Lords Sitting of 26 November 1981

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock (Prayers having been read earlier at the Judicial Sitting by the Lord Bishop of Liverpool): The CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES on the Woolsack.

Air Fares: Discounts
The Earl of Kinnoull: 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 whether they will confirm reports that the Dutch Government are providing a 35 per cent. discount for air travellers flying from Schiphol Airport to the Far East with the national airline KLM and whether the Government would consider similar action for British airlines.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Trefgarne): My Lords, fares between the Netherlands and other countries are a matter for the Governments concerned and we have no role in their approval. They are, of course, of interest to United Kingdom airlines who operate in parallel markets. I am advised that there have been changes in fares from Amsterdam to Far East destinations and in some cases significant reductions. We have been assured by the Dutch Government that these changes have come about as a result of the commercial judgment of the KLM management related to the competitive market position. The Dutch Government have also assured us that no subsidy to KLM is in any way involved.
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, may I thank my noble friend for that assurance and information. Would my noble friend comment on how serious Her Majesty's Government take the obvious competitive threat that Schiphol Airport offers to future interlining traffic of the London airports?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, this is a matter for the managements of the airports concerned. The general position of Her Majesty's Government in these matters is that we seek to achieve a competitive environment in these things and the arrangements at Schiphol are clearly part of that.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, is the noble Lord the Minister aware that the Dutch Government are now supporting a wide range of low-cost fares? Is he further aware that many of these discounted fares which formerly were available only in the "bucket shops" are now available at all travel agents in Holland? Can he, finally, tell the House whether the Dutch Government have legislation similar to ours saying that such action is illegal, or whether they have not?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, as I have explained I think on numerous occasions to the noble Baroness, this is not a question of national legislation but a question of agreement between the Governments concerned. I am not in a position to comment upon the agreements between the Government of Holland and the other Governments with which they do business.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, I am sorry; that is not the question I asked the noble Lord. I asked him whether the Dutch Government had legislation similar to ours which made such action illegal or whether they did not.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I am quite certain that there is no provision in Dutch law to allow things which are contrary to international agreements.
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, may I ask the Minister whether the 35 per cent. discount means that it is cheaper for British travellers to fly to Schiphol and then take KLM aircraft to the Far East?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I do not think I can do that arithmetic in my head, but certainly the economy fares offered by British Caledonian and British Airways between London and Hong Kong, for example, are between 30 per cent. and 9 per cent, lower than the economy fares from Schiphol.
Lord Beswick: My Lords, while I appreciate what the noble Lord said about the position of the Government in these matters, he has defined their role, he said, to ensure a competitive position. But is it not necessary to ensure that the competition is fair? Is there not a case now—again I appreciate the difficulties—for saying that we could have regulation of fares or we could have a situation where there is no regulation of fares? Surely, it is quite absurd to have the present nonsense. Can the Government not do something more to get sense into this matter?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord. Unfair competition is certainly not part of our policy and is not something we seek to achieve. That is why we were at pains to ascertain from the Dutch Government that there was no question of any subsidy so far as KLM were concerned.
Lord Davies of Leek: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that some of us should be wary of over-competitiveness in the use of aviation machines, and that many of us would prefer the security of flying with cool-headed British aviators and aeroplanes to running all round the world looking for cheap fares?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, as a former pilot, I welcome what the noble Lord says.

British Airports Authority: Financing
3.5 p.m.
The Earl of Kinnoull: 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 whether they consider the present capital financing of the British Airports Authority for the development of their airports is satisfactory in view of the fact that 80 per cent. of such developments need to be financed from revenue and whether this constraint on the BAA is in the interests of airlines and the consumer.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, there is no formal requirement that the BAA should finance any given percentage of its capital investment from revenue. As with other similar nationalised industries, the authority is expected to earn the required rate of return on new investment and this will substantially determine the internal revenue of the authority. Its external financing requirement will vary from year to year according to the difference between its capital requirements and its internally generated resources.
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, while thanking my noble friend for that reply, may I ask him this: In view of the recent reports that the British Airports Authority intends to increase its charges by 12 per cent. this year to the now very harassed airlines, is it not time that this monopolistic body should look to increased efficiency of service rather than increasing charges in isolation of market difficulties?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I certainly agree that the BAA ought to be operated as efficiently as is possible, and although I would not claim that the authority is perfect in that respect it has a very creditable and defensible record. But what I think my noble friend is really asking for is some amelioration for the airlines which goes wider than mere internal efficiency in the authority. That would mean a subsidy from public funds which I cannot countenance.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, in view of the desire of the Government to introduce private capital into the nationalised sector, have they looked at the possibility of financing the airport developments by private capital and leasing to the Civil Aviation Authority? Is there any reason why such arrangements should be brought within the external finance limit of the PSBR?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, that is one of the possibilities that we examine from time to time. However, it would have no effect upon the costs of the British Airports Authority and thus its ultimate charges.
Lord Harvey of Prestbury: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the British Airport Authority's charges are just about the highest in the world? Would he look into this matter and see that we are really competitive and encourage airlines and private operators to come to Britain?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I am aware that the fees of the British Airports Authority are among the higher charges for their type of services in the world. On the other hand, it is one of the few airport authorities which operates without a subsidy.
Earl Amherst: My Lords, would the noble Lord not agree that the high tariffs charged by the CAA to the airlines are largely responsible for the very high fares now charged by the operators?
Lord Trefgarne: No, my Lords, I would not agree with that. The terminal charges—as they are called—at British airports, which relate to the total cost of course of British airlines, represent something less than 5 per cent. of their total costs.
Lord Jenkins of Putney: My Lords, in considering what help we should give to the British Airports Authority, would the noble Lord consider that it is desirable that further increases of flights into Heathrow should be discouraged? Would he therefore encourage the airports authority to allow for cheaper landing charges at Stansted and Gatwick rather than Heathrow?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, that is already the case.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, is the noble Lord the Minister aware that these very high charges, whether they are justified or not, of the British Airports Authority are one of the main reasons for the high passengers fares, particularly to Europe? Could he not take that into account in looking at the proposed 12 per cent. increase?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, as I have just explained to the noble Earl, Lord Amherst, the noble Baroness is not correct.

The Office of Manpower Economics
3.9 p.m.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: 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 how many people are employed in the Office of Manpower Economics; what plans have been made to reduce this; and what is the estimated cost of the office in the current year.
The Ministry of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Earl Ferrers): My Lords, the current staff is 44. This follows a reduction of one-third from a total of 65 as a result of the abolition of the Standing Commission on Pay Comparability and an efficiency review of the Office of Manpower Economics. No further reductions are planned. The cost this financial year will be about £857,000.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that reply. Does his statement that no further reductions are planned exclude the possibility of nonetheless making them? Does my noble friend recall that it was this organisation which last year was responsible for the extremely expensive error in calculation which resulted in greatly increased public expenditure on teachers' salaries?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I was aware of the latter fact. The fact that no more reductions are planned does not of course mean that they are excluded; it means merely that they are not planned.
The Earl of Halsbury: My Lords, would the noble Earl agree that, in view of the very large number of review bodies, ad hoc committees of inquiry, and so on which the Government set up to act as honest brokers between themselves and spheres of administration for which they have responsibility, the advice that they receive would be incoherent and chaotic unless all those bodies shared a common secretariat?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Halsbury. I think that that is largely so, and I would add that the Office of Manpower Economics is totally independent.
Lord Orr-Ewing: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the figures that he gave us mean that each of the 44 persons serving in the office is costing nearly £20,000 a year? If it is not possible to make economies in numbers, would it be possible at least to make economies in the seniority of people serving in the office, in order that the taxpayer should not have to meet a cost which will probably amount to £1 million next year?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, simple mental arithmetics are not always the best guides to efficiency. All I would tell my noble friend is that the estimated costs for 1981–82 are in fact 34 per cent. below last year's in money terms, which presumably is more than in real terms.

Northern Ireland Job Creation: Financial Aid
3.12 p.m.
Baroness Ewart-Biggs: 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 why there is a lower level of financial assistance given to job creation schemes in Northern Ireland than to those operating in the rest of the United Kingdom, and whether they have reconsidered their attitude towards this discrimination since the Written Answer given to Lord Melchett on 24th July 1981.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland (The Earl of Gowrie): My Lords, in general, the financial assistance available for job creation in Northern Ireland is at a higher level than in Great Britain. There are, however, necessary differences between the financial assistance provided in Northern Ireland under the Action for Community Employment Scheme and that available in Great Britain under the broadly comparable Community Enterprise Programme. These differences are designed to provide as many jobs as possible within the resources available, as well as to help to ensure that the sponsors make a genuine contribution themselves.
Baroness Ewart-Biggs: My Lords, I wish to thank the Minister very much for that Answer, but I still do not think that he has quite explained the anomaly. Would he not agree that it is quite extraordinary that in Northern Ireland, where economic conditions are worse and unemployment figures are higher than in other parts of the United Kingdom, employing bodies using the job creation schemes are generally benefiting less than are their counterparts who are benefiting from similar schemes in the rest of the United Kingdom? Surely the Minister should give a commitment that community organisations in Northern Ireland engaged in this essential work of social benefit should be brought into line with the rest of the United Kingdom by being given 100 per cent. gross wage cost per employee and the equivalent administration grant of £400?
The Earl of Gowrie: My Lords, I would agree that economic conditions in Northern Ireland are worse than they are in the rest of the United Kingdom, which is one of the reasons why it is so important to restore stability, both politically and in terms of security, in the Province. But I would not agree with the further points made by the noble Baroness. The evidence does not support her contentions. I am glad to report that the Northern Ireland scheme is proving very successful in providing worthwhile employment for the longer term unemployed, and the planned number of places has been not only fulfilled but exceeded.
Lord Reay: My Lords, has my noble friend seen the terms of an attack reportedly made today on the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland by the Member for Macclesfield, Mr. Nicholas Winterton? If so, would my noble friend care to take this opportunity to repudiate the attack, in regard to both its substance and its insulting terms?
The Earl of Gowrie: My Lords, I have seen a report of the attack. I think it is widely felt that for many years people both within and outside political groupings have been bipartisan about the Northern Ireland issue, and it is very unhelpful not to be so. But I think that all political parties have their mavericks, and Mr. Winterton is perhaps the Dennis Skinner of the Tory Party; he is full of sound and fury, but he signifies very little.
Lord Blease: My Lords, may I ask the noble Earl whether he has noted that since his appointment as a Minister of State for Northern Ireland this is my first opportunity to face him across the Floor of the House? Will the noble Earl the Minister accept that this side of the House sincerely appreciates and understands the acute and testing difficulties of his new position and his parliamentary brief? May I further ask the Minister whether he is aware of the great concern among community organisations about the financial aspects of the Action for Community Employment Scheme, and whether he will consider the position so as to allow some flexibility to enable community organisations, as well as statutory bodies and local government bodies, to compete in the scheme?
The Earl of Gowrie: My Lords, I am grateful for the remarks directed to me by the noble Lord, Lord Blease, and I am even more grateful for all the work that he is doing outside Parliament, as well as in Parliament, for the Province. I believe that the Action for Community Employment Scheme is sufficiently flexible to cater for a very wide variety of projects, such as those involving building, environmental improvement, community service, research, exhibitions and the rest. We have found not only voluntary bodies coming forward, but private organisations as well.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, may I ask the noble Earl why in the previous Written Answer, to which reference is made in my noble friend's Question, it was stated that the sponsors receive a lower percentage because it was desired that they should show a genuine commitment? Why should that be asked of organisations in Northern Ireland when it does not apply to organisations in the rest of the United Kingdom? Does it imply a feeling that the organisations in Northern Ireland do not have the same sincerity as those in other parts of the United Kingdom?
The Earl of Gowrie: No, my Lords, it does not. The noble Lord will be aware not only of some differences between the system in Northern Ireland and that in the rest of the United Kingdom, but also of the fact that very many organisations and businesses there receive very high existing United Kingdom central subsidy and subvention. Therefore it was felt that it would be effective if some contribution of this kind were made by private sponsorship.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: My Lords, will my noble friend agree that perhaps the difference to which reference has just been made could be attributed to the remarkable co-operation and help from the trade unions in Northern Ireland?
The Earl of Gowrie: My Lords, I am very glad to agree with that remark, and I have had many meetings with trade unions in Northern Ireland which certainly confirm my noble friend's point of view. My noble friend the Leader of the House points out that I should not have mentioned a Member of another place by name. I apologise for doing that, but I in no way retract anything else that I said.
Lord Brockway: My Lords, reverting to the supplementary question of my noble friend Lady Ewart-Biggs, may I ask the noble Earl whether he would not agree that some action towards ending unemployment in Northern Ireland—the highest in the United Kingdom—and rectifying the appalling housing conditions would be a real contribution to a settlement of the conflict there? Is the noble Earl aware that recently I met a trade union official who had met a Protestant shop steward in the shipbuilding works in Belfast and the shop steward of a Catholic factory in Londonderry, and that they were both completely united in their social and economic demands? Is it not those social issues on which we should be concentrating?
The Earl of Gowrie: My Lords, not only should we be concentrating on those issues: we are concentrating on them. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State, as well as myself and other Ministers, have constantly reiterated the danger facing the economy of Northern Ireland and the necessity to restore political stability there in order to encourage inward investment, and to encourage, too, the British taxpayer, who pays so much of the subvention to Northern Ireland. We are pleased that this message is getting through.
Baroness Ewart-Biggs: My Lords, would the Minister not agree that the work being done by the community groups in Northern Ireland is essential to the policy that we have had in Northern Ireland, and that they themselves feel that there is an unfair discrimination in this case? Would he therefore not agree that we should give them all the help and encouragement that we possibly can?
The Earl of Gowrie: My Lords, I certainly agree with the latter point, but the simple fact is that there is not unfair discrimination in the case of Northern Ireland. There is discrimination: the discrimination is that Northern Ireland gets more money comparably than any other part of the United Kingdom.
Lord Elwyn-Jones: My Lords, in regard to the earlier reference to two honourable gentlemen in another place, would it not have been more appropriate and in accordance with custom for the noble Earl to have withdrawn the criticism of those named Members of another place? Would that not have been in accordance with the custom of this House?
The Earl of Gowrie: My Lords, I am delighted to do that, but, of course, I had to answer a question put to me by my noble friend.

Farm and Horticulture Development Regulations 1981
3.21 p.m.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers rose to move, That the draft regulations laid before the House on 4th November be approved.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move that the Agriculture and Horticulture Grant (Variation) Scheme 1981, which was laid before this House on 4th November, be approved. It might be convenient if, at the same time as we deal with the Agriculture and Horticulture Grant (Variation) Scheme 1981, we consider the Farm and Horticulture Development Regulations 1981, the Agriculture and Horticulture Development (Amendment) Regulations 1981 and the Farm Structure (Payments to Outgoers) (Variation) Scheme 1981, which were also laid before the House on 4th November.
Three of the statutory instruments before your Lordships introduce in the United Kingdom the restrictions on investment aids for milk and pig production. The remaining statutory instrument, the Farm Structure (Payments to Outgoers) (Variation) Scheme, is concerned with payments of grants to ageing farmers. This is the simplest statutory instrument, so I will deal with it first and, so to speak, get it out of the way.
As long ago as 1967 we introduced a scheme to encourage older farmers to retire and to allow their farms to be amalgamated to form larger units. Soon after we joined the European Community, similar arrangements were adopted which we had to implement. Because farms in the United Kingdom are generally significantly larger and more economically viable than elsewhere in the European Community, there has been no great interest in these arrangements. But under the terms of European Community Directive 72/160 we are obliged to operate a scheme of incentives to older farmers who want to give up their farms for amalgamation. The statutory instrument which we have before us today makes very minor amendments to the principal scheme which Parliament approved in 1976, and will have no practical effect on the farmers involved in the scheme. They will still be able to qualify for the grants on the same conditions as before.
I would now come to the other three statutory instruments. Many of your Lordships will recall that the price package which was agreed by the Council of Ministers in April of this year included a number of amendments to European Communities Directive 72/159 on the modernisation of farms. This is the directive which requires us to have the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Scheme, which is the EEC scheme, and permits us to have the Agriculture and Horticulture Grant (Variation) Scheme, which is our national scheme. The changes, which were agreed by Ministers, are introduced partly by new European Community regulations and partly by a new directive which amends Directive 72/159. European Community regulations, as opposed to directives, are directly applicable in all members states, and so, technically, they need not be incorporated into our domestic legislation. But if we did not amend our own legislation it would be misleading and incomplete. We also wanted to clarify certain points. In addition, we had to implement the amendments which have been introduced by means of a European Community directive which does not have effect in member states without national legislation. These are the main purposes of the remaining three statutory instruments which are before your Lordships.
As many of your Lordships know, for some years there have been certain limitations on the extent to which investment in pig production could be grant-aided. These limits were on a financial basis, and they were complicated to administer. The Council of Ministers decided last April to replace them with new physical restrictions which we believe will have much the same effect in the United Kingdom as those they replace.
Another important decision, which was also made last April by the Council of Ministers, was to limit assistance to dairy enterprises. In future, grant under the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Scheme and the Farm and Horticulture Development Scheme will be paid only on that part of the investment which is needed for a maximum of 40 cows per labour unit in the case of businesses with up to one and a half labour units (in other words, up to 60 cows). For businesses which already have more than one and a half labour units, an increase in the herd size of not more than 15 per cent. is permitted. Businesses which
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expand beyond these limits will be eligible for aid on the relevant proportion of their investment.
However, under the Agriculture and Horticulture Grant Scheme aid will be limited to businesses with not more than 40 cows. Any business which is expanding above, or which already exceeds, this limit will not receive any aid under this scheme. The sort of investments which will be covered by these restrictions are milking parlours, dairies, buildings which house dairy cows (including fixtures and fittings) and so on. We shall not be excluding from grant-aid items like buildings for young stock or general purpose investments such as fencing, drainage, machinery sheds, et cetera, even if they are on specialist dairy farms. We shall continue to exclude aid for the purchase of dairy cows.
There are other changes which were agreed by the agriculture Ministers and which are incorporated in amendments to Directive 72/159, and which we have to implement by means of domestic legislation. The principal objective of the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Scheme is to help farmers increase their income through a programme of planned investment. Farmers whose incomes are already well above the average non-agricultural income cannot qualify, but those whose incomes are only just above that level may do so. One of the amendments in the statutory instruments sets out more precisely which of these farmers may qualify and stipulates that they may receive only two-thirds of the normal grant.
At present there are two types of investment limit on which grant may be paid. One is a limit per labour unit—per person on the farm—and this is being significantly increased. The other is an overall limit per farm business. The present ones we introduced ourselves last year. The one applying to the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Scheme is now being imposed, at a very slightly lower level, by the European Community. The one applying to the Agriculture and Horticulture Grant Scheme is unchanged. The statutory instruments implement these changes. A small alteration to the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Scheme will be the inclusion of forestry income in the provisions relating to the achievement of what is known as the comparable income.
The three statutory instruments which are before your Lordships implement these changes, but, with one exception, they do not amend the coverage of the schemes or the rates of grant. The exception is, I am glad to say, the extension of grant aid to the provision of permanently-sited durable structures cladded with plastic which are to be used for agricultural purposes. We already pay grant on such structures to horticultural enterprises; but plastic-clad structures are now being used for housing animals, particularly sheep, and we considered it only right to aid them on the same basis as for horticultural purposes.
Most of the changes to these grant schemes are technical, and I have done my best to describe them to your Lordships. They will, however, come as no surprise to the farmers who will be affected by them. The decisions which were taken by my right honourable friend the Minister and his colleagues in the Council of Ministers earlier this year were fully publicised at the time, and the farming unions in the United Kingdom

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have been kept informed of progress. My Lords, I commend these schemes to your Lordships House, and I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft regulations laid before the House on 4th November be approved.—(Earl Ferrers.)
3.30 p.m.
Lord Bishopston: My Lords, the House will be grateful to the Minister for the information that he has provided in moving these four orders. He said at the end of his speech that in many ways these are technical matters. But they go beyond that; they concern matters of principle with regard to our relationship with the Community itself and the CAP. I am not sure that the House will appreciate the reasons for the orders being brought forward, because there has been criticism from all sides in the industry and from the National Farmers' Union about the possible effects. With regard to the dairy sector, the National Farmers' Union say that they "deeply regret" the decision implemented by these orders of restrictions on capital grant aid for dairy farming. The main aid will be limited to smaller dairy herds and to an amount which will not increase the herd size beyond 60 cows for the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Schemes (AHDS) and 40 cows for national investment grants (AHGS).
It seems extraordinary, as we have the most efficient and productive dairy sector, that measures should be taken by the EEC to restrain our output—and that is what these orders are all about—and, at the same time, to encourage the smaller, less efficient farmers and producers in other parts of the Community. I am sure that there will be no disagreement on those comments. As the Minister has said, last year a European Community document set out proposals to restrict investment aid in milk and pig production and these proposals form part of the larger package of structural resources agreed with the Council of Ministers in April of this year.
These three orders before us today implement the measures in the United Kingdom; for, of course, we have to comply with their terms. But I agree with the Minister that it is helpful that, although we may not have to do so, we are amending the legislation accordingly. The main changes include the restrictions, as the Minister has mentioned, in respect of milk and pig production. Under the AHGS, it seems, aid will be limited to businesses with not more than 40 cows. It is well known that we have larger dairy herds, and we shall be at a disadvantage because of it. We are efficient producers of milk, not only with the larger dairy herds but with regard to the average output per animal. These are important points because they mean that we can have a much higher output generally.
For this reason the Community wants to restrain us because there is a surplus in the Community. But the surplus is not of our making. We produce just about enough of our liquid needs, as noble Lords will know, and less than our needs for manufacturing purposes. So there is scope for even higher productivity in this country at the expense of the less efficient production elsewhere. I think that many will ask why the British farmers and producers should be
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restrained and the less efficient in the Community not only be protected but encouraged by the restraints of the EEC directives and by the effect of these orders on our industry. It would be interesting to hear from the Minister a few facts about our average herd size and our production per animal compared with other member states and the effect of these orders. There has been over a period of time a number of restraints to reduce or eliminate surplus milk production and no one would argue about that; but what I am saying is that, although this order is not too serious, it is a step in the wrong direction.
Some recognition of the efficiency of British milk production and the distribution scheme was shown by the Community's acceptance that the Milk Marketing Board should continue to operate. This is a rare tribute to our producers, distributors and consumers. It was an achievement to have got that continuation made possible.
With regard to pig production, the curtailment of grants in the pig sector is also a cause for concern to the pig industry and to the National Farmers' Union for it removes the existing financial limits on pig investment and enables future grants to be determined on the basis of pig numbers. Here again the United Kingdom industry is discriminated against more strongly, our pig herd size, like the dairy herd size, being higher than in the rest of the Community, as grant aid will be available only up to 85 breeding pig herds or 550 fattening pig places per farm. The Government, I think, should have sought to apply to the EEC for the discretionary investment exemption of up to 1,000 fattening pig places under the AHDS. Maybe the Minister of State will comment on that assertion.
As we all know, the pig industry has for many years been beset with problems. I recall in my days in the Ministry with successive Ministers, the efforts we made from time to time (sometimes regarded as being marginally legal within the Community) to help the industry. Investment overall has not been high enough. These orders do not encourage investment and may indeed inhibit progress in a sector of our industry where we are only 75 per cent. self-sufficient in pig meat and therefore we are capable of much greater production. Instead, there are these limits which will discourage high productivity.
Although the outlook is more hopeful generally for the pig sector, I think we can do without this latest dose of cold water from the Government and the EEC. I appreciate that there are some aspects which are still open to grant aid. I am thinking of the general purpose items such as the Minister has mentioned: the cladding of buildings, for instance, and the requirement for 35 per cent. of feedingstuffs to be produced by the business. Will the Minister comment on the position of farmers who, following the dropping of the Government's former requirement of prior approval, may be caught out by the changes, not yet having got approval of their development plan involving investment in pigs?
We are all proud of the efficiency and productivity of our agricultural industry. Most of us would agree that if the productivity and efficiency of agriculture were seen in other parts of the economy and in other industries this country would be facing fewer problems

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than we face today. It is essential that in our dealings with Brussels our Ministers continue to stress the point that, if changes are necessary within the Community as a whole, they should take an example from our producers and, as I said last week on another item concerning the Community, accept changes which are related to the highest common denominator and not otherwise. I hope the Minister can assure the House that in future dealings the Government will stand firm and look after British interests, although we recognise the progress towards that interest which the Government have made in the past.
3.38 p.m.
Lord Lloyd of Kilgerran: My Lords, may I join in thanking the Minister for so carefully and well describing the content of these many regulations. I do not propose to enter into the technical matters in the way that was done so eloquently by the noble Lord who has just sat down. I should, however, like to refer to one theme which, it seems to me, formed the basis of the Minister's account of these regulations. He said that these regulations before the House were intended to help farmers to increase their income by planned investment. He also said that these regulations will come as no surprise to farmers. I am wondering about the farmers who come from the parts of Wales with which I am familiar, and whether these regulations are sufficiently understood and have been made clear by the Department of which he is the Minister, to the small farmer whom it is intended to help.
Can the noble Earl say whether there are easily available pamphlets in simple form to summarise the regulations in such rural areas as those parts of West Wales? I can understand that the large organisations, the farmers' unions, have no doubt sent round to all their members accounts of these regulations before they were published, and also the EEC regulation 72/159 to which he referred. This is not a simple document to understand. May I, therefore, ask the Minister to give an assurance that the widest publicity will be given to these regulations, particularly in Wales, to help farmers, as he said, to increase their income by planned investment?
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: My Lords, I should like to say one or two words very briefly. I appreciate entirely the problem facing our Minister of Agriculture when he has to go to Brussels and argue our case, because our case is a simple one. We farmers in this country have tried—and tried very successfully, as the noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, said—for a number of years to improve the techniques and the production, to lower costs, employ fewer people and at the same time increase the amount of land under cultivation and the amount produced. In this case we are referring to dairy and pigs. We have been extremely successful.
If the one task you are asked to do—and it is not easy, as we all know—is successful, and you do it, it is a bit hard to find that these regulations from Brussels penalise the very thing that has been done; in other words, to enlarge the amount of production and the areas under cultivation, to reduce the numbers employed
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and to produce everything as efficiently and cheaply as possible. I know that in Europe they are struggling with a peasant agriculture. Whether in Germany, France, Belgium, Holland or wherever it is, there is tremendous pressure from their farmers, who are saying: "We are only small farmers; we have not got the equipment or the means of production that they have in other parts, and particularly in the United Kingdom. Therefore, we want help to keep small and to get as much money as possible." That is exactly the opposite of what we have tried to do and what we have done very successfully.
It is hard on the dairy farmers. An enormous number of people have gone out of dairying in this country, as any farmer in your Lordships' House knows very well. Yet our production is first class; it has not gone down and we have been able to get as much milk on to the market as we did when we had certainly at least another third more people in the dairy industry. So, as I say, I think it is a little hard on people and while I do understand the Minister's probems—and I am a strong supporter of the Common Market, so I must not be too critical—I realise that he is facing a difficulty. But if this has to happen and if it hits our dairy and pig industries badly, then our Ministry has to make some sort of gesture towards those people which will compensate them for what they have had to do because of the CAP or the Brussels regulations.
Speaking as a farmer, I am grateful to the Government for the many ways in which they do help us and for the many ways in which they fight our battles in Brussels. I am confident that they will go on doing so, but these particular orders for the time being are just a little harsh on two sections of our dairy industry.
Lord John-Mackie: My Lords, I should like to say a few words on the Farm Structure (Variation) Scheme which the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, thought could be got out of the way fairly quickly. If the other three are to be a help for we farmers, as the noble Baroness, Lady Elliot, has just said, I will accept with gratitude. But as the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, will know, I have been in correspondence with him on the question of farm structure.
This order is to vary the payment to farmers for amalgamating farms. I farm 22 miles from your Lordships' House and round our village in less than 10 years we have had three nice farms fragmented, mainly for reasons of finance and getting the most out of them. The most recent example was a very nice 150-acre farm with a nice farmhouse, two cottages and a beautiful set of buildings: that was sold piecemeal recently and broken up completely. I think this is a very bad thing indeed.
I understand the attitude of the noble Earl and I can fully appreciate his difficulties, but the Ministry have a very negative attitude towards this. If we can pay grants for amalgamating farms, would it not be possible to give some help towards preventing the fragmentation of farms? It is quite tragic to see this farm at the foot of my road broken up and bought by developers and such people, the farm buildings and house sold to one person, with no land at all, or very little—perhaps a few acres to keep horses—and they will go completely out of use in spite of recent grants having been given, as I happen to know, for the buildings,

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for a grain store and another store on the farm. I think this is quite ridiculous. The Minister should take a much more positive attitude and see if something can be done to stop the fragmentation of farms.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: My Lords, I wish the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, had remained behind to ask a few questions about the economics of agriculture. What he was talking about with the Office of Manpower Economics is surely chicken-feed compared with the intricate administration behind these regulations. The Minister of State introduced these regulations, I thought, in a spirit of resignation. I can quite understand, on this of all days, that there is a spirit of resignation in the minds of Ministers and of noble Lords on the Benches opposite.
I think that aid to agriculture has become one of the most intricate mysteries of public administration in modern times. How can the public grasp—how indeed can noble Lords in this House grasp—the real significance of regulations of this kind? I would say in passing that if industry generally had had the cosseting, the care and the public money which agriculture has had over the last 30 years probably our industry might be more efficient than it is. There is no doubt that we have treated agriculture as a special case almost to the exclusion of real necessity for industrial need elsewhere.
However, since we are so conscious both of manpower considerations and of public expenditure, I would welcome any information that the Minister can give us about the background to these regulations. Will they save money, or do they mean spending more money? If they are largely technical, as the Minister of State said, are we then having a complex exchange of one form of regulations for another, to little purpose other than to comply with the regulations of the Economic Community? Do all the forms have to be changed? Does there have to be much more explanation given, as the noble Lord on the Liberal Benches said a moment ago? Do the farmers understand this? Have we here another problem of people not taking up their claims and not knowing what they are entitled to? Should there be an advisory service to farmers to stimulate them to ask for the public money they do not know they are entitled to?
This is a mystery world and, as a layman. I am anxious to know more about it. The only interest I have to declare is that on several occasions I was chairman of the Agriculture Farm Price Review in a Labour Government. I was the arbiter between the Minister of Agriculture on the one hand and the Treasury watchdogs and those in control of the purse, on the other. That was an interesting experience in arbitration.
Quite seriously, does it take more clerical officers or executive officers to bring about the administrative changes that are needed to implement the paragraph which I see here? It reads:
"For the purposes of this regulation 'pig place' means the facilities necessary to house one fattening pig; save that where the herd includes breeding sows, the facilities necessary to house one such sow shall be taken to be the equivalent of 6·5 pig places.".
There is a sum for you. I am sure that there has to be a clerical officer, with an executive officer to make
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sure that the clerical officer gets his fractions right, and we have an interesting study in the economics of agriculture. I shall not bore the House with other quotations from these regulations.
What I noticed at the beginning of this debate—and I am in a rather playful mood this afternoon—was the exodus of noble Lords from the Chamber when these regulations came forward. Was it the farmers leaving, because they felt too embarrassed to remain behind, or have all the non-farmers gone and left all the farmers behind? It is an interesting study in manpower in this Chamber. At the present moment, who represents what on these regulations? I claim to represent the public interest, which is always a good alibi when you are poking your nose into other people's business.
But, seriously, this is an astonishing set of documents and if they are only to comply with the directives of the EEC one might ask for an exemption clause. If the changes are technical and will lead to unnecessary administrative expense, could we be excused from making them? Is that impossible? I think that I have said enough. Probably, laymen should not remain behind when regulations on agriculture are under discussion, because this is more complicated than taxation which everybody grumbles about. After all, it has been said that anybody who can fill up a football pool coupon can do anything that public administrations can ever require them to do.
Lord John-Mackie: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, may I say this: We were warned about making off-the-cuff calculations, but I have the feeling that in one year British Leyland has had three times what agriculture gets.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: My Lords, I would not know the grand total of public money that has gone into British Leyland. On the whole, there is not the equivalent of British Leyland in the agricultural industry. They are mostly small businesses, and we are all interested in small businesses and in giving aid to them now. All right, then. Those who want aid for small businesses might take up all the grants given to agriculture at the present time and see whether there is any precedent there that might help.
I ask your Lordships to look at paragraph 4 of the Agriculture and Horticulture Development (Amendment) Regulations, which reads:
"(b) that the nature or structure of the business is such as to place at risk the maintenance of an earned income at the level of the said comparable income, and that the earned income per labour unit reasonably required under the existing system of production is not greater than 120 per cent. of the said comparable income.".
I am sure that small businesses would like to claim under that paragraph. There is probably money there, if they only knew where to find it. I really should like to see how farmers can cope with all the questionnaires that have to be sent out, and answered in order to qualify for these grants. I wonder whether agriculture ought to be asked to simplify its claims upon the public purse, so that the public understand rather more clearly what farmers get out of the state for all the things which they do, and which they should be doing, in the ordinary course of their business.

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My personal observation is that, on the whole, agriculture is a pretty prosperous industry.
Lord John-Mackie: My Lords, I must apologise for rising a second time—
Several noble Lords: Order!
3.55 p.m.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, is always fun to listen to. He said that he was in a playful mood. He began by saying that I got up in a spirit of resignation. I assure the noble Lord that I have no intention of resigning. It may be that others will dispose of one, but, in that respect, I do not think the noble Lord will have much joy. I think he really meant a spirit of resignation that—for some extraordinary reason in his eyes—things are not as pleasant as they might be. But I assure the noble Lord that the Government are entirely happy with the state of affairs in which they are trying to improve matters.
I was sorry that the noble Lord referred to the exodus which happened as soon as I got up. I noticed that, and I assure the noble Lord that it was not the farmers who were leaving, nor, indeed, the non-farmers specifically. I thought that, because it was I who was rising, that indicated to others that it would be more agreeable to leave the Chamber.
I thought that the noble Lord opened up his soul a little when he said that the only thing he had done was to be chairman of the Agricultural Farm Price Review. Just before he said that, he asked whether there should be an Agricultural Development Advisory Service. That is one of the most extraordinary things for anyone in the noble Lord's position to ask, because the Agricultural Development Advisory Service has been going for, I think, about 40 years, certainly under a different name. It is one of the most remarkable organisations, which spends its time advising farmers on how to improve their land, how to improve their work and how to get better productivity. But the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, is to produce Bills the whole time, and he is producing another one today to stop the export of agricultural produce in one form or another.
The noble Lord, Lord Houghton, asked whether this matter would involve more civil servants. I can tell the noble Lord that there were 15,000 civil servants in the Ministry of Agriculture in 1978, when the party of which he is a distinguished member was in power, and there are 13,000 now, in 1981. So the number of civil servants has gone down, and I do not think that that is a cause for anxiety.
Then the noble Lord said that he wondered whether small businesses had the advantage of funds such as are available to agriculture. I would only tell him that, since 1979, the present Government have introduced 70 different measures to increase the capacity of small businesses. So they have not been left out. If the noble Lord asks whether all the small businessmen know what kind of grants are available to them, I can only say that I do not know whether each one knows of the 70 that are available to him.
But as regards the burden of the noble Lord's remarks, I would only say this. Of course these
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subjects and these documents are complicated. If he finds difficulty in understanding them, I think we shall all find difficulty. But that is the nature of the legality of the system. Any form of agricultural support always was complicated. I remember, before we entered the European Community, finding great difficulty in understanding the ways in which some of the deficiency payments operated. So there is nothing new in that.
To come to the slightly more serious remarks which were directed to me about these amendments, I was quite glad when the noble Lord, Lord Lloyd of Kilgerran, said that he would not go into the technical detail which the noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, had gone into. For that, I am very grateful and I much appreciate his co-operation. I would put him straight on one point. He asked what effect this would have on the small farmers of Wales, for whom he said I am responsible. I assure him that it is, in fact, the Secretary of State for Wales who is responsible and not the Minister of Agriculture. But I can also assure him that the Agricultural Development Advisory Service, of which he will know a great deal, even if the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, does not, is there to advise the farmers of Wales—and will do so—as to their rights and as to the possibilities under these schemes. Explanatory leaflets will be available to farmers from the Ministry's divisional offices, and they will explain the details of the schemes.
The noble Lord, Lord John-Mackie, said it was a pity that in some places farms were being broken up. I can understand his feelings over that. Of course, the usual complaint is that farms are being amalgamated and being made too big. It is quite interesting to hear that the noble Lord, Lord John-Mackie, now complains when farms are being made smaller. I think it would be wrong for the Government to take individual action over anything like that; indeed, we do not have any powers to do so. Inevitably, it is a case for the market. There are occasions when farms will be amalgamated, as well as occasions when farms will be made smaller. That is the nature of the agricultural scene.
The noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, as well as my noble friend Lady Elliot of Harwood, said that these statutory instruments were hard on dairying. There is no doubt that they will have an effect on dairying. The noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, quite rightly said that they will affect the output of British dairy farms and that this was not fair. I sympathise with his viewpoint, but one has to accept the fact that as a member of the European Community we have a collective responsibility for surpluses which arise. We have a collective responsibility so far as we have to pay for the surpluses, or subscribe very substantially towards them. We have a collective responsibility for how to dispose of the surpluses.
What my right honourable friend has always said is that the European Community, if there is to be penalising, should penalise those people who create the surpluses—and the increasing surpluses. That is why he has always been against the co-responsibility levy, as it has been suggested it should be applied, because it would discriminate against certain of the larger farms. But I can tell the noble Lord that the average dairy herd on the continent is about 13 whereas the average dairy

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herd in the United Kingdom is 51. But over 40 per cent. of the dairy farms in England have fewer than 40 cows. Therefore they will be able to qualify for the national grant. The corresponding figure for Northern Ireland is 70 per cent., for Wales 60 per cent. and for Scotland 37 per cent. In the United Kingdom as a whole, 25 per cent. of herds have fewer than 20 cows. So this is trying to avoid an increase in yields of milk produced by farms which are of larger size. I know that it is inevitable that where there is a surplus of milk something has to be done to restrict it totally. Inevitably, also, in a package of this nature one has to agree within the Council of Ministers various items which may affect countries differently. It is an agreement, and it is an agreement of a package. I think the noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, will realise from that that a number of the smaller farms will still be able to obtain grant for this and that the larger farms will not. But there is nothing to stop the larger farms from making their own improvements without grant.
Lord Bishopston: My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. I am sure he will realise that if we are to overcome some of the problems of surpluses and high costs, and many of the criticisms of the Community itself, we have to ensure that agriculture and food production take place in those areas where they are most efficient, otherwise the growing concern and criticism of the Community will continue.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the noble Lord is of course perfectly right, and he opens up a wide discussion which it would be inappropriate to start upon now. All I would say to him is that those who are the most efficient are, in a way, those whose existence can be justified on financial grounds, but that there are other factors which have to be taken into account. The noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, referred to discrimination against the United Kingdom in pig places. In 1979. about 75 per cent. of United Kingdom holdings had fewer than 400 pigs and less than 9 per cent. had between 400 and 1,000 pigs. The average pig herd in the United Kingdom consists of fewer than 200 pigs and most pig farmers therefore will still be able to qualify for grant.
The noble Lord also referred to pig and dairy enterprises which will be caught by the new restrictions. Farmers who already have an approved development plan, which includes investments in these various sectors, will be exempt, but anyone who wishes to vary an approved plan to include investments of this kind will have to comply with the new restrictions. Under the agriculture and horticulture grant scheme, farmers who have started work or incurred expenditure on dairy or pig investments will be exempt from the new restrictions, provided that they can produce evidence that they had entered into a legally binding commitment to incur the expenditure before 30th November.
I hope that I have answered most of the questions which were put to me. I realise that in some ways certain noble Lords would have preferred a different set of statutory instruments. I would merely repeat what I said earlier: that we are part of the Community and that to effect a price package which has to
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allow for a reasonable return for the farmers without permitting an over-production and a surplus it is necessary to come to corporate decisions. If I may once more refer to the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, I would say that the success of the common agricultural policy, despite all its difficulties and complexities, is that ever since its inception we in the European Community have been able to have an abundance of food at reasonably cheap prices and of a total variety. That is a small price to pay for these statutory instruments.
Lord Vernon: My Lords, before the noble Earl sits down, may I put this point to him? He said that there is a surplus (which is true) of milk products in the Community as a whole. It is also true that there is not a surplus within the United Kingdom and that we have to import quite a large proportion of our dairy products. So this particular order will discriminate against the United Kingdom dairy industry.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I do not think it will discriminate against the United Kingdom. It will cover each state equally, in so far as the grant which may be payable refers to the same size of farms, whatever state one is in. In that respect, therefore, it is uniform. Of course I accept that it does not apply to the larger farms and that in that way it is discriminatory. But it does not apply to the larger farms in any other country, either.
Viscount Massereene and Ferrard: My Lords, before my noble friend sits down, may I ask him whether this means that the Government are asking the larger dairy and pig farmers to reduce their numbers of cows and pigs to the numbers kept by the small farmer who will get the grant? We in this county have a most efficient agricultural industry which equals the record of Denmark. One man on the land in England produces food for 27 people, whereas one man on the land in France produces food for only 8 people and one man on the land in Germany produces food for only 9 people. This is, without doubt, discriminatory. It will affect the great efficiency of agriculture in this country. I agree that we do not want surpluses, but why should we pander to the desire of the French Government for the agricultural vote, which is very big in France?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I have a remarkable respect for my noble friend's mental acrobatics. He asked whether this means that the large dairy farms have got to reduce the numbers of dairy cows down to the size at which they can claim the grant. I never said anything of the kind. The statutory instruments do not say anything of the kind. I cannot understand how my noble friend could have begun to think such a thing. If, however, he thought it—and he clearly did—I can tell him that he is wrong. Indeed, I went further than that. I said that it does not stop larger farmers from expanding their dairy herds; they can do so. But they will do so without the benefit of the Government grant or without the benefit of a European Community grant, simply because there is a surplus of this product and it is considered unwise to encourage those who are already big producers to get even bigger. But if they

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wish to do so out of their own funds, they are entitled to do so.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Farm Structure (Payments to Outgoers) (Variation) Scheme 1981
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers rose to move, That the draft scheme laid before the House on 4th November be approved.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft scheme laid before the House on 4th November be approved.—(Earl Ferrers.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Agriculture and Horticulture Development (Amendment) Regulations 1981
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers rose to move, That the draft regulations laid before the House on 4th November be approved.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft regulations laid before the House on 4th November be approved.—(Earl Ferrers.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Agriculture and Horticulture Grant (Variation) Scheme 1981
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers rose to move, That the scheme laid before the House on 4th November be approved.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the scheme laid before the House on 4th November be approved.—(Earl Ferrers.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

London Docklands Development Corporation (Vesting of Land) (Tower Hamlets London Borough Council) Order 1981
4.12 p.m.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon rose to move, That the order laid before the House on 10th July be approved.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move that the London Docklands Development Corporation (Vesting of Land) (Tower Hamlets London Borough Council) Order 1981, a copy of which was laid before this House in July, be approved. With the leave of the House, I should like at the same time to speak to the next order, the London Docklands Development Corporation (Vesting of Land) (Greater London Council No. 2) Order 1981.
On 1st July, the House approved orders setting up the London Docklands Development Corporation and vesting in it certain lands owned by the Greater London Council and the Port of London Authority. Two further orders were approved by this House on 31st July vesting in the corporation lands owned by the London boroughs of Southwark and Newham. In the debate on those latter orders, I told the House that
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further orders had been laid, affecting some 63 acres of land belonging to Tower Hamlets Borough Council and some 44 acres owned by the Greater London Council. It is with those two orders that we are concerned today.
The Local Government Planning and Land Act 1980 enables urban development corporations to acquire land compulsorily and, in the case of publicly-owned land, by means of a vesting order, subject to affirmation orders in both Houses of Parliament. The principal purpose of the latter provision is to enable UDCs to have enough land at the outset for their own early projects and to prepare a range of sites for private developments. The corporation put forward proposals for the early acquisition of some 850 acres of publicly-owned land. Orders vesting 278 acres of Port of London Authority land in the West India and Millwall Docks and in Beckton; 15 acres of GLC land on various sites; 142 acres of Southwark land and 87 acres of Newham land have already been approved.
The corporation are also negotiating for the purchase of land from the British Gas Corporation, British Rail, the Thames Water Authority and the Central Electricity Generating Board. The Government's case for the orders is that, to be effective, the London Docklands Development Corporation needs to own a substantial amount of vacant or underused land on which it can carry out any necessary preliminary work and then release it for development. That is a key component of its strategy. Most such sites are in public ownership and several of them are included in the orders before us.
Your Lordships may recall that a Government proposal to set up a development corporation was considered by a Select Committee of this House. That committee heard evidence and sat for 50 days, producing a unanimous report which endorsed the Government's proposals with the exception of the proposed change in the boundary. Although that committee did not consider the specific proposals for vesting land, they clearly accepted the need to vest land in the corporation.
The two orders before us today were laid on the 10th July and were open to petitions for a period of 14 days. One petition against the GLC order by the Greater London Council was received; two petitions were received against the Tower Hamlets Order, from Tower Hamlets Borough Council and the Association of Wapping Organisations, which is a local community group. In their petition, the Greater London Council argued that the vesting order would deprive the council of potential sites for public sector housing and that the inclusion of various plots would prejudice the implementation of various development proposals which were envisaged. Tower Hamlets argued that the vesting order would deprive them of land which they proposed to use for public sector housing; that the corporation already had sufficient land for its purpose; that the order would frustrate a civil engineering contract for the reclamation of various parts of the London Docks complex; and, finally, that in any event the order made no provision to indemnify the council against the obligations arising from that contract. The Association of Wapping Organisations argued that the vesting order would deprive the local community of new public sector housing and that the

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community facilities enjoyed on some of the plots proposed for vesting would be taken from them.
In response, the Secretary of State pointed out that the question of the availability of housing land had been considered during the lengthy proceedings on the designation order; that assurances had been given to all three bodies concerning particular points which they had raised, and that the development corporation would take over the reclamation contract. Compensation will be paid to Tower Hamlets for any loss suffered as a result of a vesting order in accordance with the provisions of the compensation code.
The three petitions and the Secretary of State's representations we considered by a Hybrid Instruments Committee of your Lordships' House. The committee's report was published and is available in the Library. In it, the committee took the view that, so far as the land for housing was concerned, that matter had already been sufficiently dealt with by the Select Committee. The committee also felt that the assurance given by the Secretary of State and the corporation adequately met the remaining points raised by the petitioners and that therefore no substantial ground of complaint remained.
The way is therefore open for both orders to be considered by the House this afternoon. The development corporation has the task of regenerating the whole of Docklands, and it is essential to that task that the corporation should have an assortment of sites in all parts of the urban development area as a base from which to pursue its activities. These two orders will finally give the corporation that broad base, and I commend them to the House this afternoon. I beg to move.
Moved, That the order laid before the House on 10th July be approved.—(The Earl of Avon.)
Lord Bishopston: My Lords, having just finished in the previous debate as a spokesman on agriculture and horticulture and rural subjects, I might have said that I was going to shake the rural mud off my boots to enter our capital city, but, as the noble Earl has said, the area with which we are concerned is one of great regeneration, and I suspect that there may be just as much mud there as anywhere else.
I am sure that noble Lords will be grateful for the detailed way in which the noble Earl has introduced these two orders. The orders provide the means by which areas of land now under the control of the elected local authorities are transferred to a UDC appointed to carry out the task given to it. The areas concerned may not be small, especially when the remaining acreage is borne in mind. As we know, a number of orders have come before this House, and indeed another place, since the Secretary of State laid the London Docklands Development Corporation Area and Constitution Order 1980 in November of last year. The noble Earl has been good enough to detail some of the background of the orders affecting the corporation, and your Lordships will know that we discussed an order on 1st July, last when the matter was given detailed consideration after the Select Committee set up by this House had spent 10 weeks going into the aspects of concern. Indeed, I think 42 days were spent
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taking evidence and seeing the area before reporting to this House on 5th June.
I mention these brief factors because they indicate that general concern was expressed about the way in which the UDC was conceived and born, and, indeed—and this is most important—how it might proceed. The case for the setting up of the UDC was that the scale and the severity of the decline of the Docklands was such as to create a national rather than a local problem. I will not go into some of the steps taken earlier about the Docklands Joint Committee—a body with representative members and in partnership with Government and other agencies. Indeed, I do not need to detail the objections raised by local authorities and others who feared that an appointed UDC was less desirable than having, the work done by the co-ordinated action of democratically elected local authorities. I refer to these aspects of the scheme's history only because it is important, I think, to note that when progress reports are made to your Lordships' House we are aware not only of the controversy surrounding the birth of the UDC but of those aspects which give cause for concern.
The fact is that the UDC has been established and it will be the vehicle, whether we like it or not, whereby change and improvement and new life will be brought into this blighted area. The LDDC has already put forward proposals for the early acquisition of publicly owned land in Southwark and Newham. I think this was the subject of the last two orders in which I was involved. Other land relates to that of the PLA, the British Gas Corporation, the CEGB and British Rail. While it is essential that enough land is acquired for there to be co-ordinated preparation, I think it is essential also that the plans and the proposals of the LDDC are not looked at in isolation but with regard to the problems and the policies of the surrounding areas under the control of the local councils, who also have statutory rights and obligations.
With this in mind, I would ask the Minister if he can say, with regard to the areas and the use of the land covered in these orders, not only how much land is to be taken from Tower Hamlets and the GLC but what areas are left to them. Can he say with regard to the proposed area how it fits in with the needs of the local councils, recognising that housing is a very important responsibility of councils which they can often best meet? Would he say, if the land is being vested for private and public purposes, what are those purposes? Would it be better for the local councils to do the job, and. with regard to housing, will it be for sale or to let? If for sale, can the noble Earl say something about the price range, and if for letting—or, indeed, for either—will the range be commensurate with the incomes of those on the council's list? I understand that in Tower Hamlets only about 8 acres are left for housing and something like 8,000 people are on the housing list. So there questions are relevant to these orders.
I would also ask the Minister what close consultations took place. I think he has mentioned to some extent the objections put, and I would like to know what area of agreement was arrived at when those suggestions were considered. I think it was helpful that the Minister referred to the hybrid instruments and the consideration of the committee, but there are

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one or two points there on which it would be helpful if the Minister were to comment.
Finally, I believe this is of great importance to the corporation's progress and indeed in regard to the concern which is felt by the councils concerned, not only the members but also the officials, as I think the Minister knows. I think there is a need for a feeling of involvement by local councils and other agencies so that they feel they are doing the job best suited to the overall needs of the local community. Speaking on two previous London dockland development orders for the vesting of land not long ago, I said that it was most important that the LDDC was sensitive about the powers taken over from the local authorities because accountability also is involved. I urged that there should be close consultation with the interests concerned, and where possible local knowledge and expertise of the local authorities and their members and officers should be used.
That is important not only because of the local know-how that we know exists in local areas but because it is important that local authorities and others should feel involved in the work which is essential to the future of the docklands area. I believe this is the best way of getting the teamwork. I believe that in all these matters, including the question of housing, we have to have regard to the human factors as well as the other considerations, because people identify with an area over a period of many years and they wish to stay in the area, and their needs must be accommodated in relation to housing, how much they can afford to pay to buy houses and how much they can afford to pay for rents and so on. I believe there is no great cause for concern at the moment about the progress made by the LDDC, but I think we should all be sensitive to the needs and feelings of the local people in order that greater progress may be made in the vital regeneration of this particular area.
4.25 p.m.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I am grateful for the noble Lord's remarks. I also appreciate, with him, that the duties we take are very broad. I am delighted that he can switch from cows and pigs to Tower Hamlets and the Isle of Dogs with such facility. The noble Lord asked me some specific questions. He asked about the private and public sectors. The London Dockland Development Corporation will concentrate on providing service sites for private sector and housing association development, and the boroughs will remain responsible for the provision of public sector housing. He also asked whether it would not be better for local authorities to do the job. Noble Lords will recall that it was on this very issue that the Select Committee recommended that the urban development corporation should be established and agreed that the LDDC is more likely to engender the confidence that generates private sector investment.
The noble Lord asked about prices. I understand that the corporation is aiming for an overall split of 50 per cent. owner-occupation, 25 per cent. shared ownership and 25 per cent. housing associations. The dwellings at present being constructed on LDDC land in Newham will be marketed at prices from £18,000 It might be useful if I quote from the Hansard of the other place for Tuesday of this week, when the right
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honourable Member for Bermondsey, Mr. Robert Mellish, who is, I believe, a vice-chairman, said:
"I want to make it abundantly clear that every house with which I am associated—past and present—has been in the price range of £18,000–£25,000".—[Col. 857.]
At col. 858 of Hansard he continues:
"We have started building the sort of houses that ordinary people can afford"
The noble Lord went on to talk about consultation. The chief executive designate of the corporation discussed land acquisition with the various public authorities in October 1980. In December of that year and on subsequent occasions my department wrote to the public authorities setting out the vesting proposals. These proposals were subsequently discussed in general in the Select Committee here. The committee accepted the principle that land should be vested in the corporation, though they did not consider the actual merits of individual plots. The Government fully accept that the LDDC must work closely with the boroughs to achieve the success we are aiming for. I am happy to tell the House that the leaders of each of the three boroughs have now been appointed to the board of the LDDC and are playing a full part in the corporation's activities. Here again, with the leave of the House, I would like to quote the right honourable Member for Bermondsey, who in col. 859 of Hansard sets this out in some detail:
"We must set up an organisation, which I call the 'docklands forum'. We must pay for it and its staff, separate it from the urban development corporation, give it its own offices and make sure it has complete independence. We inform the forum of everything, such as details of planning, and let it transmit the information to the various groups about which they will know. That is the only way in which I can see the plan working".
I understand that the corporation is this afternoon discussing this proposal, and I am sure they will look on it favourably.
The noble Lord also mentioned Tower Hamlets. We believe the figure to be about 10½acres, of which 2½acres only will remain within the urban development areas. This is how much will remain within Tower Hamlets' ownership. Most of the GLC housing land has been transferred to the boroughs, and it is not possible straight off to give a figure for the GLC housing land.
Tower Hamlets have an extraordinary record in housing in that 80 per cent. of their housing is council houses. They have, indeed, a waiting list of 8,000 people, which I think the noble Lord mentioned, and the London Docklands Development Corporation has said that it will give nomination rights to those people. Again, I should like to stress that the development corporation is going forward on those lines, with both shared ownership and housing association development very much in view. My Lords, I hope that, with those assurances, the noble Lord and other noble Lords will be pleased to accept the order.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

London Docklands Development Corporation (Vesting of Land) (Greater London Council No. 2) Order 1981
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I beg to move the second Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That the order laid before the House on 10th July be approved—(The Earl of Avon.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Boxing Bill [H.L.]
4.32 p.m.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. While I speak from these Benches, I should emphasise that this is a Private Member's Bill and does not represent any party commitment so far as the Social Democratic Party is concerned. It is a Bill to prohibit professional boxing, and I suppose that the first question that will be asked is why I should revive this debate which seemed to die with the passing of the late Lady Summerskill.
What stimulated my interest in this matter was the report I read a year ago of a young Welshman who died in a Los Angeles hospital of respiratory complications due to a prolonged coma. He never regained consciousness after being knocked out 26 days earlier. Johnny Owen had fought for a world title and to earn enough money for his working-class family to buy a pub in Merthyr Tydfil. As he was carried comatosed from the ring on that night the fans of his opponent cheered and shouted obscenities. A few weeks later a likeable West Indian from London's East End—Maurice Hope—lay on the canvas unconscious for almost 10 minutes, his body shaking in convulsive shudders. Thousands who witnessed this sad sight whistled their approval and support—support for a "victory"—while millions watched it on television.
I know that it will be said that those two events took place outside of the United Kingdom, but it is the route that British boxers must take in order to attain fame or a European championship or a world championship. It was those events that sent me searching through the records of this House to find the details of the last debate on a Boxing Bill. It was, of course—and perhaps this is in the memory of some Members of this House who are present today—introduced by Lady Summerskill. Some may remember her: she was a very courageous and formidable lady who made a great contribution to the deliberations of the House of Lords during her presence here. I am proud to carry on, albeit inadequately, the mission which she initiated at that time, for everything that she said on 10th May 1962 has been borne out by the passing of time. On that day there was a Division in the House. There voted: Contents, 22, and Not-Contents, 29. I am hoping today that there will be an even more generous response and support for this Bill.
I confine my justification for the Bill to three basic propositions. First, I believe that the perpetration of violence is evil and anything which encourages it or glorifies it damages the fabric of a civilised society. Secondly, I believe that boxing frequently results in brain damage and sometimes in death. Thirdly, I believe that we have no moral justification for organising for profit a public spectacle in which the main object of the spectacle is for one human being to knock another human being unconscious.
With regard to the first of those propositions, this House has frequently expressed concern about the
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extension of violence in our community. I am not suggesting that boxing alone is responsible for the growth of violence but it does nothing to diminish it. We are all convinced that frequent exposure to the sight of men inflicting injury on others is harmful and degrading, and so we complain and we try in legislation affecting television, for example, to limit these things, sometimes unsuccessfully, so far as our television companies—BBC and ITV—are concerned. But boxing apparently escapes from those constraints. The sight of two superbly trained athletes fighting in a ring, each seeking to knock the other unconscious can now be brought into our homes regularly at peak-viewing times. The hero is the man who achieves this in the most devastating manner. In my view, this glamourises violence and reduces our sensitivity to violence.
The second proposition concerns the physical damage which results from boxing. Ingemar Johansson, the former heavyweight champion of the world, in whose native Sweden boxing is now banned, happened to be in London last month and commenting on boxing today he said:
"With fighters getting faster and stronger, maybe they will now be able to kill with one punch".
Some Members of the House were present on the occasion of the last debate on this subject and may recall Lady Summerskill's references to a quotation from Billy Walker. He was the blonde bomber from West Ham. He was the great white hope of the time, a heavyweight with a punch. He had just won a gold medal, I believe, at the Olympics, and turned professional. This is what he said on turning professional:
"I'm no longer a sportsman. How can you call professional boxing a sport, with all the villains and rogues who are part and parcel of the game? It's a business. A hard business all the time, a cruel business some of the time. I've no illusions about the noble art of self-defence or any of that kid stuff. That's all right for the amateurs. But from now I'm paid to hurt. The more I hurt, the more I'm paid".
I was in the Library yesterday and I picked out from one of the newspapers there a report of a fight that had taken place in Wembley Stadium the night before. It was headed "Bloodbath". The report simply stated:
"Tony Sibson retained European middleweight title at Wembley last night with a breathtaking, awe-inspiring display of primeval savagery".
I believe that that fight was projected in the sports programme of the BBC last night.
The medical evidence in this matter is overwhelming. Professor Corsellis who published The Aftermath of Boxing in 1973, carried out a retrospective study on the lives of 15 boxers and concluded that many "had ended up in psychiatric hospitals". He further reported that the examination revealed serious and often horrendous destruction of cerebral tissue in most of the 15 cases. The noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, who unfortunately had to leave the Chamber for another meeting, told me of his experience as a medical man and of the research that is carried out in Manchester University, where apparently they do their best to retain the brains and the skulls of boxers over the years, and they carry out examinations on the consequences of boxing on their brains. According to the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, this is totally consistent with the findings of Professor Corsellis,

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to which I have referred. He goes on to say that there is now solid foundation for the view that some experienced boxers develop a clinical disorder, the greater part of which has a neuro-pathological basis; the severity of the condition varies greatly, ranging from a mild clumsiness of speech and movement, with or without memory loss. I am sure that we are all familiar with boxers being interviewed who have shown evidence of these results. Incidentally, I notice that Mohammed Ali is no longer as fluent as he once was.
Next to serious brain damage, eye damage is the greatest indictment of boxing. The detached retina and other serious eye injuries have left many boxers blind or with sight seriously impaired. Recently the British lightweight boxer, Dave Williams, was operated on for a detached retina. Maurice Hope, who took such a serious beating a few months ago, only last year had his eyesight saved by the technological miracle of laser beam surgery carried out by the eye specialists at Moorfields. I am sure that the eye specialists at Moorfields would have something to say about the number of cases in which they have been involved where there have been similar casualities.
I recall another of our heroes, another winner of a gold medal. The last gold medal won by a British boxer at the Olympics was won by a man called Chris Finnegan. Where is Chris Finnegan now? I will tell you. He is almost blind. Following a detached retina, he lost the sight of his right eye and his left eye is now deteriorating badly. To compound Finnegan's problems, he is now unemployed and reputedly broke.
Such extremes of fortunes are by no means rare in this game. Among the boxing fraternity there is an adage: First the timing goes; then the legs; then the money; and then the friends. That is certainly the history of many of the people who have sought, through boxing, to achieve an easy way to riches. For working-class boys from the East End of Glasgow, London, Liverpool and Belfast it offered the illusion of a quick way of escaping from poverty. Where are the heroes of the past? Did they escape? How many made it? Today it is the turn of the impoverished blacks to provide this entertainment for those who can afford to watch them.
This House has frequently shown its concern for the sanctity of human life, and I hope that there is agreement that it should never deliberately be put at risk. Yet 335 deaths have occurred since the war as a result of injuries sustained in the ring. We in this House have supported legislation designed to avoid pain and suffering. We have in a number of cases been prepared to limit the freedom of the individual if the interests of society as a whole are adjudged to be paramount.
I know it will be said in this debate, "If people want to box, let them", and "If people want to go and watch it, let them". The same argument might have been adduced when we banned cockfighting. I am sure that there were people who wanted to watch it and who would provide the animals, but we decided that it was a degrading spectacle to see animals suffering for the enjoyment of spectators and for the benefit of bookmakers. Is it any less degrading and
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any less brutalising in its effect to witness and hear the commentator at the ringside say:
"He has a cut over his right eye and this will be the target. There is blood coming from the other and his opponent can now go in and finish him. His corner has done a wonderful job on his cut face and he is coming up for more. He is still standing and is being hit savagely about the head"?
Of course, the referees have duties to intervene at some stage, but only after a great deal of damage has been done.
I live in the West of Scotland and I know a number of boxers. One of the nicest young men I have ever met is Jim Watt, who recently lost his world lightweight title and who is being tempted to enter the ring again. I hope that that decent young man will not change his mind. Here is a description of his last fight, which was published in the Scottish Sunday newspaper, the Sunday Standard. It said:
"Jim Watt lost honourably at a cruel cost to his body. There was no sanctuary and only an hour of continuous pain was inflicted on this proud Scot whose purse … now in the stillness of the arena, seems almost a miserly obscenity for the wounds he endured but from which he would not run away.
Out of this fight will come much admiration from all those who saw a champion lose like a champion to the better man. By the end his face was a grizzly tattoo of scars, his jaw swollen, his mouth and nose awash with blood, his eyes staring blindly through the cuts and bruises which encircled his eyes so angrily".
The fight went a full 15 rounds and at the end this decent young man said:
"I didn't quit. I gave what I had but it was an uphill struggle throughout and I hope no one was ashamed of me".
That bloody spectacle took place in an English ring at Wembley and was witnessed by millions on their television screens. If such violence were to take place outside the ring, we would demand immediate police intervention. Yet in a ring, and organised for profit, it is encouraged. I do not believe that that is the mark of a civilised society.
Of course it will be said in this debate that rugby football is often violent, and mountaineering is dangerous, but in both cases violence is not the object of the sport. In rugby football, violence is punished—although sometimes I feel that the Welsh have not heard of that—but nevertheless violence in rugby football is punished by the referee.
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, that cannot be true. A strong tackle in rugby football is violent, and it is not punished if it is a legitimate tackle.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, it is punishable. There are certain rules in rugby football which are designed to prevent the inflicting of injury by one man on another. That is the distinction between rugby football and boxing. In mountaineering, steps are taken to minimise the risks to human life.
I hope that there will be no opposition to this Bill on account of the details contained in the Bill. I believe that the strongest argument in favour of the Bill is a moral argument. I believe that we have no moral justification for organising this kind of spectacle. As a Christian, I believe that our bodies and our brains and our intellect are God-given to use in God's service, and I believe that, to the extent that we inflict punishment on these bodies and these faculties, and impair these faculties, we are doing something that is not consistent with Christian conduct.

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Therefore, my Lords, I hope that there will be no Division on the basis of the details. These can be discussed at Committee stage. The Bill is aimed at the prohibition of professional boxing organised for profit as we know it, and the decision should be made on that principle. The Bill will not prohibit boxing in schools, or amateur three-round contests. Why? Because statistics demonstrate that the damage done by these events is very limited compared to the professional game. I believe that the so-called noble art has no place in a good society. It is degrading and it encourages the wrong motives. The spectacle at Wembley of the last Alan Minter fight is a justification for that claim.
There are greater evils in our society, but there are some laws which we have passed, and some gestures which we observe—for example, the abolition of capital punishment—which in themselves are not significant in their total impact yet which occasionally make us proud, for they mark adherence to more civilised standards. I believe that the abolition of professional boxing would be one such gesture. Norway and Sweden have already taken this course, and I ask your Lordships to follow that lead, and beg to move that this Bill be given a Second Reading.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Taylor of Gryfe.)
4.54 p.m.
Lord Morris: My Lords, I believe that your Lordships should be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, for the obvious sincerity with which he has used this Bill as a vehicle to demonstrate his personal indignation at a spectacle which horrifies him. But, with the greatest respect to him, I put to him three simple points. Nobody ever forced anyone to box. Nobody ever forced the noble Lord, or any noble Lord, to watch boxing if it offends them. In addition, has he ever investigated the lengths to which the British Boxing Board of Control go before issuing licences and before renewing licences? The position today is very different from what it was between the wars, and indeed from what it was even 15 years ago. At this very moment, the British Boxing Board of Control is fighting hard to obtain an international standard with regard to licensing, and, indeed, to bring in the thumbless glove. The noble Lord referred in detail to the serious injuries that can obtain as a result of the thumb on the glove.
Notwithstanding those points, I sincerely believe that this Bill is a joyless, politically naive, miserable little measure which is devoid of any merit whatsoever. The major reason why this is so is that, if this Bill were to proceed further, it would bring this noble House into serious disrepute. As your Lordships are well aware, at the present time in history there is a strong movement against paternalism in politics: a movement away from Government decree on how people should best run their lives. This Bill, I suggest, is a classic example of the "nanny" approach by Parliament; an example of the well-intentioned eroding the freedom of the individual to live and to learn from life, and enjoy all that life has to offer.
I cannot believe that the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, really understands what the effect of this
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measure would be. Other than making this noble House a laughing stock in the eyes of the people for whom we presume to legislate, it will break one of the glasses through which our young men learn, for professional boxing is the base upon which all amateur boxing depends. It is the expression of the highest skills in an ancient sport. Prize-fighting, as your Lordships are aware, goes back to Graeco-Roman days. It is a far older institution even than the SDP!
The real value of professional boxing lies in the fact that it encourages the grass-roots efforts in the amateur field. If professional boxing were to be proscribed, which would be the effect of this Bill, amateur boxing would die, and this I believe would be a tragedy. The owlish academics so often forget the young. They forget the fact of the nature of the beast, man; they forget that little boys love, literally love, to fight. All the lessons of life in fighting, and indeed in not fighting, can be learnt to great effect in the ring, and indeed from the youngest age.
I believe that I speak from a certain position of strength, for I fought as an amateur from the age of eight until nearly 19. My first lesson in the ring was at that very age of eight, and it was this: if you are locked in a corral with someone who is determined to do you injury, it concentrates the mind wonderfully. The second lesson is to get to your opponent before he gets to you. This lesson is important, because not only do you learn but your opponent learns. He learns the measure of himself.
The first fight I fought was purely so that the gym master of my preparatory school could learn who had any particular aptitude, or indeed taste, for this particular endeavour. Whether it was his acknowledgment of the virtue of the alphabet, or whether he had a sense of humour, he happened to put me in the ring with my twin brother, who happened to be a head shorter than I was. One thing I did know was that it was vitally important to get to him beforehand, because, when I made it absolutely plain to him that I was looking forward to knocking seven bells out of him, it put him off the subject very quickly indeed.
He learned, as everybody knew, not so much that he was physically incompetent but that he was physically incoherent, and that he infinitely preferred the more leisurely pursuits of the academic world, like scripture and geography. It is in this particular demonstration to the very young—I do not mean just at eight but right the way through one's school years—that boxing has its immense value. It teaches you never—that it is a disaster—to lose your temper, that there can be great nobility in losing, that fear lies in the heart and mind and that skill will always beat might. Noble Lords need not take my word for it; the lessons are contained in the literature of boxing. Rather like cricket, though to nothing like the same extent, boxing has a very rich literature. It is one of the few sports that has moved men to write of it like angels. It is a classic demonstration of men, their heroes and the games they play.
I wonder whether the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, has ever visited any of the clubs affiliated to the London Federation of Boys' Clubs, and whether he has ever spoken to the young men who box and has asked them the simple question, "What has boxing given you?" In their own individual ways, those who indulge in this

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sport always come up with the same answer, "Boxing has given me so much". When asked in what way, they invariably reply, "It has taught me so much of myself and of other men".
Many noble Lords will recall their own experience of bespectacled swots at school who brought self-respect and the admiration of their fellows upon themselves as a result of their ability and courage in the ring, despite their incompetence in team and individual ball sports, which of course require a different type of skill. Does the noble Lord really wish to throw away a great and ancient learning process?
Any who might have even for a moment considered flirting with that political virgin the SDP must have had their ardour cruelly cooled by this tawdry Bill. The SDP, coyly hiding, as well they might, behind their ugly acronim, might claim no authorship. However, they cannot escape the scandal of the company they keep. At best, the Bill shows a low taste in bedside reading. At worst, the SDP cannot deny that they are in bed with the author. I humbly suggest that your Lordships should, not for the first time, demonstrate your eminent commonsense by allowing this tawdry little Bill to proceed no further, to save this noble House from falling into disrepute and to state loudly and clearly in the Lobby that this measure is nothing other than a governessy irrelevance and a waste of valuable parliamentary time.
5.3 p.m.
Lord Belhaven and Stenton: My Lords, I do not intend to follow my noble friend Lord Morris in referring to this as a tawdry little Bill; that is not really the way to refer to any Bill which the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, has in good faith brought before your Lordships' House. Before leaving my noble friend's speech, I would tell him that I was forced to box as a boy, and certainly that used to happen in schools. I was not directly forced, but I was in the sense that my courage was challenged by an older boy. I went into the ring and boxed and, thank God, I was bad at it. That is not to say that had I been good at it I would have finished up punch-drunk, because with my background, I would not have been drawn into professional boxing, and I remind the House that the Bill is about professional, not amateur, boxing. Amateur boxing would still be legal and in my view it should remain legal because, however stupid it may be, the citizen should be allowed to do what he likes.
In 1970 I raised this matter in the House in the form of an Unstarred Question, which was answered for the Government by my noble friend Lord Aberdare, who gave me a courteous "No". Since then, so far as I am aware, this subject has not been raised in your Lordships' House and I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, for his courage in bringing it up. I hope he sticks to the subject, but not with the same total enthusiasm as the late Lady Summerskill, whose passing we all lament; she was a little too enthusiastic about the subject, including when I asked my Question in 1970, because she wanted to abolish amateur boxing as well.
As for professional boxing, my feeling is that the human body was not made to be a punch-bag. That is certainly so of the human brain. It is an abuse of the creation of God continually to pummel the brain
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until, if it goes on long enough, a man becomes an idiot. I am not against manly and dangerous sports, not even the most dangerous of them—mountaineering, rugger or what have you—because if a man conies out at the end of it he is usually perfectly sane, able to think and follow an avocation. He is not made into a fool.
I have seen people who are punch-drunk and I know what it does to them. They do not know they are punch-drunk and they think they are all right, but if you know their history and the fights they have had, the reason is clear. I spoke to one chap who told me he had been in 50 fights, and he was against professional boxing because of his experience in it. He talked to me about punch-drunk people without realising that he himself was punch-drunk, but I realised that.
Young men who get drawn into this game are the finest and bravest of our youngsters and it is quite wrong that they should be drawn by sleazy commercial interests into losing their intelligence, sometimes the use of their eyes, heart and any other sort of damage. Imagine going 15 three-minute rounds! I did some Army and school boxing. That was three three-minute rounds and that was tough enough. To ask a man to go 15 rounds is, in my view, absolutely monstrous. At least we might reduce the number of rounds, even if we do not make boxing illegal.
My only doubts about the Bill are my natural distrust of legislation. I have often thought that both Houses might profitably take a five-year holiday and pass no legislation at all. But the subject before us is not often raised in either House. Again I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, for raising it, and if he presses it to a Division, I shall support him.
5.8 p.m.
Lord Nunburnholme: My Lords, perhaps I should begin by declaring a slight interest in that I too have put gloves on and gone into the ring, but that was many years ago. Perhaps it would be a good idea when regarding the Bill if we retained a sense of balance, proportion and logic and looked at the legal aspects a little more closely. The Bill refers to any person who organises boxing for profit. I do not know the legal definition of "profit", but the dictionary says it means "for gain". If a charity organises, say, a dinner at the National Sporting Club or the Grosvenor House and two professional boxers agree to give an exhibition bout in aid of the charity, it is undoubtedly being run for profit. Would that be illegal? Personally, I think it might not be legal. There is also the question of whether or not it affects amateurs, because the word "profit" does not necessarily mean monetary gain. It means gain, something to your benefit, and perhaps "benefit and gain" could include not only a cup or a shield, but also the prestige that you bring to your school when one school is boxing against another, or if there are two institutions boxing against each other.
I have seen many amateur fights and it is certainly true that on most occasions young boys, 15 or under, do not punch hard enough to inflict any great damage on each other. But when one school boxes against another there might be one young man of 17 rising 18 who is a very, very fine boxer indeed and has a tremend

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punch, who is up against another young boy of 16 who, although a good boxer, is immature for his age and can easily be put on the floor.
One of the things that causes brain damage is not necessarily the punch itself but the fact that the boxer goes over backwards and is in either an unconscious or semi-conscious state and the back of his head hits the floor. In many amateur boxing rings the floors are not properly padded—they are almost bare boards. Ask any old professional boxer about this and he will say, "As I went over it was my head that hit the ground, and that put me out". Very often that is what does the damage.
Perhaps amateur boxing for any form of profit, not necessarily money—the Bill just says "profit"—may be illegal; I do not know. All I suggest to your Lordships is that if anybody makes a profit out of this it will be the lawyers. I think that they are going to have a field day over this Bill because of the way that it is worded.
There is one other small matter that I should like to draw to your Lordships' attention; that is, that if this Bill goes through it will put a lot of people out of work. I suggest to your Lordships that we have enough unemployment as it is. What may very easily happen as a result of this Bill is that the young fighters that we have, instead of fighting in this country will train in this country but fight abroad.
There is an element of risk and danger in every sport. The noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, has referred greatly and at length to brain damage. As I say, I am no lawyer; but there is a legal expression, volenti non fit injuria, which simply means the willing party accepts the risk. We have something called free will. There is an element of risk in many activities, as the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, said, such as rugger. Many rugger players are carried off the field unconscious and it has not been unknown for a rugger player to receive a blow or a kick at the beginning of a game, play the whole game, come off and remember nothing about it from then onwards. In fact, he has been semi-conscious or concussed throughout the game. This is brain damage.
Riding is exactly the same. If you fall from a horse, the blow, the hard object, is not propelled towards you: you fall off the horse, down towards it. The result is the same. If we are going to ban boxing, should we not logically ban any sport such as rugger or riding? Very often at a race meeting the ground or the going is described officially as "soft". But if you ask any jockey that day who has had a fall he will tell you that the ground was very hard. I am sure that many of your Lordships will agree with me that as you get older the ground gets harder. But we do not have to go hunting. Lord Birkenhead once said he was finished with hunting. He said: "Henceforth this furry animal may proceed upon its way unmolested by me." In other words, volenti non fit injuria.
Car racing is a very dangerous sport. Many people have been killed, not only drivers but the public. There is the classic example of free will. Mr. Jackie Stewart put it in good parliamentary language and has made it perfectly clear that in no circumstances and under no inducement of any monetary gain whatsoever
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will he return to the sport. He has made known his own free will.
Many times we have heard in this House, particularly from the noble Lord, Lord Brockway, about the evils of the atom bomb. Gunpowder has killed millions of people. We can only roughly estimate the number in millions. We do not ban gunpowder—and by that I mean all high explosives, nitro, dynamite and even the atom bomb. The evil lies in the man and what use he makes of it. Gunpowder gives a lot of pleasure to a lot of people who use it for shooting. Also it is very important in our industrial mining enterprises so we do not ban it.
What was interesting was that when President Reagan came out of hospital after he had been shot, a member of the press asked him whether or not he would tighten the control on firearms as a result of being shot. His answer was very interesting; it was one which I would commend all chief constables and senior police officers in this country to study. He said: "No. In the cities of New York and Washington we have the tightest gun controls of probably anywhere in the world and it did not prevent me being shot. What I suggest is that there should be a tightening up of the penalties and an increase in the penalties for the improper use of firearms." Here was the President of the United States saying that. This really comes back to free will and what use we make of it. We all agree to ban war.
This leads me on to the internal combustion engine. Although millions of people have been killed by gunpowder, I am told that almost as many, or if not more, have been killed by the internal combustion engine, and particularly the motor car. Most of the deaths and very serious injuries in a motor-car have been due to injuries to the head; in other words, brain damage. If we ban boxing for this reason, ought we not logically to ban the use of the motor-car? That would be absurd.
The noble Lord, Lord Taylor, touched on the way boxing works. There is a need to clean up boxing; here he has a very good point. There is a lot of money in boxing now, and particularly in the televising of boxing. Boxing is getting into the hands of a few men. I go to America often and I have many American friends. I do not think that one of them would disagree with me that boxing in America leaves much to be desired in that it is in the hands of the syndicate, and that indeed the Mafia have a finger in it.
The professional boxers whom I know in this country refer to something called the syndicate operating here. Boxing is in the hands of a few men, one or two of whom perhaps are too greedy. I know of one lightweight boxer, whose name I shall not mention, who was told—and I think I can quote the words:
"You remain a big fish in a little bowl, or you join me and go places—otherwise you stay where you are".
He joined, and he did very well.
There are plenty of good fighters in this country. There is no need to bring over third-rate ones from America to build up a fighter to world standard, which he is not. Then we talk about a fighter having a glass jaw, because when he gets to the world title stage he has to get into the ring with someone who really is good, and he does not deserve to win. There are plenty of good fighters up in the North.

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The noble Lord, Lord Taylor, referred to cock-fighting and said that it was abolished as an ignoble and horrible sport. I do not think that those were his exact words, but that was the effect of what he said. I may be wrong, but from what I have studied I gather that cockfighting was abolished because people gambled on it too much.
The British Boxing Board of Control probably does not exercise the control that it might do, and here your Lordships could perhaps consider some action. I do not want to go too much into this point, but I know that professional boxers past and present are not completely satisfied in this regard. They feel that perhaps the board does not realise to the exact extent which way boxing in England is now going.
I have known one or two boxers. It is a great sport. As they say themselves, it is a tremendous game. It has a tremendous thrill to it. When the heavyweight champion of the world climbs into the ring there is a magic about it which is equalled only by Derby Day and the Grand National. There is something to it, and I am proud to have shaken the hand of men such as Teddy Haynes, the ex-middleweight champion. They were great men in boxing and they were absolutely straight.
The Bill reminds me rather of a little paragraph in one of the early chapters of the autobiobraphy of the late Lord Montgomery of Alamein. He described how his mother used to say to one of his brothers or sisters:
"Go and see what Bernard is doing, and tell him to stop it"
There is always someone trying to nibble away at the British heritage. I for one will have no part of it. I ask your Lordships to support our national way of life and our national sports.
5.23 p.m.
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, I believe that Sir Winston Churchill was once asked which side he was on in the Spanish Civil War, and he replied, "Both sides". I can imagine that anyone coming fresh to the debate this afternoon and listening to the arguments so cogently put, might feel to be in that position. But in my mind I come down, at any rate at this stage—the Second Reading; I suppose that there might be amendments later—on the side of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, who moved the Second Reading of the Bill so eloquently and with such deep feeling. I thought that he rather overstated his case, though he did not overstate it half as much as the noble Lord, Lord Morris, overstated his case. The argument that we could not have amateur without professional boxing is to me fantastic. We do not say that about any other sport, and so I am afraid that I dismiss that particular argument.
However, leaving that aside for the moment, I must say that when the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, implied that at rugger violence was forbidden by the referee I felt that he could not watch a great deal of rugger. Obviously rugger is a violent sport. So is even the form of football practised at the school which the noble Lord, Lord Home of the Hirsel, and I attended. He was very much better than I at it, and therefore more violent, but at any rate no one pretended
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that he suffered brain damage, or even perhaps that I did—
Lord Home of the Hirsel: The noble Earl kicked pretty hard!
The Earl of Longford: I think that it was the noble Lord, Lord Hailsham, but I had better be careful about that; but the Duke of Montrose actually bit him at the Eton Ball game. I remember that that was mentioned in a debate on Rhodesia; it was supopsed to prove some important point one way or the other. At any rate these contact sports are violent, and I am certainly not even going to begin to discuss the question of banning them.
However, let us agree that the noble Lord brought out two aspects of the horrors of the lives of many professional boxers, and he spoke with great respect of the young boxing champion whom he mentioned. He pointed out that many people suffer brain damage if they continue in the sport as a vocation and that horrible passions are aroused. I am perfectly ready to agree, though I do not go to see many boxing matches now. I used to go to see them when I was young. But sometimes I see them on television, and I must admit that the audience are not a pretty sight. So I am entirely with the noble Lord on that aspect. I am inclined, so to speak, to remove the occasion of sin from these audiences.
Therefore at this stage I agree that we should try to ban this kind of commercial boxing. If people are to be paid, the money has to come from somewhere, presumably out of the pocket of the public. At this stage I am with the noble Lord. The noble Lord was quite careful, but I am not sure that he was careful enough, and I must say that some of the things that he said would reflect on boxing generally. I cannot agree that boxing at school is in itself more dangerous than, say, rugger, or even the school game played by the noble Lord, Lord Home, and myself. So if we are not going to ban violent games at school altogether, I do not think we should ban boxing.
I quite agree that some boys dislike boxing. But of course many boys dislike football, and perhaps nowadays at schools they are excused—rightly excused, I think—from it. If a parent says that his son does not fancy being knocked about in any shape or form, the boy should be excused. There is much more liberty of that kind nowadays than there used to be, and that is all to the good. But I do not think that so far as boys are concerned boxing is in any special category as compared with football. However, when we come to the professional sport, bearing in mind the evil passions that can be aroused in the audience and the damage done, which might last a lifetime, then at any rate at this stage I go along with the noble Lord.
5.28 p.m.
Lord Noel-Baker: My Lords, I want to support my noble friend Lord Taylor of Gryfe and to thank him for what I thought was a very remarkable speech which he made this afternoon. I find it difficult to believe that any noble Lord would not be converted in favour of the Bill by what my noble friend said. I have taken part in many sports, including two which

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require physical courage of a kind and physical endurance, and which perhaps involve danger. I took part in track athletics for many years, and I engaged in mountaineering until I was 79. At the age of 79 I was twice over 14,000 feet in Switzerland. I have done a great deal of mountaineering.
I have had many friends who have been amateur boxers, and I have watched much amateur boxing in the Olympic Games. I confess that I experienced a feeling of genuine jubilation when I saw a British boxer, with extreme skill, defeat a Russian opponent, who was much larger and looked much stronger than the British boxer, in the final of an Olympic contest. I remember that the founder of the Olympic Games, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, who I regard as one of the great statesmen of the century, with a record of success in his work achieved by few statesmen in any realm of human activity, was ardently in favour of boxing and boxed himself until he was over 50.
I confess that I have often had doubts about amateur boxing. I am not sure. While at a school, no doubt, it is open to very little objection and there is much to be said in its favour, some amateur boxing can in my view involve danger of an unacceptable kind. But if I am a little ambivalent about amateur boxing I am not ambivalent at all about professional boxing. When I was in another place there was a man, a constitutent who became a close friend, who had himself been a rather eminent professional boxer. With his earnings he bought a public-house, which he kept and managed himself. He insisted, as our freindship developed, on taking me to witness professional boxing—big fights, as he called them—from a ringside seat. I could not disguise from him that I disliked the whole thing. I disliked the fight and I disliked the attitude and emotions of the crowd. It seemed to me to arouse a feeling of sadism among the spectators. I am perfectly certain that that very frequently happens, and that it is a most undesirable phenomenon. I believe there is everything to be said against professional boxing. I believe it is a social abuse, and I hope we shall follow Sweden and Norway in banning it here.
Lord Hunt of Fawley: My Lords, I just want to add a very few words about punch-drunkenness, which is a terrible affliction. It can come on many years after a person's boxing career is over; it does not need a number of knock-outs—a number of small injuries can produce it—and it is a terrible affliction to have in your family. It is a sort of pre-senile dementia: you lose your memory, you lose your sense. I myself would do anything to prevent even the dozen cases of punch-drunkenness that now occur.
5.34 p.m.
Lord Shinwell: My Lords, I apologise for my intervention but my reason for not putting my name on the list is because I doubted very much when I read about the possibility of this debate whether there would be any interest displayed by Members of your Lordships' House. Another reason why I failed to intervene in that fashion is because I have to declare
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an interest. I happen to be the President of the London Branch of the World Sporting Club. I have been so for many years, and my predecessor was a Member of your Lordships' House—the Earl of Derby. In all my experience of that club, I have never witnessed anything which was improper. I have never observed that in the course of the contests no medical assistance was available; there was always a doctor there in case he was required to render some assistance.
I declare another interest, and that is that I happen to be an honorary member of the Brighton Branch and also the London Branch of the Ex-Boxers Association. I am bound to say, having attended some of their functions and looked at some of the older people who were also attending, there was hardly a sign that they had ever been involved in a contest. Certainly they were the most amiable, delightful and civilised people I have ever met—as civilised as anybody in your Lordships' House. That reminds me that British boxers of the past, going back to the days of Dutch Sam, Mendoza and the various prize-fighters who fought with bare knuckles instead of using gloves, were invariably supported by Members of your Lordships' House. It was the aristocracy of Britain which supported them and attended those illegal contests which took place in various parts of the country despite the surveillance of the police.
I only want to take advantage of a three-minute round—I have already occupied two minutes, so I have not much time—before we have a technical knock-out, as I hope will happen at the end of this debate. I was unable to hear much of the speech of my noble friend Lord Taylor of Gryfe. I was not present at the beginning, and when I came in I had not something available so that I could hear more easily, but I wish he had devoted his efforts on this occasion to trying to deal with preventing this monopoly which exists at present in professional boxing. There are too few people operating, and undoubtedly they are in the business to make a profit. I am not afraid to say this. I am not afraid of them anyhow; they cannot hurt me, and they had better not try. I cannot understand why Lord Taylor of Gryfe should bother about their making a profit. He is connected with various businesses, and I am quite satisfied that he does not mind making a profit now and again. There is nothing wrong with profit; I like a little myself sometimes.
Let us try to understand this. Occasionally there is something improper in professional boxing. There is something quite improper sometimes in amateur boxing—and here I would say this. Of the two, I prefer professional boxing, because if a man is to go into the ring he must seek to acquire some skill in the business. After all, it is skill that counts more often than hard punching, though hard punching nowadays, I have observed, does carry an opponent out of the contest quite easily. But amateur boxing is sometimes conducted in a fashion which savours of professionalism, and I do not care for that at all. If we are going to have amateurism, let it be honest amateurism and make no bones about it.
As regards the effects on the professional boxer, of course there are Members of your Lordships' House who can quote instances where somebody has suffered or somebody has died because of boxing, or has

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suffered brain damage. I accept that at once. But that applies to professional wrestling. I wonder whether Members of your Lordships' House ever watch professional wrestling on Saturday afternoons. How horrible it is, how brutal it is, how bestial it is!
The Earl of Longford: That is just a sham.
Lord Shinwell: One becomes furious—so furious that one would like to go in and punch them on the jaw and settle the matter; a real knock-out. The same applies to motorcar racing; and with great respect to my noble friend Lord Noel-Baker, who was once a famous half-miler (although I have observed that ever since he has always come late for a meeting; he always came 10 minutes late, and I used to direct his attention to it; I never could understand how he had won the half-mile when he was younger) I am bound to say that even in sprinting or in hurdling, as we have observed many times in Olympic and other contests, accidents occur—of course they do. I remember an incident at a boxing contest in Dunfermline in Scotland many years ago. It was a contest of 10 three-minute rounds. One of the contestants did not turn up so that they had to get somebody to take his place. Someone in the audience offered his services. He was a rather stout, portly, pot-bellied man and he said that he was ready to fight anybody and had done some fighting in his time. So he appeared in the ring. He did not last for very long. The other fellow knocked him down at once and he lay on the floor, completely knocked out. They had to get an ambulance to take him away and someone in the audience, looking at him on the floor, ugly, grotesque, said, "Well, if he is going to hospital, take him to the maternity hospital".
That is how to deal with this subject and I suggest that there ought to be a technical knock-out—not wholly to the disadvantage of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe. But he has had his say, as have others. I hope that the noble Earl, Lord Avon, who looks like a professional boxer, will not indulge in any knock-outs this evening, but will say that the Government have lots of other business to deal with. There is unemployment—shall I go on?—and the rates are going up. Shall I go on? Let us have no politics in this business, just commonsense; and let us have that technical knock-out.
5.42 p.m.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, after that round of seven minutes I feel slightly punch drunk myself. I think I ought to start by saying what is the purpose of this Bill. It is to stop any boxing match, either professional or amateur, from being arranged for profit. That would include charitable or sponsorship events for profit. Some noble Lords were slightly awry in their descriptions. Another thing I noted is that my noble friend Lord Belhaven and Stenton twice mentioned a five-minute round. In fact, no round ever goes more than three minutes, I understand.
The effect of this one-clause Bill on boxing could be catastrophic and its effect on other sports could equally be enormous. We have all listened with great interest to what the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, has said and I appreciate, as, I am sure, does the
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House, the deep commitment which lies behind his thinking. I do not think that any of us would have thought his presentation in any way inadequate. I found it extremely comprehensive. However, I believe that we should be reminded of the consequences that this type of legislation would engender.
The democratic society that we all believe in and applaud gives an individual the fundamental right to choose the sport in which he wishes to participate. By legislating against one particular sport, we would withdraw that right. This Government, indeed successive Governments, have never considered such measures, whether individuals compete against each other, in sport, for payment, for charitable purposes or under the promotion or sponsorship of a third party. The Government believe that to do so would be a step in the wrong direction. The noble art (if I may so call it in this House) of boxing has long been a recognised, worthy, sport in the United Kingdom. I use the word "sport" intentionally because the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, played a little too much, I thought. on the word "violence". This should be a sport where skill and self-defence are part of the training. The noble Earl, Lord Longford, said that the audiences in this sport were not a pretty sight. I wonder at what sport audiences are a particularly pretty sight. But the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, then corrected me slightly, because, obviously in his club, the audience would be an extremely pretty sight.
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, I attended the noble Lord's club. I found the atmosphere there specially civilised. The referee stopped the fight as soon as it got brutal. It must have been due to the influence of the noble Lord.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I take the noble Earl's point, but I think he was talking also about audiences generally. I should like to refer to audiences generally in all sport and I do not think there are any that are particularly nice except, perhaps, the Royal Box at Wimbledon which is always very attractive.
The original "Queensbury Rules" first formulated in 1867 are the basis upon which boxing is practised by both professionals and amateurs. It is here that I believe the medical profession has played such a major part in formulating a medical discipline within those rules which all boxers must satisfy before they are licensed to take part in a boxing match. As many noble Lords mentioned the risk values, I should like to say a few words on that. I acknowledge that it is the personal injury to individuals that is of most concern to those who object to boxing as a sport. What I believe we must accept is that those entering the boxing arena do so in the full knowledge that an injury may occur, Individuals enter boxing from their own interest in the sport, but, having elected to do so, they are subject to the most stringent medical discipline before they are allowed to compete. Having been licensed, following a full medical examination, to compete in either professional or amateur boxing, a person's medical welfare is carefully monitored. Indeed, a recent requirement in the professional arena, where matches are over a longer duration, is that when an individual applies for a licence his medical examination

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form must include a skull X-ray with a full report accompanying such an X-ray.
Much has been said in the press about a brain scan. It is the considered opinion of the chief medical officer of the British Boxing Board of Control, a man highly respected in his profession, that the value of a brain scan is in establishing the diagnosis of acute or chronic intracerebral damage, and is already used in this context in professional boxing. It is of little if any value in anticipating when such damage would or could occur. I would not profess to understand the intricacies of such medical science, but I believe we must acknowledge the opinion of a person so highly respected in his profession.
The medical welfare of any person is a matter of concern for us all, whatever way of life is chosen. Boxing administrators at both amateur and professional level are as aware of this basic requirement of human understanding as any other governing body of sport. Their medical regulations are consistently reviewed to ensure, so far as is practicable, that injury can be detected, treated and cured if such injury is sustained. More importantly their regulations are so framed that a person who is not physically capable cannot partake in the sport. Such regulations have caused disappointment to a number of young boxing hopefuls who, because of some minor defect in their fitness, have been refused permission to participate.
I hope that, albeit briefly, I have allayed some of the fears concerning the medical welfare of those who wish to enter the sport of boxing. The many other sports that were mentioned today—mountaineering, rugby, motor sport, horse racing and various aviational activities—all contain a considerable degree of personal risk. There have been some personal reminiscences. As someone who has always played cricket, I always told all the oarsmen in my house that the most dangerous thing to do was to row because it strains the heart. We can all argue against the sport that we do not particularly like.
As I say, like all these sports boxing is supported by the personal decision of an individual to participate. The Bill before the House today could, if enacted, be taken as a precedent by others to seek to control sports similar to those I have mentioned. This Government cannot support proposals which impinge so drastically on the individual freedom of our citizens to compete against each other in the sport of their choice and therefore could not support the Bill as legislation.
5.49 p.m.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords. I do not wish to detain the House in replying to the debate, but I should like to say a word in connection with the statement of the Government. With regard to the purpose of the Bill, it is not the intention of the Bill, as I made abundantly clear in my speech, that amateur boxing should be prohibited. This is a Bill designed to prohibit professional boxing, and if there is any doubt in the wording or the terms of the Bill in distinguishing amateur from professional boxing, that can be amended and made clear at the Committee stage. Therefore, today's debate on the Second Reading is about the prohibition of professional boxing.
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The noble Earl, Lord Avon, said that the effect of this on other sports would be enormous. I am not sure that that is so. In my opening speech I tried to distinguish between boxing and other sports. The distinction is quite simple: boxing is designed for one person to knock another person unconscious and inflict injury. There is no other sport where that is the basic purpose of the exercise. To that extent it is quite distinct from rugby football, mountaineering and the other sports that were mentioned—
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, as one of the noble Lord's supporters, I hope he will not press that point unduly because an ordinary boxing match is decided on points. So I think that idea of knocking another person out is very rare in amateur boxing.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, an ordinary boxing match is not always decided on points. I quoted the spectacle the other night in Wembley Stadium of a man who—I forget the actual phrase—inflicted brutality and punishment on a man in the 9th or 10th round and knocked him out. That is the history of boxing: and the victims of that are people who are wandering about poor, wandering about punch-drunk, mumbling and blind. That is the difference between boxing and some of the other sports that were mentioned. That should be kept in mind.
We take deliberate decisions in this House when we weigh the liberty of the individual against the total interests of society, and we pass laws accordingly. We did so years ago in relation to cockfighting. Why did we do that in this country? Because we believed it was a brutalising and demoralising thing for people to foregather in crowds and cheer and applaud two animals inflicting damage and death on each other. We are very sensitive in this House about danger and suffering to animals, and I suggest that we should show the same sensitivity when we are talking about a sport which organises two people to enter a ring for the express purpose of inflicting damage on a fellow human being.
The professional sport does not depend on two people going into a ring in privacy to do that. It depends on organising a great spectacle and bringing it into millions of homes, because the TV fees are important to sustain it. Does anyone believe that these sights that we see in the boxing ring do not reduce our sensitivity to violence? I believe they do, and for that reason we build into the IBA and BBC laws restrictions on the amount of violence that is to be shown. Why do we do that? Because we believe that the sight of violence and the continual exposure to violence of people in their homes reduces their sensitivity to violence and has a brutalising effect. It is for that reason that I suggest that boxing is rather different from the other sports that were enumerated by noble Lords opposite.
The noble Lord, Lord Morris, made a great play with the word "tawdry". I have tried to look it up in the dictionary in reference to this debate. I believe that what is tawdry is offering young working-class people, and now the blacks, the opportunity of escaping by this route quickly out of poverty by a public spectacle—fighting with one another in the ring to the plaudits of thousands. At the end of the day they

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suffer and frequently end up in the poverty they hoped to escape from. That is tawdry, and I do not believe the word can be applied to any Bill which is designed as this Bill is, for the three reasons that I quoted at the outset.
First the perpetration of violence is evil in itself, and anything which encourages it or glorifies it damages the fabric of our society. Secondly, as to the results of boxing, there is evidence here, and the noble Earl, Lord Avon, quoted some of it, but if I may say so he ought to have gone to a much more objective source. He quotes simply in support of his case the medical officer of the British Boxing Board of Control. I appreciate that steps are taken by the board to minimise damage, but the damage is frequently done before the referee's intervention on medical examination between the rounds. He might have gone to the Royal College of Surgeons, for example, or to any of the objective authorities on this subject to get his evidence—it is there in abundance—that boxing does disturb the brain and frequently results in blindness and damage to the eyes.
Finally, this is not a tawdry Bill: neither is it an attempt to interfere with the freedom of the individual in any cheeseparing way. This is a Bill that says that we in a democratic society stand for certain moral values, and it is not within our category of moral values to organise for public spectacle a boxing match in which one human being seeks to knock another unconscious. I cannot find it in my Christian conscience to believe that it is part of a Christian society. It encourages the wrong motives, and for that reason this House will not be diminishing itself if it accords this Bill a Second Reading. It will have shown a respect for civilised standards and done something of which we can be proud. For that reason, I beg to commend that the Bill he now read a second time.
5.57 p.m.
On Question, Whether the Bill shall now be read 2a?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 47; Not-Contents, 77.

DIVISION NO. 1

CONTENTS

Amherst, E.

Jenkins of Putney, L.

Amulree, L.

Kennet, L.

Aylestone, L.

Killearn, L.

Banks, L.

Lawrence, L.

Bathurst, E.

Longford, E.

Beaumont of Whitley, L.

McCarthy, L.

Belhaven and Stenton, L. [Teller.]

McGregor of Durris, L.

Melchett, L.

Blease, L.

Noel-Baker, L.

Boothby, L.

Ogmore, L.

Brockway, L.

Phillips, B.

Byers, L.

Rathcreedan, L.

Caccia, L.

St. Davids, V.

Collison, L.

Seear, B.

Cooper of Stockton Heath, L.

Simon, V.

Craigavon, V.

Stedman, B.

Crowther-Hunt, L.

Stone, L.

David, B.

Swansea, L.

Diamond, L.

Taylor of Gryfe, L. [Teller.]

Fisher of Rednal, B.

Gladwyn, L.

Vernon, L.

Hampton, L.

Wilson of Langside, L.

Houghton of Sowerby, L.

Wootton of Abinger, B.

Hunt of Fawley, L.

Wynne-Jones, L.

Jacobson, L.

894

NOT-CONTENTS

Ailesbury, M.

Hylton-Foster, B.

Airey of Abingdon, B.

Lane-Fox, B.

Alexander of Tunis, E.

Lindsey and Abingdon, E.

Alport, L.

Long, V.

Ardwick, L.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Avon, E.

Lyell, L.

Belstead, L.

McAlpine of Moffat, L.

Bishopston, L.

McFadzean, L.

Bledisloe, V.

Mancroft, L.

Bruce of Donington, L.

Marley, L.

Campbell of Croy, L.

Mersey, V.

Cockfleld, L.

Molloy, L.

Colville of Culross, V.

Monson, L.

Colwyn, L.

Morris, L. [Teller.]

Cork and Orrery, E.

Northchurch, B.

Cowley, E.

Nugent of Guildford, L.

Craigmyle, L.

Nunburnholme, L.

Croft, L.

Orkney, E.

Cudlipp, L.

Peart, L.

Cullen of Ashbourne, L.

Pender, L.

Daventry, V.

Rankeillour, L.

de Clifford, L. [Teller.]

Robbins, L.

Denham, L.

Sandys, L.

Dilhorne, V.

Shannon, E.

Eccles, V.

Shinwell, L.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Skelmersdale, L.

Elton, L.

Spens, L.

Faithfull, B.

Strabolgi, L.

Falkland, V.

Strathspey, L.

Fortescue, E.

Terrington, L.

Fraser of Kilmorack, L.

Thomas of Swynnerton, L.

Gainford, L.

Trefgarne, L.

Gormanston, V.

Vaizey, L.

Grey, E.

Vaux of Harrowden, L.

Gridlev, L.

Vivian, L.

Henley, L.

Wallace of Coslany, L.

Hill of Luton, L.

Westbury, L.

Holderness, L.

Willoughby de Broke, L.

Hornsby-Smith, B.

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

BBC External Services
6.5 p.m.
Lord Byers Lord Byers rose to ask Her Majesty's Government why, in view of the opinions expressed in this House on 30th July, they decided to proceed with damaging cuts in the output of the BBC's External Services, including the complete abandonment of direct broadcasts in Italian and Spanish to Europe at a time when accurate reports of British policies and news to EEC members are vital importance.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I rise to ask the Unstarred Question in my name, and I would remind the House that we last debated this question of the cuts in the External Services of the BBC on a Motion which I put down for 30th July, when we asked the Government to reconsider these proposed cuts. The House will remember that the Government were defeated on that occasion by a 2 to 1 vote—82 in favour of my Motion and 45 against.
The reason why I put down this Unstarred Question is that I consider the response to the advice tendered to the Government by this House on 30th July seems to be devoid of rhyme or reason, except in terms of horse trading or of window dressing. As I see it, they have decided to reduce these cuts from £3 million to £1½ million and they seem to think that honour will be satisfied. I do not think that that really makes sense.
On 30th July we were told by the Foreign Secretary, first, that the External Services of the BBC were an important arm of Government foreign policy, that external broadcasting has a most important part to play in the influence that Britain can exert throughout the world, and then he said:
"it is I think reasonable to suggest that the Foreign Office, the Government and Parliament—I repeat, and Parliament—should make decisions as to the priorities and importance of the various aspects of external broadcasting".—[official Report; col. 812.]
Now the decision has been made to reprieve the Burmese and Somali services, for which we are very grateful, to halve the output of the Brazilian and French for Europe services, to halve the subvention to the transcription service and to close on 31st December the direct services to Spain, Italy and Malta. I fail to see what part Parliament was allowed to play in these decisions. Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, will inform us as to what part we really did play in this. I simply do not understand the thinking or the philosophy behind the decisions.
On 30th July, I was told by the Foreign Secretary that I was asking for more money for the External Services of the BBC, when it was quite clear—patently clear—that all of us in that debate were demanding not more money, but the maintenance of the services which it was proposed to cut. Now we are told that the Government do not need to save £3 million a year; they now need a saving of only £1½ million. I would ask: how has that come about? I believe that it is another of those conjuring tricks which are a speciality of the Treasury—
Lord Trefgarne: Oh!
Lord Byers: My Lords, I think it is true. I hope that the noble Lord will explain. Let me put this to the noble Lord. In fact, the Government have cut operating expenditure on these programmes by £1½, million a year in the next three years, and they have decided to cut the capital expenditure programme by another £1½ million in 1983–84 and 1984–85. The reason why they have not cut the capital programme by £1½ million next year is that it has been cut so much already. There is nothing more to cut. I want to ask whether the noble Lord will confirm that this arithmetic is correct and answer the question: what happens from 1985 onwards? What is there in the long-term programme which will give reassurance to the BBC about its External Services?
On 30th July, the Foreign Secretary ignored the views expressed in the Fourth Report of the Foreign Affairs Committee in another place, when they said:
"Your Committee is of the opinion that influencing the population of countries and their leaders is very important for the United Kingdom. Diverting funds from other projects in the capital expenditure programme, all of which are essential, is not feasible and in any case would be self-defeating"
They went on:
"Nor is it realistic to suggest cuts in other activities of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office or the BBC to find a sum of this magnitude. Accordingly, we have concluded that the money should rightly come from the contingency reserve".
That is what I proposed to the Foreign Secretary in the last debate. The contingency reserve, I understand, now stands at £1·2 billion. I should have thought that
896
it could carry this particularly small sum. I do not believe the problem can be money. I think the truth is that the Foreign Office pays lip service to the importance of the external vernacular services but at the same time proceeds, perhaps unwittingly, to undermine them.
For these services to have maximum impact they must be credible. To be credible they must be consistent and must not be subject to contraction, expansion or extinction on short-term considerations. This is what in fact is at stake. That sort of action gives the impression abroad that these services are vehicles for propaganda whereas their proper reputation, earned over a long time, is that of vehicles for telling the truth to the world.
I believe that this displays a poverty of political judgment. Can you imagine the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office insisting on these cuts at a time when the Japanese have decided to make substantial increases in their overseas broadcasts? That must be the right answer: not to reduce but to maintain. or even to increase. I think that all this emphasises that the Foreign Office is unable to get this matter into perspective and is prepared to inflict damage on overseas broadcasting services out of all proportion to the savings which would be achieved: £1½ million savings out of a defence budget now running at £12 billion. The perspective must be wrong.
Moreover, just to lend point to the importance of the external services, I would remind the House that there is a standard clause in this excellent book, called Hints to Exporters, which is issued by the British Overseas Trade Board. Every one of these, for each country in which we are interested, has a particular standard clause which reads:
"The BBC External Services broadcast throughout the world in English and 39 other languages. An important part of their output deals with developments in British industry, science and technology. New products and processes developed by firms in this country are featured prominently in news and other programmes, with the name of the manufacturer mentioned, where appropriate. All inquiries reaching the BBC as a result of these broadcasts are passed on to the firms concerned. The BBC External Services welcome as much information as possible from industry. They are interested in new processes, new products, export successes, contracts and exhibits at trade fairs abroad. Information should be sent to the Export Liaison Unit at Bush House …".
In my view, this is no time to diminish in any way a service which is part of our export trade promotion—part of the British way of life. We need to retain everything that can help trade overseas and jobs at home. I think we are entitled to ask the Government to think once again before it is too late and to reassure the House about the long-term future of these services.
6.14 p.m.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, I am very glad that the noble Lord, Lord Byers, has tabled this Question for debate. In spite of the concessions announced by the Government in another place on 26th October, following their defeat by a substantial majority in your Lordships' House last July, the situation is still most unsatisfactory, as the noble Lord has said. I should like to support everything that he has said.
Operating expenditure is now to be cut by £1·5 million instead of the original sum of £3 million first planned by the Government. But the Government,

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I understand, will still make up the £1·5 million that remains by cuts in capital expenditure. There will he cuts of £1·5 million in 1983–84 and in 1984–85.I am not clear whether these cuts are to be continued beyond 1984–85.
The Government have said that they still intend to spend the original total of £102 million within the next 10 years, but clearly more of it is now scheduled to be spent outside the period covered by current spending plans. I should therefore like to ask the Government whether they still intend to spend the original total of £102 million during the next 10 years, since much more of this capital expenditure will now lie beyond the lifetime of this Parliament.
Will the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, also confirm that there are to be no further cuts in this area and no further undermining of Britain's voice abroad for short-term financial considerations? The Government spokesman said during the debate in another place on 23rd July that he did not believe that the importance of these broadcasts to our overseas markets was a big consideration and that the Japanese, as the noble Lord, Lord Byers, has said, do not consider that their commercial interests would be served by a massive increase in external broadcasting. I am paraphrasing what the Government spokesman said in that debate. Fri actual fact, Japan, since that debate, is now planning a very large increase. The Japanese Broadcasting Corporation announced in September that they were planning increases from 21 to 40 languages, and a major expansion of ours. Perhaps the noble Lord when he comes to reply will say whether the Government are prepared to review their attitude in the light of the Japanese decision.
The journal The New Civil Engineer in its September issue commented that it is a great help to our overseas trade and industry for programmes to be transmitted in the language of the country concerned. I understand that the European Parliament are to examine the possibility of reforming the European Broadcasting Service which foundered in 1979. This service, known as Euro Radio, would include external broadcasting. Are the Government aware that without any direct Italian or Spanish services the British contribution to Euro Radio will be much limited?
I welcome the decision to retain half the French for Europe service and the Portuguese language broadcasts to Brazil. This at least is something to be thankful for. However, the BBC will have much difficulty in meeting the required operational saving, since reducing the hours of Brazilian and French broadcasts does not halve the cost of running these services.
Perhaps the noble Lord will tell the House what effect these cuts will have on the BBC's French language broadcasts to Francophone Africa'? Will the noble Lord also let the House know why the Spanish and Italian services to Europe are to be closed at the end of the year and replaced by what the Government described in another place as "a modest recorded tape service", financed of course by the BBC? Do they not think that this is rather a hasty decision? And what are the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to do if compelling reasons arise, when they wish to start up these direct broadcasts again? There could be a change of policy, as there was in the case of the
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Turkish service which was to have been cut in 1979, if plans had gone ahead, and then was increased by half as much again as the political situation in Turkey changed.
Then there is the question of the transcription services, mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Byers, where it is the Government's intention to halve the subsidy. The Government want the BBC in future to move towards becoming self-financing in this field. These again are words used by the Government spokesman in another place. This was made clear in the debate on 26th October by the Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Are the Government aware that the BBC have asked their overseas customers whether they would be prepared to pay an increase that would be sufficient to remove the dependence on subsidy and that the overwhelming response from the corporation's customers, both large and small, has been, No? Why should it be otherwise, my Lords, when the BBC's competitors provide their products at prices below the market rate'? It is clear that the BBC's customers are not prepared to pay a price that would enable the corporation's transcription service to become self-financing. At present the BBC charge the maximum fee that the market can bear. There is a limit as to what the corporation can charge. What is to be the future of this service with a reduced subsidy—and one day presumably without a subsidy at all—acting in competition with a subsidised service provided by other nations'?
I must ask the Government whether they attach importance to Britain's transcription service. They say that they do, but by their actions it seems otherwise. If they do—as I hope they do—I must ask them whether they will reconsider their decision to halve the subsidy, because if the transcription service goes one day then all its marketing and distribution facilities will go too. That seems to be something that has not occurred to them. The overseas regional services, whose grant the Government are continuing, for example, depend on the transcription service for these facilities. This is just another example of the muddle into which the Government have got themselves by this hasty and ill-conceived decision in order to save the comparatively small annual sum of £1·5 million. It is a small budget saving but it is one that will be to the great detriment of Britain's voice and influence abroad.
6.22 p.m.
Lord Ferrier: My Lords, I too am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Byers, for raising this question again and I look forward to hearing the Minister's reply in the face of the facts which this debate is laying before him. I suggest that he will require all the ingenuity with which he is undoubtedly blessed to deal with it as he would wish.
I am surprised at the Government's rejection of the message which was clearly represented by the Division here in your Lordships' House on 30th July. I am slow to wrath but there is at least some measure of disillusionment in my mind at what has happened. Indeed, it could be said that it might be construed as a slap in the eye for this House, although it is fair to confess that the Tories who voted with the noble Lord, Lord Byers, on that occasion were outnumbered by the

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Tories who voted with the Government, despite the tremendous figures. But what about the Cross-Benches? We shall hear from them, I suggest, and from the noble Lord, Lord Hill of Luton, for one, I am sure.
I have looked back at contributions that I have made on this subject in this House over a number of years, but they appear now as water under the bridge if the present programme is to continue. Even when I said:
"It is not that we cannot afford to; my Lords, we cannot afford not to",
I said that on the occasion when I was urging the increase of—and I quote:
"the advantage which the BBC Service, thank goodness, still holds and has worked at for so long".
That was in a debate in October 1979.
Of course, I have taken many soundings from friends and acquaintances, nearly all of whom support my view and the view expressed by the previous two speakers. One contary voice said that the BBC's present attitude is so biased against Government and so slanted to the Left that their overseas services consequently must be most misleading, and that the fewer of them there are, the better it would be. That was a new angle to me but it struck me as being worth recounting to your Lordships.
However, looking back at the debate on 30th July, I thought that, on the other hand, the content of the Overseas Services was accepted as being thoroughly reliable as they stand. Nevertheless, there is no doubt in my mind that in recent times the BBC has become increasingly anti-Government and anti-Tory and leans to the Left whenever possible, or at least conceals the Government party's achievements or damns them with faint praise.
Be that as it may, there is no need to emphasise the paeons of praise for the Overseas Service contributions from all over the world. Curiously enough, I had one from China only this morning when I met a cousin fresh back from that country. An old friend from India lunching with me here the other day said how in one of his undertakings in Saudi Arabia the premises are absolutely vacated on the dot of five o'clock because everybody rushes to their car radios to get the one o'clock news in Arabic from London, which comes through good and clear. I seem to recall that the Government's case was that it was more important to increase the strength, but there is one area in which it comes through good and clear. He said that the Iranian broadcasts are utterly unreliable and the beams from India are not powerful enough.
Other speakers will be more specific about the actual cuts which remain. I am speaking of the Spanish, Italian and Maltese ones in Spanish. I am not personally conversant with them but the broad principle seems to be perfectly clear, as I shall show in the next few words. I am one who agrees with what the chairman, Mr. Howard, said in his Wentworth lecture in June. He asked:
"Why do they listen so regularly? Because of the quality of our programmes and the accuracy of our news. Because they know that we broadcast without fear and without favour, and as professionally as possible. And yet we are crippled in the External Services for the lack of a paltry few million a year.
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When a thousand million a year is poured into British Leyland, it seems pretty absurd not to put three or four million a year more into the External Services".
That was in his lecture in June. As I said when I began my speech, I look forward to my noble friend's reply to the Question and if it is not to be a full restoration of the threatened cuts I trust that the Government will think yet again. I beg them to do so.
Before I sit down, the one question which crosses my mind is this: what did the Commons vote about this? Were they ever asked to vote? The Foreign Secretary spoke of the opinion of Parliament, but the only expression of the opinion of Parliament that was actually taken in the Division Lobby was in this House.
Lord Boothby: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, may I ask him one question? Does he realise that at the moment Italy is the main target of the Communist radio and that the dangers arising from that are very considerable for all of us, and does he not think it absolutely scandalous to withdraw our service to Italy?
6.30 p.m.
Lord Hill of Luton: My Lords, as has been said already, the House is doubly indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Byers, first for raising the matter as he did at the end of July and, secondly, for convincing the House to pass his Motion with a two to one majority: and again today in trenchant terms he has dealt with the modified cuts that remain. I do not propose to follow him in that, for I think it was superbly done and does not need repetition or support.
I want, if I may, to raise three questions. The first is the reason behind this. Why, in heaven's name, for a paltry sum of £1½ million is damage risked to our External Services? I just do not understand it. Why? And associated with that is the other question: Why, over the years, have there been six re-examinations in eight years with a view to a reduction of expenditure? Why, to take other figures, have there been nine thorough-going reviews in 20 years, and in two years there have been nine cuts in individual services? Why? This is not a rhetorical question, for I just do not understand what has led the Foreign Office—to take one set of figures as an example—to make six cuts in eight years. Why?
Of course, I know that in general governments do not much like information services, apart from their own. This applies of course to all Governments. Ministers, when they listen to broadcasting or read newspapers, if they find something which is flattering to themselves, that is beautifully impartial; but if they find something which is genuinely impartial it is slanted against them. Do not let us be too superior about this. This is a failing of politicians of all parties generally. But surely that cannot of itself be the explanation.
Government nowadays, of course, seem to dislike the media generally. That is another story. But I find it really rather disturbing when criticism is made of news and pictures of what has actually taken place, suggesting that there is a form of prejudice, a sort of bias, that is embedded in the press and broadcasting. Prime Ministers—and this applies, I suppose, to most,

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if not all, Prime Ministers—do not like broadcasting; indeed, they particularly dislike the BBC. They do not like information services over which they have no control. They do not like the autonomy of the BBC in programme content. I suspect that the Foreign Office, which has its own information services, resents the existence of an information service which it does not control, which is autonomous in its content. And yet none of these seems to be an adequate explanation for these repeated scrutinies of the Overseas Services of the BBC.
So what is the explanation? Frankly, I do not know, and I think we ought to be very suspicious of this technique over the years, of taking up the plants by the roots with a view to modifications, and in particular cuts. There seems to be an animus in the Foreign Office against the External Services. That has led in large part to a loss of morale, to bring me to my second point, in the External Services. You can understand the feeling of those who for years have been running a very important service, for example, the Italian service, to find that it disappears at the end of the year. They are bound to ask themselves: Why is it that this fine service, so valuable in war as well as in peace, so valuable yesterday and valuable today, will be of no value after 31st December? You can understand that question.
But there is another aspect, and it is this. These repeated re-examinations of the service have, of course, had an effect on those who have not suffered cuts. How must they feel, those who work in services which have escaped this phase? What must they feel about their prospects of escaping it next time, in a year or 18 months, judging by the experience of recent years? The morale of those in this well-nigh anonymous service is desperately important to its quality. If they are anxious, if they are looking over their shoulders, if they are thinking of other posts and other activities, one cannot wonder that in fact their work is in danger of suffering by that very anxiety.
So I am led to make one new suggestion. I hope in fact the Government will withdraw the lot. After all, they were compelled by the arguments put forward to make this change to half the cuts that they formerly proposed. I hope they will go the whole hog and withdraw them all, as the noble Lord, Lord Byers, so powerfully argued. But I would ask them, in respect of the frequency of examinations, to think of those who are still there, those who remain. They are bound to have doubts about their future. There is bound to be an unease. In other words, cuts may be defended as minor—and, goodness knows! it is the easiest thing in the world to defend these cuts as minor in terms of money saved—but if they are still insisting on these cuts, would ask for one other thing to happen: that we give up this six times in eight years review; that in fact when the pattern is laid down, as it is now or will be, we hope in its earlier form, there is a requirement that that pattern remains in existence for a period of years, say five years, subject of course to the Foreign Office being fully entitled to start new services, to require the BBC to start new services in the light of world conditions.
It would give a certain rigidity, it might be argued, but those who are devoting their lives to this specialist form of work are entitled to see some prospect ahead, and not the danger that every year or 18 months, for
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some reasons they do not understand their jobs are destroyed and their services are destroyed. Why should they not have, why should the service not have, a certain sense of security for a few years, on the understanding that additions may be necessary as conditions change? I would put that suggestion to the Government, not because I believe it is the whole solution to the problem, but because I believe that whatever is done about this particular set of cuts it seems to me that this kind of change is necessary for the general good health of a service which, as we all freely admit, must be adjusted from time to time in relation to the world situation. It will give them a measure of security and so remove the very real danger of a loss of morale, loss of security, which I am certain is to be found now among those who work for services which have escaped this time.
So I would say to your Lordships that we really must get away from this almost annual examination of the services. But still we are left, as I am left, with a failure to understand what it is all about. I very nearly said that it is a "fiddling" sum of money, but perhaps I should say a trifling sum of money, in national terms, that has come forward—£1·5 million. We have had two debates in your Lordships' House with a great deal of anxiety aroused. Surely it is a nonsense that we have been going through in recent years. It is time there were some order, some stability and sense behind the Foreign Office as regards how it manages this service. In any case, let us get away from the assumption that the service is so trivial and so unimportant that every 18 months or so we can re-examine it, abolishing this and adding that. That is the wrong attitude towards this service. It has suffered as much from that loss of morale as it has from the loss of certain individual services.
Therefore, I would urge the Government to consider the suggestion of some period of stability of the kind I have put forward in order not to encourage, whether it wants to or not, the fall in morale that is necessarily associated with this method of regular, almost annual, re-examination of a service that needs to be left alone to get on with its work and not always be considering what the Foreign Office wants to do and is inclined to do by way of cutting the service.
6.42 p.m.
Lord Kilmarnock: My Lords, I must apologise in advance for having to leave the Chamber temporarily when I sit down because we are discussing upstairs in your Lordships' unemployment committee some clauses to which I have proposed some amendments. I hope that I may crave your Lordships' indulgence for that. I come once again, quite openly and unashamedly, into the lists on behalf of the BBC's vernacular service in Spanish. I am not speaking simply because I have been briefed or lobbied but because of my personal knowledge of the country and what the BBC means to it.
The first matter that springs to my mind is the glaring discrepancy between the proposed cut and the whole thrust of British foreign policy which has been firmly and rightly in support of democracy in Spain and of that country's application to enter the European Community despite the still unresolved difficulties of the Gibraltar question. It might be argued: Why do

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we need to spend money broadcasting to an ally? But Spain is not yet in the European Community or NATO and there are signs of very considerable unrest in the country, which make it highly questionable to assume that democracy is "in the bag" in Spain or that that country is firmly and finally a member of the Western Alliance.
In the debate on Lord Byers' last Motion in July I mentioned a possible parallel with Turkey. Eighteen months ago it was proposed to close the Turkish service. Who would contemplate such a thing now? There is also the case of Portugal where the service was closed in 1957 because it was felt superflous to broadcast to our "oldest ally". The service was re-opened in 1962 because it was recognised at official level that the shut-down had been short-sighted and a mistake. Spain is by no means an old ally. She is only precariously a new one.
In the last debate on this subject on 30th July the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, said at cols. 870 and 871 of the Official Report:
"Naturally, we should continue all services to Eastern Europe, where the media are not free".
But they are not free in Spain either, in the sense that we understand freedom. In Italy I understand that there is some degree of pluralism with the different parties controlling different channels, but in Spain Radio Nacional de Espana is state controlled as is the television network. Obviously there are forces in Spain attempting to rectify this, but they have not been successful. And it is a curious fact that the BBC Spanish service's audience has not decreased—as might have been expected—with the coming of constitutional democracy. There is no evidence that the BBC broadcasts are now felt to be superflous in that country.
That brings me to consumer reaction which I spoke a little about last time. I cannot help reverting to it. cannot possibly, in the time which I have, quote from more than a tiny fraction of the hundreds of individual protest letters so far received. However, I shall give a very brief selection. A listener in Madrid wrote:
"From my earliest childhood the BBC has been my companion through those moments of an uncertain future (I am 52 years old). For the first time I did not want to believe the news I heard tonight. Impossible!".
Again I quote from a listener in the troubled province of Vizcaya who says:
"Nobody can doubt that it has been a sentence of death. For me the BBC is like a human being because for 39 years … it has brought true and impartial information to us Spaniards who only with difficulty obtained news from other sources".
Again a listener in, I think, Salamanca writes:
"The savings will be minimal compared with the enormous influence of these services, even in the aspect of economic propaganda, for instance in the news about the latest developments in British industry".
And the same listener writes:
"I am not going to get used easily to this suppression. I think it has been a disgraceful decision by the British Government and Parliament".
Finally, from a listener in Lerida:
"They leave us in a tunnel without light".
I repeat, "a tunnel without light".
This decision was presented as a fait accompli to the managing director of the External Services at noon on
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the day the announcement was to be made in the Commons. Given a freer hand the BBC could, I understand, have found other ways of making £1·5 million worth of savings on current expenditure without cutting any service. But they were not given the choice. This is surely against the Government's often stated principle of not interfering with the management, even of state-controlled corporations and letting them get on with the job within certain guidelines. Could the noble Lord explain why this principle does not apply in the case of the BBC's External Services? Will he not undertake to return at least this area of decision to the External Services management?
What is the extent of the savings in the Spanish case? The current annual cost is calculated at £190,000—less than the cost of a family house in Hampstead as I pointed out on the last occasion that we debated this matter in your Lordships' House. The residual line and tape service which is contemplated will cost £44,000, reducing the saving to approximately £146,000 without allowing for redundancies and, of course, whether a "line and tape" service would be taken up is entirely at the whim of the customer, in this case a state-controlled monopoly. I am told on good authority that it is most unlikely in the present climate that material either critical of the Spanish Government or supportive of British attitudes in areas such as the Common Market or Gibraltar would be acceptable.
I cannot believe that it is this minuscule financial saving that the Government are really after, although the noble Lord, Lord Byers, has already raised this point as well as the noble Lord, Lord Hill of Luton. So what are the Government trying to save? Is it just face? Is it the face of the Foreign Office with the Treasury? Of course I understand that there must be some give and take between the spending departments and the Treasury and that some thing; we should like to do may have to be sacrificed. But this is something we are already doing pretty well at very marginal cost, the suspension of which will make only a minuscule saving. And such inter-departmental manoeuvres will certainly be lost on the Spanish people who will see it—witness the letters I have quoted from, and there are many others—as a breach of faith.
I should like to end on a personal note. Some 15 or 16 years ago I was riding through the mountains north of Almeria in the South of Spain and I came to a decaying mining town, where all hope appeared to have been abandoned. It was a most God-forsaken place. In the evenings a few of the remaining inhabitants would cluster together to listen almost religiously to the BBC in their own language, from which they appeared to derive the necessary strength to continue the uphill struggle for the redress of their grievances. It was not that the BBC was inciting them to subversion; just that it gave them the smell of a country in which we ordered things better—or so they fondly believed. We must of course all hope that the present attempt at democracy in Spain survives. It will not be the King's fault if it does not. But we must also face the fact that it may fail. In that case by suppressing this service we should be depriving hundreds of thousands of Spaniards of the opportunity of listening to objective news and balanced views in their own language. If the people I mentioned are still alive,

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they would think, not without some justification, that we had betrayed their faith. I wonder whether the Government have really taken this into account. I strongly urge them to think again.
6.50 p.m.
Lord Crowther-Hunt: My Lords, we are all grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Byers, for putting down this Unstarred Question and, like him and other noble Lords, who have spoken in this debate so far, I am disappointed at the Government's response to the clear majority view expressed in your Lordships' House in that debate on 30th July. However, quickly and briefly, I want just to make two points. The first of these is about the Spanish service. It is at least something that the Government are ready to maintain a recorded tape service. But, of course, as the noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock, has pointed out, this does not get us very far. At most, as I understand it, this might produce some three hours of material a week. But, as the noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock, also pointed out, whether any of it ever gets broadcast in Spain will depend entirely on the decisions of the two main broadcasting services in Spain—the state-controlled radio service and Spain's main private commercial network.
As regards the state-controlled radio service, I understand that a recent purge in the management there has resulted in the reinstallation of Right-wing Government nominees and this, given the present political climate in Spain, makes it highly unlikely that any tape material supporting and explaining British views and attitudes on such matters as Gibraltar or even the Common Market, would be acceptable. So the tape service leaves us entirely at the mercy of Spanish broadcasting stations and the pressures that might be brought to bear on them.
It is in this general context that I would make one plea to the Government, and I make this against the background of last Sunday's demonstration in Madrid, where some quarter of a million people gathered to mark the sixth anniversary of General Franco's death—the biggest demonstration of disaffection with democracy yet mounted by Spain's extreme right.
Given that Spanish democracy is still in such a pre carious state, would the Government at least agree to consider reinstating the full Spanish service of the BBC should there be continuing evidence of a growing threat to Spanish democracy? I assume, of course, that should there by a successful Right-wing coup in Spain, the Government will wish to reinstate the full Spanish service forthwith, and, naturally, I would welcome an assurance on that particular point as well.
My second point is a more general one. When your Lordships' House debated the BBC's External Services on 30th July, the noble Lord the Foreign Secretary emphasised that the External Services of the BBC are financed entirely by the Government and that it was for the Government to decide:
"…how best the money we give them should be allocated between the different External Services and between current and capital expenditure".—[Official Report, 30/7/81; col. 812.]
At the same time the noble Lord the Foreign Secretary made it clear that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office does not exercise any editorial authority over the content of the BBC's programmes. That the BBC has complete editorial freedom and independence is,
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of course, undoubtedly so, and certainly the BBC would not operate on any other basis. That is why the BBC, operating with complete editorial independence, has established an unrivalled world reputation for the unbiased and independent reporting of world news and British news.
However, there will always be those who believe that he who pays the piper must inevitably have at least some influence on the piper's tune. It is to ensure that no such charges can ever be validly made that I put forward a modest little proposal which, if the Government will consider it, might well act as a sort of buffer to assure the continued independence of the BBC's External Services.
I start with the view that the Government of the day must, of course, have the final decision on the amount of money to be allocated to the BBC's External Services. But if the Government could create what I shall call a BBC External Services financial advisory board, it could act as a sort of buffer between the BBC and the Government. What I have in mind here is a board that might consist of, say, one or two Members of your Lordships' House, one or two Members of another place, one or two industrialists and one or two trade unionists, and perhaps even a couple of academics might be added to such a body. If such a body were set up, after appropriate consultations with the Foreign Office and with the BBC, and perhaps also after carrying out appropriate investigations into the efficiency of the BBC's External Services, in my view it would be its job to recommend an appropriate allocation of Government money to the External Services of the BBC. It could do this each year on a rolling five-year basis, taking into account each year—after consultations with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and also with the Treasury—the Government's overall economic strategy and also the financial requirements of the BBC's External Services.
If such a body were set up, in my view the Government would not be obliged to accept the recommendations of the sort of body I have in mind. Indeed, I do not think that any such imposition could ever he made on a Government. In the end the Government themselves must be able to decide what allocation of money to make to the External Services. The Government must always have the right to go against any recommendations that such a financial advisory board might make. But the existence of such a board would act as a sort of independent buffer between the Government and the BBC.
It would perhaps be a sort of University Grants Committee, though I am not sure that this is a particularly happy analogy in current circumstances. But the fact that the University Grants Committee might not be operating particularly happily at the moment is no reason for believing that this particular body would be struck, or might be struck, with the same sort of blight, because its composition would, of course, be very different.
Be that as it may, such a financial advisory board would, in my view, reinforce the editorial independence of the BBC, and on the world stage it would dispel any suspicion that he who pays the piper must have some influence on the tune. May I ask, therefore, that the Government should at least agree to consider this. It would obviously be wrong to expect a "Yes" or

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"No" answer to the idea of such a board from the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, this evening because, in my view, it is too important a matter for an off-the-cuff reaction. But l hope that at least the noble Lord would agree to take away and consider this idea and perhaps, when he has considered it, come back and report to your Lordships' House.
6.59 p.m.
Lord Morris: My Lords, I know that this has been said before, but I believe not only that noble Lords should be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Byers, for tabling this Unstarred Question; but that the whole nation should be grateful to him. As your Lordships are well aware, he does not speak often, but when he does and as the noble Leader of the Liberal Party in your Lordships' House, I believe that every word he says should be listened to with the greatest care. Indeed, that is very easy to do because he speaks so beautifully and argues so very cogently. I would never dream of even trying to compete with what he says. I think the mirth from my own Front Bench is totally and completely out of place, if I may say so.
There are points that I am going to repeat, but they desperately need stressing. The question of consultation, which I believe the noble Lord, Lord Hill of Luton, brought up, is very important. I would remind your Lordships that between 25th June, the date of the last round of Nanny's announcements from Whitehall, and 22nd October, when the decision to hold a debate was announced, during the four-month period when both Houses made their distaste of the proposed cuts quite clear by a fine debate in your Lordships' House and by a vote of a very large majority, and by no less than 160 at least, if my memory serves me correctly, of Members of the other place tabling their names to a Motion, the Government did not even discuss the proposals with the BBC in detail, and the BBC was given no opportunity to indicate other possible ways of saving the sums involved. I find that totally astonishing, and it is quite wrong that a Government should behave in this way. We are not talking about a narrow interest of Bush House. We can almost forget the qualitative arguments. What we are talking about is the national interest.
If one bothers to read foreign newspapers—and it is worth recalling that very few people in the world read newspapers, but a hell of a lot of people listen to the radio—the lineage that this country gets in French newspapers, German newspapers, Italian newspapers, in Belgian and Dutch newspapers, is minimal; only when there is bad news does it strike. But there is an enormous audience for the BBC.
What does Nanny, our unholy mother, the Treasury —I suspect they arc behind it—want to do? They want to cut out the voice of the United Kingdom. I know this is past history but I want to set the record straight. It remains important because it raises a vitally important point in the relationship between Government, Parliament and the BBC. It is this point which the noble Lord, Lord Byers, raised so importantly.
One should never forget that in the last nine years no less than seven cuts have been imposed on the External Services, almost invariably accompanied by references to a great national asset. When I say
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"cuts", my noble friend keeps on looking at me and saying "not true". We are talking specifically about cuts in the services which the BBC can put out. This is where the Foreign Office have the whip hand. It is well known—my noble friend Lord Trefgarne knows—they have the right to say that you can broadcast to this country, or to that country, so many hours here and so many hours there, and it is the whittling away by virtue of that particular power by which they have the BBC by what are called in the vernacular, "the short and curlies"
The odd thing is that when they make these cuts they always refer to "this great national asset". It is an odd thing too, I have always believed, to say that it is a great national asset and then to pare it: and to pare it insidiously. Under the BBC's charter of licence, Parliament gives the Government of the day the right to prescribe the languages in which the BBC External Services shall broadcast and the duration of such broadcasts. The BBC External Services are enjoined by Parliament, I remind the Government, to broadcast in the national interest.
We then come to the question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Byers: Why have Her Majesty's Government chosen to ignore the expressed will of Parliament? I completely fail to understand this. Are we just a rubber stamp? Are we nothing at all? If Her Majesty's Government seriously believe that the BBC External Services have not broadcast in the national interest, let me just serve this up to your Lordships: In 1982, the BBC World Services celebrate their 50th anniversary. They were celebrating the latest audience survey in which it was shown that world-wide 100 million people were listening regularly to the BBC. Of this 100 million, the highest in the BBC's history and the highest in the world, three-quarters listen to the various vernacular services rather than the English broadcasts of the World Service.
This, I believe, puts paid to the observations made by my noble friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, who suggested on an earlier occasion this year that everyone in the world really should learn English. He did this none too indirectly, and with the greatest respect to him—
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I should be glad to know when my noble friend said that.
Lord Morris: My Lords, I am sorry, would my noble friend repeat that? I did not catch his words.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I said that I should be glad to know when my noble friend Lord Carrington made the observation which my noble friend Lord Morris has ascribed to him.
Lord Morris: My Lords, I cannot recall that. I did not say that he made the observation. I suggested that that was the implication of his observation, which is not the same thing at all. It was quite clear from what he said, and I am not reading between the lines too deeply; I assure my noble friend on that point.
The point that the noble Lord, Lord Hill of Luton, made is absolutely fundamental: the continual paring at the BBC External Services has an appalling effect

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on the services that are extant. It is not only in terms of staff morale but also in terms of the listeners. It gives a fragility, a feeling of fear, to all those who listen to this particular service: Are they a temporary thing? Are they going to be further eroded. But to tamper with the foundations of the External Services in this way cannot be in the national interest. The BBC, given a duty of broadcasting overseas in the national interest by Parliament, does not think so, and it is never given the chance to suggest alternative ways in which these damaging cuts might be less damaging.
The lack of consultation over the future of the External Services is in marked contrast to the close consultation which the BBC and the Government have over the licence fee which funds domestic BBC radio and television. If consultation is possible over the licence fee without threatening the Government's constitutional position, one wonders why it is not possible over the External Services. If Bush House is indeed a national asset, then the national interest demands some better way of securing for the External Services a secure financial position; an agreement on the need to preserve the vernacular services in the interests of Bush House and the nation as a whole.
7.8 p.m.
Lord Ardwick: My Lords, I should like to follow the noble Lord, Lord Morris, when he calls attention to the gap between the Government's professed admiration for the External Services and their financial provisions. It is rather like a man who tells his wife how much he loves her every time he cuts the housekeeping allowance. I should also like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Byers, who gives us another opportunity of expressing our scorn at the Government's attitude in these matters.
I am not going to say very much tonight. All that could be said about the subject was said in the last debate. All the indignation that could be felt was expressed, and the Government at the end of it found themselves in a miserable minority. Of all the troubles that the Government have brought upon themselves by their cuts, there has been no trouble so large for a cut so small. But, of course, the Government as a result of the decision in this House, as a result of the universal displeasure that was felt at their action, had to do something, and so an act of parsimony has, thank heaven, been abandoned. But the amende we have is not an amende honorable; it is a grudging amende; an amende minimal and ungenerous. If it can be accepted, that is simply because half a loaf taken away is better than the whole loaf taken away.
If the saving had any real significance it could easily he accepted, but it seems to be a mere token cut in the name, one supposes, of equality of suffering, and when the noble Lord, Lord Hill, spoke of his suspicion, which I felt in the last debate, of the jealousy, envy, dislike perhaps, of the BBC by the Foreign Office, I must say that he is not the first eminent former high officer of the BBC to express that sentiment.
A few days before our last debate I asked the Government whether they would try to rescue the transcription services which were threatened with closure by the prescribed economies in the BBC's Overseas Services. I received a little encouragement from the Minister, the
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noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale. They wanted the services to go on, he said. They just wanted to chop off the £1 million grant in aid. Then it was further explained that the services included cultural affairs, and of course the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has no truck with culture. Goering reached for his gun when the word "kultur" was mentioned. The Foreign Office reaches for its pruning knife.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, has the noble Lord heard of the British Council and is he aware what that costs the Foreign Office?
Lord Ardwick: My Lords, not only have I heard of the British Council but I have spoken in your Lordships' House of the struggles of the British Council, because of the meanness and parsimony of the British Government, to continue on course and of the terrible effect that has had on the morale of the employees of the British Council, just as it is having on the morale of the External Services.
I was told that the other part of the services, the Topical Tapes, would continue to receive £350,000 a year grant in aid, and the Minister—I have warned the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, that I would raise this matter—said the Government could see no reason why the really important part of the whole service should cease. But the subsidy to the transcription services, running at over £1 million, is to be halved, as announced by the Government in another place on 23rd October. The transcription services must apparently have its subsidy cut in two, yet the Government still hope that, within that very large cut, the Topical Tapes could be fully preserved. That does not make sense. The Topical Tapes cost £350,000 a year. That would leave only £150,000 for the rest of the services, which up to now have been absorbing £650,000. They would receive less than one-quarter of what they had been receiving.
I must therefore ask what is happening. What is happening to the Topical Tapes service which the Government hold in such high esteem and which they do not want cut? Is it true that one-third of the staff will have to be unloaded and that the output will be reduced by an even greater proportion? Have the Government really lived up to their promise and their professed hope that the Topical Tapes service will continue unimpaired? Is that realistic in view of the size of the cuts now imposed? I hope that in his reply the Minister will be able to give me a convincing reassurance.
7.14 p.m.
Baroness Airey of Abingdon: My Lords, I apologise for not having added my name to the list of speakers, but I shall not speak for more than a minute or two. While sharing in the concern of so many noble Lords that the external broadcasts are to be discontinued to Spain, Italy and Malta, I congratulate Her Majesty's Government on keeping the external broadcasts to Somalia, particularly since the recent alliance between Libya, Ethiopia and the South Yemen. It has always been a dangerous part of the world, but I believe that that alliance has made it a very much more dangerous part. I am therefore particularly thankful that we shall continue our external broadcasts there. This

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may serve as an example of how particularly thankful we should be that, when a danger like this appears on the horizon, we have the comfort of the external broadcasts there.
7.15 p.m.
Lord Gladwyn: My Lords, during his speech the noble Lord, Lord Morris, who I am afraid is no longer in his place, made some reference to what he understood the Foreign Secretary had said regarding the great importance of broadcasting in the English language in the overseas programmes of the BBC. I understood the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, to say that he would like the passage verified, and I think I have found it. The Foreign Secretary said:
"First, we believe that the World Service of the BBC is by far and away the most important. The English language, despite the misgivings of the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, is a world-wide language. It is becoming almost the world-wide language. More and more people are speaking it every year. It is the World Service in English on which the reputation of the BBC largely depends".
If the figures for the world audience for the overseas programmes given by the noble Lord, Lord Morris, are correct—was it three-quarters of 100 million who listen to the BBC in their vernacular languages?— then the observations of the Foreign Secretary read a little strangely; and, when he replies to the debate I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, will say whether that impression is in any way correct.
I also wish to refer to a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Ferrier, about the impression which I gather he said some people had that the BBC overseas programmes are largely dominated by what might be called Left-wing philosophies and ideas. I am a devoted listener to the overseas programmes in English on the BBC. I listen to them quite often, indeed usually in the mornings, in preference to Radio 4. I also listen to their programmes to a certain extent in French, and even in German, and over the years I have never myself derived the impression that those broadcasts are unduly influenced by the Left. I find them to be extremely impartial and I particularly enjoy the reports they have from their special correspondents throughout the world, which I have never found to be completely dominated by the Left-wing ideas. I do not know if any other noble Lords have discovered such tendencies, but I never have and I therefore believe, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Ferrier, agrees, that such accusations are malicious and completely unfounded.
Lord Ferrier: My Lords, when I referred to bias to the Left I was not referring to the overseas services at all. I too listen to them in English. I was referring to the general trend in this country.
Lord Gladwyn: Is the noble Lord referring to Radio 4, my Lords?
Lord Byers: Or Jimmy Young?
Lord Gladwyn: My Lords, I have not myself experienced such a tendency in the BBC's programmes, and in any event we are this evening talking about the overseas programmes. In respect of those, I have
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heard people say they are unduly influenced by the Left. Perhaps it was not the noble Lord, Lord Ferrier, who said that, but certainly other people have said it.
The Government's reason for cutting down, for the seventh time, on the overseas programmes of the BBC has always been that it is necessary to save money and that all Government agencies that spend money should bear their proportionate share of the general cuts, the only exception of course being, so far as I understand it, defence and, if I am not wrong, the police. There is no doubt that all departments and agencies, when faced with cuts, tend to make out that their own is a special case, and it is obviously far simpler for the Treasury to impose a uniform cut rather than have to argue with a large number of vested interests all intent on proving, for one reason or another, that they are special cases. I admit that.
Nevertheless, there are surely instances of cuts which really are self-defeating; that is by the infliction of which you patently lose more than you gain. So insisting on a strict, what might be called, "equality of misery"—which I think is the policy pursued by the Treasury—might occasionally land you in what is, frankly, an absurd situation, which is what has happened, as we think, in the overseas programme of the BBC. Besides, if you really are in a bad way financially, the last thing that you want to do is to give the impression to the outside world that you are broke. Nor, if defence is to be exempted, does it make much sense to undermine what in effect constitutes our first line of defence; namely, the impression that we create on the not always very sympathetic, to say nothing of the hostile, foreigner. All this has been said before, but I believe that it bears saying again, even though, as we all know, the dye has now been cast and the corporation has received its irrevocable marching orders —at least for the next year.
But in the remaining minutes at my disposal I should like for a moment to dwell on something which, to some small extent, might mitigate the effects of the latest cuts. I believe that even now we do not fully appreciate both the immense advantage which the English language confers on us and how important it is that students, for instance, should continue to communicate with each other in, so to speak, an English atmosphere, employing what has now become, as indeed the Foreign Secretary rightly said, a kind of world lingua franca.
Happily, my old department, the Foreign Office—in the ability of which I have great faith, and which, I need hardly say, I do not myself blame for what are obviously the follies of the Treasury—is, so the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, tells me, now taking the lead in promoting that student mobility, as it is called, which in a free world it is so important to maintain. I think that the audio-visual methods of teaching, such as the transcription of the External Services undoubtedly offers, will be seen as one of the main instruments in furthering the recommendations of the Commonwealth Consultative Group (I think it is called) which were endorsed in paragraph 84 of the communiqué of the recent Melbourne Conference.
I refer more particularly to the conception of what are called regional "centres of excellence", which might be established throughout the Commonwealth as a long overdue decentralisation of the present one

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way system whereby nearly all Commonwealth overseas students, when they go abroad, come to this country. What is called "distance teaching" (broadcasts and cassettes) is now a recognised means of education and is something that has come to stay, as witness the very considerable adoption of such methods in the United States, and indeed in the Soviet Union, where it has been adopted with the greatest success. It could certainly also be adopted with profit in the British Commonwealth.
I sincerely trust, therefore, that the powers-that-be will keep our existing expertise, and in particular our excellent BBC library of programmes, up to strength and continue to exploit all the opportunities which these offer for the spread of British techniques, British trade, and British interests generally. I need hardly add that I also sincerely trust, together with other noble Lords, that in a year's time the Treasury, having arrived at the conclusion that we no longer have any money to spend on anything, will not insist on yet further cuts, which would no doubt result in a real crippling of the entire overseas programme structure.
Lord Ferrier: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, I wonder whether, with his wide knowledge of Europe and his multilingual gifts, he can tell us to what extent an audience such as that referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock, listening to a vernacular programme, are capable also of listening to the same thing in English and comprehending it—either in Spain or in Italy.
Lord Gladwyn: My Lords, I should say that the majority of those who listen in the vernacular are not capable of listening to and understanding it in English, more particularly in Spain, where there is very little English spoken, and likewise in Italy, which I know very well. I think that the great majority of those listening, while they might be able to speak a little English, would not be able to follow the details and implications of an argument conducted very quickly in English. Yes, I should say that the immense majority of those who listen in the vernacular would not be able to understand the World Service in English.
7.26 p.m.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, at the outset I wish to apologise for the inadequacy of my vocal chords this evening. I recall once before, a year or so ago, when in a similar predicament saying to your Lordships that if I "conked out", my noble friend Lord Long, sitting beside me, would jump up and continue with the speech that I had prepared, and I hope that my noble friend will feel able to do that again this evening should the need arise.
I well recall the very useful debate about the BBC External Services in your Lordships' House on 30th July. In winding up that debate I tried to answer many of the points that had been made. Although some noble Lords welcomed the Government's emphasis on a capital programme to improve the BBC's audibility, a majority laid greater stress on current services. On that same day in July my noble friend the then Lord President of the Council, I think, said that the Government would take into account the views expressed, as well as those expressed in a debate in another
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place on 23rd July. I think, on reflection, that it was my right honourable friend Mr. Francis Pym, who was then Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, not the Lord President of the Council, as he now is. We have indeed taken into account most fully all those views, and as a result we put forward fresh proposals which were endorsed in another place on 26th October.
The question before us is based on what I think is the false impression that we are making what are called "damaging cuts". We are in fact substantially increasing expenditure on the External Services. There is thus no net cut. Our aim is to finance a major and sorely needed capital programme to improve audibility. The Government have all along been prepared to contribute the lion's share towards the audibility programme. But we believe that it is right that the BBC should make some contribution by switching resources from current operations to investment. We are now asking the BBC to switch only half the amount that we originally proposed in June.
The only services to be ended will be Maltese, Spanish to Spain, and Italian. In the case of Spanish to Spain and Italian, I am happy to announce that new services of recorded programmes for rebroadcasting by radio stations in those countries will begin on 1st January 1982. The BBC will thus continue to have audiences in both Italy and Spain, albeit indirectly. As regards direct broadcasts from London, Italians and Spaniards will of course still receive the World Service in English, and the growing interest in the English language—whatever some noble Lords might have said—combined with better audibility, suggests that listenership will increase. Thus the only service that will end completely is the one to Malta. That service is for only 35 minutes a week, to a population of 320,000, who mainly speak English.
I greatly regret the ending of direct broadcasts in the vernacular, but it is essential to draw up priorities on foreign policy grounds. At a time when economies have to be made it is reasonable to reduce services to friendly neighbouring countries where the media are free and where we have other opportunities to make our voice heard. We reluctantly chose the services to Spain and Italy because each goes to one country only, by contrast with the French service to Europe, which goes to four countries.
We have many contacts with Spain and Italy through our embassies and consulates general, the constant interchange of businessmen, journalists, tourists and students, and, of course, the BBC's World Service in English, which broadcasts for 24 hours a day compared to the one hour a day in Spanish and Italian. The United States, for example, does not broadcast in the vernacular to Spain or Italy. In spite of one petition from journalists in Spain, which may not have been entirely spontaneous, reactions in the printed press to our proposals have been negligible in that country. A BBC press conference in Italy was reported only on the inside pages.
As regards the services we are reducing as opposed to ending, we have agreed with the BBC that rather than mathematically halving the hours of the French service to Europe and the Portuguese service to Brazil, as we originally requested, they should continue to broadcast 12¼ and 8¾ hours a week respectively, which makes a combined total of nearly three hours

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a week more than we initially proposed. Both these services will still be much larger than several other BBC services, but the savings achieved will enable the BBC to devote more funds towards the capital programme. Perhaps I could add in parenthesis here that the French service to West Africa will in fact continue untouched.
Turning to the transcription service—
Lord Morris: My Lords, would my noble friend allow me to interrupt him before he leaves entirely the Spanish services? May I ask him what effect he thinks this increased expenditure on the capital programme, on audibility, is going to have on the Spanish and Italian services? He has referred particularly to the free media in Spain. My understanding is that the strongest objection that came out of Spain as to the excising of the Spanish service was from the Spanish broadcasters themselves, and, indeed, from journalists. Could my noble friend expand on his implication that the journalistic response to the Spanish cuts was not entirely of their own volition, or was not entirely free?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, on the latter point that the noble Lord has made on the petition which was presented to the embassy in Madrid, I am not certain how far some of the people who subscribed to that petition had in fact been asked to do so by sources outside Spain. Turning now to the transcription service, our intention was to halve the subsidy, which at current prices is running at well over £1 million per annum. This is a matter which greatly worried the noble Lord, Lord Ardwick, and I think, indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi. In fact, thanks to the BBC finding savings from overheads we have been able to agree that the subsidy need not be reduced by as much as a half. I was happy to see that the managing director of the External Services was reported in the BBC house journal Ariel as saying that, despite the reduction of the grant-in-aid subsidy, it may only be necessary to reduce the transcription services' output, at present about 500 hours a year, to around 350; that is, by about 30 per cent.
Lord Ardwick: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord but could he particularise between the tapes service and the general transcription service? As I understand it, about seven of the 22 members of the tapes service are having to be unloaded, and their output is being reduced by almost 50 per cent.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I am coming to that now, and I think that in a moment I will cover the point that the noble Lord has raised. We are confident that a respectable service will continue based on an existing library of 30,000 hours of recorded material and continuing current production made in the ordinary course of events for both the domestic and overseas programmes of the BBC from which it should be possible to make sales. Again, this is a question of priorities, and we consider that some of the money previously available to the transcription services would be better employed in the capital programme. Within the remaining half of the transcription services
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subsidy we hope that the excellent topical tapes services can be fully preserved. I hope that meets the point raised by the noble Lord.
Lord Ardwick: It does not, my Lords, if the noble Lord will forgive me. If the staff is being cut by about seven of the 22 members of the operational staff, and if the output is reduced by almost a half—if those figures are correct figures—how can one say that the service is being fully maintained?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I am talking about the topical tapes service within the transcsription service. The total output of the transcription service, including the topical tapes services, is to be reduced by about 30 per cent., as I said —not 50 per cent. Naturally, there will be some reduction in staff following the reduction in subsidy, but we are satisfied that the output which I have described will be possible with the remaining staff having regard to some productivity and other considerations which can be brought to bear.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, before the noble Lord leaves the transcription service, in view of what he said would he confirm that it is now no longer the Government's policy that this transcription service should move towards becoming self-financing? Because as I explained in my speech, this is just not on, and they are having to compete with the subsidised services provided by other countries.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, as I said, we are proposing to reduce the subsidy by about 50 per cent. That is not the same as was originally proposed. As for the service moving to a self-financing position, we certainly hope that the service will in certain instances be able to increase the revenue it earns; perhaps in some cases, though doubtless not in all, by, for example, raising the charges they make for their services. But I do not think that I can go further than say what I have already said, which is that we are reducing the subsidy by half, and from that it must follow that we are not for the moment proposing that it should proceed to a totally self-financing basis.
Our top priority remains the capital programme. The Government have approved the programme as a whole and intend that it shall be implemented as planned within the decade. It is our firm intention to complete all the projects, valued at £102 million at 1981 prices, which have already been announced in Parliament. There will have to be some slowing down in the years of the present PESC period up to 1984–85, but much of this would have been inevitable anyway because of planning permission delays for the main transmitter projects in the United Kingdom. We are still providing £13 million new money in the next three years, and broadly similar amounts in future.
It has been said that the proposed new money merely restores cuts announced in 1979 and that the External Services have been subject to a series of cuts in recent years. This was the theme of, particularly, the noble Lord, Lord Hill of Luton. But the reductions we announced in 1979 were only reductions in planned increases. The other so-called "cuts" were mainly

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small ones, and there have also been at least two increases in the grant-in-aid. The latest plans include far greater expenditure on Bush House modernisation, for example, than previously foreshadowed, as well as a completely new relay station for the Far East. Our proposals are not dissimilar from those which were under consideration by the previous Administration. In their White Paper on Overseas Representation, published in August 1978, they said:
"Cuts can however be made in some of the vernacular services. The pattern of vernacular services should not be regarded as immutable".
We agree with these sentiments. For too long current services have benefited at the expense of the audibility programme. In every organisation it is necessary to decide how much within a finite total of resources should be spent on investment and how much on current operations. I would suggest to those who may still harbour the impression that the External Services have suffered "cuts" that they should rather see the reductions which we have asked the BBC to make as judicious pruning to concentrate resources where they are most needed to promote the healthy growth of a sturdy tree. I am confident that now that the protracted doubts over our proposals have at last been resolved the tree will grow from strength to strength. Over the past two years we have regularly consulted with the top management of the External Services to keep them abreast of our thinking. Detailed consultations are now taking place at working levels to obtain the optimum and earliest realisation of our plans.
My Lords, perhaps I could now deal with some of the other points that were made, and possibly in slightly greater detail with one or two of those to which I have already referred, in particular the points made by both the noble Lord, Lord Byers, and the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, about the details of the new money which the Government will contribute. The figures have been discussed in general terms with the BBC, but I cannot go into details because public expenditure figures are not normally made available until the publication of the White Paper at the time of the Budget. The Government will contribute over £13 million of new money in 1983–84 and 1984–85 combined and broadly similar amounts in future years. Also I would refer in a little more detail to the costs of the capital programme which will amount to about £102 million in the decade. New transmitter facilities will account for £54 million of that; Bush House modernisation for £17 million, replacements and minor works, £31 million—all at 1981 survey prices.
The noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, also referred to the position of the Turkish service and drew comparisons between the circumstances which surrounded the cuts to that service in 1979 which have now been reversed; but we must be flexible in our priorities. The international situation has changed in that part of the world and, in particular, with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Following the invasion of Afghanistan we increased the vernacular services to countries on the USSR's southern border. Had Turkish been cut, we are confident that the BBC's ingenuity would have been able to restore it, just as they are now restoring the Pushtu service to Afghanistan.
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The noble Lord also referred to the Japanese external broadcasting service. I understand that they are actively considering expansion of their present 259 hours a week in 29 languages to roughly the same level as the BBC; namely, about 700 hours in 40 languages. But contrary to what the noble Lord has said—but I would not want to be dogmatic about this—no final decision has been taken. Japan has a much higher gross national product than the United Kingdom and perhaps is more in need of disseminating its image.
The noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock, and my noble friend Lord Morris, referred to the Spanish service to Spain. It was said—not tonight, and not in these terms; but it was the tenor of what the noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock, was saying—that during the attempted coup in Spain in February many Spaniards were only able to rely upon the BBC Spanish service for their news. That is a flattering view since the state radio went off the air for about two hours—
Lord Kilmarnock: My Lords, that was a point I made in the last debate, but not this evening.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, the points made by the noble Lord were on the same theme but I accept that that was not the precise point he made on this occasion. But it was the theme of my noble friend Lord Morris and at least one other noble Lord; so that I thought that an answer would satisfy three noble Lords rather than delay each of them with separate replies. Since the BBC Spanish service broadcasts for only one hour a day, it is just as likely that the Spaniards turned to the BBC 24-hour world service in English when their own service was off the air at that time.
The noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, and others referred to the criteria for choosing vernaculars to be cut. This is a general point which ran through the speeches of almost every noble Lord. We have to draw up our priorities for these services on foreign policy grounds. In 1980 and 1981 we prescribed 17 hours a week of increases in Russian, Parsee, Turkish and the new Pushtu service to Afghanistan. The last decrease which we prescribed, the service to Sri Lanka in 1976, was under the previous Administration. We base ourselves on several criteria, in particular whether there are other channels of getting across the British point of view. We have not thought it necessary to have vernacular language services to the Netherlands, Denmark, Norway or Sweden.
My noble friend Lord Morris also raised the question of consultation with the BBC. Foreign Office Ministers have held regular discussions with the BBC management since the 1979 reductions were announced. The general outline of our thinking, including the stress on audibility, was made clear in January 1981 when a table of further expenditure plans was drawn up as a basis for discussion. The BBC were informally warned then of all the services to be reduced, except for the one to Brazil, about which they were told two days before the announcement. The Government had only two working days' notice of the Opposition Motion in another place on 26th October, which meant that it was only possible to inform the BBC of our revised plans on the morning of the debate. We would have wished then to have consulted the BBC more fully and to have informed your Lordships in parallel. It

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was a Supply day debate in the other place initiated by the Opposition and the Government have no control over that.
Lord Morris: My Lords, I referred specifically in my speech to the period between June and 22nd October. Were the whole Government and Whitehall on holiday then?
Lord Trefgarne: No, my Lords, but we had not finally reached our conclusions and thus it was premature to offer a new plan to the BBC while still considering what that plan should be. Our consideration had to be accelerated when the Opposition in another place put down a Supply Day Motion for debate. I am the junior Minister in the Foreign Office responsible for the External Services and I was informed of the upcoming debate in the other place on the Friday; and I was in New York at the time. The noble Lord will not be surprised to know that it was difficult for me to reach an immediate conclusion in conjunction with my colleagues on the new plan until my return from the USA.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, would it not be true to say that the Government made their concessions because they knew that they were facing a defeat in another place?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, that is not the correct interpretation of our actions. As my right honourable friend the then-Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster said, we took into consideration the views of both Houses of Parliament.
Lord Ferrier: My Lords, I hesitate to interrupt the noble Lord on this, but I asked whether there was a vote in another place and what the figures were. gather there was no vote.
Lord Trefgarne: There was a vote in another place on 26th October. I have not got the figures. The Government won easily.
Lord Ferrier: But on the 23rd July!
Lord Trefgarne: My noble friend asks what happened on the 23rd July. I have not got those figures. I will find out and convey them to him.
My Lords, now that the Government have given a clear directive for the future financing of the External Services, I hope that we can all concentrate our minds on carrying out our plans to the best advantage of this country in the spirit of co-operation which, I know, exists with the BBC. As I said in the debate on 30th July:
"The External Services are a national asset of the highest importance".
Their staff, who will number some 2,750, provide a high quality product universally admired throughout the world. They will still be broadcasting over 700 hours a week of direct broadcasts in 37 different language services and will still be in fifth place in the world league. With the increased financial resources which the Government are providing to improve audibility,
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involving the construction of 16 new transmitters in the United Kingdom and 10 overseas, their regular audience of 100 million may well double by the end of the decade. I hope your Lordships will be inclined to agree now that the Government have fully and properly taken account of your Lordships' views and the views of the other place in this matter.
Lord Crowther-Hunt: My Lords—
Lord Hill of Luton: My Lords, would not the noble Lord—
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I think it is permissible—and the Clerk will no doubt gesticulate if I am wrong—for noble Lords to intervene just as the Minister sits down, claiming that he has not yet done so.
Lord Byers: My Lords, I think it has been explained by the Procedure or another Committee that it is undesirable, when a Minister has sat down after answering an Unstarred Question, for the debate to be continued by a series of noble Lords asking him questions.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I accept the guidance of the noble Lord on this matter, who I think sits on that committee. I will therefore sit down.
Lord Boothby: My Lords, I hesitate to interrupt the Minister, but perhaps I might just ask before he sits down—
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, if the noble Lord, Lord Boothby, will forgive me, I think that the House, by general consent, has come to a conclusion on this matter on the advice of the noble Lord, Lord Byers.
I therefore beg to move that this House do now adjourn.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.