Lords Sitting of 20 October 1982

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

Lord Pennock
Sir Raymond William Pennock, Knight, having been created Baron Pennock, of Norton in the Country of Cleveland, for life—was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord McFadzean and the Lord Thomson of Monifieth.

Air Routes and Military Airspace
2.48 p.m.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether, in view of the necessity for an overall ministerial decision upon the area of military airspace affecting the deviation of passenger air routes, they have been able to refer to the Council of Ministers the detailed suggestions from IATA concerning 10 routes within the European Economic Community which could produce considerable savings for airlines and passengers in finance, fares and fuel.
Lord Lyell: My Lords, a special European conference of the International Civil Aviation Organisation has asked its European Air Navigation Planning Group to look into IATA's specific suggestions, and this group is in the process of holding four meetings to consider the IATA proposals. We believe that this line of approach is more likely to achieve results than raising the matter in the Council of Ministers, particularly as many other nations, as well as the members of the Community, are involved.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, while thanking the noble Lord the Minister for that reply, may I ask whether he is aware how indebted I am to the director of the National Air Traffic Services and his colleagues for the time that they gave me during the Recess and from whom I learned a great deal? Is he aware, also, that I appreciated the details sent to me by the Secretary of State only this week following the action taken by him when he requested his officials at the Department of Trade to look into the whole question of air traffic control aspects of fuel saving? Finally, may I ask the noble Lord whether, as he has already indicated, the House will not be glad to learn from the noble Lord, Lord Cockfield, and I quote:
"A special European conference of the United Nations International Civil Aviation Organisation has asked the European Air Navigation Planning Group to look into IATA's problem, and this Group is in the process of holding four meetings specifically to consider the IATA proposals."
Several noble Lords: Speech!
Baroness Burton of Coventry: I wonder whether the Minister would convey to his noble friend Lord Cockfield the appreciation of all of us interested in civil aviation at what has been done?
Lord Lyell: My Lords, I am sure my noble friend will he most grateful for the comments and support of the noble Baroness. I shall pass on her comments and her gratitude to the director of the National Air Traffic Services. If I can pass on any compliments, I shall certainly do so very swiftly.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, following that catalogue of acknowledgements, may I ask the Minister whether he is aware that the Secretary of State did say that he would continue to press this matter? Could the Minister give an indication when the time seems suitable for putting down a follow-up Question?
Lord Lyell: My Lords, we never bet on a hypothesis. I am sure the noble Baroness, and indeed the House, will await with interest the result of the four special meetings of the special planning group. That should be in the very near future.
Lord Derwent: My Lords, if the noble Baroness and the present Government are going to agree like this, are not the rest of us going to miss a lot of fun?
Lord Lyell: My Lords, one's very presence in your Lordships' House is fun. I hope my noble friend will remember that.

Lorries: Regulation
2.52 p.m.
Viscount Montgomery of Alamein: 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 when they expect to announce their proposals for goods vehicles with particular reference to maximum weights and axle arrangements.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, the Government have put forward a comprehensive and improved package of measures to reduce the environmental damage caused by lorries and to make our road freight industry, as well as the firms who depend on it, more efficient. These proposals cover road construction; grants to encourage the transfer of freight from road to rail or waterway; lorry re-routeing and control; lorry action areas to alleviate the effects of heavy traffic; new noise and safety requirements; changes in operator licensing: limits on lorry dimensions; and a new taxation system. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Transport hopes shortly to announce detailed proposals on lorry weights and axle arrangements, and to bring forward the necessary regulations.
Viscount Montgomery of Alamein: My Lords, while thanking my noble friend for that most interesting Answer, may I say that it does not quite answer the Question? Therefore, I would like to ask him two supplementary questions. First, is he aware that the heavy goods manufacturing industry and related ancillary support industries are suffering from what is in effect a planning blight by the lack of decision in this matter? Is he further aware that the European competition is growing and suffers no such disadvantage, and is in fact making inroads into an area of activity which has formerly been dominated largely by domestic manufacturers? Secondly, may I ask my noble friend if he remembers that in June this year, in answer to a Written Question, he stated that an announcement would be made very shortly? What does that now mean? In the light of the imminent decline of this very important industry, would he not agree that a decision and an announcement is really very essential?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, the Government are indeed aware of the considerations my noble friend has put to the House this afternoon. The Government are still determined to press on with the package. We believe that at the moment there is more general acceptance by the public of this package, of which increased weights are a logical part. My noble friend asked me to comment on the expression "very shortly". I find it a little dangerous in this House to comment on dates, but I still think it will take place very shortly.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, may I ask the Minister whether it is not a fact that the Armitage Report, of which I hold a copy in my hand, expressed uncertainty as to how axles actually damage roads and expressed the view that there was insufficient knowledge on certain aspects; for instance, the effect of lorries on bridges, on underground pipes and on pavements and also the vibration effect on buildings? It expressed the view that there should be more research into these matters. Can we have an assurance that before heavier weights for lorries are introduced this research will be completed?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his comments. Of course, he is totally correct: the research is going on all the time. As far as bridge damage is concerned, our objectives are to take remedial action to repair damage caused by existing traffic. As he says, we are continuing to experiment with road weights.
Viscount St. Davids: My Lords, I wonder whether the noble Earl, since he mentioned the Goverment's very welcome measures to transfer traffic from the roads to rail and waterway, will comment on the fact that the dock labour boards are in fact blacking any effort to transfer cargo to waterways while not blacking any effort to transfer it to road, on the grounds that it is the equivalent of dock labour?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I cannot confirm what the noble Viscount has said, but it is an interesting comment and I will indeed check up on it. We have
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recently extended the scheme to inland waterways and also to BR subsidiaries. Freightliner and Sealink, and raised the maximum rate of grant from 50 per cent. to 60 per cent.

Olive Oil: EEC Discussions
2.57 p.m.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are satisfied that they have at their disposal sufficient expert knowledge of olive oil and other Mediterranean products to enable them to participate effectively in discussion of issues relating to these products in the Council of Ministers.
Lord Sandys: My Lords, the Government have at their disposal all the information which is currently available on olive oil and other Mediterranean products. The information, on olive oil in particular, is not as complete as we would wish. We can participate in discussion of these issues in the Council of Ministers as effectively and as knowledgeably as other member states, who are in receipt of the same information.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply, which implies, as I expected, a feeling of a state of uncertainty about olive oil. While I do not know of many olive growers in Anglesey or Sussex, or even Inverness-shire, it is very important to this country in view of the contribution and the surplus which might occur. Have Her Majesty's Government any plans which might simplify the problems in front of us? For example, in Italy, I understand, twice as much money is paid out in a production subsidy as is paid in a sales subsidy, which indicates quite a gap. Perhaps it indicates that the same view of love of the state and adherence to its rules does not apply there as might apply in some northern climes. Have the Government any simpler plans for supporting this quite important industry?
Lord Sandys: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, raises wide issues, and of course they will be to a considerable extent exacerbated on the proposed enlargement of the Community. I think perhaps in this context the noble Lord will permit me to examine what Her Majesty's Government have in mind, because increase in production and no fall in consumption is likely to take place. We believe, therefore, that the Community should seek to contain production and to limit the possibility of surpluses. With this in mind, we believe that aid based on a flat rate per olive tree would reduce the returns to be obtained by any increase in production.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, does the Minister personally count the olive trees?
Lord Hale: My Lords, is the noble Lord the Minister aware that I have been lying in bed for months reading reports of poisoned olive oil in Italy, of international

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investigations almost on the line of the Seveso disaster, to which I called attention first, some eight or nine years ago, when it was run down? Is he aware that those concerned have not yet been able fully to trace how the adulterated oil gets mixed in the cheap olive oils which are being sold on the streets of Italy today?
Lord Sandys: My Lords, I am sure that the whole House will welcome the noble Lord, Lord Hale, back to his rightful place and will he much interested in the time he has spent in examining this interesting but disastrous story of the adulteration of products simulating olive oil. I fear this goes rather wider than the Question as drafted and perhaps the noble Lord will put before your Lordships a suitable Question at a later date.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, may I underline what my noble friend Lord Mackie of Benshie said. In view of the accession of Greece and the probable accession of Spain and Portugal, do the Government appreciate that there is likely to be a substantial increase in the surpluses of Mediterranean products, especially olive oil? If that takes place it will have a bad effect on the Community budget. Therefore, is it not very important that Her Majesty's Government find out quickly as much as they can about the production and marketing of olive oil so that this country will he in a position to play a full part in the future consideration of what may be a very big problem in due course?
Lord Sandys: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Cledwyn, will he very well aware that your Lordships' House is taking a great interest in this matter through the medium of Sub-Committee D of your Lordships' Committee on European Communities. Her Majesty's Government are very much aware that expenditure on price support for Mediterranean products, of which olive oil is one of the most important, has been one of the fastest growing in the Community's agricultural budget. It raises issues in this regard to which the Government will pay the closest attention.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, will the Minister press for a quick count of the olive trees, which matter, I understand, has been hanging fire for some years?
Lord Sandys: My Lords, the noble Lord is quite right. There is indeed a particular issue here. A register is being made, known as the olive oil register. Unhappily, progress on compiling it has been slow, although our colleagues in the Community and the Council of Ministers are very anxious to see it pursued with all dispatch.
Lord Walston: My Lords, will Her Majesty's Government be prepared to instruct their agricultural attaches in the embassies in Athens, Rome and Madrid—if they have not already done so—to make a special study of this olive oil problem so that Her Majesty's Government, and particularly the Ministry of Agriculture, are as well informed as possible of all the facts in this complicated matter? That will enable them to play a full part in the discussions in Brussels.
Lord Sandys: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Walston, is right. We already receive a great deal of information from our attaches in the capitals to which he referred. Nevertheless, I will remind my right honourable friends of the issue that he has raised and will encourage further thought to be given in that regard.
Viscount Eccles: My Lords, will my noble friend remember that we eat more marmalade than any other country and if we can obtain it at a cheaper price that would be a good thing?
Lord Sandys: My Lords, I wholly agree with my noble friend.

The Universities: Funding Plans
3.4 p.m.
Lord Hunter of Newington: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether their plans for funding the universities through the University Grants Committee include acceptance of a triennial financial plan, given the abandonment in 1978 of the quinquennial system of funding: and what their policy is for the future.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Elton): My Lords, the Government intend to continue the present triennial arrangements.
Lord Hunter of Newington: My Lords, in thanking the Minister for his short reply, may I ask what the Government's view is about the future of the University Grants Committee? Will it he academic, advisory or executive? If executive, will that have any effect on the freedom and autonomy of the universities?
Lord Elton: My Lords, the Government have no plans to change the broad role and function of the University Grants Committee. Nor do Ministers seek to influence academic decisions between courses and universities. However, we believe that it may well be appropriate for Ministers to have, to a modest extent, a little more influence over broad shifts of emphasis upon which they could be questioned, such as that at present taking place towards science and technology and away from arts and social sciences.
Lord Rochester: My Lords, in their funding plans, do the Government aim to bring the University Grants Committee into closer relationship with the structures now being set up to deal with higher education in the public sector?
Lord Elton: My Lords, as I said at the opening of my answer to the previous supplementary question, we have no plans to change the broad role and function of the University Grants Committee. There are no detailed structural changes immediately in mind that I know of.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, is the Minister aware that some universities are going through an extraordinarily difficult time, including the University of Wales with which my noble and learned friend and I are closely associated? Does his reply about a triennium mean that there will not be any further cuts on universities, at least for the next three years?
Lord Elton: We certainly recognise that the universities have been going through a very difficult period and we should recognise the very able and flexible way in which the universities have coped. We are now approaching the floor, as it were, of the cutback, and it is hoped that the level of funding will he maintained at the same level for the subsequent year.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, I apologise to the Minister for coming back to this point, but he has not replied specifically to my question. He said that the principle of a triennium will now he in operation. Can he clearly say that that means that no university in the United Kingdom will be subjected to cuts by the Government, through the University Grants Committee, for the next three years?
Lord Elton: My Lords, the noble Lord will not expect me to give detailed forecasts—
Baroness Jeger: Why not?
Lord Elton: Because one does not anticipate budgets over a period. The question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Hunter, was about a triennium. The advantage of the present system is that one is given a firm figure for the immediately ensuing year and figures of increasing flexibility over subsequent years which enable one to plan ahead and also meet contingencies as they arise. I am sure that is the right balance.
Baroness Jeger: My Lords, speaking as a governor of one of the colleges of London University, I must press the Minister further. When we are given a triennial figure in ordinary English that would make us feel assured for three years. The Minister now appears to be saying that that is not the case. Is he aware that it is impossible for people who are involved in university planning to work on such a basis?
Lord Elton: My Lords, if it is of help to the noble Lord and the noble Baroness perhaps I can be slightly more precise. We intend that 1983–84 should complete the planned period of contraction and we hope that the level of grant provision then reached can be maintained in 1984–85. However, your Lordships will know that one cannot tie oneself to precise volume figures at a time of uncertain inflation rates.
Lord Alport: My Lords, is the Minister aware that it is impossible for any vice-chancellor or senate of university to plan ahead if they only know for certain what amount of money will be available to them for one year? The noble Lord indicated that for the two subsequent years it may change in a way in which they cannot possibly anticipate. Is he aware that that may throw out all the plans made for the subsequent two years?
Lord Elton: My Lords, it would he very nice for all of us if we could always count on the money in our pockets buying what we want it to buy. Unfortunately, in real life we can only count on the amount of money in our pockets. The noble Lord would like that to be more precisely defined. He will see from the letter which my right honourable friend wrote to Dr. Parkes on 14th July, which was published, that figures were given in approximate terms for the years 1983–84 and 1984–85. Those are planning figures and my noble friend would be the last to complain if contingencies were such that they had to be varied downwards and not upwards. Flexibility must be available in both directions.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, would the noble Lord not be prepared to say that the Government really mean to stick to the figure? I am a director of Dundee University, and I know about the trauma that they have gone through in arranging a 15 per cent. cut over three years. Every department has taken part and they have succeeded in achieving immense cuts. If the noble Lord is to stand there—
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: Question!
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, it is a question. If the Minister is to stand there and say that there are contingencies that might alter downwards the money available, that would be a blow to the confidence of the universities which are following the Government's plan.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, is the—
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, perhaps I could have an answer to my question.
Lord Elton: My Lords, with respect, the noble Lord has not asked me a sentence which ends with an interrogation mark. I do not know what the question is.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, the Minister is quite wrong. I said, does he really mean to stand there and say that he cannot even say that he will try to keep the money up?
Lord Elton: My Lords, I have already stood here and done better. I have said what we intend to do.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, is the Minister aware of the success of Stirling University—one of the universities most severely affected by the cuts—in attracting industrial development to the campus of the university in the form of an investment by a large United States computer company? Could he encourage other universities to follow similar initiatives?
Lord Elton: My Lords, what the noble Lord has described sounded admirable, but obviously I cannot comment without notice on specific cases. However. I shall look at what the noble Lord has said and if it is as admirable as he describes it, I shall bring it to the attention of my right honourable friend.
Lord Fletcher: My Lords, would the Minister make it clear one way or the other whether or not universities and colleges can lie in the financial provisions made in the triennial plan?
Lord Elton: My Lords, I repeat that we intend that 1983–84 should complete the planned period of contraction and hope that the level of grant provision then reached can be maintained in 1984–85. If the noble Lord reads that tomorrow morning at his breakfast, I think he will find that it comes to as clear an indication of our intentions and the direction of our expenditure plans as it is fair to give at that distance of time.
Lord Glenamara: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that more than half the higher educational sector now lies outside the universities, mainly in the polytechnics? Is he aware that they are suffering from the most appalling difficulties, and that the local authorities, which normally help them, are unable to do so any further because of constraints on their spending? Could the noble Lord give a similar assurance about the funding of the polytechnics to the one that he has given about the universities?
Lord Elton: My Lords, this Question has gone on a long time. The Question is about universities, and the noble Lord asked me about polytechnics.
Lord Hunter of Newington: My Lords, now that we have a triennium, can the Minister say whether local authority rates, pay settlements and matters of that kind, which, under a quinquennial system, were subject to an additional grant, will be the subject of additional grants in the new triennial system?
Lord Elton: My Lords, I think that I should take advice on the answer to that question. I shall write to the noble Lord.

Business
Lord Denham: My Lords, it may be for the convenience of your Lordships to know that dinner will be available at the usual time this evening.

Western Isles Integrated Development Programme (Scotland) Regulations 1982
3.14 p.m.
Lord Melchett Lord Melchett rose to move, That an Humble Address be presented to Her Majesty praying that the Western Isles Integrated Development Programme (Scotland) Regulations 1982 [SI 1982 No. 996], laid before the House on 21st July 1982, be annulled.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing it my name on the Order Paper. First, in moving this Motion, may I stress that I broadly welcome the aims of the Western Isles Integrated Development Programme, and I have tabled this Motion today to give us an opportunity in Parliament
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to debate the programme. I have no intention at the end of the debate, however unsatisfactory the Minister's reply might be, of asking the House to divide against the programme or to threaten it in any other way.
However, I think that it is worthy of debate, and that view seems to be confirmed by the number of noble Lords who have put down their names to speak. As I say, I very warmly welcome the concept of integrated development programmes and, indeed, I welcome 95 per cent. of this integrated development programme—the programme for the Western Isles. However, I have very great concern about one part of the programme. It is a narrow concern, but it affects extremely important issues. It is my primary reason for wishing to have a debate on the subject.
Very briefly, to describe the programme, the IDP is funded jointly by the EEC and the British Government on a 60-40 basis. It contains a wide variety of measures to improve and assist local craft industries, tourism, construction of roads, piers and related infrastructures, the improvement of agriculture and support for forestry and fisheries. In all. £56.6 million will be spent over five years. At present, however, only the agricultural, fisheries and forestry measures are guaranteed support and it is those measures—amounting to £20 million—which are the subject of this statutory instrument before your Lordships today.
Of the £20 million available for agriculture, it is only a small part of that, which is itself less than half the total expenditure on the IDP—£3.4 million to be precise—which will be spent on land improvements, which causes me and a number of other people great concern. Our concern is yet more limited because there are many areas in the Western Isles where land improvements could be carried out without there being any conflict with other interests. But there is a very severe risk—indeed, a certainty—of conflict with conservation interests if land improvement is carried out in certain parts of the Western Isles.
As I understand it, the areas most likely to be affected by the £3.4 million to be spent on land improvement are 10,000 hectares of commons grazings, 13,000 hectares of inbye land, and in particular 1,000 hectares of machair. That 1,000 hectares of machair is the area that is by far the most important from a nature conservation point of view, and it is very restricted. It occurs on only three islands—North and South Uist and Benbecula—and, on those islands, only on the west, Atlantic, side of the main north-south road that runs along the islands.
The nature conservation importance of the machair is really outstanding. To give your Lordships an idea—and I am sure that other noble Lords will touch on this—you could take the whole of the Somerset Levels, about which there has been enormous public concern—Ministers have visited them, there have been numerous meetings with NFU and CLA representatives, conservationists and conservation bodies have spent hundreds of thousands of pounds buying land there, and so on—and in 100 acres of the best land in the Western Isles you would find more breeding birds.
Therefore, the area that we are talking about in the Western Isles is of quite exceptional nature conser-

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vation importance. Indeed, it is probably the most important area for birds and wild plants in the whole of the United Kingdom. It is, indeed, the only area in the United Kingdom which is of international significance. In international terms, this country is not all that well endowed with wild birds, wild plants and so on; but the Western Isles, and this particular part of them, certainly is of international importance and is recognised as such by naturalists all over the world. It is one of the few areas in this country which we have an international responsibility for safeguarding.
If the area of nature conservation significance is so restricted and if it is so important in international terms, the question must arise: how could an integrated programme possibly give rise to any conflict in this area? The unfortunate fact of the matter is that these wetter areas of inbye land and wet machair have been singled out as the most promising by the DAFS for land improvement expenditure. It is the very same areas that have been singled out for expenditure on land improvement which are of maximum importance for nature conservation.
The next question which a number of your Lordships might reasonably ask is, if a conflict of this sort is inevitable why does not the Wildlife and Countryside Act, on which your Lordships spent some time recently, provide a sensible solution? The answer to that is that the Wildlife and Countryside Act only provides a means of resolving conflicts of this sort on sites of special scientific interest; but the system of designating sites of special scientific interest is widely recognised as being defective nationally and particularly so in the Western Isles. This is mainly because shortage of staff in the Nature Conservancy Council has meant that a lot of areas which are of SSSI status and which are normally called proposed SSSIs have not been officially designated. To give your Lordships an example, in the Western Isles the best areas for breeding corncrakes, which is one of the very rare birds which abound in this area, and the outstanding area for ringed plovers which also breed in the Western Isles, and other waders, have not been designated as SSSIs.
The other reason for believing that it was worth having a debate on this subject in your Lordships' House was to put the record straight. It is unfortunately a fact that the Government have persistently misrepresented the case that conservationists have made about the IDP since it first became public. First of all, to the European Community. The Government have apparently told the EEC officials concerned that their statutory advisers on nature conservation, the Nature Conservancy Council, are happy with the IDP and see no problems with it. That has been confirmed by officials in the Community who have said that that is the message they received from the British Government.
After that message had been conveyed I had a letter from the chairman of the Nature Conservancy Council, Sir Ralph Verney, which said, amongst other things.
"this IDP is integrated in name alone".
He said that the failure to provide funds for project environmental appraisal,
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"is a serious problem, and in our view infringes important principles of EEC environmental policy".
He went on to say:
"I must say we have been disappointed by the lack of opportunity to obtain true integration within their programme so that nature conservation would have featured in its own right".
The Government have also misrepresented the conservationists' case in responding to concern raised at international level about the IDP. An official at the Scottish Office in writing to the International Council for Bird Preservation said, first of all, that he assumed that the concern which the International Council for Bird Preservation had raised was,
"presumably based on the impression that there will be large-scale drainage of ecologically valuable wet lands with a view to introducing the sort of intensive arable farming associated with certain parts of the mainland".
The letter went on:
"Nothing could be further from the truth".
What could actually not be further from the truth is that any conservationist had suggested that there was going to be intensive arable farming in the Western Isles. It would have to be somebody pretty stupid, with respect to the Minister's private secretary. I think it was, who signed this letter, who was going to suggest that the sort of arable farming which I and others go in for in East Anglia was really going to be suitable as an agricultural practice in the Western Isles. It really seems to me to do no good to the Government case to attempt to set up some ridiculous supposition of this sort and pretend that it is the conservationists' case against the IDP and then proceed, not surprisingly, fairly easily to demolish it.
The Government—and I regret to have to say this—have also just been downright rude about the conservationists who have raised the question of the IDP and its problems with them. The noble Earl the Minister who is to reply to the debate said in Scotland, in September, to a local paper:
"A great many of the people who are expressing anxiety have never been to the Western Isles, know nothing of the Western Isles, or the difficulties of those who live in the Western Isles. These people who are expressing anxiety have never bothered to find out for themselves what the IDP is, or means, or the sort of help it is going to give the people in this part of the world".
I do not know whether the Minister had me in mind when he made those remarks. I had just spent, a few weeks before, over an hour with him and his officials having him describe the IDP to me, and I can only say that if I did not understand after that I cannot help feeling that some of the blame should be attributed to him and his colleagues.
The Minister of State, Scottish Office (The Earl of Mansfield): My Lords, as the noble Lord asks a rhetorical question and not strictly rhetorically, perhaps I may answer it here and now. Of course I did not mean the noble Lord. But equally he will acknowledge that he does keep some pretty strange company.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I do not acknowledge that for a moment, because the organisation which has been in the forefront of raising this issue, and which has raised it with the Minister and his officials, is the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. They first drew this to public attention, and they responded to requests for information from a number of politicians

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about the IDP. Incidentally, first from myself in the hope that I could show that the IDP was what the Ministry of Agriculture in England and Wales should be pushing as a sensible means of agricultural improvement and development in other areas of the United Kingdom. It was greatly to my disappointment to discover that there was this major flaw in the programme.
I had thought, and still believe, that IDPs have tremendous potential for supporting communities not just in the Western Isles but in many other areas of the United Kingdom. I do not think that the RSPB really warrant the sort of rude remarks which the Minister made. They have, for example, visited the Western Isles annually since 1950. Their staff have made four visits there so far this year. They have employed somebody there for the last 15 years. Since April they have had six meetings with the Minister's officials at DAFS. They have had meetings with the North of Scotland Agricultural College, with the Nature Conservancy Council in Scotland, and so on. To suggest that these are people who really do not know what is going on there, have never been there, and do not know what they are talking about is, with great respect to the Minister, a quite unwarranted criticism.
Apart from the RSPB there are a great many botanists, many of whom I have spoken to, who have been on field trips to the Western Isles over many years, and I would suggest much more frequently and consistently than anybody from the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries in Scotland. To suggest that conservationists do not know the case they are making is unfair. I hope that the Minister will be able to give us a rather more constructive reply to the debate today.
So far the Government have been totally unbending on this. This is a very small area. Even when it became clear, as it has done, that the Government are determined to press ahead with development even in this thousand hectares which is of outstanding importance, and very minor suggestions have been made as to the way in which the damage can be minimised, the response from DAFS has been unyielding and unbending. To give your Lordships two examples, there is very little silage making in the Western Isles at the moment, but the IDP aims to increase this to increase the amount of fodder available for winter feed. Silage cutting will threaten nesting corncrakes. It is likely to chew up adult birds, destroy the nests, and so on. Conservationists have asked DAFS whether it would be possible to ensure that silage cutting takes place after 21st July and not before. The response to that was, No.
Ragwort is going to be killed because it is a noxious weed, as noble Lords will know. An assurance was asked for that, because these areas are botanically so important, a non-broad spectrum herbicide should be used to kill the ragwort; and there are a number which, while they may not be specific to ragwort, are a great deal more specific than others. Again DAFS refused to give any assurance of that sort.
The agricultural objective of the scheme, this part of it at least, is primarily to increase winter fodder by increasing the amount of silage that is made and indeed by improving summer grazing by increasing grass production. The question arises, why will that
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cause any dangers? One suggestion has been that all this area was drained in the past and it is simply going to revert to previous agricultural practice. It is true that there are old drainage ditches, some of which are blocked, in the area. But I would suggest that anybody who knows anything about modern farming and drainage will know that clearing out ditches with modern machinery, with Hymacs, and so on, bears absolutely no relation whatsoever to the sort of ditching done 100 years ago by people working with spades.
In addition, 100 years ago broad spectrum herbicides were not used to spray the wild flowers and other things growing in the fields, and there was no question of fields being reseeded with modern strains, for example, of rye grass, or whatever, to improve grass production. So the kind of agricultural improvement which DAFS have in mind in this area is not, and bears no relationship to, traditional crofting practice, and the effects of this and other steps—for example, removing iris and nettle beds, which are important early cover for corncrakes in the spring—will undoubtedly lead to major losses, first of flowers, which seems quite unarguable, and it may be that the Minister has not taken that point on board sufficiently so far, but also to the nesting and breeding birds in the islands.
The next challenge, as it were, from the Government is, "How do you know this? None of this has started yet. The IDP has not begun, so how can you tell this will happen?" There has been some land drainage and improvement work done in the Western Isles, in particular about 100 acres on Benbecula have been drained and reseeded. Experts who visited that area this spring have made it perfectly clear to me that it has had a drastic and bad effect on the wild life, both plants and birds, of the area, so it is quite clear that what is intended will be very damaging indeed.
This raises one other defence which the Minister has put to myself and others, and that is that everything which will be done under the IDP was possible in the past and that all that is being done is to raise the rate of grant slightly. It seems difficult for the Government on the one hand to announce this as a major new development which will have major benefits for the islands, while on the other to say, "It is really nothing new. All of it would have happened anyhow". That is clearly not true. The rates of grant are much higher under the IDP and there will be a number of staff going round making sure the grants are taken up and developments take place. Therefore it is not possible to argue—indeed, it is a little silly for the Government to try to argue—that the IDP will make no difference.
I stress that I am not against public money going to the islands. As I said before, and want to reiterate—because this has been constantly misrepresented—I warmly welcome the integrated development programme. I am extremely concerned that about £36 million of it has not yet been guaranteed by the Government, and I hope the Minister will be pressed by others on that point. Nor am I against, I wish to stress, money going to the crofting community in the Western Isles. I recognise clearly the importance of local people living off the natural produce of the islands, including agriculture and fisheries, where, incidentally, I think there is probably

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a much stronger case for more expenditure than the IDP actually allows, and that has been confirmed to me by people in the Western Isles who know a great deal about the fisheries case.
Certainly some very trenchant criticisms are made, not least by the Government's own agricultural advisory service, the North of Scotland Agricultural College—the equivalent of ADAS in the South—about the agricultural justification of the scheme, and I have no doubt that other noble Lords will comment on that.
But there are alternative ways of spending the money and alternative ways of creating many more jobs at much less cost than this particular part of the agricultural package. For example, the Highlands and Islands Development Board reckons that the cost per new job created ranges from about £4,000 for marine engineering, £1,700 for crafts and £8,200 for tourism up to £10,000 for agriculture. I welcome the fact that the IDP gives money to many of these areas, and that is one of the reasons I strongly support it, and I feel I should comment on the question of tourism. Noble Lords may not think that the Western Isles are what most people would see as a tourist paradise, but that is a mistaken view. Obviously it will not be a major factor in the economy. I do not pretend it is, or will be, nor do I think it should be, but it is a factor. For example, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds have a reserve on the Western Isles. Annually, about 1,500 people sign the visitors' book in a bothy on the reserve. There is no doubt that many more people visit the reserve than sign the book, but that will give your Lordships an idea of the number of visitors which the wildlife on the islands can attract.
I have a catalogue of an American tour firm which takes in a number of places in the United Kingdom including Windsor Castle, the North Norfolk coast for birds. York and York Minster, Hadrian's Wall, Edinburgh, the New Forest and Snowdonia, but it includes two days in the Western Isles. I suggest that if Hadrian's Wall, York Minster or Windsor Castle were threatened by the integrated development programme, people interested in tourist development in this country would have something to say about it. It is interesting to note that all of those places are visited for a shorter time than these visitors spend in the Western Islands; they spend two days there as opposed to one day visiting almost everywhere else I have mentioned. The tourist season for people watching birds and going to look a flowering plants is rather earlier and longer than traditional holiday-making tourism, so it has some economic usefulness. It seems absolutely ridiculous that in what is called an integrated programme, such a small part of it should threaten that tourist potential to the extent I believe it does.
The Government have said repeatedly in discussions with conservationists about the IDP that if conservationists make a fuss about it, they will set up what has been referred to by Ministers as a birds versus people argument. They have used that phrase rather than conservationists and it seems to me have been very much in the category of a self-fulfilling prophecy; the Government said often enough that if there was a bird versus people argument, some people would be
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misled into believing that that was what the argument was about. It is not. In so far as it is, I believe it is a conflict entirely and exclusively of the Government's making. I say that because as a result of this problem in the programme—this small part of it which will give rise to such enormous conflict over a number of years, I believe, unless the Government give the sort of assurances that conservationists have asked for—I can see only two possible routes down which this integrated development programme will go.
The first is that the Government will ignore the conservation case—incidentally, in the process breaking various international obligations which they have entered into about the protection of these very rare birds—and that will, of course, guarantee the controversy I have mentioned. It will guarantee it continues and that there is an international row, a row not just in Europe or in this country but internationally about the destruction of wildlife in the Western Isles. It seems to me that as a result it will jeopardise the possibility of a future integrated development programme, which is widely talked about for the Western Highlands and which again, as I say, given my support for the concept of IDPs. I would warmly welcome. Thus, the Government, by taking a narrow and unyielding view of this IDP, will cut the throats of a large number of other farmers in the Western Highlands and crofters who would have benefited from another IDP there.
The other possibility is that the Government will actually listen to the conservationists' objections in these areas. They have, incredibly, devised the IDP to guarantee conflict in a way that no conservationist supports because, unlike any other farmer or crofter in the United Kingdom, if a crofter under the IDP is refused an agricultural development grant on conservation grounds, they will not have to be offered a management agreement by the Nature Conservancy Council or anybody else to compensate them for the loss of agricultural potential and development which the IDP would have brought them. That is singling out the crofter for special discriminatory and unfair treatment outside all other farmers in the whole of Great Britain. It seems totally unjustified and I have not heard a single argument from the Government to justify such treatment.
Of course, the reason is that they know perfectly well that for it to be an integrated programme, funds to help crofters who keep their land managed in traditional ways should be available in the programme itself. That is what an integrated programme means: that you integrate payments for nature conservation, tourism, fisheries, forestry and agricultural development all within a single programme. That is what the Government have refused to do and that is why I fear that the IDP will cause conflict which, as I say, I very much regret. I still hope that at this late stage the Government will see the error of their ways in respect of this particular part of the programme and will change their course before it is too late. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That an Humble Address be presented to Her Majesty praying that the Western Isles Integrated Development Programme (Scotland) Regulations 1982 [S.I. 1982 No. 996], laid before the House on 21st July 1982, be annulled.—(Lord Melchett.)
3.39 p.m.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, put his case with vigour and a certain amount of passion. He was wise enough to say that he does not want the Western Isles to be turned into a Norfolk or East Anglia and that he wants to see the development programme go forward. I say at the outset quite unashamedly that, as a farmer, I am on the side of the farmers and crofters and that, while the birds are important, the 30,000 people in the Western Isles are much more important.
About 8,000 or 9,000 live in Stornoway, but the bulk of the people live in townships all over the 300,000 hectares of the Western Isles; and that is a lot of space—more space than anywhere else in Europe. They are people who have a passion for the land.
Part of the conservationists' case has been the production of a paper by an individual member of the North of Scotland College of Agriculture, with which my family has had a long connection, and it is not the policy of the North of Scotland College of Agriculture to play down the importance of agriculture. Individual members produce papers which stimulate discussion. But in fact the figure is £4 million in cash, as near as can he calculated, going into the Western Isles and the 30,000 people who live there. It is a lot of money. I doubt whether the tourism connected with seeing the birds, which I agree are important, is all that important.
I believe that the feeling of the people of the Western Isles is enormously important. Lord Leverhulme, who was a man of immense energy and vision, spent millions of his money in the Western Isles trying to set up a fishing industry, and he was beaten by the passion of the people for the land. That is what beat him. It was not that the idea was wrong, or anything else like that. But they would not co-operate. What they wanted was the land and to live and work on the land, and that feeling is deeply engrained in those who are left in Lewis and Harris and the rest of the Western Isles. That must be taken into account more than any other single factor.
Other things have been tried in the Western Isles. The Highlands and Islands Development Board has just had to close down a fish exporting factory at a loss of millions of pounds. But agriculture goes on, and I believe that any development scheme that ignores agriculture and does not do something to promote it and to make it more efficient and more attractive for the part-time crofters—any scheme which does not acknowledge that—is bound to fail.
In my view the scheme that we are now considering cannot do the harm that the conservationists are claiming. We are talking of an area of 300,000 hectares. We are talking of the machair. The machair was the most important part in the old days. They used to nourish it with seaweed, and they grew crops. They took off not only hay; they grew oats as well.
I understand that the corncrake population is declining. Some of my ornithologist friends tell me that the lack of cultivation may in fact be one of the causes of the decline in the numbers of corncrake. I cannot believe that taking 1,000 hectares and improving it can do anything that would really damage the extremely valuable wildlife and birdlife that we have there. But I know that, if one does not
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encourage the improvement of agriculture, if one does not give these people a little more coming in, and better stock to look at and nourish, as well as a better opinion of their stock and their agriculture, they will not be retained on the land.
I should like to put to the House a very simple proposition. I do not wish to hold up the House, since many other people wish to speak. The importance of improving the grazing, of improving the stock in the Western Isles, is extremely vital towards improving the confidence of the people and the crofters. I cannot believe that the modest programme set out can do anything but good for both the wildlife and the human life, which is the important thing there.
3.44 p.m.
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: My Lords, I listened with considerable interest to the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, as well as the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie. I cannot follow the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, in saying that sufficient consultation has not been undertaken over the programme. The programme, which comes into effect now, has been worked out with the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries for Scotland, the Highlands and Islands Development Board, the Crofters' Commission, the Western Isles island councils, the North of Scotland College of Agriculture, and the Nature Conservancy Council.
The Nature Conservancy Council, for which undoubtedly the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, was speaking up, has had officials at every committee meeting that has been engaged in the plan. It has had a special representative on the main committee. It has had officials attending the working groups set up to advise on the land improvement schemes which, as the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, has said, will be a great asset not only to the agricultural side, but also in regard to the question of the preservation of the birds and so on. It is perfectly clear that the consultation covered every interest, and agreement was reached by everybody. Everyone agreed on the scheme.
Of course there have been a few extremists, who have been carrying on a kind of war against the whole scheme, but they are in a minority. As I understand it, they are not people who are supported even by the Nature Conservancy Council, because that council has been in on all the discussions and all the plans.
There are arrangements whereby safeguards for the environment exist and will continue to exist, and these kind of safeguards already operate in a great many other areas, too. So to do what it proposed is nothing new; it is something that will help the whole community. The interests which are being consulted, and which will benefit, are very widespread. There are included in the areas covered improvements for agriculture and for the crofters' farming which are as the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, said, absolutely vital to the particular area.
There is to he assistance for transport, and this, too, is vital. Anyone who has been to the area will know how difficult it is to get about and how important it would be to improve the transport. Then there is the question of the social activities, such as help with the

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tourist industry, and additional small industries will all benefit everybody and will do no harm to birds, flowers, or anything else. Then there will be help with marketing, as well as co-operative production, which is also extremely important, since the area where the agricultural units are is very small and on the whole crofters are part-time workers. Therefore it is necessary to have marketing schemes which will help everybody and in which all car participate.
Furthermore, unless a scheme of this kind is carried out in the Western Isles, the deterioration which has begun will continue and the conservationists who are against the scheme will expose the whole population to not receiving grants and help which the EEC and the Government are prepared to give.
I have recently returned from a short trip. Some of us on the agriculture committee of your Lordships' House were invited to go to see what are called the less advantaged areas of southern Italy, some parts of Bavaria—hill land and smallholdings—and some areas of the South of France. If one goes to such areas, it is perfectly obvious that while they have valuable agricultural products—olives, vines, and so on—they cannot live entirely on those holdings, and they receive tremendous help from what I believe are called social-economic developments, which in the main involve tourism and things which arise for tourists. The areas that we visited reminded me very much of the Western Highlands and the Western Isles. In the areas that we visited there are being provided employment and trade which otherwise would not be able to continue. I think that anyone who saw these areas would realise that what really helps them is to have (as it were) two types of employment, and to be able to get assistance to set up the structure which is required for these matters.
The scheme for the Western Isles is bringing in EEC money and help to an area which has not been included before. Help on this scale has been going to other places—to Ireland, for instance—and there are two other schemes, one in France, in the Lozere, and the other in Belgium, in the Luxembourg Province. The EEC has given great assistance to those areas. I was enormously encouraged by the fact that in the case of this particular scheme and these areas we, too, now, for the first time, are going to benefit from the EEC and are going to get a considerable amount of assistance from them.
This scheme will bring to Scotland assistance which will be of the greatest use to the crofters of the islands and to their social and economic development, which is as vital to the population as is agriculture. All through this the Nature Conservancy Council has been consulted and has agreed. This plan, which includes conservation as well as development, will increase the possibilities of development in those areas, and this will be to the benefit of everybody.
I think it would be nothing short of tragic if now, in the case of a very small area and as a result of a very small amount of protest, so to speak, this scheme were held up. While I understand and appreciate that Lord Melchett is speaking for a small number of people who have these strong views, I think they are wrong. I think all the people who are operating this scheme have just as strong views on using the scheme to develop all that
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we are talking about and on the conservation that is required for this very small area.
I would remind your Lordships that if you let land just go hack to bog, if you let land rot, what will happen is that it will be overrun by a great many vermin, like mink, rabbits and so on, and that will not help the bird life, either. In fact, it will be extremely dangerous, because we know that mink are a great danger to bird life, as well as in other ways. So I think it would be nothing short of tragic for this scheme, now agreed by everybody, now worked out, now about to begin, not to go ahead with the strong support of everyone in your Lordships' House.
3.53 p.m.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, I am pleased that there are some in the House, like the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, who are concerned about conservation and wildlife protection; but I cannot help feeling that I have been round this course before, when I was chairman of the Forestry Commission. Whenever we endeavoured to plant up some new area in the Scottish Highlands, we had the regular pressures from so-called conservationists, whose only concern was that the countryside which they knew and recognised, and in which they were brought up, should not be changed. In a sense, they were conservationists but they were conservatives in the extreme.
I have always believed that the appearance of the countryside is not diminished, and is probably enhanced, by its ability to support traditional industry; and there is nothing more pleasant for me than to go to the Highlands and the Western Isles on occasion and see that some people have the opportunity to earn their living in a place where they want to live. If you look at the statistics of employment in the area you will see that the Western Isles is a sad place. While the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has obviously visited the Western Isles and knows them, I suspect that many of his supporters have not visited the Western Isles and seen the sad spectacle of the deserted and brokendown crofts, where people who have been unable to earn their living in traditional industry have had to leave the countryside in order to find employment elsewhere.
There was massive depopulation in the Western Isles following the clearances, and that story has been well told. But looking at the period from 1921 until today, the population in the Western Isles in the areas concerned in this IDP was 44,000 in 1921 and is now 29,000. The number of cattle has decreased from 4,700 in 1967 to 3,800 in 1980. As a Scot who loves the Western Isles, I am concerned about these human statistics, and I am concerned that there should be opportunities for people to earn their living in the Western Isles. It is not only a matter of population statistics: these are widely-spread areas. So what happens when the population declines, as I have outlined? It means that schools are closed and post offices are closed; and it means that the whole infrastructure breaks down. The general amenities of living in the Western Isles must decline if you permit a continued reduction in the number of people who can earn their living in these places.
So I hope that the Prayer that is submitted to your Lordships' House will he rejected. This is an

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imaginative scheme. It is funded substantially from the EEC, and it is part of their support to improve agricultural structures in the less favoured areas of Europe. I am delighted that these funds are being applied on this experimental basis in the Western Isles of Scotland, and I shall be very interested in the results.
The argument is made by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, that this is disturbing the wildlife and the bird life of the Western Isles, but he does less than justice to the Department of Agriculture in Scotland and to the government in Scotland, and to the Highlands and Islands Development Board. Let me assure Lord Melchett that there are many people in Scotland who are just as concerned as he is with the wildlife and with the protection of birds in the Western Isles, and that the Department of Agriculture for Scotland and the Highlands and Islands Development Board consult in the case of any agricultural programme in the Highlands and in the Islands with the local nature conservancy officers; and so far as I can gather from a message received from the HIDB only this morning, there has been no serious conflict between them and the local official of the nature conservancy in the case of any of the agricultural schemes which they have produced.
Surely the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, will accept that it is possible for people in Scotland to be concerned about the same things as he is concerned with, but to ally that concern with an even deeper concern for the creation of a reasonable economic structure in the Highlands and Islands. The HIDB was set up because the Highlands and Islands had special problems—economic problems, deep-seated problems. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, says that there are alternative uses for subsidies, that marine engineering will create more jobs. Let him study the transport costs by McBraine taking marine engineering parts from the outlying islands to sell to the shipyards or to wherever they build fishing vessels or other ships on the mainland or in the south.

The noble Lord is dreaming dreams which have no reality, and he is creating a monster which has no substance. We are concerned about bird life; we are concerned about conserving the beauty and the wildlife of the Western Isles; but we are also concerned with giving people the opportunity to earn their living, and this is an imaginative scheme which will stimulate that. My Lords, 80 per cent. of the people who live in these areas have some involvement in agriculture. All of them are crofters, some of them part-time crofters, and there is no other scheme or no other form of economic investment which has more importance for the population than this scheme. Consequently, I would ask your Lordships to approve it.
4 p.m.
Baroness White: My Lords, I should like to support the Prayer of my noble friend Lord Melchett. I had hoped very much that the noble Earl, Lord Cranbrook, could have been here today, but important business has detained him elsewhere. As your Lordships will know, he is chairman of the sub-Committee of the European Communities Committee which deals with environmental matters and which has taken some evidence on the matter before the House this afternoon. However, that Committee has
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not yet drawn up a report, so one cannot say that one is speaking on behalf of the committee. Nevertheless, as this is likely to be the last occasion on which I myself shall address your Lordships as chairman of the main Select Committee on European Communities, I am glad that it is a matter on which I take a strong personal interest myself.
I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Walston, is hoping to speak later in the debate. I am delighted that he found time to visit the Western Isles for a day during the Recess. I have noted the brief report which he has submitted to the agricultural sub-committee of the European Communities Committee. Clearly, he had a most enjoyable time but, if he will forgive my saying so, I found his report what I can only describe as rather sugary. His hosts were, plainly, not wishing to cloud his day with any awkward problems. I myself was not able to journey so far, but as a guest of the Highlands and Islands Development Board, I have in the past been to both Lewis and Harris, though not to the other islands.
However, during this Recess, I did get as far as Edinburgh and some three weeks ago I spent an afternoon at the Nature Conservancy Council office there, where their version of the story was different in emphasis from that given to the noble Lord, Lord Walston. I have since had some discussions with the appropriate NCC officers in London. I have, of course, seen a copy of the letter which the chairman of the NCC sent some time ago to Lord Melchett and I have also spoken to senior officers in the Environment Directorate of the European Commission in Brussels, who were equally concerned and dissatisfied with the present situation. I have also been in touch with the European Environment Bureau in Brussels. Finally, needless to say, I have read the integrated five-year development programme. So I have conscientiously tried to do my homework.
My Lords, I stress this, not out of any self-righteousness, but because of the remarks already quoted by my noble friend Lord Melchett which came from the noble Earl, Lord Mansfield, during the time that I was in Scotland. I, too, quote from the Stornoway Gazette. Some of us, after all, have done our very best to study this matter in as objective a way as possible. It states in the Stornoway Gazette:
"Lord Mansfield said it was quite wrong to say that the [proposed] IDP schemes would mean a new threat to the environment".
He went on to emphasise that much of the aid is similar to what was given in previous years. It is only the scale of help that is new.
Of course, my Lords, the scale is part of the problem. One cannot spend £56 million mostly, though not exclusively, on physical changes of some kind in the area concerned, without having some major physical effects—many of which must have environmental significance even in areas which are not formally designated as of special importance.
I would, of course, emphasise, as did my noble friend Lord Melchett, one's complete support for the integrated programme. There is no doubt whatever in one's mind that this is a most desirable scheme, and no one who has ever crossed the Minch could doubt it. So there should be no misunderstanding about that. What we are discussing is really something which is marginal but nevertheless of considerable importance

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internationally as well as for our own reputation in this country. No one should underestimate—and we certainly do not—the need for special help to sustain the population and to improve the economy of the Western Isles. To anyone who says that spending £56 million sterling over five years for the benefit of slightly fewer than 30,000 people (in addition to the money which has been put in already over the years by the Crofting Commission and the Highlands and Islands Development Board) is perhaps spending rather a lot of money, even though a substantial contribution will be coming from EEC, I would reply that one should accept it as necessary new money with the hope that it will achieve the desired result.
To suggest that something on this scale is, in effect, irrelevant to the environment—which is what the noble Earl is suggesting—is not, in my view, sustainable. One recognises that direct work on land reclamation and development is only a small part of the total proposed scheme—considerably less than 10 per cent., as my noble friend Lord Melchett indicated. But that argument cuts both ways. If the proportion is so small and if the main thrust of the programme is towards non-agricultural employment and social and physical infrastructure, then I would suggest that some desirable modifications of the land development proposals could involve no great sacrifice. As Mr. Bill Lawson, director of the project team on the islands, wrote in the Guardian of 30th September last:
"Agriculture in the Western Isles is unlikely to provide full-time employment for more than a few".
Part-time employment is, of course, the basis of the crofting system anyway. He went on to say:
"the land improvement proposals in the IDP are only a little more attractive than the existing grants under the Crofting Acts".
If that is so, then their effect, surely, must be marginal.
One can then, I think, intelligently respond by asking the question: if it is as marginal as is suggested by the Minister himself and by the team leader, then does one really need to apply such marginal sums in the really relatively few areas where there is still a very real concern about the effect on wildlife and natural resources of all kinds? In other words, need one go in for treating the relatively small percentage of existing machair which one understands is to be part of the scheme? Would it not be possible to compromise on that while carrying out no doubt entirely desirable agricultural improvements in other areas which are less sensitive?
I will leave this argument now in the interests of brevity. We appreciate that the noble Earl is trying to get to Inverness at some time tonight. I will leave the argument simply pointing out that one cannot have it both ways. The real problem in this so-called integrated scheme is that there is lip service to environmental values but very little to sustain it. In the last part of the "General Background" section of the official programme, the international ranking of the islands is fairly indicated. I quote:
"The islands are internationally important for wildlife, including large seabird colonies. On the west coasts are found some of the finest examples of machair in Scotland and there are extensive wetland and moorland habitats. The four National Nature Reserves, two of which are"—
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on the international list of particularly important and sensitive areas—
"and thirty-five Sites of Special Scientific Interest … emphasise this biological importance … the Western Isles is part of a priority biogeographical province … requiring extra protection on account of its global ecological importance in relation to existing measures of protection".
My Lords, we have an international obligation, both legally under the EEC directive on bird protection, and in other international organisations in which we are members and to which we are a party. We should not suggest that this is something which we can just put on one side. The situation is that while £56 million in all is to be spent, there are no additional funds of any kind to be available either from Her Majesty's Government or from the European Communities for environmental improvement or protection. It seems to me that it is quite absurd that no additional money should so far have been offered in a scheme of this magnitude in relation to this relatively small area.
The Nature Conservancy Council are, as we well know, much concerned about the situation in which they feel that they have been placed. They were indeed brought into the working party but only as observers and not, I am informed, as full members. Should they wish to advise that grants be withheld under the IDP scheme, even though the position, as the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has made clear, is not legally quite the same as under the Wildlife and Countryside Act, they will feel under very considerable moral pressure. They regard it, so they inform me, as being quite inequitable that under one scheme compensation grants should he inequitable that under the other one they should not. At present if they wish to undertake either additional work or to offer any kind of compensatory grants on environmental grounds they are to be expected to do it from their existing budget.
However, it is quite obvious to anybody that if you are going to spend the money of the order that I have suggested in this relatively small area and on a relatively small number of people, there must be additional work involved. There should be adequate additional work to appraise the various developments, not only in the designated areas. This is bound to put extra work on the NCC staff, and I repeat that so far Her Majesty's Government have offered them no extra sustenance whatever but simply an indication that they might spend out of their existing budget, which is likely to be under considerable stress, under the provisions of the Wildlife and Countryside Act if that is properly implemented.
The European Communities' position is even worse because they, after all, are the instigators of the integrated development programmes. But the funds that they make available, generous as they are in many respects, are very strictly confined to agricultural structures and socio-economic functions. They have indicated quite clearly that so far as the Integrated Development Programme is concerned there is no money whatever available for environmental protection or improvement under the terms of the programme, in spite of the programme's references to the obligations to consider these factors. The environment directorate, DG XI, in Brussels in this particular sphere has no real influence over the agricultural directorate, DG VI. There is no EEC environment fund on which to draw as there is a regional fund and

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a social fund. A pilot scheme to monitor results of this programme ex post facto, is all that DG XI, the environment directorate, can offer. It is not quite "thank you for nothing", but it is very near to it.
So, as chairman of the Select Committee appointed by your Lordships to scrutinise Community action, I conclude by saying as emphatically as I can that the United Kingdom representatives in Brussels should actively seek to remove the legalistic hindrances in this scheme and help to ensure that proper provision is made for some reasonable environmental input into these otherwise desirable integrated programmes. At present the scales are tilted quite unfairly.
4.15 p.m.
Lord Craigton: My Lords, I put my name down to speak in this debate but unfortunately, by a clerical error, it was not included. I have asked to speak in this debate early because I have to go to another very longstanding appointment and I am speaking, with your Lordships' leave, by courtesy of my noble friend Lord Onslow. I rise to support the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, in what he said. The noble Baroness, Lady White, referred to the Integrated Development Programme and quoted from it. It seems to me the merits of Lord Melchett's case are expressed in the plan in this way:
"… the Western Isles is part of a priority biogeographical province (the Scottish Highlands and Islands) requiring extra protection on account of its global ecological importance in relation to existing measures of protection."
In harmony with that clear statement from the Minister is EEC Regulation Article 3.1 which requires the Government to ensure that the IDP is compatible with the protection of the environment.
What does the IDP, the instrument, say, about carrying out the policy of Her Majesty's Government and the EEC Regulation? The IDP is silent—it is quite incredible!—on the need so vital here to protect the environment. It gives 85 per cent. grant. What for, my Lords? Re-seeding, drainage and fertilisers. But the 85 per cent. might well be for damaging the scientific interest of the area, for threatening the corncrakes and the waders dependent on wet pastures. This is, to say the least, misleading for the potential customers for grant because a quite vital consideration in receiving grant is that referred to in the Minister's own document. As the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, said, many occupiers, if they knew the danger, would, I am sure, have too much regard for Scotland's interests to apply for particular grants. But are they given any guidance at all here? The answer is, no. Ought they to be? The answer is, they should have been.
There is one other point. Chapter 10 of the programme raises another important point and I should like the assurance of the Government that we will get their co-operation. Paragraph 10(3) emphasises that the assessment of environmental needs should be considered early—and I underline "early" and not,
"at an advanced stage in the planning process".
It refers in paragraph 10(7) to the machair as,
"a unique, fragile biologically important ecosystem",
and that a need for change should be carefully considered to be sure,
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"that severe or irreversible damage to the machair is not being exchanged for a mere ephemeral or short-term benefit".
That is the Minister's own statement.
My Lords, what are we discussing? It is putting money—some of the taxpayers' money—into possibly some of the poorest farming land in Britain, and that at the risk of endangering an area that is a unique wildlife sanctuary that already brings visitors. Properly nurtured it would bring more visitors and, if properly looked after, in a few years' time would be a source of pride and prosperity to Scotland. I believe the NCC is short of money to carry out the obligations placed on it by Parliament, but is it really necessary for we conservationists to let this vital protection be endangered because we are sorry for the NCC? Should we not say to the Government of this country, "We will not stand for this particular risk being taken"? That is all I am talking about—the risk being taken. It is up to you to ensure that this is not done. This is going to cost money. To pay for the essential pregrant-making investigation—and this is all we are asking for—in Chapter 10 the programme requires £50,000 for the NCC in a five-year period. I may be wrong, but I understand that the Secretary of State and the Department of the Environment have increased this sum to £60,000. I doubt whether that is enough, but all I would ask the Minister to do is to give the House an assurance now that if this amount for preinvestigation is insufficient to do the job properly, as recommended in his own proposals, more money will be provided.
4.21 p.m.
The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, one of the benefits of joining the EEC was the multinational approach to the deprived social regions of the member states, of which the Western Isles are a perfect example. Therefore I hope it is not too presumptuous for a lowland Englishman to congratulate the Scottish Office on 95 per cent. of their achievement. But of course there are caveats. The first is the historical one; lots of people from the clearance Dukes of Sutherland, through Lord Leverhulme, to the Highland and Islands Development Board have chucked money at the Highlands and have seen not one penny (or very little of it) returned. Sometimes great hopes have been raised, jobs have been created; and then industries and schemes have gone bust, with the equivalent disappointments involved. The other caveat obviously concerns the environment, and I think this is really what we are all talking about today. The environment fear concerns the SSSIs and the bird population and the general appearance of the countryside.
Various factors, land holding among them, have resulted in traditional farming methods being carried on on the machair and on the inlies. The turf, which supports a wide selection of wild flowers, is still much in evidence. Are we sure that ploughing it and planting it with modern grasses and making silage will be really profitable either to the crofters themselves or to the community, if by so doing their income from tourism is decreased because of a decline of our much talked about friend, the corncrake, which, some of your Lordships may he aware, has practically gone from the mainland of Britain? Perhaps the Scottish Office would find it more beneficial to subsidise the ferries, both air and sea, to a much greater extent than at

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present. Therefore the net price obtainable for crofters' beasts—admittedly they sell in the autumn—would he much better for them than the increased price and also the increased numbers obtained by silage, et cetera, and still very expensive ferry to the mainland.
The worry that some of us have concerns the £3.4 million to he spent on land improvement. This will result, as I have said, in the reseeding and the removal of iris beds and the lowering of water tables, resulting in a reduction in the size of the lochans, and the consequential threat to the large wader nesting sites, improvement of the dry machair so that the traditional pattern of fallow and small field pattern is lost.
The IDP envisages the improvement of 20 per cent. of the machair and 50 per cent. of the inbye land. This does clash a little with ministerial statements that no "large-scale improvements" will he brought about. The sum of several small-scale improvements adds up, I suggest, to a large-scale improvement. I realise that it is difficult to criticise from a lowland farm Government efforts which are essentially correct, generous-minded and socially just; but as the Government, in paragraph 10.7 of the ID programme, say themselves:
"The conservation of this unique, fragile—"
and the reason I am quoting this following what the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, said, is that I want to emphasise the word "fragile"—
"and biologically important ecosystem depends upon sympathetic management".
These caveats must he aired. Article 4 of the EEC Directive 79/409 on birds requires habitat protection measures to be taken for certain rare species, including the 15 found in the Western Islands. No mention is made of this in the IDP.
A cost-benefit analysis of the improvements has not been carried out because Ministers are aware they would not be cost-beneficial. As I said earlier, it is for social reasons that the money is to he provided, and we all recognise that social reasons are very important in this context. We all recognise, as did the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, how essential it is for a man to have the standing to be able to work and earn his living in the home and in the place where he was born and reared. It is hard for us here to criticise anything that is going to produce money for that, even though I think it is possible to suggest that some of that money could he spent in better ways.
Can the Minister confirm that Section 32 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act requires landowners whose grant has been withheld after a rejection by the NCC to the improvement of an SSSI to be offered a management agreement and that section is being waived on the grounds that because it is not a grant given as a Ministry grant but one given under the European scheme, therefore the obligation to offer a management agreement is not still on the NCC? If that is the case, all the arguments several of us had during the passage of the Wildlife and Countryside Act for changing "shall" to "may" in Section 32 will now be stood on their heads by the Ministers who themselves argued against them. It will be quite amusing and interesting in terms of political semantics to see whether that is the case.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, I wonder whether my noble friend would allow me to intervene. Is he saying that he wants "shall" rather than "may" now?
The Earl of Onslow: No, My Lords, I did not say that. I said that is what the law says. If Ministers are then going to say: "We agreed that 'shall' should be the case last year but now, just because it is convenient to us we are not going to give enough money to the NCC to allow them to offer management agreements", that is exactly what we said would happen, and we are now being proved right even earlier than we thought would be the case. There is nothing more smugly satisfying than to he able to say, "I told you so". It is also quite probably the most irritating thing for the people to whom you are saving it.
Furthermore, if this is the case, what will be most unfair is that the islanders themselves will feel prejudiced against. Now we have got the "shall" argument, "shall" it shall he and "may" it may not be. Surely if the cost-benefit is so definitely not in favour of this improvement, then the money could just as well he used for management agreements, together with the improvement of piers and roads envisaged in the IDP and further subsidies to both air and sea ferries, and the social gain which the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, rightly talked about would be achieved and the environmental damage would be limited. After all, a recent paper by Mr. Dalton, published by the North of Scotland College of Agriculture concludes:
"It is highly unlikely that the crofting sector can absorb a great deal more capital profitably either from the viewpoint of the whole economy or of the individual crofter".
Therefore I would suggest that the net return to a crofter will be increased more by management agreements and cheaper ferries than by too much improvement, and at a greater benefit to the fragile environment and its enormously high nesting density of waders—all these corncrakes and all the habitat, which I suggest is not only the heritage of the Western Islands but the heritage of us all, which is so important.
4.29 p.m.
Lord John-Mackie: My Lords, there is much to respect in the ideas of my noble friend Lord Melchett, although many of them I disagree with; but I think we are all very grateful to him for raising this topic today because I think your Lordships will agree that it has developed slightly wider than he probably thought. I think that is a good thing because this is a subject of great importance, particularly to the West of Scotland and the Western Isles themselves.
We all know how beautiful the Western Isles are, but I think that that beauty is marred when one looks at the derelict crofts and the derelict areas of land where people lived, worked and made their living in the past. These areas have now, in many cases—we are talking about tens of thousands of acres—almost gone back to nature again and are useless agriculturally, which spoils the environment more than anything else. The noble Baroness, Lady Elliot, mentioned the trip we had together in Bavaria and southern Italy, and the improvement in the housing and the buildings there. I thought of what such an improvement could do to western Scotland and the Western Isles. Drainage,

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lining et cetera can improve the pastures and after all, it is a pasture area—although some crops can be grown—producing store sheep and store cattle. If that were done, it would help the environment and would certainly not hinder it. The noble Lord, Lord Craigton, said that there was no mention of the environment in the brochure, but I should like to correct him, because on the second last page of this brochure, at the bottom, is mentioned the environment and its importance. So I think that he made a mistake in saying that it was not mentioned—
Lord Craigton: My Lords, I referred to the IDP itself—the official document, not the brochure.
Lord John-Mackie: My Lords, this document is what is going out to the people in question and it is mentioned there. In the general picture of people who are very environmentally orientated, there is always this term, "destroy the environment". But you do not destroy the environment by schemes such as this: you change the environment. I should like to emphasise that. In my opinion, a scheme such as this for the Western Isles will change the environment only for the better. But using this term "destroy the environment" is all wrong.
The noble Baroness, Lady White, quoted the Stornoway Gazette. I should like to quote what I think is a much better paper for the Highlands—the West Highlands Free Press. I know that there is a bias against some of your Lordships who live there, and that it is left-wing orientated, but it is widely read and I think that many lairds in the Highlands read it with great avidity. I get it regularly and it keeps me in touch with that area. I should like to quote from an article by Mr. Charles Pickup. It is a very good article on the subject and it is headed "Defusing the 'conservation vs. IDP' row". I should like to quote one paragraph and ask the noble Baroness to think about it:
My own research has shown that inbye reseeding treatment can enrich the wildlife of the moorland grazings. Similarly a resucitation of croftland between the machair and the moors could be of benefit to the birds. In many areas land which once was cultivated has degenerated into rushy sheep pasture which is of little use agriculturally and of little interest to the conservationist. With more arable cultivation and grass production for hay or silage in this zone a greater variety of wildlife habitats will be created.
"A visit to any of the offshore islands around North Uist will show that where arable cultivation has ceased the diversity of birds and flowers is reduced. A revival of cultivation in similar derelict areas will undoubtedly benefit some of the specialities of the machair wildlife".
He goes on:
"The corncrake is a case in point."
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I have read this article as well and, equally, am fond of the Western Highlands Free Press, no doubt for much the same reasons as my noble friend. We have enemies in common with them. But that article which he quoted explicitly excludes the area that I am concerned about, which is the wet machair. It, talked about the moorland and derelict inbye land, but I made a great deal of play in what I had to say about the fact that it is the 1,000 hectares of wet machair which is the major concern of nature conservationists. What my noble friend has read out does not impinge on that at all.
Lord John-Mackie: My Lords, I am sorry to start to quote again, but the last sentence states:
"A revival of cultivation in similar derelict areas will undoubtedly benefit some of the specialities of the machair wildlife".
So the author does mention that area and, as I said, he says that the corncrake is a case in point. I know there is great regret at the passing of the corncrake in most areas of the United Kingdom, although my wife assures me that she heard one in Essex last summer. I am not sure how accurate that may be, but that is what she said. So I make that point that Mr. Pickup makes.
There is the same experience in forestry. When new forests have been planted all over Britain, the wildlife is far in excess of what it was before. This has been proved time and time again, but most people refuse to believe it. As most people know, private forestry owners and the Forestry Commission have wildlife people looking after enormous varieties of wildlife that have come into the forests because of the change in the environment. There has been a lot of detailed criticism of some schemes, particularly of the cleaning of ditches and the redraining of the 1,000 hectares of machair land. This is only 20 per cent. of the total machair land. No doubt it is quite a large area, since it is 1,000 hectares, but I cannot help thinking that the article which I have just read out is right and that helping this land to be better agriculturally will help not only agriculture, but the wildlife as well.
I know that one point that is made about draining this land is that you lower the water table, but I think that they have had only one drought year, which is this one. The Western Highlands is not well-known for its droughts. But in these flat areas, with new drains, the water table can be controlled with sluices et cetera, and I see no objection to that. One thing that is certain is that you will not grow crops of good grass or anything else on wet land that has to be drained.
There has been criticism that the Nature Conservancy Council will not be paid for their assessment work out of the funds that are to come from elsewhere. I think that this principle has been agreed before. The NCC has work to do and it has to get it from the Department of the Environment and not from the Ministry of Agriculture. My noble friend laughs, but that is the case, and he will need to press the Secretary of State for the Environment if he wants the money for an assessment service, which is quite important.
Another point—and I am very surprised that the noble Baroness, Lady Elliot, did not raise it—is that, if environmental considerations are given precedence over agricultural ones, there will be a deal of frustration in getting schemes completed. There is nothing worse in planning a scheme than having an NCC officer breathing down your neck all the time. I have had to do with many schemes where people have just given up, saying: "I can't be bothered if this is what is going on". So one has to be very careful in pressing the environmental lobby too hard on agriculturalists, if you are going in for these schemes.
Finally—and I am going fairly wide now—why, in this era of surpluses,' particularly in Europe, should we produce more food under expensive and difficult conditions, as there are in the Highlands? Last week, we had a short debate on the question of bringing 89,000 tonnes of New Zealand butter to a surplus butter area in this country. The point was made very

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strongly that the help which New Zealand gave us in two world wars warranted seeing that they had precedence over the surplus in this country. But I understand that, man for man, the West of Scotland and the Highlands of Scotland provided more men in the two world wars than any other part of the country. So if precedence is being given to New Zealand on that basis, then why should the Western Highlands of Scotland not produce what they can produce, which it can be argued is also in surplus—sheepmeat and, to a certain extent, beef? I understand that, in some areas of Scotland, store cattle are scarce this year and are likely to be more scarce, because the beef herd has been going down year after year. So I do not think that there is a surplus.
But that is not all. I do not know how many noble Lords listen to "Thought for the Day". This morning a very nice, much travelled vicar quoted the World Bank as saying that 700 million people are badly fed, that there is malnutrition among them and that probably half of them are starving. He said the World Bank had made a conservative estimate and that probably 1,000 million people rather than 700 million are starving. If that is the case, there is no surplus of food in the world. There is a lack of will and knowhow in getting food to these people. I do not think that the argument about food being expensive to produce in these areas should carry any weight at all.
I said earlier that what are important are people, the land and the environment. Therefore I suggest that this scheme should go on. Do not hinder it by putting forward environmental considerations. Although they must be taken into account, do not hinder the scheme.
4.40 p.m.
Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, I join other speakers in my gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, for enabling this debate to take place. He is not proposing that there should be a vote to reject the regulations, but this debate gives us an opportunity to discuss them. I think there is anxiety throughout the country—there certainly is in Scotland—about this plan. As it is an integrated development programme which might be the precursor of others, it is important that we should look at it carefully.
It brings a very large contribution from the EEC. For the £20 million over five years to be spent on agriculture, forestry and fishing there is a 40 per cent. contribution from the Community. That part of the programme which is of concern to those who are worried about damage to the environment is the land improvement part. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds has been taking the lead because of the threat which it sees to birds. But to the Royal Society and to others it is less than 10 per cent. of this programme which is of concern.
At the outset, I should like to make clear my own views on the present situation. I believe that to stop or seriously delay the IDP would be folly. I believe that the Western Isles have the highest unemployment in the country. It is over 30 per cent. The resources there are few and the opportunities are limited because of their remoteness. Of the possibly endangered species in the area, the most important is the Hebridean crofter. In other words, I would remind the most ardent conservationists—I hope I shall not be taking
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my life in my hands by saying this—that people are more important than birds. Provided that this IDP is not rejected or discarded, there need not be a conflict. There need be no conflict between people and birds. But if the IDP were to be rejected or very seriously delayed, I believe that people would suffer.
So far as the Government are concerned, they cannot afford to ignore safeguards for flora and fauna. Any administration which was responsible for the extinction or the near extinction of a rare bird would have a lot to answer for to the electorate of this country. Under the EEC scheme, the Government have to give an assurance that the IDP will not damage the environment. It is not clear, however, that they have taken the steps necessary to protect the environment. The area of concern is a strip running down the West Coast of the Isles. It consists of that unusual land surface, the machair. It is only to be found in a few other places in the United Kingdom. It is, of course, formed by shell sand being blown over sand dunes and spread over peat. Also, in the language of crofting tenure, there is the "inbye" land, mostly adjoining the machair. Together they form a habitat for particular birds and for rare and interesting flowers and plants. It is accepted in the IDP, on the subject of the scientific importance of machair, that:
"The conservation of this unique, fragile and biologically important eco-system depends upon sympathetic management".
Unless my noble friend can explain them today, there appear to be no visibly dependable provisions for monitoring, for safeguarding particular sites, or for compensation if it is clear that a crofter should not carry out work under the IDP for essential reasons of conservation. The machair and the inbye land support a high percentage of the total United Kingdom populations of certain waders and the corncrake. If care is taken and if special measures are adopted, the IDP need not decimate them. I hope that it is not too late to include the provisions needed.
I have had a little experience of such situations. I am known to be, and have been since a teenager, a birdman in Northern Scotland, but I have also had to deal with similar situations as a Minister. About 10 years ago there were the planning applications for platform building sites at Nigg Bay and Ardersier, which cover a large area of shore and which were immediately recognised by all those concerned with birds as a threat to certain shore birds. There was understandable anxiety, but it was also important to avoid the necessity of public inquiries. I am glad to say that not only in those two cases but also in the case of Flotta, which has become a terminal in Orkney, those who had put forward reasoned objections were satisfied when we were able to provide suggestions by which the threatened species would be able to continue without disturbance. Otherwise, the first oil flow from the Forties Field would have been up to two years later. Also, the Piper Field would have been much delayed as a result of a Flotta public inquiry, had there been one.
I understand that there is some rigidity in the financial boundaries between the funds which can be spent on agriculture and the funds available for protecting the environment. That is not only in this country but also in the EEC schemes. I should like to ask my noble friend Lord Mansfield when he comes to reply to

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say whether it is correct that money for the protection of the environment cannot be produced from the agricultural funds of the EEC and that only agricultural funds are available—this £20 million to be spent over five years. I understand also that the Nature Conservancy Council have been attending the meetings on this programme. May I ask my noble friend whether it is true that the NCC are prepared to offer a management agreement where any farm capital grant is rejected on conservation grounds, and that such an offer would be made to any crofter in that area who was in that situation. For this purpose, is an IDP grant a farm capital grant? If there is not some scheme like that to which the Nature Conservancy Council are committed, it seems that any crofters in that situation would be treated less favourably than farmers anywhere else in the country. That surely cannot be the intention of the Government.
I wrote to my noble friend at the beginning of this month and raised some of these points. I hope that this evening he can give us the assurances which are needed, or tell us that action is being taken to cover these points. The IDP should go ahead. I do not think anybody has spoken against it, but the essential safeguards for the survival and maintenance of certain species must be seen to be accompanying it.
4.49 p.m.
Lord Walston: My Lords, it is rash for an East Anglian farmer, albeit one who has a lifelong interest in the rural scene and in conservation, to enter into a discussion which is so very close to the hearts of those living in the North-West of Scotland. I do so only because, towards the end of July, I attended a meeting chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, where the dangers posed to wildlife by this particular project under discussion were raised. It struck me then that a very strong case had been made out for some drastic alteration in the proposals. Therefore, when I was in that part of the world, I made a special expedition to Lewis and Harris in order to find out in a short while what I could about the scheme. I was very fortunate in being able to spend a whole day with the man responsible for the project and his assistant and the latter part of the day with a representative of the Nature Conservancy Council.
It was as a result of that that I prepared the report to which the noble Baroness, Lady White (I am sorry she is not in her place now) referred as being somewhat "sugary". I am not quite sure what she meant by that. I gathered she thought that the report did not emphasise the conflicts that appear so apparent to us in this Chamber listening to this debate. I did not emphasise them, because in my opinion they were not there. I would much rather have a small amount of natural sugar on the report than a rather larger amount of synthetic salt rubbed into wounds which exist only at some distance from those islands which are directly concerned in this project. While I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, there is a danger that harm can be done to this enormously important, valuable and imaginative project by giving the impression by what is said here and in other places south of the border that there is a head-on conflict between those who are interested in agriculture, those who are interested in wildlife, those who are interested in
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people, and those who are interested in birds. I do not believe that any of your Lordships who went to those islands today would feel that was the case at all.
Let me quote, in the first instance, from the pamphlet that has been produced for the information of crofters by the Integrated Development Programme.
In one paragraph it states:
"The islands are of international importance to wildlife, flora and fauna. In drawing up plans for projects, proper consideration must be given to the need to protect the environment."
Elsewhere it states:
"Many parts of the Islands have been declared SSSIs and any scheme affecting an SSSI requires prior consultation with the Nature Conservancy Council."
Lord Melchett: My Lords, if the noble Lord—
Lord Walston: May I just finish the quotation, my Lords? It goes on:
"The project team will be able to advise you whether this applies to your scheme and if so, to arrange discussions with the NCC for you."
Lord Melchett: My Lords, this is the second time that the actual leaflet describing the IDP for the people concerned has been quoted. It does seem a shame that the noble Lord did not read from the whole of the pamphlet; he jumped from the pamphlet to another piece of paper.
The paragraph in the pamphlet goes on to say:
"For developments within national nature reserves of SSSIs the Nature Conservancy Council must be consulted."
One of the criticisms I have is this is far too restrictive. As I and others have made clear, the nature conservation interests in the Western Isles goes beyond the NNRs and SSSIs. It is misleading, as far as this country's international obligations to wild birds have been concerned, to say that it is only in those restricted areas that the NCC should be consulted.
Lord Walston: My Lords, I would have continued and will continue to deal with the point which the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has just raised. I quoted those two sentences only to show that those responsible for the IDP are fully aware of the environmental implications of the scheme and that they are not simply tough agriculturalists interested only in producing more and better grass, higher quality silage, and better beef and sheep. They are people who are aware of the total implications of the environment and of the enormous importance to the other isles of the flora and fauna which exist today.
In fact, the agricultural side of the organisation said to me personally that their objective was to improve the total life of the islands. They fully realise that tourism in its widest sense was an important part; the tourists not being the conventional type of Brighton or Blackpool tourist, but tourists who went there to enjoy and sometimes study the wildlife. Anything which detracted from that would be defeating the purposes which they had in mind. I assure your Lordships that they are very much aware of this.
Furthermore, the personal relationships between them and the NCC appear to me to be extremely close. They both assured me, in the presence of each other, that they had no doubt that they could reach happy

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agreement on at least 95 per cent. of the projects which were likely to be proposed, and that the only sources of conflict might be a maximum of 5 per cent. I think the noble Lord agrees with me there. Let me reiterate the point that there is close collaboration and understanding between the agricultural side and the nature conservancy side in the islands itself. Any idea of confrontation between them is extremely misleading.
In passing. I would like to make two points—both of which, in a manner of speaking, have already been raised. One concerns the corncrakes, which I was assured were diminishing up there because of the diminution in the animal acreage. If this scheme, as seems probable, is going to enable a rather greater acreage of oats to be grown; it would have an advantageous effect on the corncrake. As the noble Lord, Lord John-Mackie, so rightly pointed out, one must not look at any change in agricultural practice as being the destruction of the environment; it will be a change, and sometimes a change may be better from the environmental point of view.
The other slightly less serious point I would direct to the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, concerns the point he made about the correct time for cutting silage and the desirability of persuading crofters to cut their silage after certain birds have nested and hatched. I would remind the noble Lord that one of the causes of the French Revolution was the fact that the Seigneur forbade his peasants to cut the hay when it was at its best, because it would disturb the nesting partridges; the peasants had to wait until the partridges hatched and flew away before they were allowed to cut their hay, when it was far past its prime. This was not the basic, original or main cause of the French Revolution, but it was undoubtedly a contributory cause and it would be unfortunate if anything of that sort were to operate—even in the remote Western Isles.
There is nothing much that I can add to what has already been said. The scheme is an admirable one. It is an extremely expensive one and it could be queried on the grounds, possibly, that £55 million or £56 million for the benefit of a relatively small number of people is not the most efficient use of funds—but that is not what we are discussing today. I am delighted that it is to be done because I believe that the contribution which the Western Isles can make in a whole range of respects, including the provision of a very fine group of people, is something on which we cannot turn our backs.
I agree with those noble Lords who have urged upon the Goverment—and I hope our voices will have some effect on the Government—that where, in some of those 5 per cent. of cases to which I have referred, there is going to he a prohibition on the implementation of the agricultural side of the plan, money will be made available to the NCC in order to implement the management agreements. It will not be a very large sum; it will probably be little, if any, more than the actual amount that would have been spent on the capital improvements. So the amount of money involved is minimal, the benefit to be obtained, from the environmental point of view and the goodwill point of view, is enormous. I hope the noble Earl will be able to give us some encouragement in this respect.
5.2 p.m
Lord Sandford: My Lords, I welcome this debate, and I welcome very much the decision of the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, not to press his Prayer against this project. I welcome the project itself; in fact I was welcoming it over three years ago when the concept first appeared from Brussels and at the time I was chairing a sub-committee of your Lordships' Select Committee on European Affairs, on rural policy. But I have to say that, whereas then we held out high hopes of this project. I must express my disappointment that we have not achieved more. My disappointment arises from three causes: first of all, that the EEC Commission in Brussels have still not found a way of assigning funds from the Social Fund or the Regional Development Fund, still less from the Environmental Fund, in order to balance the funds that are assigned from agriculture, without which balance it is not really reasonable to call this an integrated development project. My disappointment also arises from the fact that the conservation element has not been adequately built into the project as a whole, and we have heard enough about that already this afternoon. There is recognition in Chapter 8 that, because no one can reasonably he expected to earn a comparable income—to use the EEC term—from agriculture alone, it is necessary to create other enterprises associated with or outside agriculture. But this whole matter has been most cursorily dealt with—there are just a few platitudes in Chapter 8 and no more; without those being properly developed we really are not justified in calling this more than a major piece of agricultural extension, but of course it is welcome for that alone.
If the EEC and the Scottish agencies listed in the project are not able to do better than this after three years. I think we have to look elsewhere in order to make progress in this whole important business of integrated rural development. I believe we can find some hope of making some progress from two or three sources. First of all, the EEC themselves have decided that in order to make more progress in this field it will he necessary to have some more research done into how integrated rural development is being tackled throughout the Community. I am glad to say that they invited proposals for such research at the end of 1980 and 10 or 20 such projects, four of them this country, are now proceeding. I have here the results of one of them carried out by the Rural Planning Research Trust in the district of Radnor in mid-Wales, in the less favoured areas, which is illuminating, but it shows that the funding going to that area through the Less Favoured Areas Directive is extremely wastefully, inefficiently and extravagantly applied, and that we are still throwing money at this problem and not really dealing with it.
The other area which we can look to now for some prospect of an improvement is the policy which Parliament approved in, I think it was, July or October of 1980, some two years ago: the new system for administering farm capital grants in sensitive areas such as national parks and sites of special scientific interest. I would, if I may, read an extract on this topic from the annual report of the Dartmoor National Park which has just come to my hands. Your Lordships will recall that the arrangement come to in July 1980 in the

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statutory instrument that brought this new system into force was that in these areas individual farmers had to take such of their proposals as they hoped to get grant for to the national park authority to see that they matched and corresponded with the conservation policies in force in the area.
Reviewing that process over the past year, I read as follows from the report of the National Park Authority for Dartmoor:
"Agricultural grant notifications are rapidly becoming the most time-consuming as well as the most important single operation within the Department".
Then it goes on:
"Over the whole year decisions were made on 248 notifications. Most of these involved several agricultural operations and many were for very substantial proposals. The value of the system lies not just in the opportunity which it affords the National Park Authority to object to damaging proposals and possibly prevent their execution …"—
and this is the important point
"in fact over the whole year there were only two outright objections to the 240 proposals put in".
That is 99 per cent., not 95 per cent. as the noble Lord, Lord Walston, was suggesting there would be.
"More it lies in the creation of an opportunity for negotiation. A large number of submitted proposals from farmers are modified prior to the National Park Authority giving its decision. Thirteen were approved subject to agreed conditions. Most important of all is the basis which it provides for contact and for discussion".
This strongly reinforces what the noble Lord, Lord Walston, was just saying. Then,
"National park staff begin to understand farming operations and farmers' values and aspirations, and farmers in turn come to associate the national park with a face rather than a bureacracy, hopefully with a face which is willing to listen and to understand and which also puts forward a supportable case for conservation which the farmer can respect and act upon".
There, I think, lies some hope for more satisfactorily reconciling the conflicts which are being apprehended.
Since then, we have the Wildlife and Countryside Act, with Section 41 thereof—alias the Sandford amendment—in which on top of that requirement we have the statutory duty for ADAS and the Scottish equivalent to give advice to farmers on the conservation and enhancement of the natural beauty and amenity of the countryside, and—and this is the second leg—
"to advise such persons on diversification into other enterprises of benefit to the rural economy".
With the kind of process that I have just quoted to you from one of our national parks—but I could quote the same thing from many other sensitive rural areas—plus the additional responsibility of ADAS and the Scottish equivalent to give advice both on conservation and on diversification into other enterprises besides agriculture, I do think we see a way forward. I am disappointed that a policy and a large-scale development project such as the one we are debating has proved so relatively unsuccessful in achieving this integration. It will be a good project nevertheless. In the light of the last three years' experience, my hope is that we will look to progress, and particularly to ADAS to make progress by putting itself more firmly in a position to give advice to farmers on diversification and on conservation. That will enable the process I have just described for Dartmoor to become the norm and the common practice throughout our countryside.
5.10 p.m.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: My Lords, I found the noble Lord's speech very encouraging. One or two noble Lords have been encouraging. The noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, eventually said that he thought that this would be all right and that he hoped the Government would take some small action, and so did my noble friend Lord Walston.
We need not despair. The arguments in favour of doing something were put with the greatest clarity by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, and he was supported in a great deal of detail by Lady White and others. I shall not go through those points again. I shall quickly take up one or two of the points that have been made and which I think should not be allowed to pass.
The noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, surprised me by saying that he did not believe that ploughing up or re-seeding the machair would do any harm. I am sorry to disagree. I was president of the RSPB for five years and, although there may be a few fringe characters who are not altogether easy to deal with, basically it is a most serious body. The noble Earl on the Government Front Bench raised £1 million, so it is not a body to be ashamed of.
Lord Home of the Hirsel: Not as a noble Earl, I am afraid.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: I am sorry, I am out of date. It is a body of the most intensely active, accurate and careful workers. May I say to the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, that if the RSPB experts suggest that something will do harm I would not be too quick to say that it will not.
While we are on machairs generally, Lord John-Mackie made a comment which interested me. He said that one does not destroy the environment, one changes it. That is true. However, one does destroy a habitat. That is the point we are talking about. The habitat of the machair is 20 per cent. of all the machair available anywhere—certainly round about—and the 1,000 hectares which the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, particularly asked to be saved form a very large part of the total available environment for certain birds, of which the corncrake, we heard, is a very important one.
The whole problem—we spent hours in the Wildlife and Countryside Act discussing this—of the environment against profitable farming is a very tricky one. There are many cases where one has to put up with the destruction of the environment or with damage to the environment for economic and personal reasons of the people concerned. This most desirable scheme will help people who have needed help for years and years. The crofters have always been, as far as I can see, left outside any reasonable assistance, although a great deal has been done in the past 30 years. Before that it was very bad indeed. They have always wanted help. They have only lived through help. It is entirely desirable that this scheme should go forward and do something about this area where, as my noble friend Lord Taylor said, there are fewer people all the time.
As a population dies or diminishes, so conditions get worse. All that is true. The trouble with Lord Taylor's speech is that I agree with every word he said except his conclusions. He said that it is most important to see

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that the help gets there. Of course it is. But it is not most important that the last 2 or 3 per cent. of the £50 million talked about should get there. The position is that the approximate £50 million is the whole scheme, of which £20 million is agricultural, £3.4 million of it for machair and inbye land—mostly the inbye land. The 1.000 hectares, by my reckoning and without doing an accurate calculation, would get under £500,000 or between £500,000 and £l million out of the £50 million.
We are not saying that in every case where there is a conservation issue one must decide in favour of the birds or the deer or whatever it may be. We are saying that in this case, where a very good job is being done, if one does not do a very small part of it, one would go a long way towards saving a very important part of a rare and important habitat for birds.
That seems to me quite different from what has been suggested. The conservationists want to stop the whole scheme. The noble Lords who have spoken on this side say they do not, and they want the schemes to go forward. However, it did not stop one or two people suggesting that they were against the whole scheme.
That is as far as I want to go. I want the noble Earl on the Government Front Bench to say that if he cannot agree to help us over £3½ million worth of the plan, which is for the inbye land and the machair land, that he will at least see what can be done about the 1,000 hectares. It is a very small concession for the conservationists of the world but it can easily be done. It would be inexpensive. There are money difficulties which the noble Lord, Lord Sandford, and others raised and I do not know how they will be met, but the amounts are small. However, it is an important point and I hope that we can obtain that small concession from this interesting debate.
5.19 p.m.
Lord Home of the Hirsel: My Lords, I must apologise for not putting my name on the list of speakers, but I was not sure that I could be here. Perhaps I may make a comment or two.
The noble Lord, Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge, and I might both be accurately described as bird men. We would go a long way to preserve the corncrake, which is one of the most delightful of birds. I am not sure that I come to quite the same conclusions as he does, but we can see that later on. Perhaps the most valuable of the EEC's contributions to Scotland and the activities in Scotland has been the injection of additional capital into marginal land. Both my noble friend Baroness Elliot of Harwood and I have had first hand experience of this. The capital contributions from Europe have undoubtedly enabled us to hold the population on the hill land which would otherwise have left. That has been a prime objective of all Governments for as long as I can remember, but we have not been very successful up till now in arresting the depopulation of the hill lands. For the crofters of the Western Isles to lose £3·4 millions of cash, applied to a comparatively small area, would be a pretty grave loss. For the reasons given, in particular by the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, I find myself unable to go along with Lord Melchett's Prayer—cogently as he argued the case.
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There are certainly rare birds on the machair land and also rare plants. Perhaps the plants are almost more interesting than the birds. But the trouble with too many of these environmental cases is that, at any rate at the start, the conservationists ask for too much and the owners of the land concede too little. This is a case in which I seem to remember the noble Baroness, Lady White, said that we could not get the best of both worlds. But I think that we can. That is exactly what I believe we can do. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Walston, that we are apt to underestimate the common purpose of the Department of Agriculture, the local authorities and the farming community, including the crofters.
Therefore, although I would like to hear the answers to the points raised in particular by my noble friend Lord Campbell of Croy about the possibility of safeguards and, for example, management arrangements, nevertheless I could not support the Prayer which is immediately before the House. However, as I say, I hope that this is one of the cases in which compromise and common sense will prevail.
5.21 p.m.
Lord Ross of Marnock: My Lords, first I should like to congratulate my noble friend Lord Melchett on having raised this subject. It has enlightened many of your Lordships about the Western Isles. We do not have very many debates about the Western Isles and I hope that in future much more sympathetic attention will be paid to the needs of the Western Isles.
My noble friend has raised an important point, and he has probably raised it at the right time. I think that it was the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, who congratulated the Government on their achievement. Quite frankly, we have not achieved anything yet. The noble Lord, Lord Sandford—if I can have his attention—suggested that this was a failure. With all due respect, it is no failure because it has hardly begun—indeed, it has not begun. That is why it is important to raise it now.
There is no doubt at all that if there is any area in Britain that requires special treatment, it is the Western Isles. May I say to the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, that it is a place not where the population is declining, but where it was declining, and that decline was stopped by the efforts of the Scottish Office and the activities of Secretaries of State, among whom I was one. I set up the Highlands and Islands Development Board just because of the special conditions of that area, which has a proud past and which has proud people. They never call themselves poor; they are rich in many things. But if there is one thing in which they are rich, it is probably scepticism about what Governments say, about what Members of Parliament say and about what Members of this House say about their concern for them, about retaining the life there and then opposing something that may appear to be for their benefit.
Let us look at the problem. People have said that they are quite happy about 95 per cent. of the programme, but not about 5 per cent., and that 5 per cent. comes down to £3.4 million in relation to land development. I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, appreciates what has been done in recent years. We gave the crofters, for the first time, the statutory right to buy their crops, and that included the

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inbye land. I think that there is probably more hope now of getting improvement because the crofters feel that they have a greater stake in it than they ever had before. But if you do not develop the inbye land, you will not be able to improve the stockholding capacity of the land, whether it be sheep, cattle or anything else. Therefore, it is not good enough to say, "We are concerned. Please do not do anything about the 10,000 hectares of inbye land"—the noble Lord's argument is false there—and then belittle the problem, saying that it is only this.
There must be an assurance by the United Kingdom Government—and in this case, of course, it is the Scottish Office—that the actions envisaged are compatible with the protection of the environment. That surely must not give an absolute veto to conservationists. I do not think that they would expect to have it. But it gives them a voice to ensure that the administrative routines are adequate for this to he carried out and for, say, the NCC to do the job that it is set up to do. I have a feeling that, if the NCC had been the SNCC and they had all come under the Secretary of State, this debate would never have arisen, because when they all come under the one Minister I can assure your Lordships that there is a possibility of welding them together and getting the routines right.
As regards the SSSIs—I think that there are 35 of them—as I understand it, it has been agreed that three months' notice will he given, and they are reasonably satisfied with that. They are not satisfied about the other areas which might he important but which are unscheduled. The point is that no project has yet started. Therefore, what my noble friend Lord Melchett has been putting forward are fears that arise because they are not satisfied with the administrative routines in the first instance and, in the second instance, as was emphasised by my noble friend Lady White, the actual funding in respect of one aspect of it from the point of view of the protection of the environment.
I want the Minister to tell us what are the administrative routines, because we have not had a project yet, nothing has failed yet and nothing has yet been tried. We must be satisfied because, to a certain extent, I think that the fears may well be justified. I shall not say that all conservationists are reasonable men, but I do not want this scheme to fall down either through the deficiencies of the Scottish Office or the obsessions of certain people in the conservation area. Let the House know just exactly what this is.
There is a suggestion in respect of outside the SSSIs that there will be two weeks' discussion. That might well not be enough. I want to see this programme go ahead. One of the difficulties about it—and to this extent the noble Lord, Lord Sandford, was right—is that we are not seeing the whole scheme. In fact, there is not a quarter of the scheme in what we are debating today. Anyone who spoke about great schemes for arable redevelopment and what will happen in the Western Isles should have read the regulations before us. In paragraph 4(d) under the heading "Comprehensive agricultural improvement" it is stated:
"the grant payable under this regulation shall not exceed the least of—"
and then there is (i), (ii) and (iii); and (iii) is £3,000. We are dealing with small projects for small people and for
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people who need help. Quite frankly—and I see that the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, has gone; everyone who speaks in these debates seems to disappear very quickly.
Lord Tanlaw: My Lords, if the noble Lord will give way, I have been asked to apologise on my noble friend's behalf, who omitted to give his apologies in advance that he could not attend the rest of the debate.
Lord Ross of Marnock: My Lords, I hope that the noble Lord will convey to his noble friend Lord Mackie my apologies for having mentioned his name, not knowing that he was going to apologise. He is always there, so I turned round with confidence thinking he would he there. The fears may well be real, and I think they can be dissipated.
There is going to be disturbance of the ecology. I began to feel like a criminal when my noble friend was speaking. I can remember—and I daresay that the same applies to the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, as it would to the noble Lord, Lord Glenkinglas, if he had been here—going to the Butt of Lewis and going through winding roads that I hope are going to be brought up to date as a result of this, and having pointed out to me with pride by the leader of a township a field on a hillside that had been reseeded. That emerald green stuck out from the stark darkness of the rest of that hillside. They were proud of it. Who did it? They did it themselves. Certainly they got money.
I do not know what the confusion was. I was horrified to hear that a civil servant had been classified by my noble friend as rude. Then he went on to say that the civil servant had said that it had been done before. Of course, it had been done before. I had been doing it before; encouraging people to reseed.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, will the noble Lord give way?
Lord Ross of Marnock: No, my Lords, I want to finish this very good story. Having got there and seen this and admired it, and seen the trouble there was to get it done, and learning it was the co-operation of the people of the township that had done it, I said; "Mr. Macleod, how did you do it?". He held up the biggest fist I had ever seen and said, "By persuasion!" Sometimes I think we need that kind of thing in this House. I hope our persuasion will be such that our fears, although they may be real, if we take the right action—and that can come from the answer we get from the Scottish Office—can be relatively groundless. We will change the ecology. But I think on balance we can change it for the better. There can be benefits from it. It is neglect that has produced some of the habitat, and you are not going to persuade me that we must continue to neglect people.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I simply wanted to put the record straight. I would not have dreamt of criticising a civil servant in your Lordships' House for being rude or anything else. I was in fact criticising the Minister on the Front Bench opposite.
Lord Ross of Marnock: Well, My Lords, I have not always said that he was the most gracious of Ministers, but the instance he quoted was about a civil servant saving to him that it had been done in the past, and I am saying that of course it had been done in the past. It is being done today under the less-favoured-area grants and under reseeding grants, and schemes like that.
This is an important point because I want to ask the Minister how much money is being spent a year on these things that are being attacked today. Secondly, is this £3.4 million in respect of land development new money, or is just the 40 per cent. from the EEC new money, and in other words we are going to be doing not so very much more than we have been doing before?
The third matter is the important point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady White. It is quite wrong, if you have got the best of routines for alerting people that there might be difficulty in respect of a highly difficult area from the conservation point of view, if the people who are supposed to be looking after protecting that and giving their advice on it have not got the staff to do it. It is one Government staffing the Scottish Office and also staffing the NCC. Therefore, it is up to them, having given them the task within the Wildlife and Countryside Bill and then given the pledge in Article 3 of the IDP, to ensure that they can do that job. That is important.
Secondly, the question arises out of the compensation available for those who are refused development under the Wildlife and Countryside Bill. They get their compensation, and I understand it has been suggested that the decision has been taken at ministerial level that no compensation will be paid to a crofter. I think it is wrong. Mind you, who is going to pay the compensation? It is the British Government, through an agency to whom they are probably denying the money. We are in this cleft stick. That has nothing to do with the IDP; these are the consequences of the IDP, and the Government have to face up to them. I congratulate the noble Lord for having raised this important debate—and given me a chance of being hoarse for the rest of the week.
5.35 p.m.
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, we have had an important debate about a matter of considerable interest to the Members of your Lordships' House, and it is also of vital concern to the people of the Western Isles. I have listened carefully to everything that has been said. I do not agree with it all, but nevertheless much valuable ground has been covered. I shall try to answer as many of the points as I can now, but if I do not or cannot then I shall write to those noble Lords to whom I am not able to respond on this occasion.
The integrated development programme represents a determined attempt to improve the economy of one of the most remote and disadvantaged communities in Britain; that is to say, the Western Islands of Scotland. As my noble friend Lady Elliot said, this IDP is one of three pilot programmes which were authorised by the European Commission. As she again said, the others are in the Lozère province of France and in the Luxembourg province of Belgium. The three areas obviously differ in many ways, but they show an important feature. The backbone of their economy is
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agriculture, but agriculture alone cannot provide the population with a decent standard of living.
The very name integrated development programme has been the cause of a number of misconceptions and misunderstandings, and certainly the programme which has eventually emerged with the blessing of the Council of Ministers is very different in character from the original integrated development programme which emanated from the Commission. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, quoted Sir Ralph Verney as saying that the programme is integrated in name only. I do not altogether agree with that although I understand Sir Ralph's reasons for holding the view that he does, or did.
The programme covers a huge range of matters from such things as water and sewage treatment which we have not discussed this afternoon, to the production of Harris tweed, which I do not think we have covered either; and of course it is true that, as some people have said, the £36 million which is to be spent on the infrastructure as opposed to the agricultural part of this, or the tourism and those parts, would have been spent eventually anyway. I suppose a lot of the work would have been done, some of it most certainly would not, but the important part of the programme is the bringing together of all this vast range of measures into one programme.
This will, and indeed already has, given the islanders a great new hope and encouragement. The noble Lord, Lord Ross, said that you cannot say it is a success or a failure yet because nothing has happened. But in fact the project team has been appointed. The people engaged on it have been giving lectures all over the Western Isles to tell people how they can take advantage of the scheme, and a great deal of enthusiasm has already arisen and a measure of hope has been raised. One must not lose sight of the serious economic condition of the people to whom this programme is directed, and it will be of enormous benefit.
We have heard about the very poor quality of the land, most of which is rock and hog. Only a tiny proportion is fit for any form of arable treatment. The entire amount of land which can grow cereals—I do not say this as a debating point but as a point of realism—is less than one large East Anglian, or indeed East Scottish, farm. The people have an ageing population. There are under 30,000 of them, and at the same time they have one of the highest unemployment rates in the United Kingdom, of over 30 per cent. They have among the highest food prices, a very restricted range of activities and an even more restricted range of opportunities. One must admit that they have in many places a complete absence of the sort of amenities we take for granted in the more favoured parts of the United Kingdom. I have visited the islands on a number of occasions in the last three and a half years, particularly recently in connection with the IDP. I have seen the difficult conditions there and spoken to a wide range of people interested in or involved with the IDP.
I have been attacked—whether the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, attacked the officials of my department is no doubt a matter we shall learn in Hansard when we read it—for being insensitive, obdurate and even downright rude, I think that word was used. At any rate, the Government agreed to produce an integrated development programme and I

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shall relate my part in it because I decided that it must concentrate, first, on measures likely to give the maximum benefit to the islanders; secondly, it must, so far as possible, build on what the crofters are already doing, which is farming and fishing; and thirdly, the effects of the environment must be taken into account. To those noble Lords who perhaps do not believe that the Government have been alive to environmental considerations, I refute that absolutely. We were alive to them from day one.
In any event, I appointed a group of officials to work out the details of the IDP and all their meetings were attended by representatives of the Nature Conservancy Council. I attended one or two myself. The inclusion of NCC officials shows that we were aware right from the outset of the need to take conservation into account. Eventually, in the spring of this year, we submitted, for submission to Brussels, a programme which encompasses about £56 million of public expenditure over five years, of which £20 million is for agriculture and fisheries, as stipulated by the regulation.
I shall not detain the House by rehearsing the details of the programme, copies of which are available in the Library, and a few noble Lords have in their possession the actual pamphlet which the customers, if that is the right word, can obtain. But I wish to make a few points about it. First, in many of the schemes, as has been correctly pointed out, the rates of support on offer are generally higher than at present. This exceptional level of Government assistance—which will, of course, be available in the Western Isles only during the life of the programme—is a clear indication of the importance we attach to it.
Secondly, none of the land development and livestock improvement schemes is totally new; they are in fact improved versions of those which have been available under existing legislation for many years. It is some of the technical details that are different, and that is why the regulations which my right honourable friend the Secretary of State made on 19th July are needed. The livestock and land improvement measures dependent on these regulations account for only about £6 million of the total package, but this part of the programme is one of the most important because although investment in agriculture alone will not solve the problems of the Western Isles, it would be nonsense to try to do so without improving the livestock and nutritional value of the land on which they depend.
If Lord Melchett's Prayer were successful, in the sense that these regulations were annulled, the integrated development programme would, of course, be frustrated, but it would not prevent the local people from undertaking exactly the same operations, with rather less help from the public Exchequer, under existing grant schemes. However, I hope to show that if that were to happen, from a conservation point of view the outcome would be much less welcome, because the work would no longer be subject to scrutiny by the assessment service which we have set up.
The noble Lord, Lord Ross, asked me about what I might call the way in which the scheme will operate. By arrangement with the local NCC staff, all projects which fall within certain categories (which have
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themselves been selected by the NCC) will be referred by local Department of Agriculture for Scotland staff to the local NCC staff for their observations. The fortnight referred to by the noble Lord should be enough for all but the most complex cases. As he remarked, the vast majority of these schemes, certainly where individuals are promoting them, will be very small in scope. But if there is a complex case and it requires further consideration, more time will then he given. Therefore, there is no question of the proposals which an individual crofter may have for the amelioration of his particular farming conditions, as it were, slipping through without anybody who is either knowledgeable or interested in conservation matters, having the opportunity to comment.
My noble friend Lord Campbell of Croy, if I heard him right—if I did not, no doubt he will correct me—said in effect that there was no system written into the scheme. But he will have looked at Chapter 10, and particularly at paragraph 4, and will have seen the very great care which is taken there so far as conservation is concerned. We come to the arguments which have been put up, particularly by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, against the scheme. I understand all too well his concern that land improvement can damage what I think can be described as a fragile eco-system. I cannot foretell the future. I cannot guarantee that on no occasion will it happen—obviously I could give that guarantee—but I think it is most unlikely because of the checks and balances we have put into the whole system.
The statistics I have given show that there is no agricultural revolution which is about to happen in the Western Isles. In many cases, the programme seeks merely to restore traditional farming practices. I think we shall be content if the programme encourages crofters to work the machair land, formerly in productive agricultural use, but currently neglected, with choked drains and infestations of undesirable weeds. I do not think it would be right, even if we had the resources, to pay large sums to crofters in Lewis and the Uists not to farm their crofts. They should be encouraged, rather, to take advantage of the pump-priming which this programme offers so that they can help themselves in effect to combat their difficulties.
I am very glad that even those who are concerned about the impact of the programme have not rejected its general aims. I have heard no credible economic or political alternative to it. The Scottish director of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds has made it quite clear that while his organisation has reservations about the land improvement measures on the machair land, it welcomes the objectives of the programme; and that was confirmed today by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett. I am sorry that previous debates outside this House have generated a great deal more heat than light. If he will forgive me for saying so, even the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, had a change of heart. When he gave evidence to the Agriculture Committee of another place on 20th May, he described the programme as "a complete disaster", before going on and answering a question from Mr. Miles and saying that he had never been to the Western Isles.
I think that perhaps many people have moderated their view, because they have learnt about the area and in some cases have even visited it. I hope that the noble

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Lord will agree with me that in the Western Isles the link between man and his environment is particularly close.
It has been said that the Integrated Development Programme will encourage in the Western Isles intensified agriculture of what has been described as the East Anglian type. I have never accused either the noble Lord, nor indeed the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, or any other of the bodies, of making such claims; and indeed the noble Lord has not made those charges. But very many people have written to me over the last few months. They have suggested that modern farming techniques, leading to what they describe as the East Anglian type cereal production, would be encouraged by the IDP. Anybody with even only the smallest knowledge of the area and of those who live in it will know that that is nonsense, and I was very pleased to hear the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, in effect to say words such as that this afternoon. However, crofting agriculture is one of the reasons why, ecologically speaking, the Western Isles is such an interesting place. The present character of the machair land in particular is partly due to the generations of crofters who have worked it. The programme will help them to continue to do so.
I want to come back to the Nature Conservancy Council. As I have explained, I look to the Nature Conservancy Council for advice. I have heard it suggested that the council is unhappy about the environmental aspects of the programme, but that is simply not so. One of the 11 chapters is entitled "Protection of the Environment", and that was written by the NCC. The council proposed an environmental assessment service which will operate, and which I have described. The NCC will be consulted about any proposed development which might constitute a significant threat to wildlife or their habitats, and I have described the processes by which we can identify such cases in time and try to secure a compromise between the needs of the local people and their environment. I believe that those arrangements will provide a greater safeguard for the environment than applies at present, or indeed will apply outside the Western Isles.
Of course I understand that the council is concerned about the additional burden that the assessment service will place on its resources. The council itself estimated that it would cost about £60,000 over five years, and it would like that to be paid for either by my department or by the European Community. I am sorry to have to say that, try as we could to find it I am satisfied that there is no legal way in which the Farm Fund—in other words, FEOGA, the only European fund to earmark money specifically for these programmes—can pay for the environmental assessment service; and I do not think that it would be right for my department to do so.
The main activities of the council are funded by a grant-in-aid, currently about £10 million a year, which is fixed by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment. He and I take the view that the additional modest burden on the Nature Conservancy Council should be funded in precisely the same way as its other management work. But I can tell your Lordships that my right honourable
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friend has said that he will take the extra burden into account in fixing the council's grant-in-aid.
Some people are uneasy about the character of some of the land improvement proposals which may come forward during the programme's life—and I have dealt with some of the more bizarre criticisms. I accept that we shall get awkward cases, but I believe that the main interest will be in repairing or improving existing drains, fencing, and grazing. There is plenty of scope here before anyone need think of large projects to drain new parts of the ecologically important wetlands.
However, there is a danger—I think other noble Lords will agree, since they have touched on it—that because of the feeling of "birds versus people", which has been generated by some of the remarks quoted in the press, the needs of the crofters are to he disregarded, as compared with the needs of wildlife. But that is certainly not the case.
It has been said, though not this afternoon in your Lordships' House, in effect that. "If the Dutch can use European funds to pay farmers to preserve the environment, why don't we?" The facts of the matter are that the Dutch cannot use EEC funds for this purpose, any more than we can. They do make payments to some farmers in a few areas to restrict certain agricultural activities, but they use their own national funds; and so can we. Our counterpart of the Dutch arrangements are the management agreements between the Nature Conservancy Council and farmers on national nature reserves and sites of special scientific interest, provided for under Section 32 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act. I can confirm that the Government and the NCC will apply the Section 32 provision to both IDP and existing crofter grant schemes where a person has been refused a capital grant.
I hope that I have—
Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, since earlier in his speech my noble friend was good enough to invite me to intervene if he had in any way misunderstood me, may I at this stage, before he sits down, say that he referred me to Chapter 10, and indeed I quoted from that chapter during the course of my speech. I acknowledge that the importance of the eco-system is set out there very clearly. But to my mind it is in general terms, and what I believe I and others have been seeking are what I described as visibly dependable measures to carry out what is there described as necessary and desirable. I am grateful for the answers that my noble friend has given, including the one given just now about the NCC. I am also grateful for his confirming in reply to my question that the EEC does not have funds for the protection of the environment that can he provided from the agricultural source. To me that seems to make it even more important that the United Kingdom Government should provide that support.
Baroness White: My Lords, I should like to supplement that intervention by asking the noble Earl, whose description of the EEC position was of course entirely correct, whether Her Majesty's Government will not exercise their best endeavours to see that in an integrated scheme some funds from the Environment Directorate might be made available for these

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purposes—funds greater than the very small amounts committed to be spent under the present arrangements.
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, I am satisfied that we cannot get any money from Europe as things stand, and as a good Scot I was very interested to try to get money from any direction that I could to supplement the scheme. We have to take the situation as we find it, and the Government have concluded that, so far as the present position is concerned, the best way is for the NCC to carry out its role and be funded by the Department of the Environment in the normal manner.
The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, would my noble friend give way on that point, very briefly? I am sorry to interrupt him. Is he satisfied that the NCC has enough money to make objections under Section 32 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act, so that if objections are upheld it can enter into a worthwhile management agreement?
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, it is for the NCC to assess its own priorities, to estimate the grant-in-aid that it requires on an annual basis and to obtain it from its sponsoring Ministry, to wit the Department of the Environment. What I have said is that my right honourable friend is aware of the situation, is aware that the Integrated Development Programme will put new burdens upon it, and will take such into account when he fixes his grant in aid. Beyond that, I do not think I can go.
My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady White, using the full authority of her chairmanship of your Lordships' Committee, said that it had heard evidence about this matter and that (if I may paraphrase her remarks) the IDP had been weighed in the balance and had been found wanting. What she did not say was that I had offered to the noble Earl, Lord Cranbrook—perhaps I could finish my sentence before I give way to the noble Baroness—to give evidence on the other side, and the noble Baroness might agree that it might be better to suspend judicial decision-making in this case until both sides have been heard.
Baroness White: My Lords, I thought I made it entirely clear in my opening remarks that I was not in a position to speak on behalf of the Committee, for the reason that they had not yet reported.
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, I am obliged to the noble Baroness for correcting me in so far as I needed such correction.
My Lords, I have, I think, answered the point about the SSSIs and national nature reserves. I want, if I can, finally, to answer the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, about his 1,000 hectares of wet machair, for that really is the nub of the whole argument—and I see him nodding in agreement. This 1,000 hectares is the maximum uptake for the whole machair scheme. Much of what the noble Lord referred to as wet machair is in fact the cultivated machair which has been allowed to decline in recent years—I may say, years in which the corncrake has also declined.
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I am coming now to the noble Lord, Lord John-Mackie, who unfortunately is not in his place, because he cannot receive my strictures for shooting my fox. I, too, read the West Highland Free Press, although I think that, politically speaking, it is much nearer his side of the House than mine. Nevertheless, I agree with what the environmental correspondent of that much-read journal has said, and I agree that he has taken a broad view of the situation. What is important is that some knowledgeable people believe that the bird population in that part of the world has declined in recent years partly because of the decline in the standard of crofting agriculture. Much of the now-neglected crofting land is of as little interest to conservationists as it is of use to the crofting economy. A variety of different habitats in a small area tends to enrich the wildlife, and crofting can maintain such a mosaic environment. I go so far as to say that the IDP may therefore extend, rather than reduce, the range of wildlife habitats.
But other environmentalists—and some of them with local knowledge—have been making precisely the point that I have made and which was made rather more elegantly by the environmental correspondent of then West Highland Free Press; namely, that there is no reason to suppose that the land improvement measures that we are proposing will destroy the unique natural environment of the Western Isles. We need a balanced approach to the large number of economic and social problems in this remote area. We must help the crofters to build on what is already there, and that must include land and livestock improvements. But with the safeguards that I have mentioned and the procedures that we have laid down, I hope the House will agree that the balance of priorities is just about right. It is in that sense that I commend the regulations to the House.
6.5 p.m.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I should like to thank everybody who has taken part in what I think is generally agreed to have been an extremely valuable debate, and I think that one or two of the things that the Minister has just said will have themselves made the debate worthwhile. Some were positive and some were possibly negative, but, nevertheless, he did go further than the Government have gone before, particularly in giving an assurance that crofters and people refused grant under the IDP as a result of conservation objections would be eligible for management agreements in the same way as people refused normal capital grant aid. I think that will be widely welcomed, not only by conservationists but I have no doubt to an even greater extent by the crofters who are likely to be affected; and if that is the only thing to have come out of this debate in your Lordships' House, it will have made it worthwhile.
I make just two or three quick points. First, to my noble friend Lord Ross, he need not feel a criminal. The sort of re-seeding which he described on the side of a hill is something to which no conservationist would have any objection. It may be that one or two of the grouse-shooters will object to moorland being reclaimed in that way, but certainly not, I think, conservationists. Indeed, one of the thrusts of the conservation argument in this is that there are huge

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areas which are quite capable of being improved for agriculture in the Western Isles and elsewhere in Scotland where there is no conflict with conservation.
It is, as the noble Earl himself said, on the 1,000 hectares of wet machair that we get to the nub of the point; and just as he said he was going to get to the nub of the point and tell me about this, he went off on to something completely different—the dry machair, the area which is under some arable cropping, where there are oats and crops of that sort grown. I quite agree with him it is possible that if that is extended on the dry machair it will improve the wildlife interests of the area, and that is why I quite deliberately left out any reference to the dry machair areas in opening the debate. It is quite possible, as long as this is done in small areas with a fair degree of variety, as he says, on the dry machair, things will actually be improved, and certainly not necessarily made any worse. But when we get to the 1,000 hectares of wet machair we come up against the problem, and it was at that point that the noble Earl scooted off sideways; and that, I am afraid, is one of the things which still worries me.
The noble Earl gave a very forthright and welcome assurance that damage was most unlikely. If he had stopped there I would have had nothing but praise for the Government's (as I would have seen it) change of heart. But unfortunately he then went on to say that he did not believe it was right to pay people not to farm their crofts rather than to encourage them to farm. Of course, that could he taken as a coded way of saying that the Government do not believe in the management agreements which they have just agreed to extend to people refused grant aid under the IDP; so with the same breath as he said something very welcome I am afraid he really took it away again. Because it will he necessary under management agreements to pay crofters, not to refrain from farming crofts, but to continue to farm them as they are now, rather than encouraging them to develop them in the way that the IDP will encourage. So I am afraid that the conflict that has been evident in the debate between different speakers is still there.
I also find it very difficult to deal with the shifting sands of the arguments against the conservation case, and we have heard them during the debate today. On the one hand, this scheme is going to do nothing new and what is the conservationist concerned about? On the other hand, it is vital for the economic development of the islands, it will make dramatic changes and therefore we should not oppose it. The analogy which two noble Lords used of the blanket afforestation of the Highlands with alien conifers I would have thought was hardly likely to endear the scheme either to conservationists or, indeed, to crofters themselves. It seemed to me to be an extraordinary analogy to draw. It really did seem to me that that was not a very sensible argument to be put by those who support the scheme.
Finally, may I make this point to the noble Earl? I entirely agree with him that it is for the Nature Conservancy Council to make a case to the Secretary of State for the Environment about the resources it needs. It did that last year and is currently doing it for the next financial year. Last year, it went into a great deal of effort, time and trouble to make a case for the
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resources that it needed, or thought that it would need, in the light of the Wildlife and Countryside Act. It put in a bid, and the Government gave the NCC half the extra money that it asked for; as a result, the NCC seems to have run out of funds for certain major aspects of its work this year and is delaying procedures under the Wildlife and Countryside Act not by 12 months but by a full 18 months. If the noble Earl will support whatever bid the NCC put to DoE this year and will make sure that they get all that they ask for, including any sums that they need under the IDP, then, again, the debate will have been worthwhile. But I have to tell him that I think it very unlikely that that will happen, and halfway through next year we will be in exactly the same position with the NCC running out of money. Then there will be some serious conflicts in the Western Isles as a result of the Government failing to provide the funds that are needed.
I should like to say that I was delighted that nobody opposed the IDP. I stand by my view that it should go ahead, although I think it is disastrous that the Government have not grasped this nettle of integrating conservation into the programme. The noble Earl seemed to say that the answer to that was that it was called the wrong thing; but an integrated rural development programme is what everybody interested in agriculture and the countryside has been asking for for years—and not least the noble Lord, Lord Sandford, as he said. He deserves a great deal of credit for the effort that he has put into this. It is a pity, when he finally gets an integrated programme, that the Government turn round and say that it is misnamed. What it ought to be is properly integrated.
I think that the debate has been worthwhile and, as I say, not least for the assurance that the noble Earl has been able to give about management agreements. I hope that it will also serve the purpose (as my noble friend Lord Ross has said) that although actual projects under the IDP have not yet started, the fact that so many noble Lords are as keenly interested as they are in what is going to happen will. I hope, be borne in mind by the project team, by local NCC staff and others. I very much hope that some of the gloomy predictions that a number of us have felt moved to make will not he borne out.
The fact is that we will be able to count the birds and flowers on the Western Isles in a year, two years or three years and will know what effect the scheme has. It will he judged by its results; and the possibility of future integration programmes for the Western Highlands of Scotland or elsewhere will also be judged, I believe, by the results of this scheme—and that places a heavy duty on the project team. Having said that, may I reiterate my thanks to noble Lords for what I believe has been a constructive debate. I beg leave to withdraw my Motion.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Transport Bill
6.12 p.m.
Read a third time, with the amendments.
Clause 14 [Exclusion of security of tenure in case of premises used for vehicle testing business]:
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of the Environment (Lord Bellwin)The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of the Environment (Lord Bellwin) moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 16, line 38, at end insert—
("(3) In this section "tenancy" has the same meaning as in the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954, and the reference in subsection (1) above to a tenancy granted by the Secretary of State shall be construed accordingly.").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, you will recall I have already made it clear that I think it most unlikely we will ever need the provisions of this clause, given the Government's intention to transfer testing to an independent non-profit-making body—LRVTA. But I am sure noble Lords will agree that it is right to provide a proper framework for control of the new testing system; and Clause 14 is part of that framework. It disapplies the security-of-tenure provisions of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954 which would otherwise apply to premises used for a vehicle-testing business, as defined in this Bill. It thus ensures that the Secretary of State would be able to regain possession of testing stations quickly and without fuss if an approved testing authority were to be in breach of the provisions of its lease; or, at the end of the lease, if the Secretary of State then wished to appoint a new authority to carry out the work.
That is the aim of the clause. We have found, however, that the clause as drafted may not wholly achieve that aim. It would disapply the provisions of the 1954 Act in relation to a tenancy granted by the Secretary of State, but not in relation to a sub-tenancy where the Secretary of State is a lessee himself and has granted a sub-tenancy to an approved testing authority. This is a matter of some practical importance, because there are number of test stations where the Secretary of State is the lessee and could only grant a sub-tenancy. To ensure these stations are covered by Clause 14 an amendment is needed. We propose to do this by including in Clause 14 the same definition of a tenancy as is contained in the Landlord and Tenant Act. This makes it clear that "tenancy" also means "sub-tenancy". I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 29 [Further provisions with respect to fixed penalty allences and notices.]:
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 30, line 41, after ("Act") insert ("and may so provide for any offence in Schedule 2 to this Act to become a fixed penalty offence in England and Wales").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, at the Report stage, I proposed an amendment, supported by my noble friend Lord Mishcon, which aimed at giving motorists in England and Wales precisely the same fixed penalty options as would apply in Scotland. That particular amendment proposed that chief officers of police in England and Wales should be enabled to issue fixed penalty notices for the offences mentioned in Schedule 2 which, of course, are confined to Scotland. The arguments which the noble Earl, Lord Avon, used against that was that this would turn chief officers into procurators-fiscal, that there would be no merit in splitting off from the mainstream of fixed penalty offences, some of which must not be dealt with at the roadside; and the noble Earl also explained the reasons for the selection of the particular offences listed for Scotland in Schedule 2.
I think it will be agreed that my noble friend Lord Mishcon somewhat demolished that part of the argument about the selection of the offences in Schedule 2; and all the points that he made are clearly set out in cols. 936 and 937 of the Official Report of 14th October last. Those which he quoted were examples of offences which could be just as competently dealt with by a constable at the roadside in England and Wales as by a constable in Scotland.
Clause 29(2) provides that the Secretary of State may by order make changes in the list of fixed penalty offences. The amendment provides that, in pursuance of that subsection, the Secretary of State may provide for any of the offences mentioned in Schedule 2 to become a fixed penalty offence in England and Wales. It will he noted that the argument I am putting forward does not instruct the Secretary of State; the matter is left solely for him to determine. Neither does the amendment specify any particular offences mentioned in Schedule 2 which should be transferred to Schedule 1.
There seems to be no reason why the Government should not accept this modest amendment. Its purposes would be to enable appropriate offences to be added to those which a constable in England and Wales may consider at the roadside in the same way as could a constable in Scotland. That would assist in saving court time, which has been stressed by many noble Lords in the House. If the Minister should say that the meaning of subsection (2) is that the Secretary of State would have this power, then I would say, "Why not add this amendment so as to make it quite clear that Parliament is willing that the Secretary of State shall have this power to move any offence that he thinks fit from Schedule 2 to Schedule 1, so that this would be applicable in England and Wales?". I beg to move.
6.19 p.m.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, has put both sides of the coin to such an extent that there is little that I have to say. I should say first of all that this amendment adds nothing to the powers contained in Clause 29. Subsection (2) would already allow the Secretary of State to make an order to provide for most of the offences in Schedule 2 to become fixed penalty offences in England and Wales. I say "most", because he could not, of course, make offences under the Roads (Scotland) Act 1970 apply in England and Wales. Therefore, I have to say that the amendment is defective in this second issue.
But may I say why we have not included these penalties which the noble Lord wants. I know that the noble Lord believes that the fixed penalty option should be available to motorists in England and Wales in respect of Schedule 2; but I think we need to look at why they were not originally recommended for inclusion in Schedule 1. This schedule was drawn up after considerable thought, looking at the individual merits of each offence. The noble Lord has said himself that some of the offences are of a nature where a decision should not be made by a police constable at the roadside because of the varying circumstances in which they can occur. In addition, there are some which are so infrequently prosecuted that there would be no impact at all on the burden of the courts, the

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reduction of which is one of the main objectives of these provisions. There are others which would not be appropriate; for instance, if failure to produce a document is involved.
Dealing with such an offence by fixed penalty could mean that the document remains unproduced, which clearly is not desirable. Nevertheless, there are a few, including those which the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, pointed out during our debate last week, which may at first sight seem suitable for fixed penalty treatment. But, as I have said, there is nothing in this Bill which rules them out of the fixed penalty system in England and Wales if a future Secretary of State, having gained experience of the present system, considered it appropriate to make an order to include one of them.
As I have said, there has been considerable thought into the drawing up of Schedule 1 and I very much hope, after what I have said, that the noble Lord will let it ride as it is at the moment.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, it would be most appropriate in a Transport Bill to let anything ride that wants to. But, I must say this: although the noble Earl has been as clear, lucid and eloquent as he always is—and certainly as courteous as he always is—I do not follow his argument and I do not think your Lordships will, either.
Two schedules have been drawn up. One schedule is applicable to the United Kingdom apart from Scotland and Northern Ireland, because Northern Ireland has to have a separate order of its own. The second schedule applies to Scotland. The noble Lord, on the last occasion, made it perfectly clear that the reason for the difference between Schedule 1 and Schedule 2 was that the procurator fiscal sits there in all his glory in Scotland and, with all the facilities that he has available and all the skill that undoubtedly he has at his command, he sifts out those serious offences from the not so serious which are contained in Schedule 2 and decides in his wisdom whether or not to issue a penalty notice.
I expected, as no doubt your Lordships did, that when looking at Schedule 2, I would find very good reason why England and Wales, and eventually Northern Ireland, will not have the benefit of these offences being available readily under this Bill, without waiting for any further order, as offences which can be dealt with by the penalty notice. If there is not a case for that, then of course the tidy way of dealing with this matter is to see to it that these offences, which can easily and most usefully be dealt with by a police officer on the spot, are in Schedule 1 available immediately for this experiment which is to be carried out. The noble Lord referred to it as an experiment, but I thought quite honestly that it was part of permanent legislation and was intended to be such.
At the risk of wearying your Lordships at a late hour—as six o'clock undoubtedly is for a Third Reading of a Bill—may I repeat some of the offences that I have dealt with. My noble friend and I could have moved everyone of these for translation from Schedule 2 into Schedule 1. We thought if we did your Lordships would he so angry with us that it was far better to deal with it as a general proposition. We hoped optimistically that the noble Earl the Minister
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would say, "Right, I will translate, and thank you for giving us the power to do that right away without troubling anybody with an order". However, unfortunately, the Government are not so amenable this evening.
Perhaps I may quote a few of these cases. The first one is the unlawful carrying of passengers on a bicycle. Who better than a police constable, there by the roadside, to see whether first of all there is an unlawful carrying of passengers on a bicycle; and, secondly, whether it is a serious unlawful carrying of passengers on a bicycle? Secondly, failure by pedestrians to comply with directions of a constable regulating vehicular traffic. He is there on the spot, he sees the pedestrians, he has waved his arms to stop them and they have not stopped. Who better than the police constable to decide there and then whether it is proper to issue a penalty notice?
Thirdly, holding or getting on to a moving vehicle to be carried. Who better than the police officer on the spot to decide whether somebody is holding on to a vehicle when he should not do so, whether it is serious and whether a penalty notice should be issued? Precisely the same remarks would apply to holding on to a moving vehicle to be towed.
My pièce de réesistance—my crowning point—is the last offence, which is causing or permitting a dog to be on a designated road without a lead. If that really needs the vigilant eye of the procurator fiscal in order to read the folder which deals with this very serious matter—well, it has been decided that in regard to Scotland, he has to do it, but nevertheless he can issue the penalty notice. My Lords, is it seriously argued that this offence should not be translated right away without the necessity and the delay of' an order into Schedule 1?
My noble friends and I have not put down every one of these offences where there could have been a debate on each. What we have done is to say: "Do not worry about an order. Enough time and expense is taken on Government administration as it is. Let us do something simple and in this Act give the power to the Minister not without an order to find a new offence to be put into Schedule 1 which is not in Schedule 2; but if Scotland has it in Schedule 2 and a penalty notice can be issued, let the Minister, if it is in Schedule 1 translate it to Schedule 1 in an appropriate case"—I have tried to give six examples—"without having to go to the bother of an order". That is what the amendment means, that is what it says, and that is the amendment, if I may respectfully say so, that the Government should in reason, logic and common sense accept.
Lord Tanlaw: My Lords, we too would like to support the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon. I believe that the Government have changed their argument. I was quite convinced when the noble Earl put forward the case about the procurator fiscal during Report stage; and I am slightly confused now as to what is the reason for the noble Earl's answer of not accepting the basic argument by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon. I have possibly misunderstood and stand to be corrected, but it seems to me that there has been a slight change of view. Perhaps the noble Earl will correct me.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I think that I should have said at the Report stage what I said earlier on at this stage. This is a basic point. This amendment adds nothing to the powers contained in Clause 29(2). This would already allow the Secretary of State to make an order to provide for most of the offences in Schedule 2 to become fixed penalty offences in England and Wales. So this amendment adds nothing to Clause 29(2), and that is really the long and the short of it. There is already the power of the Secretary of State to do what the noble Lord wants. If the noble Lord has not these specific offences down in his amendment, then all we do at the moment is get rid of the order-making power.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, before the noble Earl sits down, may I say with great respect that he has not clearly informed the House what the position is under this amendment. I know that he wants to be fair. This amendment enables the Secretary of State to make this transfer from Schedule 2 to Schedule 1 without an order. Therefore he can do it simply, without the expense of it and without the trouble of it, when it is in Schedule 2 and he wants to move it over to Schedule 1. I would have thought, with respect, he could have accepted that position.
The Lord Advocate (Lord Mackay of Clashfern): My Lords, would the noble Lord be kind enough to say what the meaning of the word "so" is in his amendment? The amendment reads:
"and may so provide …".
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, if the noble and learned Lord the Lord Advocate wishes me to delete the word "so" and then will accept the amendment, I readily agree to do it.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, I think my noble friend has supplemented quite effectively the points I made when I moved this amendment. It is not the sort of issue upon which we would want to divide the House. There is commonsense in the amendment and if the inclusion of one or two words makes it unacceptable, as we are discussing a clause put in by the Government therefore it becomes a Lords amendment, I believe there is still time and opportunity for the Government to take a look at this when the Lords' amendments go to the other place. I would hope they will take a careful look at what has been said by my noble friend and see whether they cannot put in this commonsense addition when the amendment goes to the other place. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 32 [Punishment without prosecution in cases within section 31]:
Lord Mackay of Clashfern Lord Mackay of Clashfern moved Amendment No. 3:
Page 34, line 46, after ("summons") insert ("or, in Scotland, complaint").
The noble and learned Lord said: My Lords, perhaps your Lordships will allow me to move this Amendment No. 3 and speak at the same time to
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Amendment No. 14. These are two simple drafting amendments in the same terms. Their purpose is to include the Scottish terminology in these provisions. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 51 [Guidance on application of Part III]:
6.33 p.m.
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 4:
Page 60, line 28, at end insert ("with the objective so far as possible of working towards uniformity").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this amendment concerns the absence of uniformity in operating the fixed penalty system. This question of uniformity in operating the system in the various police forces has been discussed in some detail both at Committee and Report stages in your Lordships' House. The noble Earl, Lord Avon, might be very pleased to know that what he describes as "sending up the football results" will not be given again this evening; but I would remind your Lordships that all the facts and figures which I gave both at the Committee and Report stages were taken from the official Government statistics, showing the complete inconsistency and disparities in the treatment of fixed penalty notices in the different police forces.
At the Report stage the Government moved some way towards meeting the criticism which was brought forward at the Committee stage, but that is not satisfactory because the clause provides that guidance should be given to chief officers in respect of the operation of Part III of the Act. There is need—and this is what the amendment seeks to do—to specify quite clearly what is the objective of the guidance; and that is what is proposed in this amendment. At the Committee stage the amendment was criticised because it contained the phrase:
"on the same basis and in respect of the same fixed penalty offences".
At the Report stage we amended it so that it read:
"with the objective of ensuring uniform police practice".
That was still considered as tying down the position far too much, but the noble Earl, Lord Avon, said, in column 940 on 14th October 1982:
"The guidance to chief officers will be directed to drawing their attention to the need as far as possible to work towards uniformity".
That is not in the Government's new clause. The amendment meets this deficiency and seeks to add at the end of the clause:
"with the objective so far as possible of working towards uniformity".
We gave very careful consideration to the wording to be added, and we thought we could do no better than use the actual words used by the Minister in your Lordships' House. Therefore, the addition of these words would leave no doubt whatever as to the purpose of the guidance, and as they are the words that the Minister used I shall be most surprised if the Government do not accept them on this occasion. I beg to move.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, if I may add just a few words to what my noble friend had said, the plea for uniformity was not merely for uniformity for

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uniformity's sake. It was to produce what the noble Lord the Minister, in his very kindly correspondence with me, said was an important matter from the Government's point of view. We were told that many motorists had failed to pay their penalties under the penalty notices which at present exist because they had not understood the complexity of the language used in the form. Therefore, the point was advanced in support of the Government's case, even though we felt that was a very merciful view to take of motorists' failure to pay their penalties. Nevertheless, we wanted to advance the case for uniformity with the Government, for the very reason they gave—in order that the simplicity of language so far as possible should be uniformly used. Therefore, I would add this further point to those put by my noble friend in the hope that the Government can accept this amendment now.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, we have had a good many discussions on this issue since the Bill began its stages in this House. I found the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, very persuasive and I have long sought in my own way to persuade the noble Lord that our intentions in essence matched his own. I am glad to be able to say that his latest proposal will cause us no difficulty, and the Government are content to accept this amendment.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 53 [Immobilisation of vehicles illegally parked]:
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 5:
Page 63, line 4, after ("approved") insert ("in regulations made").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, first may I thank the noble Earl and the Government for accepting the previous amendment. I hope we may have similar accord on other amendments which will come later. In moving this amendment, with the leave of the House, I should like to speak to Amendment No. 12. This amendment deals with the clause making provision for immobilisation devices which, in common parlance, I will call wheel clamps. On Report, a similar amendment was tabled and on that occasion the noble Earl explained the Government's intentions. In column 966 on 14th October, he said:
"The approval order would be a formal document issued on the authority of the Secretary of State. It would not he subject to parliamentary proceedings".
In withdrawing the amendment on that occasion, I said I would consider what the noble Earl had said, with a view possibly to returning to the matter on Third Reading. I recognise that there are differences in your Lordships' House on the whole question of wheel clamps. There are those who want to have them. There are those—my noble friend is one—who say, "We do not want them". Others, like myself, were, I think, in the majority and the Government have gone a long way towards accepting our view that we were prepared to experiment and try out wheel clamps and the Government have made suitable amendments at the Report stage. Therefore, it is important that we should carry the maximum number of people in the change proposed for the exercise of these immobilisation devices.
The definition given in subsection (9) does not explain what would be the real nature of any device. It could be many things and I could think of items which I would not support if they were to be introduced as wheel clamps. All we seek in this amendment is that Parliament shall be given the opportunity, if it so desired, of considering the devices that may be approved by the Secretary of State. On this occasion the amendment does not ask for the affirmative procedure. I would point out that the consequential Amendment No. 12 would provide for the order to be by statutory instrument, and that may be annulled under the negative procedure. This seems to be a simple opportunity for the Government to accede. If Parliament so wishes, let it discuss a regulation setting out the nature of the device approved by the Secretary of State, so that the matter may have parliamentary scrutiny. I beg to move.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, said, this is a small tidying-up point to Clause 53. The amendments would require the ministerial approval of immobilisation devices to be expressed in regulations, subject to parliamentary approval, as the noble Lord said. The procedure for approval as the Bill stands, without these amendments, is that before any type of device can be used, it must be assessed and approved by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State. That approval will be given in an order printed by Her Majesty's Stationery Office and made available to the public. The procedure is the same as the one used for breath testing equipment for many years.
In considering immobilisation devices for approval, the most important considerations will be to see that the device is safe from the point of view of the motorist and passers by, and that it will not damage the vehicle. I do not believe that it is necessary to require regulations approved by Parliament to ensure that. Nor is it necessary to have regulations in order to inform the public that a particular device has been approved.
I think it most unlikely that the police would have considered the use of unsafe equipment, or risked damaging vehicles with unsuitable equipment. As a double safeguard, we have agreed that there should be a ministerial check on the equipment to be used. To introduce a further parliamentary check would, we believe, serve no useful purpose and create a possibility of delay and frustration, if a new device became available which was a self-evident improvement on earlier models, but could not be brought into use until time had been found to draft regulations and submit them to Parliament. These devices are likely to be very simple in design, and it would. I believe, be unnecessarily cumbersome to tie their approval to this procedure. That is the way I would like to see it. I think that the noble Lord will disagree with me, but that is our point.
Lord Tanlaw: My Lords, before the noble Earl sits down. I agree from these Benches that these devices are the modern equivalent of the stocks and we feel that they must be used by the law. I would ask the noble Earl whether these regulations will make it possible for British manufacturers to be able to submit designs and manufactures of these devices, which I

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understand are of an imported nature with foreign patents. So I hope that if these devices are to become part of our lives, they will, at least, be the British modern equivalent of the stocks, rather than a foreign modern equivalent of the stocks.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I understand that the police are looking at a number of different devices, some manufactured in the United Kingdom and others manufactured abroad. No final decisions have been taken, but I am sure that the police will bear in mind that, on several occasions, this House has looked towards the British equivalent.
Lord Swinfen: My Lords, I wonder whether my noble friend can tell us if the owner of a vehicle which is damaged by one of these devices will be able to obtain compensation from the police.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I think that we went through these issues in an earlier debate. As this is now Third Reading, I think that we should stay on the narrow issue.
On Question, amendment negatived.
Clause 54 [Exemptions front section 53]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 6 and 7:
Page 63, line 33, at end insert ("or (as the case may be) since the end of any unexpired time in respect of another vehicle available on the relevant parking meter at the time of parking."
Page 64, line 37, leave out ("reference in subsection (2)(c)") and insert ("references in subsiction (2)")
The noble Earl said: My Lords, perhaps I may speak to Amendments Nos. 6 and 7 and move them together at the end. The need for these amendments arises from a possibility raised by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, on report. The noble Lord asked whether
"an immediate clamping device could be put on a vehicle "—[Official Report, 14/10/82; col. 971.]
when a motorist finds that there is spare time, paid for by some other person, on the meter when he parks. I was able to reassure the noble Lord that there is no question of immediate clamping in such cases, as the vehicle would not be illegally parked and would not be within the scope of Clause 53(1).
However, the noble Lord's intervention has caused us to think further about the precise point at which such a motorist's exemption from clamping runs out. His case cannot be said to fall within Clause 54(2)(b). If there was no obligation to pay an initial charge at the time of parking, and if he did not himself pay an initial charge the two hours cannot be measured from a nonexistent starting point. The words which this amendment adds to Clause 54(2)(d) will make it clear that in such cases the two hour exemption runs from the expiry of the charge previously paid in respect of another vehicle, which was available on the parking meter when the second motorist arrived. If he decides he is likely to need rather more time than is available on the meter, he is, of course, entitled to put money in, and the two hour exemption will then run from the expiry of the extra time he has purchased. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, for raising the query
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which has led to this clarifying amendment. My Lords, I beg to move.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, may I convey my gratitude to the noble Earl the Minister for the very kind things he has said. Every time I read the Act—when this Bill has become an Act—on the statute book, I shall remember when I come to this section the very small contribution that I was able to make in your Lordships' House.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 61 [Speed limits.]:
Lord Lucas of Chilworth Lord Lucas of Chilworth moved Amendment No. 8:
Page 73, line 39, at end insert—
("() After 1st November 1982, wherever a trunk or principal road is provided with such a system of lighting as is mentioned in subsection (1) above the details shall he recorded in a central registry under the control of the Secretary of State.")
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this amendment follows on Amendment No. 34BB at a previous stage of the Bill. May I remind your Lordships that that amendment concerned Clause 54, as it was then, dealing with speed limits on a number of roads which may be altered by virtue of lighting engineering works and lighting installations. Despite a number of amendments to clarify the position, my noble friend has always maintained that any amendment allowing for the clarification of future problems—that is, problems that may occur up to and including this month—would leave the way open for very similar problems to those that have occurred in the past to accrue in the next 20 or so years. It is the intention of this amendment, therefore, to ensure that the Government's wish to draw a line as at the enactment of this Bill on all past regulations, and those speed limits which obtain currently, whether they are 30, 40, 50, 60 or indeed 70 m.p.h. on certain categories of roads which may be lit or unlit now, shall not be prejudiced by its enactment.
In order that there should he a clear definition of when the change occurs, I have suggested that a register be kept, either locally or centrally, which will establish when lighting alterations occur that may affect the speed limits on roads upon which such lighting installations take place in the future. Then there can be no argument as to what was the intention of the law, in the unhappy event of a prosecution. This would, therefore, simplify the matter, enabling everybody concerned to understand the position that they might then find themselves in. My Lords, I beg to move.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I fully appreciate the concern expressed by my noble friend that Clause 61 will mean that any trunk or classified road, other than a motorway, will become restricted automatically when street lighting is installed. However, this will not, in practice, be the position in every case and, indeed, the number of roads where this might occur is likely to be quite small. First, so far as trunk roads are concerned, these are the responsibility of the Secretary of State and I can repeat the assurance that I have already given to your Lordships that he will comply with his own criteria for setting speed limits to ensure that appropriate limits are in operation when lighting is

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installed. Other roads are the responsibility of individual local highway authorities, but not all these will attract automatically the 30 m.p.h. limit when street lighting is installed. An unlit road which has a local speed limit imposed by order—say 40 or 50 mph—will not attract the 30 m.p.h. limit automatically if street lighting is installed, because the speed limit imposed by the order will prevail.
This, then, leaves only the unlit roads which are subject to the national limit only—60 m.p.h. on single carriageways and 70 m.p.h. on dual carriageways, If these had lighting installed—and the new lighting programme is such that their numbers are not large—they would become subject to the 30 m.p.h. limit, unless the highway authority took action to raise that limit.
I cannot of course give the same absolute assurance in respect of local authority roads as I could for trunk roads, that the necessary adjustments to speed limits will always be made on those roads when lighting is installed. However, we shall be issuing advice to local authorities about the effects of Clause 61. This will include a recommendation that wherever new lighting is to be installed on a road, the consequences in relation to the appropriatness of the speed limit which will apply after lighting should always be carefully examined and the limit adjusted as necessary in the light of that review. In cases where a national limit-60 or 70 m.p.h.—would be replaced by the 30 m.p.h. limit, the presumption should be that the former limit would be retained unless there were some positive reason why a lower limit should be imposed. In other cases, where an intermediate limit imposed by order would prevent the 30 m.p.h. limit being imposed automatically, authorities will still be advised to consider whether that limit would remain appropriate after lighting.
As to the practicalities of my noble friend's amendment, I think its wider implications rather than its potential effect make us hesitate. The setting up and keeping of a register of street lighting installations for the purpose of establishing the restricted or nonrestricted status of trunk and principal roads would involve the use of additional resources by both central and local government. At first, such a register might be a fairly simple thing to keep, but in time it would inevitably grow in complexity, because of the need to record the de-trunking or de-principalling of roads when that occurs, and retrospectively the dates of lighting installations on roads which are later categorised as trunk or principal roads. The justification for setting up such a register as is suggested here would need to be very strong—stronger, in fact, than we can appreciate at the moment, particularly in face of the probable demand it would make on public expenditure.
I acknowledge that the success of what the Government are trying to achieve through this clause depends to some extent on the performance of local authorities. We are relying on them, when street lighting attracts, or would attract, restricted road status, to take the necessary steps to ensure that appropriate speed limits are in force after lighting. We do so at present of course in relation to unclassified roads and we are now extending this to non-trunk classified roads. The
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number of roads affected currently is not large and the task should be well within the capability of all authorities. We have no reason to suppose that they will not, in conjunction with lighting operations, take such steps as are necessary to adjust the speed limits on those roads. Nevertheless, we intend to keep a careful eye on the way in which the restricted roads provision, as amended by Clause 61, works in practice. If it is seen not to be satisfactory, we shall certainly look again at the problem and consider what further measures might be taken, including, if necessary, further legislative amendment. We shall of course keep in mind my noble friend's idea of a register. I hope what I have said and the assurance I have given will persuade my noble friend not to press his amendment.
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, I have to thank my noble friend for that explanation, and I am quite happy to tell your Lordships that I have no intention of pressing the amendment to a Division. I am also happy to accept the Government's assurance with regard to those matters which lie totally in their hands—in other words, the trunk roads. I have some hesitation, however, about placing reliance upon my noble friend's hope that other local highway authorities will follow the same practice. I hope, therefore, that the advice which will be given is written in such terms as to prevent highway authorities from falling into the ever-present trap of succumbing to the demand of local pressure groups to reduce speed limits. It has been proved by the department that they are not effective so far as road safety is concerned.
I say without any malice to my noble friend that the Government might have thought about this matter when Clause 44, as it was then, of the Bill was first drafted. Although a great number of roads may not be involved, there is a loophole which I think should have been plugged at an earlier stage. I take note of what my noble friend says with regard to keeping an eye on the matter. Even though events may not prove the need for further legislation, the gap which exists in the Bill will I hope be demonstrated to be sufficient for further powers to be taken in future legislation, so closing the gap. With those remarks, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 62 [Approval of radar speed measuring devices]:
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 9:
Page 74, line 1, leave out from beginning to ("evidence") in line 5 and insert ("There shall be inserted after section 78A of the 1967 Act the following section—
Approval 78B. On the prosecution of a person for any speeding of radar speed measuring devices. offence
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this is the first of three amendments which relate to the Government's new Clause 62 dealing with the approval of radar speed measuring devices. Noble Lords will recall that the Government's new amendment was introduced at the Report stage in preference to a much more detailed amendment submitted by my noble friend Lord Mishcon and I.
Amendment No. 9 is confined to an important technical point which affects a principle. The Govern-

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ment's clause sets out words to he inserted in Section 78A of the 1967 Act. However, our reading of the situation is that that section, with subsequent amendments, excludes special roads—that is, motorways. In our view, this Government provision in Clause 62 should apply to all roads and to all speeding offences where this type of equipment is used as evidence. The amendment deals with this point by providing that instead of the Government's provision, which later on we hope to amend, being inserted in Section 78A, there should be a separate subsection after Section 78A. This means that the exclusion of special roads such as motorways would not apply. In other words, this provision would then apply to all roads and to all speeding offences where radar equipment is used. I think that our facts are correct. If not, the noble Lord the Minister will no doubt tell me. I beg to move.
Lord Elton: My Lords, I am happy to confirm that the noble Lord is right in his analysis. We wish the equipment, although there is not too much of it in use at present on motorways, to be embraced in the provisions of the Act, as it will be. The noble Lord was very observant and quite right to put the Government right, and I shall be happy to accept this amendment.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, may I say how grateful we are to the noble Lord.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
6.58 p.m.
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 10:
Page 74, line 9, at end insert ("in regulations conforming to a performance standard specified in those regulations").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, we are doing exceptionally well tonight. I am hoping we may succeed a third time by the amendment which I am now going to move. Amendment No. 10 deals with the main point of the Government amendment which was introduced at the Report stage. The Government, as I frankly acknowledged and for which both I and other noble Lords expressed gratitude, moved considerably between their attitude at the Committee stage and the Report stage. The very detailed amendment which my noble friend and I submitted at Report was criticised on various counts. One was that every time a design changed and a new procedure was approved new regulations would be required. That criticism is completely avoided by Amendment No. 10 which is now before the House.
The Government amendment, Clause 62, is inadequate. I must ask the noble Lord what is meant by "a type approved by the Secretary of State". At col. 992 of the Report stage the noble Lord, Lord Elton, said:
"What we propose is that the branch"—
that is, the Scientific and Research Development Branch of the Home Office,
"will examine all the radar devices currently in use and advise the Secretary of State as to the appropriateness of approving the equipment; the need to issue guidance on operating procedures and training will also be considered".
Therefore, one could have the situation that this could lead to approval of all the radar measuring devices at
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present in use, despite the widespread criticism there is of some equipment; criticism made not only by motoring organisations but made also by the decisions of various courts and by noble Lords in all parts of your Lordships' House.
I am not going to quote what the noble Lord said in the last debate, at Report stage, but most speakers in that debate (and remember, we were not taking party lines on these road safety measures) wanted a more detailed definition of what precisely is to be approved. The general tenor seemed to be in line with the spirit of my detailed amendment (which many thought was too detailed), which was that there must be a standard to which equipment should conform. The present amendment before your Lordships avoids the criticism made of the amendment at Report stage—that it spelt out too much detail. It simply asks for additional words to be added so that the important phrase will read,
"of a type approved by the Secretary of State in regulations conforming to a performance standard specified in those regulations."
The amendment would do two things. First, whatever is approved by the Secretary of State must be set out in regulations so that, if desired, there could be parliamentary consideration. Secondly, that there must be laid down a performance standard to which this type of equipment must conform. On this occasion the amendment is not attempting to lay down whether the standards should be prepared by Home Office scientists, the TRRL or the British Standards Institution. That is a matter left solely for consideration and decision by the Secretary of State. What it does say quite clearly is that there must be a performance standard. The wording of the amendment is such that there will be no necessity to have new regulations from time to time, because the regulations will lay down a standard. That is the important thing—it will not name any particular equipment. It will lay down a standard to which different equipment which it is desired to use must conform.
Should it be argued that it is difficult to produce a standard—and I do not wish to thrust any particular standard on the House—I my hand a document laying down proposed police traffic radar performance standards for the state of Florida. The introduction to this document states that these specifications and performance standards are based on a modified version of the proposed National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's performance standards for speed-measuring radar, which was published in the United States' Federal Register in January 1981. I gather that it was prepared by a body which is equivalent to our own BSI. We all know that the BSI has produced documents (and I mentioned this in our last debate) on the various types of standards and how they can be prepared. Therefore all the information is available if one wants it. There should be no doubt whatever in preparing a standard.
I would like to make one or two points absolutely clear, because this was stressed by noble Lords at Report stage. I believe the whole House is united in wanting to help the police. As I said at Report stage, the police must have the best possible equipment. The amendment is directed to three heads: (1) helping the

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police to have the best equipment; (2) ensuring that there is equitable and fair treatment of motorists; (3) a very important point, avoiding strain between police and motorists because of widespread doubts as to the effectiveness and accuracy of the equipment now in use.
I have no wish to question—and would challenge anyone who endeavoured to do so—the integrity of the Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Elton. But as he said on Report, he has to work on advice given to him. Similarly, I have to work on advice given to me. The advice on which I am working has been given by persons very experienced in this field and by the engineers of the motoring organisations. On that evidence, one would not accept all the statements made in your Lordships' House justifying the present equipment. It was said that the prospect of achieving a design breakthrough banning interference altogether is remote. Yet I have here documents of which I have read the appropriate parts, (I am not going to claim I have read them all and would be challenged if I dared to say so) again from the United States of America; from the National Bureau of Standards, the Law Enforcement Standards Laboratory, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and the Federal Communications Commission—which I am told is equivalent to our own Home Office in these matters. These documents make it quite clear that as far back as 1977 there was available equipment which was not susceptible to radio interference. I must just accept the evidence given to me.
Often, because of their absence of technical knowledge, many motorists are not in a position to challenge evidence about equipment when they are caught for speeding offences. Where technical knowledge has been available to the defence, in a large number of cases the prosecutions have been dismissed or withdrawn. It was mentioned in our debate at Report stage that there is not a large list, but there is a substantial list where prosecutions have been dismissed or have been withdrawn. For instance, I know that a substantial number of cases in Avon, Somerset and Nottinghamshire were withdrawn on those grounds. I am sure everyone will agree that this is most unsatisfactory. We want to have thorough reliance on any equipment, and we want to have the best equipment for the police to use.
At Report stage I referred to the awareness of certain documents of which I requested confirmation. One was said to be a memo from the Association of Chief Police Officers which stated that the Home Office quite clearly wanted to bring pressure on the police to adopt a British standard. I hope that is correct because the amendment I am moving proposes this; that there should be a performance standard. I hope that your Lordships will appreciate that this amendment is put forward not as carping criticism and not from any campaigning outlook. We want the police to have the best equipment. We want it to be effective equipment—and it must be equipment upon which everyone in the country can place some reliance. Therefore, we want the simple words added at the end of the Government's own clause:
"in regulations conforming to a performance standard specified in those regulations."
This is such an important matter, involving only a few important words, that I hope the Government will make it a hat trick and accept this amendment. I beg to move.
7.8 p.m.
Lord Elton: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, has led us with great elegance on to fairly well-trodden ground on which both his footprints and mine are already clearly marked. I fear therefore that I may have to repeat a little of what I said before. The amendment falls into two halves. First, there is the reference to a performance standard; secondly, there is the link with regulations. As I understand it, although "performance standard" is a term of the art understood by engineers, it has no legal meaning as such. It is, presumably, derived from the references to the British Standards Institution which were included in the noble Lord's previous amendment. Having persuaded him to drop that reference, I fear that I may seem to he ungrateful if I point out that without the reference to a performance standard, the amendment makes no sense. It would mean that a standard would have to be defined, and its items listed. Then, if we were to follow the noble Lord's wishes, we would have to turn this list into regulations, and I have two fundamental doubts about this.
First, if and when the scientists decided that the performance standards needed to be changed and, say, certain minimum standards raised, we would have to allow time to make regulations before passing on to the public the benefits of that conclusion. That seems to me to be an unnecessary use of parliamentary time.
Secondly, we do have a perfectly good system already which was introduced with the advent of the breath testing equipment which we use. Because of public interest in the equipment and the innovation in the law which it represented when it was introduced, it was felt necessary to have the Home Secretary approve it. The equipment and the change in law was extremely controversial at the time. Yet Parliament did not think it necessary then to have the approval done by regulations. The system has worked perfectly well ever since. Our scientists evaluate the equipment put to them by manufacturers and advise the Secretary of State on its suitability. I think I should say that the work of our scientists in this field is of a very high order and held in great esteem abroad as well as in this country. It is upon their evaluation and advice that the Secretary of State bases his approval, or, as the case may be, his refusal to approve, items of equipment, and if he does decide on their advice that approval should be given he signs an order known as an approval order; this is printed by Her Majesty's Stationery Office and available on sale to the public. The latest one put out costs 20p.
In any case where a driver wishes to be sure that the equipment he was tested on was approved by the Secretary of State or where he suspects that it was not, he can require the prosecution to give evidence to that effect, which it will do by producing the approval order for that equipment. This system has worked perfectly well since 1968. It is flexible, but it gives the required degree of oversight. No helpful innovation is slowed down by it.

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As to the innovations in Florida, I regret that my knowledge of what has been proposed there is not up to that of the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, but if it is of service to him I will be happy to see that it is put before the scientists who will be doing these evaluations. Their advice, I think, is as valid as any given to the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, and indeed it is British. I would strongly urge that what is rightly regarded as an appropriate procedure for the extremely complex breath testing equipment, which I think has gone through six marks since it was developed, should also be accepted as appropriate for this equipment. I must ask your Lordships to resist this amendment.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, the House will have listened, as it always does, with the greatest of care to what the noble Lord the Minister has said. In addition to being, I hope, courteous, I wish I could follow with an expression of confidence in what he has said. First of all, to make a comparison with the breath testing equipment is really not to provide a correct analogy at all. One knows perfectly well that that breath testing equipment, first of all, is a colour changing equipment and therafter is a measurement of content of alcohol if an analysis is taken. That does not need the same absolute precision that corroborative evidence in regard to speeding offences requires.
If your Lordships would look at the very words of the present Bill to which my noble friend referred you would find that all that is provided for here is that the instrument in question shall be "of a type" which is specified. So when the noble Lord says this is going to satisfy everybody because if objection is taken on behalf of any defendant all the prosecution has to do is to produce an order of the Home Secretary—I think it is the Secretary of State for Transport not the Secretary of State for Home Affairs—
Lord Elton: My Lords, if the noble Lord is asking who would authorise, I understand it would be the Home Secretary.
Lord Mishcon: I am much obliged; I was right the first time. It could only be evidence brought before the court that it was of a type. It would not be the evidence which I think this House requires, which is that it shall be of a standard which has been approved by the Secretary of State. This is merely of a type which has been approved.
The noble Lord the Minister said by way of objection to the present amendment that there is no language known to the law which can define the words used in this amendment with precision. If that be an argument of the Government, may I say that there is no precise definition known to the law of the word "type". Indeed, I cannot think of a more general, vague term to cast before any court at all.
So this amendment seeks to do something which must be sensible. The noble Lord the Minister, in language which was so well chosen, spoke about walking down a road which has been well trodden. May I invite him to walk a little further down that road, which is all that is required of him in order to meet the valid point that this amendment makes. It is this: do not just have it as a "type" but as a "standard" which is set down in regulations. That standard, one
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imagines, will be there for a very long time before it requires to be altered by any subsequent regulation. That was the only other objection the Minister had to this amendment.
It is a question of principle which is involved. It is a question of whether this House in doing its duty really tries to solve the problem that has been thrown up in the courts and with motoring associations and with the police, too. Are we going to try and solve it properly by laying down a standard, or are we going to play with it by merely talking about approval of a type of instrument by the Secretary of State. I invite the House, as does my noble friend, to grasp the nettle and see that this problem is solved now that we have another Transport Bill before us. The number of Transport Bills we have had is such that one rather imagines that a Government in drawing up future legislative programmes are going to require a lot of persuasion before we have a chance of legislating on this important matter again.
Lord Tanlaw: My Lords, I think the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, in moving this amendment has given so much trouble and research to it that I am quite persuaded that the term "performance standard" is a reassurance to a motorist who will be convicted by this equipment. I give just one example. Will this equipment show the same speed in all weather conditions? Electronics are particularly susceptible to weather conditions. A performance standard of the kind mentioned in the amendment would be a reassurance to a motorist that the device used is going to register the same numbers regardless of the time of year or the weather.
I do not go along with the Minister in comparing this with the very stringent laboratory tests that have no doubt been taken with the breathalyser. This is a different type of equipment; it is used out of doors, having to work in much more difficult conditions electronically, and having to provide a much more difficult answer than would chemical analysis. I do not think that argument can hold up a lot of reassurance for motorists who are going to be penalised under this Bill. I am very happy with what the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, said, and I believe the terms of this amendment are constructive and reassuring to motorists who are perhaps going to be penalised under this clause.
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, perhaps I might say to my noble friend that I am a little unhappy about the word "type". In the Navy, for example, radio transmitters are called types. We used to talk about the type 691; they probably have more modern ones now. The type 691 was approved as a type for introduction into the naval service. I had a small hand in that happening. But it did not mean to say that every type 691 radio transmitter was effective all the time; they broke down and had to be repaired. Therefore, the use of the word "type", as I believe the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, indicated, is not wholly satisfactory in meeting the requirement that the particular equipment in use at the time should be effective and, as proposed in the amendment, up to the standard required.

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As we are talking about a clause which was a Government amendment and which is, therefore, able to be amended further in another place, as I understand the rules, I hope that the Government might give thought, even if they do not like this amendment, to proceeding further with a slightly better wording than exists at the moment.
7.20 p.m.
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, I should like to make a few comments. During previous stages of the Bill I have expressed doubts about this method of testing speed. With the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, I share certain misgivings. However, I do not feel that those misgivings will disappear by accepting the amendment. I would be very reluctant to have the detailed regulations put before Parliament to be discussed by parliamentarians who, with the greatest respect to all of them, might have scant knowledge of the technical matters put before them.
I rest very solidly on the work done by Home Office laboratories. I have mentioned this fact before in your Lordships' House, in particular with regard to those instruments developed for breath and for other analysis. I know exactly what I mean by a performance standard. I think it is more an engineering term than a legal term. My noble friend should accept that it is better that Home Office scientists should prescribe what the instrument shall do and then work towards it rather than—I shall he a little frivolous, if I may—scan the Exchange & Mart for a few odd instruments of a like type and say: "We shall check these to see if they meet the criteria". That would be the wrong way to go about it. If my noble friend says that "performance standard" has no lawful form, I think he will at least understand what all of us mean by "lawful form".
There is one other matter that worries me and that is the "type". It also worries the noble Lord, Lord Underhill. If the objections voiced by the noble Lords, Lord Underhill and Lord Mishcon and, indeed, my noble friend Lord Mottistone, have value—I think they have—the easiest course for the Government is to remove some of the words from line 8 on page 74 when the Bill goes to another place. The words at present read:
"unless the device is of a type approved by the Secretary of State".
If we remove the words,
"of a type",
we rest with,
"unless the device is approved by the Secretary of State".
That is quite simple and narrows everything down. We end up with instruments that are approved, not just some loose fringe area of them.
I believe that developments in fields of this nature are so fast that Parliament could not keep up with the changes that would be required if we had regulations. My noble friend the Minister has gone a long way towards meeting the major criticisms. The general debate that has followed should appraise police forces of Parliament's doubts and fears. If they cannot take a hint from that, I doubt very much whether we could ever write anything in any Bill which would achieve that object. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, will not press the matter further on this occasion.
Lord Harmar-Nicholls: My Lords, if the noble Lord does press the amendment, I shall vote with the Government, but I hope that the Government will heed the arguments that have been put forward. I am not at all impressed with the matter being left to the Home office experts without guidance on a scale that might be envisaged in the words of the amendment. I shall explain why I am not entirely happy. The example I am about to give is not completely analogous but it is enough to disturb one's confidence. I remember a situation where application was made to erect a building that had to house inflammable materials. In one area it was left in the hands of the local people without the sort of guidance that ought to have been coming from the top. The answer was given that the building should have a concrete roof of a certain thickness, that the doors and shelving must be made of steel. That advice seemed very logical and sound. The plans were prepared and the building erected according to that general guidance.
A short time later a similar building had to be erected in an area not more than nine or 10 miles away. When the plans were submitted showing a concrete roof, steel doors and shelves the applicants were told, "No, the building must have a very flimsy roof with shelves made of wood and the doors of ordinary asbestos". It was considered less dangerous to allow any possible explosion to disperse rather than seek to contain it in a rigid fashion.
I do not know which was right, but I do know that it is difficult to follow exactly where one stands. The same thing could apply to motorists. They are disturbed at this modern way of one man being able to use a piece of electronic equipment. If the words that the noble Lords, Lord Underhill and Lord Mishcon have in mind are intended to give a clearer guidance on what is wanted and are likely to give a little more satisfaction to people who will be victims, I should have thought it would be worth having another look at the wording, and if not accept the amendment, at least go some way towards meeting the spirit behind the amendment.
Lord Wilson of Langside: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, expressed reservations about the amendment on the ground that he had, in turn, reservations about the possibility of matters coming before your Lordships' House and the other place on which parliamentarians would not have a full understanding. The noble Lord shakes his head. Perhaps I misunderstood him and, if so, it is my fault. I was merely about to say that if that were the consequence of this amendment being accepted it would not be the first time that such a situation had arisen: where we had to reach a judgment with such advice—technical and otherwise—as might come to us. As has already been said, although it is not necessary to repeat it, there is no comparison between the situation under this clause and that of drunken driving or driving with an excessive amount of alcohol in one's blood and the use of the breathalyser. For my part, having listened to the debate, I would certainly hope that the Government would accept this amendment.
7.30 p.m.
Lord Elton: My Lords, it is not usual for a Minister to speak twice on Third Reading, but I have had many challenges thrown down, many questions asked and the Opposition Front Bench have contrived to have two speeches already, so your Lordships may think it fair to allow me to speak again.
I start with the question of the breath-testing machine to get that out of the way. First, it is of course already referred to in the Transport Act. The breath-testing equipment to which I refer is not the simple device to which I think the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, refers, but the very sophisticated evidential machinery which is highly accurate, scientifically complex and satisfactorily supervised by our scientists, who, I think, stand second to none in the world.
To return to the more central matter of type approval, I fear that I may not have explained sufficiently to my noble friends and others what is implicit in this. I believe that it achieves what my noble friends what to achieve, because each individual instrument will be issued with a certificate of conformity to the type and the type—that is, the platonic ideal, which, if you like, all these have to match—will be that approved to perform in the way which is regarded as satisfactory—in other words, to the standards which we regard as satisfactory. So the effect of the word "type" and the effect of the word "standard" in this context are identical.
That said, it still may be—
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, before my noble friend turns to another matter, perhaps I can ask him one question. He said that each piece of equipment will have a certificate. Who will issue the certificate? Will it be given by my noble friend's scientists? Will they look at all the equipment? Or will it be given by the makers and so be taken for granted that it will go on working properly?
Lord Elton: My Lords, the individual pieces of equipment will be tested by the scientists and they will then have a certificate of conformity to the type which is regarded as satisfactory by the Home Secretary because that piece of equipment performs to a standard which your Lordships would accept. That standard is that it will tell with a degree of accuracy and with a lack of deviation which would be satisfactory for a court.
The noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw, who has spent many years in a moister clime, is afraid that on a really wet day the equipment might not work. My scientists—if I may so call them without any degree of anything, except pride—are aware that it rains very heavily sometimes and that policemen go out in the rain to check the speed of vehicles. In addition to that, every instrument already has its calibration checked every day before it is used and any time that it may be put in doubt. I would expect that to be one of the things that would be required under the method that I propose.
I turn now to the question of the parliamentary process. With the greatest respect to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wilson of Langside, even if we go along with him in all that he said about the expertise of parliamentarians and its effect, the fact
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remains that if it was suddenly discovered that regulations were required not to approve but to withdraw approval from a device, that also would have to go through the parliamentary process and there would be a very awkward time when a mistake could not be rectified and the machinery in use would be in question. That is what we all want to avoid. We also want to avoid diversity of standards. We want to be certain that everything is sufficient to testify or not to the judgment of a constable as to the speed of a vehicle.
I can assure my noble friend Lord Harmar-Nicholls that whatever the vagaries of the case he mentioned—and I shall be interested to hear of them afterwards because of my own interest in fire services as well, but I do not want to broaden the debate—we shall not have a situation when one gets into Northamptonshire on the MI and be able to say "Let us put our foot down because they are using variety X of speed-testing equipment and that has a 25 per cent. accuracy deviation". I believe that what I propose is workable and practical. I am sorry if the terminology that I have used has confused your Lordships. I believe that we have the right solution and I hope that your Lordships will give it a whirl and not accept this amendment.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, other noble Lords and I have stated that the Minister has gone a long way from his original stance on this matter, and that is very much appreciated. I am grateful to other noble Lords who have supported the spirit of the amendment. On the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, I have seen regulations on constuction and use as regards motor-cars which, believe me, are very complicated. Yet these are available for the procedure of annulment. Therefore, I have no doubt that if Members of this House and of the other place can cope with that, they could cope with a regulation of this kind.
The Minister has elaborated some additional words. I am certain that it will be very helpful if those additional words were looked at and added to the Government's own clause. I shall not say what the words should be; I think that one has to think about this. Frankly, this is not the sort of issue on which I would wish to divide the House. I should like to think that the Government would recognise that they still have one other opportunity, because the Government's clause is an amendment to the Bill when it left the other place. Therefore, the Lords amendments have to be considered in the other place and it is possible, from my understanding of procedure, that it can be amended in the other place.
Not one noble Lord has said that the Government's words are absolutely satisfactory. It may be that there is a defect in the amendment which I have proposed, but I would like to think that the Government would say, "We agree that it is not the sort of thing upon which we ought to vote because many people outside have not listened to a single word that we have said". It is a non-party issue. Heaven knows which way they would vote because there are no Whips on. Therefore, I would much prefer the Government to say that many views have been expressed by people who want something different.

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At the end of his remarks the noble Lord, Lord Elton, said that a piece of equipment would be approved. This is something that noble Lords and I want to avoid. We want a performance standard to be laid down so that any piece of equipment should conform to it. The equipment is then set against that standard. That seems to me to be the sensible thing to do. On Report a number of noble Lords emphasised this far better than I am. This is what our amendment would try to achieve.
I am prepared to accept that the words in my amendment may not have proper meaning, but other noble Lords have said that the Government need to have some elaboration. It would be very helpful to the House if the Minister—and I am not asking him to make a commitment—could take this last opportunity before the Lords' amendments go to the Commons to look at what has been said by various noble Lords today. I believe that that would be very helpful. I hope that that will be the attitude taken because, despite my unwillingness to test the House, a principle is involved here in that we want to have a proper understanding between the motorist who is booked for a speeding offence and the police. At the moment, there is considerable dissatisfaction with the equipment being used. It may be that the equipment is all right. But there is a feeling among the public that this equipment is not properly evaluated.
That is the principle here and I hope the Government will feel that they can accept my suggestion. I make it quite clear. We ask that they do it without any commitment; that they have an open mind, with no commitment to make a change. Let them look at it to see whether it is possible to make a change. Before I beg leave to withdraw the amendment, I should like the Government to make that statement.
Lord Elton: My Lords, the noble Lord places me in the procedural difficulty of matching three Opposition Front Bench speeches. I would merely say that everything your Lordships have said on both sides of the House will be studied, as always with the greatest of care in the department and by my right honourable friend.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, on that basis I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
7.40 p.m.
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 11:
Page 74, line 9, at end insert—
("() The device shall be operated in accordance with an operating standard specified in regulations made by the Secretary of State.").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this is the third amendment dealing with Clause 62 and the radar speed equipment. This amendment does not rest upon what happened to the previous amendment, because there has been so much criticism about the need for the proper operation of equipment. At the Committee stage the Minister emphasised that in one of the court cases to which I referred the judge had stressed that the equipment has to he properly operated. I readily accept that we not only want a proper standard for the equipment but it has to be properly operated.
Therefore, this amendment asks that in dealing with prosecutions the device must be such that it is operated in accordance with an operating standard again specified in regulations made by the Secreary of State. This again would seem to be simple. Everybody agrees that there must be good operating standards. The Minister has said that careful attention is being given to this, and the simple thing to do would be to put this subsection in to supplement the Government's own clause. I beg to move.
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, may I come in at this juncture to speak to this amendment. It also gives me the opportunity to assure the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wilson of Langside, that I meant no discourtesy whatsoever to eminent scientists. What I was worried about was that if we go too far down the road of requiring so much to be brought before Parliament we might he in danger of getting a technical specification written into regulations which so few of us would he able to deal with in a parliamentary process. That is all I meant.
So far as this amendment is concerned, again because I have in previous stages expressed sympathy for the general tenor of what is included here, I have to say that in general terms I accept the principle behind Lord Underhill's amendment, but for exactly the same reasons as I suggested when we discussed his previous amendment I do not think this is wholly practicable. Certainly if we get as far as the Home Office approving a piece of equipment, it follows that the method of operation will also be included in such certification, and I suppose it would be up to a defendant to prove that the equipment was not operated in conformity with the manufacturer's standard.
I cannot see that setting out an operating procedure in a regulation is necessarily going to ensure that the regulation is carried out. I have greater faith than my noble friend Lord Harmar-Nicholls in the work done by the Home Office laboratories. Certainly in connection with the new screening device, prior to the use of an evidential breath-testing device in the instructions given to the police as to the operation of that instrument, how often it should be checked, tested, and so on, they even went so far as to say that unless the screening device is used regularly the equipment would have to be withdrawn from service because it would not fall within the bands acceptable. In certain areas of the country that device is not used because it does not conform to the standards. I think much the same could he said with regard to the operating instructions.
I feel that we ought now to accept what has been proposed as a fairly major step towards removing the doubts most of us have had at one time and to see what transpires over the next two or three years. I should not like to go further with this particular amendment at this stage.
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, I too do not really support this amendment. I would hope that my noble friend would be able to assure me that when the device is of a type approved by the Secretary of State that will automatically include operating instructions going with it, because one would imagine that they are

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always supplied. In any case, the key point in this amendment is that they shall be operated correctly. My concern is that the operator himself may not be properly trained in the use of the equipment, and I should like to have seen something about training of the police in this amendment if I were to support it. It has not got that, and therefore I do not support it. But I should like a bit of reassurance from my noble friend about the operating procedure automatically being of a type that is approved, and about proper arrangements to train the police to use them as part of the way in which he would hope to handle it.
Lord Elton: My Lords, if I repeat a small section of my earlier argument your Lordships will forgive me if I do so briefly. It is simply to draw your Lordships' attention to the fact that we again have the term "operating standard" standing free, as it were, of British Standards which makes the amendment in that sense weaker than the noble Lord would wish.
What in general terms we propose to do would be to consider the best operating practice while we are studying the equipment and recommend that best practice to the police in our guidance. This is very simple, and above all flexible. Consider if you will the position that would arise if the performance standard were defined in regulations as the noble Lord wishes, and our scientists discovered that a particular procedure in the standard was in fact producing misleading results. If the standard is defined in regulations it can only be changed by regulations. We could not instruct the police informally to change a particular procedure, because although this would be in the public interest any test carried out in this manner would be unlawful. This would mean that a person checked in the "reformed" manner, if I can call it that, could claim to a court that the check was not properly carried out, and the evidence would therefore fall. This is exactly the kind of legal morass which we have only just taken steps to pull ourselves out of in the context of drunken driving.
I do not think we want to get into it again with radar. To avoid this situation the police would have to stop using the equipment until the new regulation was made. I cannot see that this would be in the public interest. By contrast, using our own approval method, any change in recommended practice would be communicated to the police immediately by telex and followed by Home Office circular without any legal complications or delay ensuing.
Exactly where the instructions that might be issued with the equipment when it was first taken into service would fit into that I cannot exactly tell my noble friend Lord Mottistone, but I have the point about instructions with equipment firmly on board from the last stage, and I shall have it very much in mind when we are devising the way in which this is to be done. I appreciate that the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, is trying to serve the public by proposing regulations for operating procedures, but I fear that what in fact would result would have the opposite effect. Therefore, regretfully but firmly, I must ask your Lordships not to support this amendment.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, the Minister has given some cogent reasons why this particular amendment
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should not be accepted. I accept that he is as sincere as I am, or anybody else in this House is, in trying to get this provision right. On the basis of what he has said, I beg to leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 73 [Regulations and orders]:
[Amendment No. 12 not moved.]
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 13:
Page 79, line 30, after ("Act;") insert—
(" (aa) an order to which section 55(6) of this Act applies;").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this is the last amendment in my name on this Bill. Subsection (6) of Clause 55, to which this amendment refers, provides that an order continuing an experimental order for the use of the immobilisation devices—that is the wheel clamps—shall not be made unless a draft of the order has been approved by each House of Parliament.
The amendment seeks to provide that before making such an order, the Secretary of State shall consult with representative organisations as he may think fit. An amendment in somewhat similar form was tabled on Report and, after hearing the noble Earl, Lord Avon, on the matter, I said I would consider the issue again to see what might be done. I have done that and I still feel that this is a necessary inclusion. I wonder whether the noble Earl has also reflected on it and if he feels disposed to accept it.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, as I indicated to the noble Lord, the Government would in any case have expected to consult on the outcome of the experimental use of wheel clamps before presenting to Parliament any draft order continuing the experiment in force. We are happy to accept the amendment, which will make such consultation a statutory requirement.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Schedule 3 [Statutory statements]:
Lord Bellwin Lord Bellwin moved Amendment No. 14:
Page 91, line 44, after ("summons") insert ("or, in Scotland, complaint").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, my noble friend spoke to this. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
7.52 p.m.
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill do now pass. We have spent many hours discussing many amendments—over 250, I believe—to a Bill which covers a number of very different subjects in the transport field. I should like to take this opportunity to thank, first and foremost, my noble friend Lord Avon who has played such a large and effective part in taking the Bill through the House. I am deeply grateful to him. I thank also my noble and learned friend the Lord Advocate and my noble friend Lord Elton for the valuable parts they have played; it is a great comfort to have colleagues of such calibre.
I wish also to thank the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, for the major role he has again played in this, the third

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Transport Bill I have brought before this House. His persistence and persuasiveness is always tempered with courtesy. A challenge it may be, but it is never less than a pleasure to debate with him. Once more he has been ably and, if I may say so, as always, eloquently supported by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, a dynamic duo indeed. His advocacy is invariably formidable and impressive and he too is very hard to deny—but we did our best! May I also mention my noble friend Lord Lucas, who has again demonstrated his considerable expertise in the transport sector. The more I have him on my side, the better I feel. Needless to say, I am grateful to the many other noble Lords who have made valuable contributions.
It has been some little time since we considered Part I of the Bill which paves the way for the introduction of private capital into the National Bus Company's express and coach holiday businesses, and into certain property developments and improvements. It is part of the Government's continuing programme for involving the private sector in the activities of the nationalised industries.
National Express is already the market leader in the provision of scheduled inter-city coach services. It is a commercial business, which the Government believe could and should flourish in the private sector, drawing on market finance and not on the taxpayer for its investment capital. The same is true of the smaller coach tour business, National Holidays. As regards property, the NBC has particularly welcomed the opportunities which privatisation will give them to upgrade their passenger facilities and realise the full potential of their property assets.
I understand very well that the Opposition have a basic philosophical difficulty with the policy underlying Part I. Nonetheless, we have had some useful debates. I recall particularly the wise contribution from the noble Lord, Lord Byers; and, on a variety of practical matters, from my noble friend Lord Teviot. Your Lordships have shown that even where there are such fundamental differences in approach, it is possible in this House to have a sensible exchange of views.
I know from our very useful debates on Part II of the Bill that there is very little between the Government and noble Lords opposite. The overriding concern of us all has been to ensure that under any new private sector testing scheme, the testing of lorries and buses is carried out safely and impartially. The clauses which make up Part II of the Bill set out to ensure that a private sector testing scheme will operate with the consistency, smoothness and high standards which are so valued in the present testing system. These are the aims we have in mind and I know that they are shared by noble Lords on all sides of the House.
As your Lordships will recall, we have announced our intention of transferring the testing system to Lloyds Register Vehicle Testing Authority. LRVTA will be able to maintain the high safety standards and impartiality to which the industry and everyone in this House rightly attaches importance; they will also be well placed to develop the system and offer an improved service to the vehicle operators.
Noble Lords will appreciate that there is a mass of detail concerning the day to day running of the system
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that needs to be agreed with Lloyds Register before we can conclude a final agreement. Work is proceeding, however, and I hope to be able to come to the House with further news before long. I know that a number of noble Lords—I have in mind particularly the noble Lords, Lord Mishcon and Lord Underhill, and my noble friend Lord Lucas, felt that as the Government had decided the best course would be to transfer testing to a single non-profit-making organisation, then the Bill should be amended to rule out any other option.
The Government are confident that our negotiations with Lloyds Register will prove successful and that the resulting testing system will be an excellent one; but that is not to say the path we have chosen is the only possible route available. It would be short-sighted indeed to decide now on one particular solution and embody this in legislation which would leave no room in the future for flexibility, development natural growth and change. The House will be aware, however, that the Government are not asking for a carte blanche here; the appointment of the testing authority, whether it be LRVTA or any other body, is subject to the approval of Parliament.
There has also been some feeling that a ban on any connection between the body appointed to carry out testing and the motor trade should be written into the legislation. The proposal that LRVTA should take over testing, of course, meets the substance of this point. They will have no connection with the manufacture, sale or repair of commercial vehicles. Nevertheless, it is the Government's view that it would be wrong to rule out for ever and a day any possibility of the involvement of any body with commercial interests. The Bill has been specifically designed to provide a structure within which any commercial interests can be safely controlled. If it were decided that some commercial interest could safely be allowed—I stress again that Parliament itself will take that decision—there are powers in Clause 8 to impose conditions on the way in which the testing business was managed.
As I said earlier, there has never been much between us on this part of the Bill. I am only sorry that our customary generosity did not allow us to accept some amendments of noble Lords opposite, and, for that matter, of my noble friends. The Government believe the future of the testing of buses and lorries lies firmly in the private sector. The clauses in Part II of the Bill seek to achieve this by providing a basis for introducing new management and new approaches, which the Government believe will improve the system and benefit the industry. But they go further and also provide for proper controls on how the new powers may be used. And I repeat again, the final say rests with Parliament itself.
The proposals in Part III of the Bill to improve and extend the fixed penalty system for road traffic offences are not a party issue. Our objectives—to achieve an efficient system which will save police and court time and also be acceptable to the motorist—are, I am sure, shared on all sides of the House, although it would be fair to say that there has not always been agreement that what the Government are proposing is the best way of achieving them. However, the Government were able to respond positively to suggestions in

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another place and in your Lordships' House itself, and I hope that it will be felt that we have proceeded in a way that tried to meet the point of achieving the very best.
Finally, I turn to what in the event has proved to be the topic provoking perhaps most interest or discussion; that is, the introduction for an experimental period of immobilisation devices or wheel clamps. Here, too, we have had very constructive debate and helpful suggestions. As a result we have been able to improve the clause, I believe to the satisfaction of the whole House, for which I thank all who have contributed their views to our discussion, not least the noble Baroness, Lady Denington. It made a pleasant change to have her as a supporter on this point.
We have also introduced a number of new items into the Bill. I should mention my noble friend Lord Mottistone, at whose initiative we have included a provision on motorcycle visors, and the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, for the measure relating to builders' skips. I think that the Bill will bring worthwhile improvements on a number of important fronts across the transport sector. It is not a Bill that we seek to defend in terms of party dogma, but rather as a series of sound, practical measures, which I hope will be welcomed by everyone with a genuine interest in the subject of transport. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill do now pass.—(Lord Bellwin.)
8.2 p.m.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, first, I should like to echo the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, and say how much on this side of the House we have appreciated the able, effective and very courteous way in which the team of Ministers have handled the Bill in all its stages. As the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, has said, this is the third occasion on which he and I—I was going to say during the short period of office of the Government—have handled transport Bills. We understand that another one is threatened for next year, so presumably we shall go through this kind of procedure again.
I am very grateful to the noble Lord for the always courteous way in which he handled affairs, and I am grateful, too, to the team of Ministers who so ably assisted him. The noble Lord, Lord Elton, and the noble and learned Lord the Lord Advocate have emulated the courteous way in which the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, handled matters. So long as it does not hurt his position, I should also like to echo what has been said about the noble Earl, Lord Avon, who had to bear part of the brunt of the Bill when the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, was not here, and we are grateful to the noble Earl for that. I should also like to thank my own colleague Lord Mishcon for his splendid help and unstinting co-operation at all stages of the Bill.
The Government have acted somewhat like Jekyll and Hyde over the Bill. In Parts I and II they acted as hard politicians, not deviating one jot, but in regard to the other Parts they showed that they were prepared to listen and so have greatly improved the Bill. I shall like first to say a few words about the unhappy Part. As the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, has said, Part I of the Bill could provide for the eventual disposal of all the subsidiaries of the National Bus Company, because the powers are there. The Government have said that
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they intend to confine the use of the powers to National Express Coaches, National Holidays, and the property company; but the powers are there if it is wished to use them in the future.
It might be asked, why did we not put down any amendments at today's Third Reading? The reason is very simple. At Committee and Report stages we put forward amendments of every possible version to try to improve Part I of the Bill. We wanted to leave out National Express; we wanted to ensure that the National Bus Company would retain 50 per cent. minimum holding, or alternatively, a 26 per cent. holding, which would give it considerable control. We made efforts to try to secure that nothing would be done to impair the integration of services available to the travelling public. All those things we tried to do, but they were swept aside, as were amendments that endeavoured to limit the very sweeping powers of the Secretary of State in giving instructions to the National Bus Company. The National Bus Company is a very successful undertaking, so is National Express Coaches, and it is significant that when a company in public ownership is successful that is when the Government want to mutilate it and destroy it; and that has happened in this case.
Part II of the Bill deals with the transfer of the testing of heavy goods vehicles and passenger service vehicles to the private sector. Again, we put forward no amendments today because we had exhausted all possibilities. We tried in every way possible either to improve the Government's proposals, or to safeguard the future. Naturally, we hope that the transfer to Lloyd's will be efficient, but if it is not, there is nothing in the Bill to guarantee that there will be one, single organisation to take over the testing, which is what we wanted. I say "we" wanted, but I point out that on that occasion the Opposition were speaking not on behalf of, but with the full support of, the operators in the industry, who wanted to continue with the present system. I do not at this hour want to go through the whole history of the matter.
The Government say that they introduced this particular part of the Bill in order to achieve flexibility. But why was it necessary to have complicated machinery of eight clauses to deal with the testing of heavy goods vehicles and public service vehicles, with which all the operators are already thoroughly satisfied? The Government are destroying the system which the operators wish to continue.
So in Parts I and II of the Bill the Government are clearly carrying out their doctrinaire policy, and I point out that no one will find a word about it in the Tory election manifesto. They had no mandate at all from the electors for either or both of these measures. Now perhaps I may turn to happier times, because in regard to Parts III and IV of the Bill the Government showed that they were willing to listen, and considerable improvements were made. For that we are very grateful to the Ministers. I believe that with regard to Parts III and IV the Bill will go back to the other place a far better Bill than it was when it came to your Lordships House. Valuable contributions were made not only from the Opposition, but from all parts of the House. That, if as a relatively new Member I may say so, showed the House of Lords at its best, discussing

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matters of great importance, but prepared to give and take.
Where there were Divisions, it was interesting to see how the House divided. Sometimes it did not divide, it split in all directions. On one occasion we proved our openness on an issue, with my noble friend Lord Mishcon and I disagreeing from the Opposition Front Bench, putting forward two different viewpoints, showing that these were matters on which there was no party Whip at all, but matters which we wished the House to consider.
I am grateful—I shall not say for the concessions, because that would sound wrong. I am grateful that the Ministers have seen that a number of matters needed improving and have accepted comments that were made to them. I believe that Parts III and IV of the Bill have been greatly improved to everyone's benefit.
Before closing I should like to refer to three matters. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Advocate said that he would look at the possibility of giving guidance to the courts, so that a Scots motorist who did not have his licence when in England and Wales would not face a penalty larger than would be the case had a constable been able to issue a fixed penalty notice at the roadside. Another matter—and I understand from the noble Earl, Lord Avon, that this has already been set in motion—concerns consultation with the Metropolitan Police in particular with regard to the use of police records when dealing with persistent offenders and using wheel clamps, which I think is what everybody desires.
My last point is on fixed penalties. Here again I am asking for another concession from the Government. We have reached a hat trick today; it has been very comforting. In view of the strong representations made by noble Lords from all parts of the House concerning various aspects of fixed penalties procedure, I wonder whether the Minister can give an assurance that there will be undertaken or can promise to consider, a careful review of the operation of the procedure, say within a period of two or three years. If something could be extended in this regard, it would be very helpful. I believe that your Lordships have made many improvements, but it would be comforting to know that after a certain period the whole procedure would be reviewed. Having said that, I should like to add finally that I think we have had useful debates on the Bill. It is a pity that we were not given concessions in regard to Parts I and II to match the very happy atmosphere that there was in relation to Parts III and IV.
8.9 p.m.
Lord Tanlaw: My Lords, I want very briefly to endorse the words spoken by the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, which were certainly the same as mine. This has been my first Transport Bill as a Liberal transport spokesman, so I have been running in during this period, partly with the assistance of the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, with some of the joint amendments. From these Benches I should like to say that I very much welcome the attitude of noble Lords opposite and the way in which they listened to what we had to say, and indeed accepted some of our amendments. I had only one slight disappointment,
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but I think that perhaps there is a chance that the Government will improve on it in their next Transport Bill. I hope that the cyclist will be given a better run for his money. If there are to be miscellaneous provisions in a future Bill, as I hope there will be, I look forward—this is a new era—to seeing their intentions in this respect.
8.10 p.m.
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, on reaching this stage of the Bill may I thank all four of my noble friends who have piloted this Bill through your Lordships' House for their very great help, and where I have not previously expressed personal thanks for the discussions and conversations which have taken place I do so now. Unlike the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, I welcome very much Part I of this Bill and look forward to an expansion of the National Bus Company's operation. So far as Part II is concerned, I must confess to having some few reservations, and I shall look forward to seeing the complete plans of the Lloyd's authority in due course. I hope that the industry which the testing system serves—it is not in fact the other way round—will indeed be satisfied and share the Government's confidence.
Much of Parts III and IV of the Bill has been concerned with (if perhaps I may so describe them) the more mundane matters, which involve relationships between the officers of the law and the motorist. I still wonder whether in fact we are not piling too much responsibility on the police in an area which, to say the least, is most delicate. When one hears from all sides of the House the number of cases which go before magistrates' courts which arise from motoring offences, one becomes extremely worried, and to add further responsibilities seems to me to be something of a pity.
I am particularly sorry—and your Lordships will appreciate it—that Clause 42 has been removed from the Bill. During the short time Clause 42 was part of the Bill it received wide publicity and acceptance. I therefore hope that the Government will take note of the views of your Lordships' House and of the public, and will take the earliest opportunity to review the fixed penalty system as regards speeding offences. Because, if I may remind the House, there has been no argument that speeding falls into a number of groups. There are those speeding offences which are very serious, those which are serious and those which are certainly less serious; and yet no provision has been made.
How the Magistrates' Association can contend that the inclusion of the then Clause 42 would have added to their work is beyond me. Indeed, if one looks at the table of offences and at the number of offences for speeding one sees that there are, I think it is, 348,000 alone that might have been dealt with by a fixed penalty and which therefore might never have gone to court, so the magistrates would have been relieved of that burden. Having said that, the Secretary of State has powers under Clause 29 to review, and whether my noble friend Lord Avon describes the present time as being premature for the fining of the law, I suggest that he and his colleagues keep very much before them the opportunity of fining the law particularly in that respect.

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I thought there was to be no Transport Bill next year. I recall coming back in 1981 from a summer holiday to deal with the most contentious of subjects, such as road humps. This year it has been clamping devices. I thought that next year we were to have a sabbatical. I shall look forward to hearing from my noble friend just what is proposed for next year. I hope that we shall get it a little earlier in the Session, so that we do not have the enormous rush and the great burden that we have had this summer, and the unhappy business of having a Summer Recess and then having to pick up the threads of the very important parts of this Bill right at the end of the Session, which has not made the work of your Lordships' House or, indeed, of my noble friends any easier.
On Question, Bill passed, and returned to the Commons.

GATT Ministerial Meeting
8.15 p.m.
Lord Greenhill of Harrow Lord Greenhill of Harrow rose to ask Her Majesty's Government what are their objectives for the GATT Ministerial Meeting in November 1982. The noble Lord said: My Lords, when I put my Question down for debate I did not anticipate that it would come to this House at this rather unsocial hour, and I am sorry that your Lordships' day has been prolonged for this discussion. But these are matters of some moment, and I think that at the present time it is very useful to have a short discussion on the coming GATT Ministerial Meeting. It is 10 years since such a meeting took place, and it is, I think your Lordships will agree, long overdue.
I think one could be easily cynical about a meeting where 70 or more Ministers arrive with complex briefs, but I believe that this coming meeting is one in which Ministers may be able to achieve what officials have been unable to achieve. Although some interesting ministerial statements have been made on this subject, particularly by the Minister for Trade, Mr. Rees, we cannot ignore the inestimable advantage of having the responsible Minister in this House, and we know we can rely upon him for lucid exposition.
The present state of international trade must be a matter of the greatest concern to all of us, and what is profoundly disturbing is the spectacle of deeply bitter conflicts between countries we normally regard as our friends and to whom we customarily look for cooperation in the solution of current problems. I see by Reuter's "ticker" that there have been fighting words this afternoon in the other place about our quarrels with the United States, and these are very unhealthy symptoms. The GATT was designed to minimise these conflicts and to try to resolve them by the operation of mutually accepted rules. The present situation should not be permitted to continue, and we must look expectantly to the coming meeting.
It is obvious that discussions will be exceedingly difficult, and, of course, I shall not be asking the Minister to anticipate positions which he will reveal in the course of the conference. But I think the House would like to hear some general observations in response to a series of questions which I should like to
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put to him. The first is: What are the future prospects of the GATT? The whole system is by no means universally accepted. The developing countries are latecomers, and in many cases understandably show varying degrees of hostility towards it. But the founder members and the traditional supporters in the present difficult trading conditions also show scant respect for the rules. I assume that Her Majesty's Government will reaffirm the aims of GATT but will seek also to improve the existing organisation rather than explore alternatives to it.
The second question I want to put is: Is the Minister satisfied that in the forthcoming negotiations we shall be able to take advantage of the collective strength of the EEC? If I remember correctly, in our debates on the Tokyo Round two years ago we concluded that the United Kingdom in fact benefited from its membership of the EEC. Will this be true again? I understand that the EEC is to be represented not, as one might expect, by one delegation; but by Ministers from all member countries plus the relevant commissioners. This may well be inevitable, but it will be very unfortunate if the full potential of the EEC is not going to be collectively employed in the discussions. What has the Minister to say on the prospects of this?
Thirdly, there is a justifiable view that the GATT has been ineffective in the matter of agriculture. It has tended to rely upon outdated agreements and, moreover, the EEC are here very much on the defensive with a rather unconvincing case that somehow these agricultural matters are internal to the Community and not within the scope of GATT responsibility. Is there not a need to negotiate new understandings that treat agricultural trade more like trade in manufactures? Not for the first time, the agricultural industry has a privileged position to the detriment of good international relations.
Fourthly, the Department of Trade representatives who gave evidence to our sub-committee rightly reminded us that the GATT has a twin purpose. It is an instrument for the liberalisation of world trade in goods and in services and also a policing instrument. In both these functions, the present situation is far from satisfactory. While the majority of Governments loudly proclaim the virtues of an open trading system, they all quietly intervene to expand their regulatory roles. There is therefore an increasing grey area between the white of the open trade system and the black of full protectionism. I wonder whether this is necessarily wrong. I am inclined to think not. Must we not in the present situation accept selective protectionism on an increasing scale, acting both as a nation and as a Community? A resounding call at the ministerial meeting to roll back the wave of protectionism which is advocated by some is surely inappropriate. One of the tasks of the ministerial meeting should be to clarify the safeguard procedure and I should like to hear the Minister's view of the possibility of this.
Fifthly, may I make a special reference to the liberalisation of services? This is a matter of increasing importance to this country, bearing in mind that the private sector trade in services, including return on overseas investment, accounts for around one-third of the total United Kingdom foreign earnings; and our service trades encounter many obstacles overseas.
I would draw the Minister's attention to a report that he will be receiving, or may have received, on this subject from a sub-committee of the Committee on Invisible Exports. It merits careful study and I hope will become the basis of Her Majesty's Government's policy. In his speech to which I referred earlier, Mr. Rees referred to inching forward on these matters. Maybe that is a correct and realistic view of these difficult problems and the speed with which they can be tackled; but I hope that the Minister will have something more optimistic to say.
8.25 p.m.
Lord Banks: My Lords, I am sure that the House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, both for raising this Unstarred Question this evening and for the way in which he has done so. I think I am right in saying that the noble Lord, Lord Cockfield, has already set out some of the Government's aims in a speech last month, and we look forward to hearing him elaborating on that and perhaps filling in some of the details which may not have appeared in the British press.
As the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, pointed out, this ministerial meeting next month is crucially important. As he reminded us, some 80 trade Ministers will be meeting together for what is the first meeting of its kind since 1973; and they meet at a very critical time. I think that the world has to choose—and perhaps in this I take a slightly different line from that of the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill—broadly speaking, between the multilateral trading system and the system of managed trade through bilateral deals. As the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, said, the nations continue to proclaim their faith in the first while they keep moving towards the second. We on these Benches have no hesitation in stating once again our belief in the free multilateral trading system.
At a meeting last month of world business leaders and economists, Mr. Kenneth Durham, who is the chairman of Unilever, warned that there would be enormous unemployment unless countries abandoned their "beggar-my-neighbour" policy aimed at keeping out imports. During the 10 years prior to OPEC, 1963 to 1973, the volume of trade increased by 8½ per cent. per annum and the volume of trade in manufactures by 11 per cent. In the following eight years both figures were halved, and last year there was no increase at all.
In spite of the attention given to them in the Tokyo Round, non-tariff barriers have been taking over from tariffs as the principal obstacles to trade. There is a complex system of so-called voluntary restraints, orderly marketing arrangements, quantitative restrictions, surveillance of imports and administrative barriers to trade. As I said earlier, and as the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, said, the world has been moving away from the multilateral system to a system of managed trade.
Article 19 of the GATT provides for action against the imports of a particular commodity from all the sources, from all the countries supplying it, where there is a sudden surge of imports. Increasingly, however, this provision is not used; but countries make the selective arrangements to which the noble Lord referred with particular countries outside the
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GATT. The rate of imports affected by these selective arrangements outside the GATT in 1980 was 13 times the value of imports affected by the implementation of Article 19. I should like to join in asking the noble Lord, Lord Cockfield, what are to be the Government's proposals with regard to the future of Article 19? Would they amend it in any way? Can he give any indication at this stage of what their safeguard policy is?
My Lords, we all sympathise with the position of declining industries or distressed industries and understand their problems. The Multifibre Agreement is an attempt to deal with one such industry, but it cannot be denied that it is a serious source of friction with the developing world. Again, it operates outside the GATT and it has been described in the Economist magazine as a figleaf for protection. Are the Government in favour of that difficult subject being on the GATT agenda? It would seem that it should be.
Another distressed industry is steel. I believe that an agreement on that between the EEC and the United States is imminent. One would be glad to see the matter solved for the moment, an agreement reached and trade war limited. As the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, has said, it is highly unsatisfactory that there should be this degree of trade hostility between allies. On the other hand, I think that I would have very strong reservations about this particular type of solution, even if we are forced into it in the meantime, because it is another example of voluntary restraint outside GATT.
The noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, referred to agriculture, which is virtually outside the GATT, and he raised the question whether it should be brought more fully within it. Again, we find that the United States is at odds with the EEC over agricultural exports. The present United States Government, though proclaiming its faith in multilateral trade, is, as a recent report to the European Parliament has pointed out, less prepared to oppose protectionist trends in the United States than its predecessors.
The United States Government complains about the common agricultural policy. They object to the subsidisation of exports. Yet the United States Government of the day specifically accepted the common agricultural policy during the Tokyo Round discussions, with its import levies and its export refunds, and the common agricultural policy is accepted by the GATT. The Community is the biggest net importer of agricultural products in the world. However, the inconsistencies of United States policy are no reason why the EEC agricultural policy should not be exposed to GATT scrutiny, particularly its effect on third world countries—and agriculture is of enormous importance to the third world. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Cockfield, will tell us that the British Government favour the inclusion of agriculture on the agenda. I believe that there is a proposal from Australia for a cease-fire on all protectionist measures. I wonder whether the noble Lord is in a position to say exactly what is meant by that and whether he can give some indication of the Government's reaction to it.
The world recession has greatly strengthened protectionist trends. As someone said: "Recession has proved the mother of protectionist invention". The deflationary policies adopted voluntarily by some

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nations and at the behest of the International Monetary Fund by others have deepened the recession and increased protectionist pressure. The recent Brandt Report dealing with North-South relations was staunchly in favour of multilateral free trade, but it also advocated the maintenance of a high level of world demand. It seems to us on these Benches that it is in the context of what we might well call this global Keynesianism that protection is most likely to be defeated.
8.33 p.m.
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, I should start by telling your Lordships that I am advised on what I have to say by the Food and Drink Industries Council; and, furthermore, I declare an interest in that I work for two of the trade associations that form part of that council, the Cocoa, Chocolate and Confectionary Alliance and the Cake and Biscuit Alliance. My main remarks will be concerned with the problems of the food and drink manufacturing industries which of course have a very special interest in these discussions and in their results.
First of all, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, very much for introducing this subject. It offers to us an opportunity to give it an airing and more especially to hear my noble friend the Secretary of State tell us his views on it. I agreed broadly with what the noble Lords, Lord Greenhill and Lord Banks, had to say about agriculture in general.
Regarding food and agricultural trade matters, I understand that the GATT secretariat have identified three principal areas of concern: market access, competition and the impact of national farm support measures. I should like very briefly to mention those points within those three headings that I think your Lordships may find interesting and on which in certain cases I hope my noble friend the Secretary of State can give us some guidance.
First, market access. There is a need to focus attention on the worst obstacles. An example of such an obstacle is that import restrictions remain in force in the United States as a result of the United States waiver on agriculture which allows the United States Government to ignore GATT rules whenever domestic policy dictates.
Another area is quantitative restrictions, and technical barriers in other major markets such as Japan and many of the more advanced developing countries are still a major problem for our exporters. Market access is also affected by measures such as voluntary restraint agreements—export limitation: for example, manioc from Thailand—variable levies permitted under Article XXIV (which allows the establishment of free trade areas) and state trading, none of which is regulated by GATT. We would welcome the proposed annual review of state trading where greater transparency would obviously be an advantage. Voluntary restraint agreements, on the other hand, are best left as bilateral instruments and not brought under GATT, since their eventual replacement by other measures could lead to greater protectionism. Variable levies form part of the common agricultural policy and are allowed by GATT in principle. I shall have more to say about that in a minute. But for certain products these variable
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levies give rise to a degree of overprotection, thus adding to processors' costs. This is specially the case for products not available within the EEC in sufficient quantity or quality. I also hope that greater efforts are made to reduce substantially the tariff barriers for all types of product.
I turn now to competition. This is the section that concerns the food and drinks industries most. Work should start on clarifying existing rules and on throwing light on the agreement struck between the United States and the EEC in the Tokyo Round on export subsidies. The major preoccupation of exporters is that export refunds on processed products could be placed in jeopardy. Exporters of processed food and drink products do not regard the refund as a subsidy. The function it performs is not to confer an advantage but to cancel out a disadvantage, namely, the high levels of EEC raw material prices arising from CAP support regimes. There is no doubt that without the refund EEC processed food and drink exporters would not be able to compete in world markets and would cease to function.
I should add that this is particularly important not only for this country but for the other countries in the Community, because food and drink processing is the third highest industry in this country and I believe the fifth highest industry in terms of investment in the EEC as a whole. So it is a major industry for us and it is extremely important that it is not hampered as a result of a misconception about what the refunds are for.
In March 1955 GATT passed resolutions on the disposal of surpluses and the liquidation of stocks which have become deadletters. GATT has now proposed to revive them and to set up consultation and notification procedures. This could act as a further discipline to restrict the EEC's use of large export refunds to dispose of surpluses of agricultural commodities resulting from overproduction at high cost. I emphasise that we make a distinction between refunds on surplus basic products and refunds on processed goods containing those basic products as ingredients.
It is important, as I hope your Lordships will agree, that this distinction should be made. Export credit sales, aid and long-term supply contracts are measures giving competitive advantage to certain countries. One of the hidden ways in which the United States, for example, can compete unfairly vis-à-vis the EEC is through sales to developing countries which include favourable credit and other aids. Credit and aid tied to specific commercial transactions should be subject to international discussion and discipline.
I now turn to the national agricultural policies. GATT is likely to agree proposals that there should be a new framework for co-operation among the main agricultural producers on domestic farm price and income support policies. If that were to happen, the trade effects on domestic policies would be examined and a formal notification procedure covering such policies would be introduced, making them available for scrutiny and challenge.
A further possibility is that the major food trading nations, principally the EEC and the United States of America, would reach tacit agreement on world market prices and exports of the main commodities.

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This could result for some products in an increase in the level of world prices and a reduction of the level of EEC prices, thus narrowing the gap between the two. This latter possibility is not one that our industries would support as a long-term policy. It would be potentially disadvantageous to third world countries. It could reduce the apparent cost of surplus production without reducing its real cost. What the food processing industry wants is freer markets and less Government intervention in the markets, not more.
Finally, the ministerial meeting should set in train a work programme devoted to greater international cooperation on farm support policies, on export policy, including especially the unregulated areas, and on the removal of waivers and other non-tariff barriers which are no longer strictly justified. I would hope that my noble friend the Secretary of State can give me an assurance that the three points I am about to mention would be ones that he would be able to support in the discussions. These are the key factors that we pick out as being of special concern to the food and drink processing industries.
First, no concession must be yielded by the EEC in respect of import refunds on processed products. Without them our industries could not compete on world markets. Secondly, greater access to third world country markets in the United States, Japan and other countries would be secured by the removal of non-tariff barriers to those markets, coupled with a substantial reduction in tariff harriers in countries like Japan. Thirdly, advantage should be taken of every opportunity to reduce the level of import protection on products not available in adequate quantity or quality within the European Community.
8.44 p.m.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, the House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, for putting down this Unstarred Question. It will afford the noble Lord opposite an opportunity, which I am sure he will welcome, of defining with his customary precision the objectives that the Government have in mind when this conference takes place. The noble Lord himself, I think, would be the first to lay down that it really is no good talking of objectives in general terms, because they can get so woolly at the edges that at the end of the generalised statement one is left with a feeling that perhaps there is more of an element of wishful thinking and hope than a specific series of objectives.
I have no doubt that the noble Lord will seek to comply with that and will say with the utmost precision just what the Government's objectives are. There was a preview of them in the document issued by the Department of Trade in July, where the memorandum said that it looked as though the issues would be grouped under three broad headings: (a) a political declaration; (b) decisions—and I underline the word "decisions"—to be taken by Ministers; (c) a residual "sweep-up" of the problems which it is agreed that GATT should study. I always like that last "sweep-up" clause on objectives. It is very often done at party conferences. Questions are remitted to the executive for further consideration—which means, of course, that they will be shelved more or less
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indefinitely for the future. I look forward, as others of your Lordships will, to the dénouement that the noble Lord will seek to lay before the House as to just what the objectives are.
I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, made his six points very well, and I will not take up the time of the House in repeating them. He asked a general question as to what is the future of GATT. That seemed to me to indicate a certain lack of conviction as to its general utility; and indeed, if one goes to the proceedings of the Select Committee on this and turns to the examination of the witnesses, one finds that this degree of pessimism has a certain echo in the evidence that has been given by the witnesses, and particularly, if I may refer to him by name, by Mr. John Meadway. I am referring now to page 3 of the evidence. To quote what he says, he comes to the world-shaking conclusion, when asked about the progress of GATT:
"I would say that since the Tokyo Round it has probably been slightly on the ascendant."
These are not exactly sentiments of any great confidence in progress. I am not reproaching the noble Lord with that. They are made with the sole object of reminding him, if indeed he needs reminding, that the problem is going to be a very big one and he starts off with the disadvantage, in effect, of having very little to show for the GATT situation as it now is or for any progress that has been made by GATT since the Tokyo Round.
The reasons are not far to seek. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Banks, as the House may think, gave a very good analysis of the basic problem when he said that the cries and the moves towards liberalisation of trade always progress much more satisfactorily and are pursued with greater enthusiasm during a period of expansion; in other words, when the economies of the world are working at, or near, practicable capacity. And, of course, no country can work to full capacity—few factories can. When the productive apparatus of the industrial nations is working smoothly, when output is going up and when things are expanding, it is more easy to achieve liberalisation of trade and to work with others to achieve that end. That is because they are all expanding, though perhaps unevenly, and it is in everybody's best interests that the maximum number of outlets should be obtained for the great variety and quantity of goods and services that have been produced.
But we do not have that now. We have massive deflation, in which Her Majesty's Government have played a leading part. They refer from time to time to world recession and the effects that world recession is having on trade. What they do not say, with an appropriate degree of modesty, is that they have been the principal architects and cause of the recession itself. They have led the world into the recession. But this is not the time to reproach them with that; there are other occasions.
It is very difficult indeed, however, to seek a further liberalisation of trade when the industrial countries are suffering, in many cases, from mass unemployment, when production and output figures are depressingly down and when, consequently, the battle for the diminishing markets, in terms of effective consumer demand, gets stronger and stronger and produces

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internal antagonisms as well as external ones. As witness—and noble Lords have referred to it—there is the attitude taken at the present time by the United States in regard to steel imports. The decline of the steel industry in the United States as reflected in the unemployment in the steel industry and its diminishing profitability, has undoubtedly brought stresses within the United States. These have, in turn, sought their political expression and have impressed themselves on the Government; and, as the noble Lords, Lord Banks and Lord Mottistone, reminded us, Governments tend to break the rules when it suits them.
I am hopeful that the noble Lord will feel constrained to indicate to the House just how far other countries, however friendly, are allowed to go in breaking the rules before we ourselves call a halt and say, "Well, if you aren't going to be bound by the rules, then nor are we." I know the feeling of noble Lords opposite concerning unilateral disarmament in the military sphere. I venture to suggest that, if the argument is applicable there, it is applicable in double force on questions of trade, which are, after all, of a more peaceable nature. But what we do not want is unilateral disarmament in the field of international trade agreements and the GATT. We do not want a situation in which we feel constrained to obey all the rules ourselves, if other states insist on disobeying them or getting round them.
I believe that one of the objects of the meeting is to review Article 19 of the original treaty, which deals with emergency action on imports of particular products. We should like to know what is the attitude of the Government to the further clarification of Article 19 of the original agreements. Do they think that it ought to be more closely defined? Are they prepared to discuss with other Governments a means of giving it a greater degree of particularisation? And, if they cannot, are they prepared to take more advantage of it? Clearly, these are matters of national concern.
The noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, mentioned the association of the EEC in these talks, and we are given to understand that the EEC team of commissioners, or part of them, will be in session, together with the Ministers from the various countries. May we have some clarification as to the differentiation of the roles? I do not know whether the noble Lord himself will be there. One devoutedly hopes that he will be. He showed an excellent spirit in regard to the unilateral action by the United States concerning the pipeline, which showed that he himself may be a man of steel.
Therefore, I hope that when it comes to dealing with such illustrious characters as Herr Haferkampf, who give one confidence, he will find himself adequate to deal with any points made by the commissioners that have an adverse effect on British interests. We shall be delighted to hear, in enunciating his objectives, how he proposes to deal with these objectives, if he finds them at any point in conflict with those put forward by Herr Haferkampf or Herr Vredeling. Or are we to take a more insular attitude?
As the noble Lord, Lord Banks, has already said, and as I have sought to emphasise, the existing conditions of deflation make it very unlikely that this new meeting of Ministers will make any substantial
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progress, and the reasons are very clear. If Ministers, as such, can speak and can direct their own country's affairs and exercise an influence upon its trade, it is possible, nation by nation, to reach some kind of negotiated settlement on many of these matters. But, of course, the fact is that Ministers are not masters in their own houses, because they do not speak for labour and capital combined. Labour in all the countries, aside from a marginal emigration or immigration, is immobile. It has to make its contribution to the production of goods and services within the geographical boundaries of the nation states in which people live and in which they have their families.
Capital has no such constraint. It can transfer itself across boundaries in a matter of seconds, from one side of the world to the other. And the very movement of capital and its investment, whether it be short term, medium term, long term or permanent, can itself have a profound effect on the importing and exporting capabilities of the countries wherein it moves. So a large part of the whole movement of trade is outside their hands. It is a matter of complete caprice. Indeed, as the noble Lord, Lord Thorneycroft, said in a speech on a different subject altogether, when referring to the whole question of the production apparatus of the country and its progress: "There is little Governments can do."
I do not know what Mr. Joseph Chamberlain would have said had he been alive at the time because Mr. Joseph Chamberlain moved in what was at one time, I believe, the good old Tory tradition which seems to have been deserted by the party opposite these many years. They believed that when the national interest, both capital and labour working together, demanded it, protectionism was quite in order and there could be bilateral agreements between states. What the GATT system is doing in the existing circumstances is to propound a multilateralism in trade, or to facilitate a multilateralism in trade which, in terms of its national impact, is bound to be distorted by the mass movements of capital to which I have referred.
It may be that I have anticipated the noble Lord. The noble Lord is, after all, in the best traditions of the late Joseph Chamberlain. It may be that he will tell the House that after giving the matter very careful consideration the Government are bent on securing the maximum flexibility under Article 19 of the original treaty. If he does so, he will receive the utmost support from this side of the House and we shall be greatly indebted to him.
9.1 p.m.
The Secretary of State for Trade (Lord Cockfield): My Lords, I am sure the House will be most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, for the efforts that he and the Select Committee have made to illuminate the issues that will arise in the course of the GATT Ministerial Meeting next month. I shall certainly study what he has said with very great interest—and also the speeches of the noble Lord, Lord Banks, my noble friend Lord Mottistone and the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington.
I do not propose trying to answer in detail the specific questions which have been put on individual points. I think the right thing for me to do would be to review the field and give an indication of what the

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Government's approach to these problems is. What actually emerges at the GATT Ministerial Meeting will be the result of a process of discussion, consultation, agreement and possibly even disagreement among the 87 nations who will be represented on that occasion. I propose, therefore, to start by setting out some of the basic facts and pressures which determine the United Kingdom Government's policy towards these matters. The fundamental soundness of the open multilateral approach to international trade is well demonstrated by the experience of the 1950s and the 1960s. Then the dismantling of the high tariffs and severe quantitative restrictions left over from the prewar era was undoubtedly one of the factors contributing to economic growth round the world.
This does not mean that the Government should blindly and unthinkingly follow a liberal trade policy for all sectors and in all circumstances. Our necessarily tough policy on textile and clothing imports is as clear a demonstration as possible that within the general framework of a liberal trade policy we must protect the interests of our own country and of our own people.
The policy questions for Governments become more difficult as major departures from open trading, or fears of such departures, increase. The economic history of the 1930s shows that once a major participant in an interdependent trade system shifts to a protectionist policy, others will follow suit. Access to its home market is the main negotiating lever a trading power has to secure access for its exporters to foreign markets. It is unreasonable and unrealistic to expect that any major trading country will continue to keep its own markets open to exports from another country if its exporters are shut out of that country's domestic market.
It is for this reason that the world is watching, with interest and real concern, how the United States Administration is coping with strong pressure in the United States Congress, fuelled by the recession, for new United States trade legislation. That could easily, in the guise of "reciprocity" or in the guise of "domestic content", bring the United States into conflict with its mutilateral trading obligations in the GATT. These fears are much accentuated by the behaviour of the American Administration in relation to steel and the pipeline.
A development of this kind—that is, a movement on the part of the United States in a protectionist direction—would be one of the biggest blows a great market economy could deliver to the open international trading system. For the same reason it is a complete delusion to imagine that universal import controls of the kind advocated in some quarters in this country can be indulged in without major damage to our own exporting industries. The noble Lord, Lord Banks, made this point very forcefully in his thoughtful speech. It is, thus, indisputably in the interests of the United Kingdom and of other trading nations that the GATT open trading system, which is one of the Bretton Woods institutions that has served the world so well, should be preserved. If it crumbles, and higher or, indeed, much higher barriers to trade go up round the world, we shall be all much worse off, whether as producers or as consumers. This, I think, is the answer to the question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Bruce
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of Donington, about the future of GATT. It is an essential part of our international trading structure but, of course, it may well need adaptation, modernisation and development.
There is much consensus therefore that the GATT Ministerial Meeting needs to succeed. But when we look at what the various countries to be represented in Geneva feel that the content of that consensus for success should be, the real difficulties of the operation become clearer. Different countries and different groupings of countries have very different patterns of trade.
It is natural, therefore, that they should want to push the GATT system in different directions. These differences of approach mattered less in the 1950s and 1960s when rapidly growing world trade enabled pressures to be accommodated relatively easily. But when there is little or no growth the process becomes much more difficult and each country in turn may feel that changes to meet the priorities of others can only be at their own expense.
Agricultural trade—and this point was raised by every noble Lord who spoke—is a key issue for countries heavily dependent on agricultural exports, such as Australia and New Zealand, and also for the United States. By and large, protection has been higher in trade in agricultural products than for industrial goods. Correspondingly, the process of liberalisation of trade in non-agricultural goods has gone further and faster than for agricultural products. Regulation of agricultural markets, both domestically and internationally, is very deeply entrenched and the agricultural lobbies are very powerful.
It is unrealistic to imagine that great changes can be made overnight. But there is a range of practical problems and grievances about the operation of international trade in agriculture which have not been recently addressed to any significant extent in the GATT; and it could be useful for the ministerial meeting to set in hand a thorough programme of work which will look at the areas where the various parties feel improvements are needed and see what practical solutions can be devised.
May I turn now to textiles. Textiles and clothing is another sector of great sensitivity as these industries remain large and important employers in developed countries. They are also sectors which developing countries can move into at an early stage of their industrialisation and compete very successfully on world markets. In order to limit the pace of change to socially tolerable levels, sectoral arrangements, of which the Multi-Fibre Arrangement III is only the latest, have been negotiated in the GATT for the past 20 years. The ministerial meeting is likely to fall at a very sensitive stage in the negotiations under MFA II of bilateral agreements between the Community and some of its main suppliers. It is too early therefore to say what forward-looking work GATT Ministers as a whole may wish to put in hand.
I turn now to safeguards and voluntary restraint arrangements—another subject which featured largely in the contributions which were made to the debate. "Safeguards" is the term used for a group of issues which arise regarding the escape clause—Article XIX, to which the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, referred—which comes into operation when imports

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rise so sharply as to cause or threaten serious injury to domestic industry. Sharp surges of imports of particular products are capable of causing serious damage to our industries, and evoke correspondingly strong pressures for protective action. This is particularly so when such imports, whether from Japan or other newly-industrialised countries or, indeed, from the United States, are encouraged by distorting domestic policies. Arrangements to deal with import surges are, understandably, also of great concern to poorer developing countries which may become, or may hope to become, competitive in limited areas.
Not surprisingly, there is a large area of disagreement between those countries who are, or hope to become, aggressive exporters, and those who have mature industries which are under threat. The controversial questions include the criteria and disciplines that might be adopted to limit the invocation of Article XIX to genuinely serious cases of injury.
Then there is the issue of selectivity: the question whether emergency action under Article XIX has to be taken against all suppliers or can be taken selectively against those suppliers whose imports are causing the disruption. Differences of attitude and interest on this issue are so great that finding a comprehensive agreement defeated the negotiators in the Tokyo Round, and appears also to be causing great difficulty this year in the efforts made in the preparatory process for the ministerial meeting.
A particularly controversial facet of the safeguards question has been that of grey area measures. This term covers measures not involving the formal invocation of Article XIX, but having a similar effect. The basic point is that the levels of imports are negotiated rather than imposed as in a formal Article XIX action. Grey area measures are undoubtedly more widespread than they used to be. To show how central they have come to be I need only cite two examples of measures that fall in the grey area.
An agreement between the Community and the United States regarding EEC steel exports to the United States would be a classic example of such a grey area agreement, and however much one may dislike the circumstances which have given rise to such an agreement if one is negotiated, nevertheless the importance of reaching a successful agreement is of immense importance both to the countries concerned and to the survival of GATT itself.
Another example of grey area measures are the agreements on sheepmeat imports into the European Community negotiated a couple of years ago. It has been argued—both the noble Lord, Lord Banks, and the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, put this point—that the proliferation of grey area measures is a major cause of danger to the GATT open trading system, and that it is imperative at the forthcoming ministerial meeting to bring this process to a stop. I do not think that in the real world this is a well-founded argument. Grey area measures have been adopted not inadvisedly or lightly, but almost always in circumstances where recourse to Article XIX could have been justified. They represent progress by agreement rather than by litigation. The opponents of grey area measures may believe that if this option had not been available free and unrestricted open trade would have prevailed. I do not believe this.
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If you look at a list of the products concerned, they are ones where economically or politically the rate of change raises very sensitive issues which Government could not stand aside from—steel, automobiles, sheepmeat are all examples of this. If the option of grey areas measures had not been available the alternative would almost certainly have been much greater formal invocation of Article XIX and more friction and conflict all round.
So I do not accept the analysis that the proliferation of grey area measures is one of the main causes of difficulties the world trade system finds itself in. Rather it is a practical solution devised to minimise trade friction and prevent worse damage being done.
As the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, himself said, such measures are not necessarily wrong. If there are to be substantial changes in the rules and practices of international trade from the position as it was left in 1979 at the end of the Tokyo Round, the Government intend to ensure that they are not detrimental to the position and negotiating strength of the United Kingdom. A prohibition on new grey area measures is unnecessary and undesirable and would be unhelpful to the GATT system. Those measures have made a significant and helpful contribution to handling in a difficult situation import problems not only in the United Kingdom but in several member states in the Community.
If we were to accept modification or restriction in this area, it would be essential that it should be accompanied by significant progress in those areas of other people's trading policy which cause us difficulties or about which we have reservations. This would certainly have to include the import policy of some newly industrialised countries which seem to us no longer to reflect their economic contribution and what they can legitimately be expected to do in the development of a more up to date set of international trading rules.
There is a range of issues involving developing countries that can conveniently be looked at together. In particular, the developing countries tend to argue that the GATT open trading system, as it has developed, operates unfairly from the point of view of relatively poor countries heavily dependent on primary products. Consistent themes of this kind are pressure from developing countries to receive more favourable import treatment for distinctively tropical products, which are mostly agricultural; and for action to diminish tariff escalation, a feature which provides a certain level of protection for processing industries in developed countries. These are issues which require consideration, but the scope for progress is limited.
On the other side of the coin are the trade problems created by newly industialised countries. As developing countries, they are in principle entitled to benefit from looser GATT obligations than industrialised countries, and they have also benefited from valuable preferences given by developed countries under GSP schemes.
But as individual newly industrialised countries—or NICs as they are known—develop industries to the point where they are competitive on equal terms with the production of industrialised countries on world markets, their special privileges become increasingly inappropriate. In particular some NICs have

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continued to use these special GATT provisions to enable them to maintain very high tariffs and other severe restrictions to keep our own manufactured products out of their growing home markets. This is not a situation that we or other developed countries generally think tolerable. The need to improve this imbalance is a major theme which I and my ministerial colleagues stress in our travels round the world advancing British trade interests.
It is too soon to say how these various strands may be brought together in the GATT Ministerial Meeting. The United States has made specific proposals about bilateral negotiations, but their ideas have so far been widely opposed by developing countries. I recognise that it can be argued that, in a world recession, it is difficult to mount negotiations designed to bring about a greater application of GATT rules by the NICs. Be that as it may, there is a perceived inequity in many developed countries in the application of GATT rules, and in my view it would be better to rectify the imbalance by negotiation rather than by unilateral actions. The danger of this is real. The EC has proposed that there should be a major feasibility study and perhaps this will be a practical way forward. But the problem is urgent and something more than a leisurely study is needed.
Perhaps I might now refer to the question of trade in services to which the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, referred. May I say that I made my own maiden speech in your Lordships' House on the question of our invisible exports and this is a matter of increasing importance to this country. Approximately three out of every five workers in this country are now employed in public or private service activities. The total export earnings of the private sector services industries rose to a record £.17 billion in 1981; our trading surplus on services is second only to that of the United States of America. This is a tribute to the energy and imagination of those who have seen the opportunities in this sector and have worked towards their fulfilment.
We have pressed very hard indeed inside the EEC for liberalisation of trade in services. This is a question that I have raised with other European countries that I have visited. The issue is likely to be important in the GATT meeting as well. I welcome the work done in this field by the Sub-Committee on Invisible Exports known as the LOTIS Committee; that is, the Committee on the Liberalisation of Trade in Services. We will support any movement at the GATT Ministerial Meeting to set up a study programme under GATT auspices, to develop the OECD work of identifying the barriers to trade in services with which the OECD has been concerned to consider possible solutions.
I now come to the question of ensuring that the collective strength of the European Community is employed to ensure a satisfactory outcome of the GATT discussions. This was a point stressed by the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill. I have few anxieties on this point. Ministers from all Community countries will, of course, attend and have the opportunity to speak. What they say will naturally reflect their own particular priorities and concerns, but this will be within the general framework of a Community position agreed beforehand. In the preparatory process
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the Commission has been the Community's spokesman. While I do not underestimate the complexities of co-ordination, I do not doubt that our membership of a major trading bloc can only benefit the United Kingdom in the preparations for this meeting.
It is important that the GATT Ministerial should make progress and be seen to make progress. But it is no good just bewailing the emergence of protectionist measures. They would not have emerged unless there was good reason for them. Their removal or diminution will come only if the causes which led to their appearance are identified and dealt with. The world has changed a great deal in the 30 years or so that the GATT has been in existence. There are countries which enjoy privileges which were justified in earlier years but may no longer be justified now. There are other areas where privileged treatment may no longer be appropriate; where what were entrenched rights may now need to be modified or surrendered.
This is, of course, a much wider canvas than it falls to the lot of the forthcoming GATT Ministerial to tackle. But it needs a clear recognition of these issues if progress is to be made at the GATT Ministerial itself. The benefits of a liberal trading system are very great. The promotion of such a system requires much more than the removal of barnacles and excrescences. It needs a move towards convergence of trading policies and practices world wide. If my home market is open to you: your home market ought to be open to me on equal terms. The November GATT meeting has the opportunity of taking an important if limited step in that direction. I hope it succeeds in so doing.

London Transport (Liverpool Street) Bill
A message was received from the Commons that they have come to the following resolutions to which they desire the concurrence of this House:
That the promoters of the Bill shall have leave to suspend proceedings thereon in order to proceed with the Bill, if they think fit, in the next Session of Parliament, provided that the agents for the Bill give notice to the clerks in the Private Bill Office not later than the day before the close of the present Session of their intention to suspend further proceedings and that all fees due on the Bill up to that date be paid;
That on the fifth day on which the House sits in the next Session the Bill shall be presented to the House;
That there shall be deposited with the Bill a declaration signed by the agents for the Bill, stating that the Bill is the same, in every respect, as the Bill at the last stage of its proceedings in this House in the present Session;
That the Bill shall be laid upon the Table of the House by one of the clerks in the Private Bill Office on the next meeting of the House after the day on which the Bill has been presented and, when so laid, shall be read the first and second time (and shall be recorded in the Journal of this House as having been so read) and, having been amended by the Committee in the present Session, shall be ordered to lie upon the Table;
That no further fees shall be charged in respect of any proceedings on the Bill in respect of which fees

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have already been incurred during the present Session;
That these orders be Standing Orders of the House.

Administration of Justice Bill [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons agreed to with amendments.

Mental Health (Amendment) Bill [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons agreed to with amendments.
House adjourned at twenty-nine minutes past nine o'clock.