by me to your Lordships' House. The noble Lord was good enough to give me notice of all his questions and to one of them I have managed swiftly to find an answer. Perhaps he and the House would bear with me if I try to go through them in order. Indeed, the organisations which are likely to be concerned by the order today were very widely consulted, and have been consulted for a period of over two years. I understand that various consultations took place early last year, that Questions had been asked in your Lordships' House and that Answers had been given under the previous Administration. I believe that these went some way towards alleviating fears of the organisations, not just of the General Council of British Shipping. We understand that the organisations which would be, and indeed are, concerned with this order are now very broadly satisfied and happy with the provisions of the order.
The second problem which the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, raised, was that of printing tickets and using up old stocks of tickets which might not draw the attention of passengers to the provisions which we propose to bring into force under the order. I understand that concern was expressed, especially by one or two large companies, but the information that we
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have is that these individual concerns are now content and are happy with the provisions that we have set out.
The third question which the noble Lord raised was one relating to the limits to the liability that are expressed in the order. It is indeed true that the financial limits would need to be reviewed from time to time to take account of inflation, not necessarily of any individual member who might have signed the convention, but indeed of worldwide inflation. At the Athens Convention the United Kingdom proposed to provide for a simple revision procedure to allow for the effects of inflation, but this failed to receive the required level of support. But the standard revision and the amendment procedures of the Athens Convention will allow for the limits to be reviewed in due course in the normal way in the reviewing process of the Athens Convention. Therefore, the noble Lord's query about inflation being taken into account is covered. The Government have looked at this and, indeed, we are continuing to make representations.
I do not necessarily think that I need to spell out the fascinations of the gold francs. The noble Lord will be able to discover that for death or personal injury the maximum is over £27,000 per passenger, and there are other limits which are expressed in a sterling term; indeed, there are orders for that, and I have the respective tables with me.
The last point about which the noble Lord was concerned was the number of nations which took part in the Athens Convention. I am given to understand that 32 national delegations took part in the discussions at the Athens Convention; that, as the noble Lord has pointed out, at present four nations have ratified the convention. These are Tonga, the Yemen, the German Democratic Republic, and indeed the United Kingdom. I understand that various other member states which took part in the convention are planning to ratify the convention, but they have their own individual problems as far as their particular carriers by sea are concerned. We are not able to hold out any great hopes of a substantial number of nations ratifying the convention so that the convention can come into force. It means 10 nations out of the 32 must

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ratify it, and we do not hold out much hope of that.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

HIGHWAYS (ROAD HUMPS) BILL
6.27 p.m.
The Earl of K1NNOULL: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. This somewhat quaintly titled Bill, which comes from another place, is in essence primarily concerned with road safety. It is, of course, a subject that the House takes very seriously and I am delighted to see that a number of other noble Lords have indicated that they will be taking part in the Second Reading debate. I very much hope that they are in support of the Bill.
The Bill follows a provisional power granted by Parliament in 1974 under Section 17 of the Road Traffic Act, which allowed the Minister of Transport to install humps on public highways—on an experimental, temporary basis—up to a period of one year to test whether this means of speed control was an effective means of reducing road accidents. The House will know that immediately after that Act the Ministry set up nine experimental sites—eight in England and one in Scotland—in collaboration with the area traffic authorities. The results of the first five sites were evaluated by the Transport and Road Research Laboratory, and its findings were published in an excellent report last year. Copies of that report are in the Library.
The clear conclusion of those evaluation tests of the five experimental sites—two in London, one in Norwich, one in Oxford and one in Glasgow—showed that humps, properly designed and sited in residential areas, with proper road signs, are an effective way of increasing road safety. Vehicle speeds are reduced, more care is taken by drivers and, as a side issue, noise levels are reduced; and although accident changes are complex, the conclusions reached in that report stated that the road casualties in the immediate area fell by 61 per cent.
The experience of these five experimental sites has led the area road authori-
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ties, and indeed local residents in residential areas, to support permanent powers being granted as against, at the moment, only experimental powers to install these road humps at appropriate locations, and not have only temporary humps—after they have really proved their worth—withdrawn, as is laid down under Section 17 of the 1974 Act. This is a very small, important enabling Bill. It seeks to achieve that simple purpose.
Clause 1 would empower the highway authorities to construct, maintain or remove humps. I would add that this means that the humps would in future be treated as a highway. So if drivers ignore the warning signs, the very clear warning signs before these humps, and drive at speed over the humps and damage their cars, the authority would not be liable for misfeasance or obstruction or damage to the car. Also under Clause 1(2) the House will have noticed that the GLC's consent would be required before any London borough could construct a hump. I should explain that the GLC is the traffic authority in the area. Finally, under Clause 1 the House will have noticed the definition of "road hump". It means in the Bill either an artificial hump or a depression. In other words it could be a hump or an 'ump!
Clause 2 repeats the Minister's powers that at present exist under Section 17 of the 1974 Act. It repeats the provision for protection of the humps, including the responsibility for their maintenance by the highway authority. It differs from Section 17 by allowing the Minister to hand over the humps, as I have already said, on a long-term basis, particularly if they have proved successful in their experimental stage.
Clause 3 empowers the Minister to make regulations. This is obviously a most important clause in the Bill. This would specify the types of humps, the types of highway, the specification of the physical features of the humps, their design, and the warning signs. It is intended. I understand, that only designs of humps which have had a tested criterion or specification would be authorised. Clause 4 lays down the important duty of both the Minister and the highway authority to hold prior consultations before installing permanent humps or even experimental humps. They have to ad-

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vertise, rather like a planning application; they have to hold a public inquiry if objections are judged substantial enough. I hope that may allay any fears that humps will multiply by the thousands, unchecked, as a result of this Bill.
Clause 5 confirms that the regulations will have to be approved by Parliament and will come to Parliament as statutory instruments. Clause 6 confirms the Bill will cover England, Scotland and Wales but not include Northern Ireland. Clause 7 repeals Section 17 of the 1974 Act. In essence, those are the clauses of the Bill. I submit the Bill is a very valuable enabling Bill, a power to be used at the discretion of the highway authorities, designed to aid and combat the ever-increasing battle to make our highways safe. Experimental studies, as I have just described, have shown that road humps can go a long way to help cut down accidents on a limited scale. It may require a little more patience of drivers; it may require a little more diligence. But that is a small price, I submit, for the saving of injuries and even life. It is a price well paid and I commend the Bill. I beg to move.
6.34 p.m.
Lord LUCAS of CHILWORTH: My Lords, I would have preferred to call this Bill something of a nonsense Bill. It is a nonsense to bring forward a Bill of such importance in this particular manner and at this particular time. My noble friend Lord Kinnoull quite rightly describes this as another measure in the battle of safety on the roads, a matter in which your Lordships have always been interested. It is therefore grossly inappropriate that your Lordships should be asked to debate a Bill of this nature, that has Government support, when no more than the Private Members' view has been put before your Lordships; when no more than 57 minutes of debate have taken place in another place. That 57 minutes' debate took place in Standing Committee, and half the time was taken up with argument—perhaps I should correct myself to say discussion—about the position of the Greater London Authority. This is, as I say, something of a nonsense. It has been around since June of last year. There has been no debate on it on the Floor of the Chamber of the other place. It is, as I say, inappropriate that your Lordships should have this Bill at this time.
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My temptation, frankly, is to ask your Lordships to refuse this Bill a Second Reading. We are right at the end of a heavy session. Is this matter of road safety going to be something put before us at 11 or 12 o'clock at night or some insignificant Friday afternoon? If it is that important, it should have proper time and proper consideration. Because of the way in which it was introduced, we do not even have the opportunity of hearing the Government's view. It will be for my noble friend Lord Long to answer as many questions as he can at the end of the debate, under very, very difficult circumstances, not of his making or indeed of the Government's making, in that we find ourselves in this Chamber with the limited facilities.
My noble friend appeared to base the justification of this Bill upon those experiments that have taken place under the 1974 Act, those nine sites that were picked out for trials, of which five have been reported on in what he described as an excellent report, that of the TRRL. He says there were clear conclusions so far as the residential areas were concerned: increases in safety, speed reduced, and although the accident statistics were somewhat complex he claimed a rate of 61 per cent. improvement.
I am going to turn to the report in a few moments, and I regret that I shall have to ask your Lordships to bear with me for perhaps longer than is usual. The only excuse I can offer you is that the subject is important, and because we know so little about it. My noble friend said that the residents in the five areas, the subject of the report, supported the use of humps. We all support restrictions that preserve our particular patch and push the problem somewhere else. If you turn to the report you will see that the decrease in traffic in these areas was merely a matter of transference to somewhere else. So some other block of residents had the problem. I would put it to you that, if you look at the Bill, you find almost anybody can put up a hump or—not to be too facetious—dig a ditch. The Bill provides for it. So we find in one road all the residents are going to be happy. Traffic has moved across to another road. There, they are not going to be happy—"Why should the traffic come down my road?" We shall have humps. We shall

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all have humps. I have got a hump this evening on this Bill!
Again my noble friend spoke in some detail, on the various clauses. I want to pick one or two of the points that he made. Clause 1 makes the hump a part of the highway. It absolves the highway authority for any responsibility thereby as a result of accident or damage to a motor vehicle, whereas under the 1974 Act there may be some liability there. Jolly good: push it over to somebody else. But it is the duty of the highway authorities to provide a fair passage. One might ask at this juncture how, with road construction and maintenance costs being severely, savagely restricted we can put up a Bill that enables somebody to spend another lot of money which could, and might, cause a hazard.
Clause 3 provides for regulations specifying the humps, on which highways, what signs, and the test of criteria. These are exactly the kind of things that we should be hearing of now so that we may discuss them. What are they? Are we going to have a long debate on the regulations when they come out? Clause 4 provides for consultation, as my noble friend said. The consultations should have been carried out by now. This is—and I use his words —a major piece of legislation and one which another place has not even debated.
The Earl of KINNOULL: My Lords, may I interrupt my noble friend I think that he has misunderstood Clause 4 on consultations. If a highway authority or the Minister wished to impose a hump, consultations would then have to take place. Consultations, therefore, have not taken place so far. If, for instance, on the noble Lord's road outside his home a hump is to be placed down, there will be procedures as laid down in Clause 4 which could involve a public inquiry.
Lord LUCAS of CH1LWORTH: My Lords, I am sure that we are grateful to my noble friend for that explanation. My point was that the consultation should already have taken place with regard to these matters in principle. My understanding is that they have not taken place within the formality of this Bill. I may be wrong, but that is my understanding.
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May I turn to the report itself?—the TRRL Report 878. I am going to just pick out a few bits. I shall try to put them in their proper context so that I do not mislead your Lordships. In the introduction it describes the' five sites. On the one near Oxford it says:
"Before the installation it had a high record of accidents; particularly to young children."
On the second site in Norwich:
"Although having a low traffic flow, it was considered dangerous by local authorities as children used the road as a play area."
In Haringey:
"It is a link between two distributor roads and is used as a short cut."
In Kensington:
"…traffic uses it as a link…".
In Glasgow:
"…many children on the estate regularly cross it to get to the bus route on the A8…".
These five experiments included 3,167 metres of road. I do not know how many humps were in them. The pictures and the descriptions do not give any indication. These are all roads which, if it were the wish of the highway authority to reduce traffic because of the reasons given, there are means already open to them. It is nonsense then to suggest that as a result of these five experiments there is a good case for opening up the whole thing.
It is said that the cost of these varies widely. It ranges from £271 to £718 per hump. The average cost is £500 per hump. But how many humps per hundreds of metres? What is going to be the cost of making an effective deterrent? My guess is £3,000 to £4,000. I do not know. It is quite an expensive little piece of road construction when potholes are appearing in roads causing danger and damage and are ultimately going to cost a lot more to repair in some years' time.
In that final part of the report dealing with traffic flow, it is stated:
"The best estimate of the average percentage reduction in vehicle flow due to the installation of humps is 37 per cent.",
but it does not give anywhere the subsequent increase in the other roads. Incidentally, the average reduction in speed is around 12 miles per hour.
The tables include that on residents' comments. Residents who want something will invariably give the right answers

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to any kind of questionnaire put before them. Indeed, when I was at college we were taught how to write a question for this type of questionnaire that will provide you with the answer. "67 per cent. thought the position of the humps was satisfactory; 62 per cent. thought the signing was satisfactory; 80 per cent. thought the visibility of the humps was satisfactory; 84 per cent. thought the humps served a useful purpose; 82 per cent. were in favour of humps on their road."
Of course they were. But what alternatives were offered to them? What did they make that judgment against? Zero. I do not think that that is a conclusive kind of argument.
In one of the tables dealing with drivers the following appears:
"On the whole are you in favour of keeping the humps on this road? Yes, 55 per cent. No, 31 per cent."
Then 14 per cent. said that they did not know. It is not very conclusive. On the accident casualties, to which my noble friend referred, there is quite a lot. In essence, yes, he is right, there was a 61 per cent. reduction on those roads. But 61 per cent. of what? There are no figures. It does not say. But it does say that there was an increase in accidents on the fringe roads. So we just move it from one place to another place.
Where it deals with the question of pedestrians, it is stated:
"After the installation [of humps] 51 per cent. of pedestrians crossed on the humps".
Where are we going to build? If we want people to raise themselves above the level of the road, let us build bridges for them. What will happen to the other crossings, pelican crossings? Make a tunnel for them? Perhaps that is what the ditches are for—the depressions which are allowed for in the Bill.
I am not really being frivolous. These are the kind of questions that the other place should have asked and been given answers to. I am afraid that the report is not conclusive. The very last paragraph says:
"If a more widespread use of humps was envisaged similar care to that outlined above should be taken in the selection of the sites and the specification of the installations".
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We had better know a bit more about it. I think we want to know a good deal more about it before we go further with this Bill.
I shall listen carefully to what other noble Lords have to say. I must tell your Lordships that, when my noble friend puts the Question as to whether this Bill should be read a Second time, I shall make up my mind whether I shall agree with him or not. This is not the most urgent piece of legislation that is before your Lordships, demanding hurried deliberation, and long days or late nights —and there are a few left of those—but if it is the intention of those who manage the business of your Lordships' House to have the Committee stage perhaps in the overspill period in October, we shall be hard-pressed then. The Bill is probably a useful addition to safety, but it should be dealt with at another time when full and proper consideration can be given to all the points in it. I ask noble Lords to listen and not to make up their minds immediately as to whether the Bill, which, although it has Government support, is essentially a Private Members' Bill, should be given a Second Reading at this time.
6.51 p.m.
Earl HOWE: My Lords, I admit to a slight feeling of inferiority in speaking following my noble friend Lord Lucas of Chilworth in view of his technical ability. It may be because T am older that I have greater practical experience, and because I have just had the unfortunate experience of driving over a couple of humps in a very small Italian motorcar, and I felt rather like Evel Knevel must feel when he gets airborne. In a small machine with a short wheelbase it is not a pleasant experience going over humps. I have also had experience of humps at Brook-lands, and sometimes they can leave a painful memory.
There seems to be a feeling that humps will improve road safety, but I do not agree with that. They are a very expensive gimmick and I cannot imagine that motorists will be pleased at having to bounce over these obstacles for years to come. It should be remembered—my noble friend referred to this—that we are in a period when resources for road construction and maintenance are greatly restricted. Local highway authorities are handicapped by

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the small share they get of the block grant. Most of that grant goes to the main spending committee, which is invariably the education authority. I well remember my experience of that from the time when I was chairman of a county education authority; all the cash went to my committee and very little to highways, and I was torn between highways and education at the time.
It is Government policy to cut public expenditure, and therefore maintenance is a terrible problem for highway authorities. We cannot fill in all the potholes on our roads, let alone construct road humps or further depressions. In any event, there seems to be a terrible rush over the Bill, and my noble friend referred to that. Undoubtedly the Bill is being rushed through, and I cannot for the love of Mike think why. Starting at 10.30 one morning, there was a short debate on it in another place and that, so far as I can see, was all the discussion that took place there. A full investigation of all the implications is needed and we need far more information. That is certainly the case before I will support the Bill.
Has there been any discussion as to the class of street or road on which humps should be installed? How many will there be on a lengthy stretch of road, what distance apart will they be and at what speed can they be taken with safety? Motorists want the answers to those questions. The TRRL have said—this has been mentioned but I repeat it because it is quite extraordinary—that pedestrians are using these humps to cross the road. Can that be considered a safety measure? To me it is quite extraordinary. I can imagine some motorists accelerating hard between humps or coming to a sudden halt with a chain reaction behind them.
The siting of these "sleeping policemen" as they are sometimes called, should be on roads with speed limits of 30 mph or less or where there is good evidence of those speed limits being exceeded in residential areas, with a high accident rate. In time, motor cars' suspensions, springs and shock absorbers are bound to suffer and, as for the motor cycle, the leap would be really dangerous for both motor cyclists and pillion passenger, unless they land in a straight line. Although I have great admiration for motor cyclists, some are a little fierce in the way they handle their
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machines and they might take these humps at rather higher speeds than should be the case, with disastrous results.
The Earl of KINNOULL: My Lords, may I ask the noble Earl to be more specific? At what speed would it be dangerous for either a motorist or motor cyclist to go over them?
Earl HOWE: I do not have the technical ability to answer that, my Lords, and I should have thought it would depend on the individual motor cyclist and how he handles his machine. In any event, surely it is up to the Government to give us some idea of the speed that is expected to be permitted to cross these humps.
The Earl of KINNOULL: My Lords, if my noble friend has read the report, which I am sure he has, he will have noticed that it is quite safe to take them at 30 mph, as is indicated in the report.
Earl HOWE: My Lords, there are other matters that need looking into, such as the question of mopeds. All the points that I am endeavouring to rub in raise questions which are bound to be in the minds of motorists and motor cyclists, yet here we are having the Bill being pushed through on a Wednesday evening at a late hour with few noble Lords present to hear what is being said. I am sure many noble Lords feel, as motorists do, that they would like more information.
How do we know that the various contractors in the counties will construct the humps to the same specifications? It is bound to take time to educate the road user to the warning signs, and such signs can often be hidden by hedges overgrown because of the present highways maintenance problems. The RAC, the motorists' friend, is not happy with this Private Member's Bill, and I am sure the same view is taken by the other large motoring organisations. Frankly, I do not believe there has been any consultation between those organisations and the Minister of Transport concerning this proposed fresh experimental legislation, and that is a pity.
At a conference of road safety officers over which I presided earlier in the year Mr. Fowler was our guest of honour. I rather hoped he might have taken the opportunity of mentioning road humps

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in his excellent opening speech, but he did not do so. He did not even refer to seat belts, but that is another matter. Bearing in mind the huge revenue which motorists hand to the Chancellor annually, they are entitled to receive better treatment from Government in return. There is much in the Bill that needs to be properly ventilated. I hope the next stage, if we have one, will provide more information.
6.59 p.m.
Baroness MACLEOD of BORVE: My Lords, the hour is late, so I shall be brief in discussing this Private Member's Bill which comes to us from another place. It is significant that although there were 18 Members on the Committee, only 12 were present when this very important Bill was discussed in another place for only 53 minutes, as has been pointed out. I am deeply unhappy about the Bill, one reason being that, as a very long-term motorist who has tried to do as much as I can for safety, I read the Bill and discovered that the only place the word "safety" occurred was in Clause 3(2)(c). If the Bill is about safety, I suggest that the word "safety" should appear in it more often. Much is made of the question of speed, but noble Lords present who are motorists will know as well as I do that slow speed is as dangerous as fast speed when vehicles are in the hands of inexpert drivers, whether they are on two wheels, four, eight, 12 or 20; it can be dangerous.
I fail to see how the humps will prevent more people from having accidents. There is a requirement that a notice has to be put up. A notice is not necessary if one lives in the road where the humps are placed, but if, as my noble friend pointed out, one is a stranger to the road, and the notice is hidden by a lorry or an overgrown tree or hedge, what happens? The motorcyclist or car driver will go along the road at whatever speed is permitted and if he has not seen the sign, he will either fall into a ditch or go over the hump. Like my noble friends, I feel that if it were normal practice in this House to throw out a Bill on Second Reading, I should certainly try to do so on this occasion. We are not told in the Bill, for instance, how big the hump is likely to be. We are not told that it must be lit, that it must be painted, or that it must have posts positioned at both ends—all points that I consider to be vitally
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important if people are not to meet with accidents caused specifically by the humps.
Reading through the Bill, I feel that whoever drafted it was sitting in an office looking out on the kind of English weather that we all hope to see, though it has not been this year; in other words, a fine day, with the sun shining. But the English weather is not like that all the time. A hump can be enveloped in autumn leaves and therefore unseeable. It would certainly be unseeable in the dark, even with headlights on. It would be equally unseeable, and therefore very dangerous, if there is snow and ice on the roads. In my view, even if the speed limit were 30 miles an hour, it would be very dangerous indeed for motorcyclists to go along a road on which there was a hump covered by ice or snow. In my opinion as a longterm motorist, if the hump is covered by snow, there is no way in which anyone can see it. For even those reasons I feel that the Bill could be a danger. I appreciate that the ideas are good in theory, but I believe that in practice the Bill would add to the dangers on the road.
Like my noble friends, I consider that this Bill is far too important to be rushed through with practically no consultation in another place, and with only a few noble Lords here this evening. It would be a vitally important piece of traffic regulation and law. Until we can put down a great number of amendments—which perhaps we shall have to do at a later stage—I cannot wish the Bill a speedy passing, and I should certainly do my best to stop it.
Viscount SIMON: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, has kindly allowed me to intervene for a few moments, since I failed to catch the eye of the noble Earl before he sat down in order to ask him one simple question—and that is all that I now wish to do. When he replies to the debate, can he tell us whether the experiments that were carried out involved depressions, as well as humps?
7.5 p.m.
Lord RAGLAN: My Lords, I feel that I should rise to say that in general I support the Bill, since I have heard so much criticism of it from Back-Benchers on the other side of the Chamber. These

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humps—or "sleeping policemen", as the noble Earl, Lord Howe, calls them—are very common indeed on private estates. In particular one finds them all over the United States. Many a jealous landowner builds humps in order to protect his expensive tarmac surface from speeders. I should have thought that everyone is familiar with them; and I do not know what all this tremendous row is about.
I take the point of the noble Baroness, Lady Macleod of Borve, about the necessity for making the humps visible. They must be visible both at night and in snow; people must know that they are there. However, on the other hand, there is the fact that most of the streets where the humps would be constructed, one supposes, are used by locals, who very quickly would familiarise themselves with the positions of these obstructions. I should like to hear from the noble Viscount, Lord Long, when he winds up whether the siting of the humps would be undertaken with the same care as is now given to panda crossings, pedestrian crossings, and the like, which are subject to a long and very complicated procedure before construction goes ahead. I know that on the whole, the Ministry is quite loath to agree to more pedestrian crossings, and it is even more loath to approve extra panda crossings, since they are not only tricky, but also expensive. I note that the siting would be subject to ministry approval, and not merely to the approval of the local highway authority. Provided there is an assurance that the ministry will take very great care in the siting of the humps, I do not see what is the objection, at least to trying them out, with a view to reducing speed, in many more parts of the country than they have been tried in already, so that we can see how they work.
Lord LUCAS of CHILWORTH: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, can he tell us on what premise he bases his supposition that the locals will soon get used to the humps? The noble Lord supposes that the humps will be constructed in residential roads, yet there is nothing in the Bill to prevent anyone from supposing that a hump might be constructed on a motorway, let alone in a residential road.
Lord RAGLAN: My Lords, I fancy that the noble Lord is exaggerating somewhat. Panda crossings and pedestrian crossings, for instance, are not constructed on motorways. One must assume that the Minister and the public highway authority have more sense than to construct one of these "sleeping policemen" in the middle of a motorway.
7.10 p.m.
Lord UNDERHILL: My Lords, I want to give general support to the principle behind this Bill, but in giving it that welcome I want to make it clear that it is a cautious welcome, because there are a number of points which I wish to raise for clarification in the course of my remarks. I can see three reasons justifying the Bill. The first is to stop what the Minister, in the Standing Committee in another place, referred to as,
"short-cut-type rat-runs in suburban areas that are used as high-speed short cuts".
I am sure that all of us have had experience of the selfish drivers, the impatient ones, who cannot wait at traffic lights and who seek to go round quiet suburban roads in order to dodge the traffic lights. Then what happens? They then cut across the traffic and impede normal people who are driving on the main roads. Anything which stops that will, I am certain, be welcomed by residents and by those users of the main roads who are proceeding normally.
The second reason is to preserve some degree of quiet near hospitals, old people's homes and schools; to avoid the noise of fast-moving vehicles, and to provide some sense of safety for young people and elderly people.
Baroness MACLEOD of BORVE: My Lords, I wonder whether I may interrupt the noble Lord? In actual fact, if you have to change down at a hump you create more noise.
Lord UNDERHILL: My Lords, I may not have had the same experience as other people—I have been driving for only 40 years—but my first experience of humps on public highways was only this Easter, when I was in Rotterdam driving in the vicinity of a very large and excellent old persons' home. I can assure noble Lords that I slowed down, and I am certain that other people did so. What is more,

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it provided that degree of quietness and safety for people in that particular area.
The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, argues that if this Bill is carried into effect all we shall be doing is to shift the problems from one area to another, from one road to another. That could be an argument against any single provision at all on the highways. That could be an argument against closing a particular road, against having a one-way sign and against having all sorts of signs. Not far from where I live there is a sign. No motorist can ever read it unless he is crawling along. The sign says something like this:
"The attention of drivers is drawn to the fact that to proceed through the whole length of this road is an offence".
Nobody can read it. I am certain that a hump with a sign in front would be far more effective than that particular sign.
My Lords, in welcoming the general principle of this Bill, there are a number of points which, although this is a Second Reading, I want to put forward, because the answers of both the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, and the Minister may enable decisions to be taken on whether or not amendments will be tabled, assuming the Bill is given a Second Reading.
I can understand the different situation in London as compared with the rest of the country, because in London the GLC is the traffic authority although the boroughs are the highway authorities, whereas outside London the same authority, the county council, is both the highway authority and the traffic authority. Therefore, I can understand that it is necessary, as proposed in the Bill, for the Greater London Council to be consulted. But it would appear from my reading of the Bill that the GLC will have the power of veto, and I would suggest that, surely, that is not right. In the Standing Committee in another place the Minister, the Parliamentary Secretary at the Ministry of Transport, expressed the hope that in practice the London boroughs will initiate the ideas for the provision of humps but will then consult the GLC. He added—and I quote from col. 6—
"one hopes that there could be some kind of understanding that road humps could be proceeded with unless it seemed to the GLC that an overwhelming traffic problem would be created thereby"
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Surely it is not sufficient for this envisaged sensible practice to have to rely solely upon hopes; surely something should be written into the Bill. Similarly, outside London we have the situation where the county councils are both the highway authorities and the traffic authorities; but in that case there is no provision whatever in the Bill for the district authorities to be brought into consultation. In view of the size of some county councils, it is surely open to question as to whether the final decision on what is a local matter should rest with the county council.
Again, in the Standing Committee the Minister expressed a somewhat similar hope in col. 12—and I quote—
"But I certainly commend the practice whereby the boroughs, or the districts when borough status has not been taken, normally come forward with proposals and their wishes are closely heeded by the county councils. Districts or boroughs should be closely involved in decisions about where to put road humps, because there is a local context to any such decision".
I am sure your Lordships who support the general aim of the Bill would agree with what the Minister says: it is just common sense. A district council will of course know the local problems, the local circumstances; and I would suggest that the county council will be concerned mainly with the problems of through traffic. As I said in relation to Greater London, surely we cannot just rely upon hope that county councils will act properly towards district councils; somehow this should surely be written into the Bill.
My Lords, I shall he grateful if the Minister or the noble Earl will clarify a point under Clause 2. The Minister is to have power to,
"construct, maintain and remove road humps"
with the consent of the highway authority. Does this mean that the Minister has no power to act without that consent; in other words, that the highway authority has the power of veto? Also, does subsection (3) of this clause relate solely to trunk roads, for which the Minister is the highway authority? Incidentally, the Minister has said that this clause retains for the Minister the power to conduct experiments. Is the Minister really to have this power? Is that in the Bill; or is it subject to the consent of the highway authority?

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I also note that in the Standing Committee the Minister accepted that there was one point of inconsistency in the Bill. Under Clause 1 the GLC will have the last word although not being the highway authority. They have the last word because they are a traffic authority. But if the Minister wishes to install a road hump in London, consent has to be given by the highway authority, which is the London borough, and not the Greater London Council. In the Standing Committee of another place the Minister said he would look at this inconsistency when the clause came before your Lordships' House. I would hope that any amendment that is to be introduced to straighten out that inconsistency would also take the opportunity at the same time to insert into the Bill the appropriate relationship between the county council and the distrct council (or, in the case of London, the London boroughs) so that we can deal with the point that I raised earlier on in my remarks.
My Lords, Clause 1 defines the road hump as being an artificial hump or a depression. It would appear to me that the Minister must arrange that the appropriate regulations will provide that there is one type of road sign to signify a hump and a different one for a depression. Otherwise, we shall get into difficulty if people are expecting a hump and all of a sudden they do down. Therefore, it would appear to me that there must be some difference in the signs. Presumably there will be international signs of some kind where there is general agreement. In my opinion it is essential that the signs be sited sufficiently in advance of the humps—maybe two signs, one some way in advance and then one nearer the hump itself—otherwise, there could be some difficulty in the matter. But common sense will get us over what are the difficulties in the way of a sensible proposal without destroying the whole thing by criticism. I also hope that regulations will make it clear that this sort of sign must either be one which is illuminated or one which is in the close vicinity of street lamps, so that it can be seen quite clearly; otherwise, we could find some difficulties.
Clause 4 provides that a suggestion to install a hump shall be the subject of consultation with the chief officer of police. That would appear to me to be a sensible
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proposal. But it then adds,
"and…such other persons or bodies of persons as may be prescribed".
This may be where it is possible to insert provisions in relation to the necessary consultation by the county council with the appropriate district council. Perhaps the Minister could give us an assurance on that. It seems to me that there should be some direct provision and not merely such vague terms as:
"such other persons or bodies of persons".
Clause 3 relates to regulations concerning details of the construction and siting of humps and the placing of road signs. I should like to ask why the word "may" is inserted in line 1 of subsection (2). Surely regulations will be essential. Why, therefore, the word "may"? This matter was raised in Standing Committee in another place. The Minister's reply stressed the desirability of flexibility in the content of regulations. I cannot understand why "shall" is not inserted for the making of regulations. I look forward to hearing the Government's reply.
My last point relates to Clause I where it states that the provisions of the Bill cover only,
"any highway maintainable at the public expense".
A quick reference to the Highways Consolidation Bill recently before the House makes clear that the appropriate local authority is the highway authority for all highways, whether or not maintainable at the public expense. I am sure that one could think of instances where the installation of road humps on private roads may be desirable. In Standing Committee, the Minister spoke of possible legal problems that could arise; but, on this point, he said that he would like to consult the local authorities about the extension of such a power. I should like to ask the noble Lord whether such consultations have taken place and the result of those consultations.
I am sorry to have raised so many points on what appears to be a small Bill. As I said at the outset, we regard it as a useful Bill; but if it is to become law it must be put right. That is why I have put questions to the noble Earl and to the noble Lord.
7.23 p.m.
Viscount LONG: My Lords, I rise, first, to repeat the welcome that my right

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honourable friend Mr. Kenneth Clarke gave this Bill in another place. I should like also to thank my noble friend Lord Kinnoull for bringing this Bill before us tonight. I gather from speeches from all quarters of the House that my noble friend and I have but two friends left, the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, and the noble Lord, Lord Raglan. Nevertheless, we will press on in trying to put the world to rights. No one is advancing road humps as likely mass life savers, but it has been shown that the right kind of humps in the right locations can reduce accidents. Humps, therefore, can be a weapon in the armoury of accident prevention devices used by highway authorities; and we want that weapon to be available to them if they should need it.
I should now like to turn to what I detected as the suspicions that have cropped up in this debate—suspicions that the Commons had not done their work properly, that this Bill had been hastened from the other place and that we were having to push it through as fast as we could do so. I might remind your Lordships that we are a revising Chamber. I hope that this Bill is accepted for Second Reading and that it will go on to Committee stage as does any other Bill that comes before us. I hope that the suspicions may now disappear and that we shall be able to do our work without having to worry about what had gone on previously. In other words, we must "do the corrections".
I felt that I ought to look at Section 17 of the Road Traffic Act 1974. It is on this section, I think, that a lot of the problems in the debate have centred. It has been suggested that the existing power to construct road humps is adequate. This is completely wrong. There is at present no power whatsoever to construct road humps as a lawful part of a public highway, except that power contained in Section 17 of the Road Traffic Act 1974. This power is defective in three respects. First, as my noble friend has said already, it requires that any hump constructed under it be removed not more than one year after construction began. This is the case even where experimental humps were successful. It is, of course, shockingly wasteful besides being understandably resented by people who see their
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roads which have been made safer, then made less safe—and at the public expense.
Secondly, even if this defect were lacking, the Section 17 powers may be used for experimental purposes only. But providing for the installation of humps of a tested and proven type to be permanent parts of the highway is not an experiment and it would be ultra Tires to use for that purpose a power defined as experimental. Clause 2 of the Bill repeals Section 17. Thirdly, the Section 17 power is available only to Ministers, which in so far as it is experimental is reasonable. Now experiments have been undertaken and have succeeded; so that the highway authorities can he enabled to construct humps that conform to tested and proven criteria.
Highway authorities wish to have this power, and the Government wish them to have it. In many cases we know through correspondence from local residents that they, too, want humps installed. The power to construct humps in accordance with the criteria to he laid down by the Minister (which criteria will reflect the findings of our successful experiments) is given by this Bill. It would not otherwise exist.
Having said that, if I may I will try to catch up with some of the questions and worries of certain of my noble friends and noble Lords. My noble friends Lord Lucas and Lord Howe were worried about the speed with which the Bill went through the Commons. I have partially answered that point. I may say that the Commons found the Bill on balance, satisfactory. A longer period could have been devoted to Committee there had they so wished. They did not so wish because, as I have said, they considered that the Bill on balance made satisfactory provisions and this was endorsed by the whole Committee.
My noble friend Lord Lucas and the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, were worried over the matter of consultations and whether there was provision in the Bill for consultations. The answer to that question is: Yes, representations have been made from local government, the Institute of Motor Cycling, the Road Haulage Association, the AA, the RAC and main road hauliers. They have all been consulted about this Bill. The

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answer to the point about the agreement is, Yes; but they will wait to see or lobby those who are going to table in the Committee stage about any worries that might arise from what we are speaking about tonight.
My noble friend Lord Lucas is—and I am drawing on his questions more than others—an expert on transport and worked on the 1974 Transport Act. He feels that anyone can lay humps on roads or private roads. I believe that was his worry. Under the Bill, highway authorities may put down road humps only after consultations and holding an inquiry. Humps can only be put down in the circumstances specified in the regulations which will have to be approved by the House. Obviously your Lordships in Committee will consider these problems. These matters will need further debate and there is no better time than in Committee.
The noble Lord, Lord Underhill, raised a question on consultations between the Minister and the highway authorities. The answer is, Yes, Clause 2(1) requires that the Minister consults the authorities. I agree with the noble Lord that when it comes to speeding, the whole object where humps are used is to bring down speed and to make roads safer. My noble friend Lady Macleod felt that the changing of a car's gears would make a noise. I hope that the modern car has now grasped the fact that it must not make a noise with its modern technology!
My noble friend Lord Howe was interested in the problem of speed. He and my noble friend Lord Kinnoull had a slight cross between them over the Transport and Road Research Laboratory's Report. He asked whether humps should be allowed only on roads with a limit of 30 miles per hour. This is a good question. It should be looked at when we go into Committee. There does not seem to be a specific speed limit laid down. This subject should be given a considered debate because the speeds are the governing factor as to why we are looking at humps. My noble friend Lady Macleod felt that humps must be properly signposted. I believe that that is in Clause 3(2). It provides that warning signs should be erected to let the motorist know that there are humps being placed in the road.
Lord UNDERHILL: My Lords, that brings in the point which I raised under subsection (2)—regulations so made may include; the word is "may". It is permissive; it is not an instruction.
Viscount LONG: My Lords, Yes it is. The noble Lord is right. It is using the word "may" in that context. Having tried my hardest to answer some of the questions that your Lordships have raised, I hope that I will be forgiven if I go onwith the rest of my brief. I will look in the Official Report tomorrow and then give the rest of the answers, because a lot of questions have been raised tonight.
The Bill provides for my right honourable friend to lay down in regulations the requirements that hump installations must meet. My noble friend has said, and I agree, that this arrangement strikes the desired balance between the need to ensure that any humps constructed on our highways are to criteria proved satisfactory, and the need to give local authorities the freedom to construct humps when they think right. The drafting of the regulations, if the Bill is enacted, will probably take a little time.
We shall have to translate experience with the experimental humps into draft statutory requirements, and then we shall of course have to consult outside organisations, which I have already mentioned and who know that this Bill is now in your Lordships' House. That includes representatives of local government, as I have already said. We shall have to consult them on our proposals and consider whatever points they may raise. But we are ready, and will be glad, to play our part if your Lordships give the Bill the unamended passage which alone will get it on to the statute book this Session, and I join my noble friend in hoping that you will.
Lord RAGLAN: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, could he reassure us on this matter of the number of humps likely to be installed by local authorities? He said, as I remember, that these humps will only be constructed where local authorities want them to be constructed. But supposing that they want to construct far too many?
Viscount LONG: I was not able to hear the noble Lord's question clearly.

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Local authorities, as I understand it, will not want to erect hundreds of these humps. They will not be laying these humps in private roads. The Minister and the authorities will have to consult each other before any move is made. I think I did say that earlier. I also said that I think the Committee stage will be very important from the point of view of bringing out some of the points that are still lacking.
The Earl of KINNOULL: My Lords, I should like to thank all noble Lords and all my noble friends for making this Second Reading such a lively debate. I do not object to the "anti-humpers" putting their case so forcefully, but one was rather surprised, on a Second Reading which normally considers the principle of a Bill, that so many detailed questions should have been fired at one. I would say to my noble "anti-humper" friends that they have had a very good run. I accept, of course, their sincerity and I hope that they will understand me when I say that they are off course and off target and, if I may offer a word of advice to my noble friend Lord Howe, I would suggest to him that the next time he finds himself driving over a hump he should not be driving an Italian car but a British one!
I should like also to thank my noble friend Lord Long for his stirring and formidable defence. I think he has answered almost every point, but there was one point which the noble Viscount, Lord Simon, raised about depressions, and perhaps I might write to him later. I think it is very unusual for this House to reject on Second Reading a Bill, however small, unless the House is wholly against the principle of the Bill. That principle, I would remind your Lordships, is already embodied in the 1974 Act. A further point is that this is a road safety measure and, as such, is worthy of consideration in Committee. I am sure that your Lordships will agree that is so, and I hope that we shall be able to ventilate all the points we wish to raise during the Committee stage, which is the appopriate time.
On Question, Bill read 2ª, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

GROUND GAME BILL
7.43 p.m.
Lord AUCKLAND: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. It was given a Second Reading in the other place in June of this year by my honourable friend the Member for Brecon and Radnor in a very short time—an even shorter time than the Bill moved by my noble friend Lord Kinnoull. But this in no way should be taken as suggesting that the other place did not consider the Bill very carefully, because it was considered mid-week at half-past ten in the morning by Standing Committee "C" which represented all the main political parties.
The fact that this Bill is going to have a rather longer discussion in this House should not be regretted; far from it. As my noble friend Lord Long has reminded us, we are a revising Chamber and it is right that Private Members' legislation, just as much as perhaps more controversial public legislation, should have proper revision. Before I turn to the clauses of this very brief and, I hope, non-controversial Bill, perhaps I may say what the Bill does not seek to do, in case there is any misapprehension that this is a Bill which will unleash a lot of irresponsible people with shotguns, going round the countryside killing rabbits and hares. It does nothing of the kind. Clause 3 of the Bill, which enables the Bill to become law three months after receiving Royal Assent, does this so that the farmers, police and other authorities are fully acquainted and thoroughly informed as to the Bill's contents. It does not allow anybody to use firearms, whether he or she be an owner-occupier or tenant, without a firearms certificate; in other words, there is no question of the law being bent in any way.
Clause I of the Bill, as amended, seeks to make an amendment to Section 6 of the 1880 Ground Game Act. Under that Act, the owner alone was permitted to use firearms on the land which he owned. Under the new Bill, subject to certain conditions which are embodied in the Bill for consultation, the owner-occupier and the tenant will be permitted to use firearms at all times. But, as I said just now, they will have to be used in concurrence with the present law. I should like to make just

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one or two general comments on this Bill. Many of your Lordships will have shot rabbits and hares—I have shot a number myself during my lifetime—and the alternatives to shooting are, to put it mildly, rather horrible. Among them are trapping, gassing, snaring and possibly the use of ferrets. There is no doubt—I think this is accepted both by those who condone blood spots and by those who in all sincerity do not believe in them—that shooting is the most humane means. The rabbit menace, as the Farmers' Weekly for July 1979 reminds us, has one sinister overtone to it, namely, the possible return of myxomatosis. Any of your Lordships—and I imagine that many of you will have done so—who have seen a rabbit in the final stages of myxomatosis, will know what a dreadful and disgusting sight it is.
This Bill seeks to enable a landlord, an owner-occupier and a tenant at all hours to shoot rabbits, provided of course that he or she has a valid licence and meets all the requirements which are necessary under the present law. It is interesting to note that there is no restriction on any other game so far as night shooting is concerned, and properly carried out, there seems to he no reason why it should not apply to rabbits.
The other important point to bear in mind, in justification for the very small amendment being made by this Bill, is the damage which is done by rabbits and hares. One has only to see a field of corn or an allotment, which has been carefully tended, stripped by rabbits to know the damage that can be done. There is no doubt that the rabbit and hare population must he kept down. As I understand it, this Bill has the support of all the farming communities and the National Farmers' Union and, so far as I am aware—certainly there has been no protest to myself—the conservation societies. It is, of course, essential that any killing of rabbits or any other game, whether on the ground or in the air, is properly controlled and carried out humanely.
I do not wish to comment at this stage on the amendment which has been put down to the Bill, except to say that it is a very unusual procedure in your Lordships' House to put down an amendment of the kind which is normally reserved for
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the other place, although of course any noble Lord is entitled to do this. But I shall make no further observation on that point at this stage. I shall listen carefully, as I am sure your Lordships will, to the debate as it continues. But I hope at this stage that I have given sufficient information as to the intention behind the Bill for your Lordships to give it a Second Reading. My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2ª. (Lord Auckland.)
7.52 p.m.
Lord HOUGHTON of SOWERBY Lord HOUGHTON of SOWERBY rose to move, as an amendment to the Motion that the Bill be now read a second time, to leave out ("now") and insert at the end ("this day six months").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Auckland, has just said that it is unusual for an amendment of this kind to be put down to Bills which are before your Lordships' House for a Second Reading. I think that is so, but this is an unusual Bill and I want to refer to its history to show how unusual it is.
It is a deceptively short Bill. As the noble Lord has said, it was introduced in another place by Mr. Tom Hooson, the Member of Parliament for Brecon and Radnor, a year ago on 27th June 1979. This Bill was given a Second Reading in another place without debate; it is customarily called "on the nod". It then waited in a long queue to get to Standing Committee in another place, and it arrived there on the 18th of last month. As the noble Lord, Lord Auckland, has just said, the Standing Cornmittee met at half-past ten. I am not sure whether I heard him say that it had finished its proceedings by twenty-six minutes to eleven. The Committee stage in Standing Committee lasted four minutes.
What happened in those four minutes is rather interesting. Mr. Hooson, in moving an amended Clause 1 of the Bill, said:
"The merits of the Bill are self-evident. The 1880 Ground Game Act was intended to help farmers to deal with ground game pests. But that Act is inconsistent because it discriminates between owner-occupiers and tenants in respect of night shooting.
"The purpose of the clause, as amended, is to ensure that discrimination no longer exists

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between the rights of owners and those of tenants"—
and the record says,
"Amendment agreed to.
Clause 1, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill".
This was very brief.
I must confess that, when I looked at the Bill and the proceedings in Standing Committee nothing was really self-evident to me. So I did a great deal of research and I found that this Bill rests upon the principal Act, which was passed on 9th September 1880. It was originally called the Rabbits and Hares Bill. It was a Government measure and it had to do with the use of firearms. It had to do with who was entitled lawfully to use the gun. I submit to your Lordships that any extension of the field of use of firearms, at night especially, requires the most careful consideration and I think that it ought to receive the consideration of the Government.
The 1880 Bill was a very controversial one. I looked up the proceedings at that time. It came before the House of Commons in the summer of 1880, and the debates lasted so long that numerous attempts were made by the Government to adjourn the debates, and sometimes to adjourn the House. I noticed that on one day in particular, 29th July 1880, three attempts were made by the Government to adjourn the debate and they were defeated every time. It was only on the fourth occasion that the Motion to adjourn the debate was agreed to.
What is really quite surprising is the "big guns" who came into this discussion in the House of Commons in 1880. Mr. Gladstone took a hand; so did Sir William Harcourt—who is alleged to have said, "We're all socialists now ", but not on that occasion—and Lord John Manners. All came in to try to persuade a troublesome House of Commons to adjourn the debate and meet another day. But the House refused and the majorities against the Government were quite substantial. So this Bill in 1880 had quite a troubled time.
The Bill of 1880 that eventually reached the statute book said, in Clause 1:
"Every occupier of land shall have, as incident to and inseparable from his occupation of the
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land, the right to kill and take ground game thereon, concurrently with any other person who may be entitled to kill and take ground game on the same land".
This was really the emancipation of the tenant who, in many cases, was not allowed the shooting rights on land that he occupied. Your Lordships might say that the Bill was a tenants' shooting charter.
I am indebted to Mr. Hooson for an admirable brief on this and other matters, which he sent to me this morning. I only wish that, instead of allowing the Committee stage to last four minutes, he had made it last 54 minutes and had put all this on the record. Then, I think we should all have been much better informed as to what the Bill is about, and would have been able to form an opinion on its merits and on whether it should proceed in your Lordships' House.
We can hardly be reassured as to the merits of a Bill that the House of Commons has debated for not a single minute on the Floor of the House and for only four minutes in Standing Committee. Either they were mesmerised by its simplicity or some hidden persuasion was brought to bear upon them to which I have not succumbed. I quote from the brief:
"The Act of 1880 altered the common law in two ways in particular. Firstly, it gave to owner-occupiers the right to take ground game even where they had granted game rights to another person. Secondly, it gave tenants the right to take ground game even where the owner of the land had reserved the game rights to himself, or had granted them to some person other than the tenant".
This explains clearly that the Bill was a tenants' shooting charter.
Having given the occupier of the land general rights of shooting for rabbits and hares, the Act of 1880 then imposed some restrictions. They related inter alia to the shooting of ground game at night. I say "inter alia" because Section 6 of the 1880 Act imposed restrictions upon the use of spring traps and poison as means of destroying rabbits and hares. But those matters are not in the Bill which is before your Lordships' House. The Bill before us is confined to shooting. It does not extend any rights of using spring traps, still less of using poison, which are dealt with by other and subsequent legislation. The Bill is confined to the right to shoot at

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night and nothing else, and "night" is set out in Section 6 of the Act as being between the hour before sunset and the hour after sunrise. That is "night".
Viscount SIMON: My Lords, I think that the noble Lord misstated it by accident. It is the hour after sunset and the hour before sunrise, is it not?
Lord HOUGHTON of SOWERBY: My Lords, we can get it absolutely right. Section 6, which is vital to what I now come to, says that no person having a right of killing ground game under the Act, or otherwise, shall use any firearms for the purpose of killing ground game between the expiration of the first hour after sunset and the commencement of the last hour before sunrise. I am sorry that I did not get it right; it just shows how complex this simple little Bill can be. I will not read the remainder of Section 6 because it deals with spring traps and poison and has nothing to do with shooting.
It is from the construction of those words in Section 6 that the mischief has arisen. The Act of 1880 contains words which I thought bore their normal meaning. However, not being a lawyer, I was deceived. I thought that when Section 6 said "no person" it meant "no person" and that when it said,
"no person having a right of killing ground game under the Act, or otherwise",
it meant that in any other wise under the Act, or whatever the source from which the right to shoot was granted to him, he was under the conditions imposed by Section 6. That is what I thought, but in his brief Mr. Hooson has disabused me, because he brings to my notice a very important judgment in the King's Bench Division in 1913, 67 years ago.
The whole point of the Bill rests not upon the words of Section 6 of the Act of 1880 but upon the construction given by the court to the words in Section 6 of that Act. It is curious that not a word was said about this in another place during the Committee stage of the Bill. It seems to me that this is most important. A case which came before the King's Bench Division in 1913—Leworthy v. Rees, 1913, 109, LT, 244—has a most important bearing upon our debate. I quote now from The Times Law Report
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of 18th April 1913, page 408, volume 29, 1912–13. This case which came before the courts in 1913 did not relate to the shooting part of Section 6 but to the spring traps part of that section.
Under Section 6 spring traps had to be placed in rabbit holes, but these spring traps were placed outside rabbit holes. That is why the case arose. On the face of it, they were unlawful. Mr. Justice Ridley said, and I quote from the report:
"Section 6 only applied to the case of occupiers of land and persons who were authorised by the occupier".
Mr. Justice Ridley thought that the words "or otherwise" in Section 6 ought to be read as having reference to Section 2. I must say that that puzzled me, but since Mr. Justice Pickford and Mr. Justice Avory delivered judgments to the same effect one must suppose that there was weight in their opinion. Mr. Justice Avory, who had a reputation later for being a very hard judge, was in 1913 as much against rabbits as in subsequent years he was against culprits. There is a story told in the memoirs of the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, that when Mr. Justice Avory sentenced a man of 82 to 15 years' imprisonment, he said, "Oh, my Lord, I'll never be able to do 15 years", to which Mr. Justice Avory replied, "Well then, do as much as you can." He was one of those associated with this judgment.
The alleged inconsistency of the Act of 1880 is therefore that the restrictions on night shooting in Section 5 do not apply to owner-occupiers or to those taking ground game under their authority, both of whom can shoot at night, whereas the tenant who acquired shooting rights by virtue of Section 1 of the 1880 Act, and only he, is under the restrictions of Section 6. Therefore I submit that the Bill before us becomes clearer now—at least I hope so—and that we can see that it removes the anomaly by conferring upon tenants who acquire rights under the Act of 1880 the same exemption from the restrictions under Section 6 as the judgment in Leworthy v. Rees gave to owner-occupiers.
The Bill therefore extends the right of night shooting. Is that what we want to do? The Bill will almost nullify altogether the restrictions of Section 6 on night

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shooting. Is that what we want to do? This situation has existed, anomaly and all, for 67 years. It may be that the anniversary year of the 1880 Act is the time to do something about it, but what is the pressure, my Lords, to rectify any anomaly under the 1880 Act, when this has existed for 67 years apparently without causing anybody any serious difficulty? I will come in a moment to whether it is because we have a lot more rabbits or whether we have more rabbits today than we had in 1913. I think we have to consider carefully whether we amend the statute law to comply with the judgment in the King's Bench Division in 1913 in order to extend the area of night shooting.
So I now come closer to my conclusion because the question before your Lordships' House, when all the technicalities of the Acts and the Bill have been gone through, is this: Do we want to extend the facilities for people to use firearms at night? I have this information—and again I owe this to Mr. Hooson's brief; and I am very grateful to him, and when he reads the Official Report I hope he will not think that I have been misusing the information that he has given me, for my case rather than for his. But a brief is a brief and I have made of it the best that I can. I think probably the anomaly that we ought to be dealing with is the fact that he mentions; namely, that there is no law against shooting any other game at night and it is only in regard to ground game that this restriction applied.
I want to suggest to your Lordships that poaching is usually done at night. I would also suggest that crime by shooting is usually done at night, or at least a good deal of it is done at night. Would it not be a good thing if, on hearing a gunshot during the night, we had every reason to presuppose that it was unlawful? Only a few days ago we were discussing the poaching of deer. In a newspaper last week there was a long article on the ravages of poaching, which neither the law nor people seem to be able to do very much about. I do not think that we ought to give more people the right to use the gun at night.
If it is contended that there are so many rabbits now that modern means of rabbit clearance are unsuccessful and that we need to go shooting at night in order to keep down the rabbit population, let us
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hear the arguments. It may be that the rabbit has returned in disturbing numbers in some parts of the country. I do not deny that. There are, however, rabbit clearance schemes, although I understand that many of them have been faltering for years. What about resuscitating them if that is what we need to do?
I have a home in the country and I keep a pretty close tag on the wildlife around me. Happily I have far more badgers than rabbits and I am very fond of them, but I would not like people to be wandering round my part of Surrey with a gun at night, with licence to shoot anything while my badgers are around and foraging —and foxes, too. Do we have to be more lax in the use of firearms than was intended in 1880? Is that the proposition? Are there not more effective and humane ways of killing rabbits than going out at night and taking potshots at them, or organising a rabbit shoot at night, with people probably not in a condition to shoot straight at anything?
Why was the restriction put in the 1880 Act at all and why was the judgment of Mr. Justice Ridley so much at variance with the intentions of Section 6? Again I am indebted to Mr. Hooson for giving me the answer. He said:
"The legislative history of this section is unclear. It was introduced as a clause in the House of Commons at the Report stage of the Bill and was merely given a passing mention by the Bill's sponsor, who was the Home Secretary".
The Home Secretary—it was not a Private Member's Bill then and I have said that the Home Secretary was Sir William Harcourt, to whose name all those on the Liberal Benches ought to give due obeisance. But in the House of Lords, Lord Kimberley—not the present noble Lord whom we love so well, but one of his ancestors, presumably; and I quote from Hansard, Third Series, Volume 256, col. 811—said this.
"The clause had been placed in the Bill as a concession to the Opposition in the other Rouse. It was desired that there should be a prohibition as to using firearms at night and on the understanding that the clause should be made general it was inserted in the Bill and he (Lord Kimberley) did not think that their Lordships would desire that an owner should have the right to shoot at night and the tenant not to have that right."
So the Bill deprived the owner of the right to shoot at night and in 1913 the judgment of the court was that the owner-occupier had the right to shoot at night,

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and therefore created the anomaly as between owner and tenant.
I hope we are not more in favour of using firearms at night than we were one hundred years ago for any reason that is not imperative and pressing and irresistible. Surely we have different ways of dealing with this problem today as against one hundred years ago.
So, what am Ito do? What are noble Lords to do? With the greatest respect, I submit that this is not the way to pass Acts of Parliament. It is not and it should not be. We are entitled to know what Bills are about and should not have to wait until the Second Reading for that; those who are not here will not know and those who are here may have had some difficulty in following the complexity of the argument. This is not the way. I know that this Bill could pass into law by going through your Lordships' House in all stages in the time remaining to us in this Session. I think that would be wrong, my Lords. I do not think the House of Commons can expect us to do it. I suggest that the Government should deal with firearms and guns and shooting, and they should not be dealt with in Private Members' Bills, even though there is a plausible case for it on the grounds of pest control.
So my amendment gives all those concerned a little time in which to consider the matter further; and if they wish to pursue it, then let us have the Bill in another Session, with proper discussion in another place. Let it be fully explained, and let it come to your Lordships' House as other Bills do, with some kind of record and pedigree behind it so that we know what sort of horse we are asked to back. I beg to move my amendment.
Moved, as an amendment to the Motion that the Bill be now read a second time, to leave out ("now") and insert at the end ("this day six months").—(Lord Houghton of Sowerby.)
Lord NUN BURNHOLME: My Lords, I should like to bring one small point to your Lordships' attention in regard to the accuracy and the dangers of shooting at night. Shooting at night is dangerous and it is against the law and basically has always been so. The police do not
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like it, landlords do not like it, the public do not like it, gamekeepers do not like it; none of us likes it. It does encourage poaching. The noble Lord, Lord Auckland, has said that this is not a Bill which gives a licence to anybody to go and shoot at night, but I would take issue with him on that. When shooting at night is allowed practically anywhere by any tenant farmer or tenant or occupier there will be a great deal of it going on. Most occupiers, particularly farmers, are generally armed with very deadly weapons, which are themselves dangerous.
There is one other point about which I am not quite certain, which is whether it will be legal to shoot with a shotgun and a rifle or only with a shotgun. The shooting of shotguns at night is dangerous enough, but a rifle is extremely so. I know for a fact that the police are not in favour of people going around at night armed with a shotgun, for very obvious reasons. For these reasons I am not in favour of this Bill. I think it is dangerous.
8.22 p.m.
Lord WYNNE-JONES: My Lords, it has been very interesting to hear the remarks made by my noble friend Lord Houghton of Sowerby. He takes such an interest in the animal kingdom that we all respect what he has to say and we realise that he speaks with a profundity of knowledge and a kindliness which are extremely important. This Bill, which is a small Bill, is a Bill to amend the Act of 1880, an Act which was entitled:
"An Act for the better protection of occupiers of land against injury to their crops from ground game".
It is quite important to remember what the purpose of that Act was. It was not a matter of indiscriminate shooting; it was a matter of controlling ground game on the lands which were being cultivated.
My Lords, we all of us have an affection from childhood times for rabbits. I suppose every one of us when young had a rabbit or two rabbits—and if you have two rabbits you certainly have more than two—in order to amuse ourselves. I expect many of your Lordships will remember the verse which went:
"A rabbit has a charming face,
Its private life is a disgrace.
I scarcely dare to name to you
The awful things that rabbits do.

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Things that your paper never prints:
One only mentions them in hints.
They have such lost degraded souls
No wonder they inhabit holes.
Where such depravity is found
It only can live underground".
The rabbit remains as something of a token of affection to all of us, but we also have to bear in mind that the rabbit does do a lot of damage and that consequently rabbits have to be controlled.
This particular Bill we have before us today is a Bill to permit the occupier of land—that is, the person who is growing crops—to shoot the rabbit at any time of the day or night. Under the present law the owner of the land alone is allowed to shoot at night, not the occupier. But the owner is not really the person who is especially concerned with the problem of protecting crops; it is the occupier. And the purpose of this Bill is to allow the occupier the same right as the owner has. Whether we pass the Bill or not the owner still has the same right; he can shoot at night, but it is the occupier who cannot.
My Lords, I personally would agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Nunburnholme has said, and what my noble friend Lord Houghton of Sowerby has said; I would like to stop shooting at night. But whether we pass this Bill or not shooting at night will go on. This Bill does not suddenly open the floodgates for shooting at night. What it does is to give the same right to the occupier as the owner has. I can see no logical reason for refusing this. If we want to look further into the whole problem of shooting, then we must do it in another way, not just by passing or not passing this Bill.
Further, I would say with regard to this Bill that it is a custom of your Lordships' House to allow Bills like this to have a Second Reading. If at Committee stage suggestions are made, such suggestions can come forward and be considered; if at Report Stage further suggestions are wanted they can come forward. But it is usual for a Bill of this sort, especially one which has passed through the other place, to pass your Lordships' House at Second Reading. Therefore, I would feel, speaking for the Opposition, reluctant to oppose a Second Reading for this Bill.
8.29 p.m.
Viscount LONG: My Lords, first may I thank my noble friend Lord Auckland
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and congratulate him on bringing this important Bill to your Lordships' House? I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, for drawing attention to "sunset" and "sundown", which is Greenwich time, because I think the times have changed since the Act and we have to have a different timing.
I was interested in what the noble Lord, Lord Wynne-Jones, said. I remember I had two rabbits, and within a short time I had two or three hundred rabbits. They breed like rabbits! Very fast indeed.
I think this is the moment for me to speak to your Lordships on the Government's feeling during the Second Reading of this Bill. This is a modest measure of only three clauses which, in the words of the Long Title, seeks
"to extend the right of an occupier under the Ground Game Act 1880 to use firearms for the purpose of protecting crops against damage from rabbits and hares".
My noble friend Lord Auckland has explained the provisions of the clause and I propose to confine my speech to some brief general comments on the Bill which I trust will be helpful to your Lordships.
I turn briefly to the 1880 Act, which enables the occupiers of agricultural land to protect their crops from damage and loss from ground game, which covers both hares and rabbits. An occupying owner, tenant or sub-tenant is an occupier for the purpose of the Act. The Act gives the occupier the right to kill ground game on his land concurrently with any other person who may have that right; for example, the owner who is not in occupation; and, subject to limitations stipulated in the Act, the occupier may authorise other persons to exercise his right.
By Section 6 of the 1880 Act, however, the use of firearms is prohibited at night, as the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, has mentioned in his amendment. That is between the expiration of the first hour after sunset and the commencement of the last hour before sunrise. The prohibition has been interpreted by the courts as not applying to an owner of the land, whether or not he is in occupation, or to others not in occupation who are authorised by the owner to kill ground game. It is this inconsistency between, on the one hand, the right of an owner to protect his crops against damage by rabbits and hares by

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using firearms for this purpose at night, and, on the other hand, the absence of such a right of a tenant farmer, that the Bill seeks to remedy.
The Bill seeks to make it lawful for the occupier of land to use firearms at night in those periods of the year when he may otherwise lawfully use firearms. It would not allow any persons other than the occupier to benefit from this concession. Nor would the occupier's right be extended to those persons who, under the 1880 Act, may be authorised by him to act on his behalf, because the Bill is primarily aimed to afford protection to smallholders against damage to their crops, and it is considered that they would be able to shoot ground game on their land at night without having to rely on some other person to do it for them. I think it was my noble friend Lord Nunburnholme who asked whether the Bill would authorise the use of rifles as well as of shotguns. The answer to my noble friend is that it would cover both, because they are boths firearms. The Government have considered the appropriateness of applying this measure only to England and Wales rather than to the whole of the United Kingdom, to which the 1880 Act applies. We agree that there is good reason for the exclusion from its provisions of Scotland and Northern Ireland.
As the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, mentioned in his amendment, the Bill was piloted very quickly, perhaps too quickly for him, through another place—but, nevertheless, it was successfully brought through to your Lordships' House—by my right honourable friend Mr. Tom Hooson, to whom we gave some help at the Standing Committee stage with drafting amendments to tidy up some technical points. It appears to me that there are now one or two rather technical points that the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, wishes to apply to this Bill. I should like to say just a little more on that in a moment. The Bill before your Lordships' House for consideration is therefore in a form which secured broad support in another place, and to which there is no technical objection. None the less, it is a Private Member's Bill and not a Government measure, and while we would not wish to hamper in any way its continued passage, our attitude is one of neutrality.
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The noble Lord, Lord Wynne-Jones, remarked at the end of his speech that he would not like to see any Private Member's Bill, or any Bill, being thrown out on Second Reading unless it could not possibly be helped. He referred to the fact that it would be far better to take a Bill that comes from another place through all its stages in your Lordships' House and so correct all the faults of the particular piece of legislation. I would ask the House to remember that we very seldom reject a Commons Private Bill. We have not done so since 1945; I think that is the timing. On the whole, most of these have certainly concerned matters of greater substance, and I think the example I want to give here is the abolition of the death penalty. The noble Lord did mention that this was an unusual Bill and an important Bill, but I would ask him to be kind to the House tonight. I would ask him if he would consider it as important as the death penalty Bill. I would ask him if he could not possibly think of withdrawing his amendment so that the Government could have another look during the Committee stage, and, indeed, the Report stage, at some of the worries he has on board. Otherwise, I have nothing further to say, but I hope that your Lordships have paid attention to the fact that we must be careful how we handle our procedures; otherwise we shall lose sight of some of the good stuff we can do in your Lordships' House.
Lord ROSS of MARNOCK: Before the noble Viscount sits down, may I remind him that he said there were good reasons as to why this should not apply to Scotland? With all due respect, I did not hear a single reason, and I am dying to be enlightened about it.
Viscount LONG: My Lords, the noble Lord has caught me on that one. I will write to him, but I have a feeling that there has already been some such legislation. I do apologise if he feels hurt in any way, but I understand there has been some legislation on the subject.
Lord AUCKLAND: My Lords, nobody could argue that this Bill has not had a very good airing in your Lordships' House this evening. I would not wish to detain your Lordships for more than a few minutes on this second day of summer —which is just about what it is. But

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perhaps I may reply briefly to one or two of the observations made. The noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, is deeply respected in both Houses of Parliament as a master of procedure. He has held many high offices, and his remarks are always listened to with respect. But I cannot help thinking that a rather over-digested meal has been made of this measure. The main argument seems to centre around night shooting. Obviously night shooting must be controlled and I think that it would be unwise to lose the Bill, because, after all, the 1880 Act is 100 years old and since then many new technical devices have been introduced for shooting rabbits and other ground game. It can be done more lethally.
Night-shooting, properly carried out, can be done far less dangerously than was the case in 1880. But, I go some of the way with my noble friend Lord Nunburnholme on the question of night shooting, unless it is absolutely necessary. I should not like to see—and I do not think that any of your Lordships would like to see—completely uncontrolled night-shooting. I do not believe that if the Bill becomes law we shall have uncontrolled night shooting. All that the Bill does is to enable rabbits and hares to be brought in line with other game.
My noble friend Lord Nunburnholme referred to the question of rifles. I think that this is something which the Government would do well to consider. Having done quite a lot of rifle-shooting myself, I agree with him that there could, especially in built up areas, be some danger, particularly with a rifle above the·22 Hornet mechanism, of which there are a number on the market. Rifles are potentially far more dangerous in their range than shotguns. But I cannot envisage rabbits or hares being shot at night with rifles. Anyway, I think that that is a most unlikely occurence—it is far more likely to be shotguns.
As regards the Committee stage in the other place—and I point out that there are certain rules of procedure about referring to the other place—I should like to repeat what I said in my opening speech: it was quite incumbent upon any Member of that all-party Committee to question any part of the Bill. There have been a number of Private Members'
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Bills which have gone through the other place and which have been fully debated. I think that your Lordships would agree—I have not been a Member of the other place, but I have been a Member of your Lordships' House for over 20 years—that the other place does not, particularly when hours of daylight are involved, allow measures through which have an element of undue controversy about them.
I do not accept that this Bill will be a haven for the thug who takes a shotgun out for the purpose of murder, which I think has been hinted at. Under the present legislation we have recently had some particularly foul murders carried out with shotguns, which we all condemn. There may well be every reason for the Government to have a look, and a very serious look, at firearms' regulations, particularly as they apply to shotguns. I believe that the Home Office has that very much in mind. Certainly, I would ask my noble friend to bear the matter very carefully in mind.
I do not think that this particular Bill will do any damage at all as regards the indiscriminate use of shotguns. I think that they will be used with discretion. The Bill corrects an anomaly which was very outdated. I believe that it should go on the statute book and that in due course—and I hope sooner rather than later—the Government will have a more comprehensive look at the whole question of firearms, because that is what your Lordships' House, the other place and the country need.
Having said that and bearing in mind that there are further stages to the Bill, if needed, it may well be—and I hope that the Bill will get on the statute book—that the Bill will need tidying up. But, at this stage, for the reasons which my noble friend and I have put forward—and I am particularly grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Wynne-Jones, for his erudite and thoughtful speech—I would urge your Lordships' House to give the Bill a Second Reading.
8.46 p.m.
Lord HOUGHTON of SOWERBY: My Lords, I am very grateful for the comments that have been made on what I said to your Lordships earlier. The noble

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Viscount, Lord Long, says that the Government's position on the Bill is neutral. What a shameful thing for a member of a Government, who are neutral on hardly anything affecting public life today, to say; with a Prime Minister who is scarcely neutral about a single item in our affairs; yet the noble Viscount says that the Government are neutral.
Viscount LONG: My Lords, very often during a Private Member's Bill the Government are neutral. The noble Lord will remember that it happened in his day. It has happened in the past.
Lord HOUGHTON of SOWERBY: My Lords, there is no excuse for it—I let the matter pass at that. I think that one ought to have a point of view. The Government have a responsibility. They have not expressed it before and I think that it is a great pity that they do not have better advice to give the House. The noble Lord, Lord Auckland, said that the Act of 1880 was, after all, 100 years old. But shooting at night in 1880 was just the same as shooting in 1980—it is just shooting and it is at night. So really I do not think that there is anything in that argument. But, more especially, when a Bill is dealing with firearms and the use of firearms which, as the noble Viscount says, appears to include rifles as well as shotguns, we must bear in mind that there is a great deal more shooting going on in the community today than there was in 1880. Those are important matters.
However, thinking it over in the course of the debate I have come to the conclusion that a Chamber which contains only 10 noble Lords on both sides of the House is scarcely in a fit condition to do anything except what it usually does, and that is to allow Bills that come up from another place to have an unopposed second reading. That is about the only decent thing that your Lordships' House can do in the present circumstances. Therefore, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment, with the promise that the Committee stage of this Bill will last a little longer than it did in another place.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
On Question, Bill read 2ª, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

HOUSE OF LORDS OFFICES
Sixth Report made and to be printed.