Lords Sitting of 14 July 1983

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Exeter.
Several Lords—Took the Oath or Affirmed.

Sexual Offences Against Minors: Penalties
Viscount Buckmaster: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are satisfied with the level of penalties for those convicted of sexual offences against minors, especially by teachers in respect of children in their charge.
The Lord Chancellor (Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone): My Lords, the maximum sentences available vary with the particular offence from life imprisonment downwards. The Criminal Law Revision Committee is giving attention to the question whether the existing law and penalties give sufficient protection to children against those in a position of trust. The actual level of penalties imposed within the maxima is for the judiciary and not Her Majesty's Government. In addition to criminal sanctions there are administrative sanctions available to the Secretary of State for Education against those who are employed to work with children who commit these offences.
Viscount Buckmaster: My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor for that helpful reply. Nevertheless, in view of the traumatic effects of such offences on young children, which frequently last throughout their lives, is he aware of a case heard in a magistrates' court in Birmingham on 23rd March when the headmaster of a Roman Catholic school, who has now resigned, was fined £400 with £250 costs for sexual offences against young girls in his charge aged nine to 10 extending over a period of three years?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I must tell the noble Viscount that members of the Executive cannot comment constitutionally upon matters which are in the purview of the judiciary.
Lord Wilson of Langside: My Lords, as it is open to a convicted person to appeal against an unduly harsh sentence, may I ask the noble and learned Lord whether it would not be certainly more logical, probably sensible, and certainly promote confidence in the administration of criminal justice if the Crown had a corresponding right to appeal against what might be regarded as a derisory sentence for any offence, quite apart from the ones in this Question?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, such a proposal is canvassed from time to time. It would require primary
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legislation. I think that the noble and learned Lord might discover that there was an element of double jeopardy in such a suggestion, which might give rise to constitutional problems. I think that it would also strike a member of the profession as altering the function of the prosecutor. In this country the prosecutor is not like Mr. Vyshinsky; he is not supposed to suggest particular sentences to a court; he is supposed to place the facts before the court and leave the sentence to the court.
Lord Renton: My Lords, could the Criminal Law Revision Committee be invited to consider a recommendation that people convicted of these offences should no longer be allowed to continue in employment which gives them the charge of children and young people?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, as regards teachers, I do not think that that is necessary because the Education Acts provide the Secretary of State for Education with adequate powers to deal with teachers who are convicted of offences of this type. When we come to deal with private employment, I think it would be rather more difficult to do. I believe that it would be wise to leave the Criminal Law Revision Committee to conclude its present investigations and then consider its report when it comes.
Lord Renton: My Lords, I was suggesting that the courts should also have the power which the Secretary of State already possesses.
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, at one time I held the position which is now held by my right honourable friend. On the whole, I think that the Secretary of State is the appropriate authority. Some of these offences—as was the case to which the noble Viscount who asked the Question referred—are tried on summary jurisdiction by lay magistrates; others are tried by the Crown Court. I personally think that the employment of teachers is very much a question which ought to be considered administratively rather than judicially; but, of course, it is for Parliament to decide.
Lord Wigoder: My Lords, can the noble and learned Lord say whether there have been many public complaints recently by members of the judiciary that the maximum penalties prescribed are proving inadequate?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I do not think there have been any by the judiciary in relation to this particular type of offence. It is fair to say, however, that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chief Justice, at the judges' dinner at the Mansion House, said in general terms, but not referring to any particular class of offence, that there had recently come to his notice a number of cases—I think he said one or two—in which sentences had been markedly too lenient.
Lord Wilson of Langside: My Lords, may I revert to the noble and learned Lord's answer to the question I put with regard to appealing the question of sentence? Would he acknowledge that it is not only the country

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in which Mr. Vyshinsky was a distinguished, or notorious, prosecutor that the prosecution has a right to be heard on the question of sentence? Would he not consider that at least many other civilised countries regard the question of sentence as falling within the province of the prosecution? Would he also not acknowledge that, having regard to the great developments that there have been in the administration of criminal justice in favour of accused persons during the last 100 years, and particularly during the last 30 years, perhaps this question of the Crown's interest in sentence should be looked at afresh?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, this is exactly the sort of question which would be canvassed if primary legislation in that sense were introduced. I am of course aware that in a great number of countries the duties of a prosecutor are differently defined from the way in which we behave in this country, but on the whole I think that this country is a model to the world, and not vice versa.
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, would the noble and learned Lord agree that in many debates in this House there has been general agreement that sentences passed by the judiciary in this country, as compared with those in other similar countries, are much too severe?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I can only say that for every complaint which comes before me of alleged excessive severity I probably get between 10 and 20 alleging excessive leniency.
The Lord President of the Council (Viscount Whitelaw): My Lords, I know that the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, wishes to rise and ask a question, but after that the House might perhaps think it appropriate to move on.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, is not the real problem the disparity between the various courts in sentencing, and not the question of the maximum sentence? Would the noble and learned Lord not agree that considerable disquiet would be relieved if it were known that there were regular meetings with the judges at which the question of sentencing was considered by way of discussion and some amount of common agreement reached as to the types of offence which society regards as so serious that there should be severer penalties?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, as regards the first part of the noble Lord's question, I think it is possible to exaggerate the degree of disparity which exists. I think a good deal of the disquiet is due to the particular treatment of individual cases in the way in which some of them are reported, giving a slant one way or the other, and not to the actual facts of the case. I would wish to add a warning against not merely the undesirability but the impossibility of sentencing people from press cuttings.
I would also say to the noble Lord that, as regards his useful suggestion about judges' meetings, we hold a seminar at Roehampton year by year; and, of course, the Lord Chief Justice, sitting in the Court of Appeal
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(Criminal Division), in fact keeps an eye on the level of sentences in different parts of the country. If a sentence is of excessive severity he incorporates something to that effect in his judgment; but if he considers that, as a whole, the level of sentences is unduly lenient, he will certainly either issue a practice direction or include in one of his judgments some guidelines as to how courts ought to behave.
Lord Jenkins of Putney: My Lord, is the noble and learned Lord aware that—
Noble Lords: No! Next Question!

Bankrupt Companies: Consumers' Prepayments
3.18 p.m.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are aware of the hardship facing those consumers who send money for goods to companies that subsequently go bankrupt; and what action is proposed to deal with this problem.
Lord Lyell: My Lords, Her Majesty's Government are aware of the difficulties of those who suffer losses in this way and are considering possible means by which the problem might be relieved. However, the vast majority of businesses which accept deposits are honest traders and it would be harmful to their interests to impose wide-ranging restrictions in order to control the minority of potential defaulters.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, if we might really get down to brass tacks, may I ask the Minister whether he is aware that the Office of Fair Trading is conducting a detailed study of prepayment problems? If he is aware of that, can he say how long this study will take? Secondly, may I ask him whether he realises that those people who are being given evidence of malpractices in this field feel that the existing law is not being used as it could be to counter these malpractices? Finally, is the insolvency branch of the Department of Trade looking into these malpractices, are these reported to them, and are they prepared to take action on the matter?
Lord Lyell: My Lords, so far as the first part of the noble Baroness's question is concerned, I am afraid that I am not certain, I may be able to ascertain a date; if I can I shall write to the noble Baroness.
On the second part of the noble Baroness's question, as she will know, these matters—and indeed many others—are covered in discussions and works that are going on in the Department of Trade and Industry on the Cork report. Thirdly, the insolvency department is aware of the problems raised by the noble Baroness. But she and your Lordships will be pleased to know that the Government realise that these consumers may

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sometimes lose money in the way in which the noble Baroness has described. However, they can protect themselves against this loss in a variety of ways. The noble Baroness and your Lordships will be fascinated to see the leaflet that is available which sets everything out in clear and concise terms as to the steps that consumers should take in the event of the misfortune described by the noble Baroness.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, but that is not getting us anywhere except in a very long time. We know about the Cork report. Will the Minister say whether there is any chance that some action might be taken soon? Am I not correct in believing that prior to the general election it was the intention of the Department of Trade that some action would be taken to help consumers in this matter? Could he inquire whether the insolvency department in the Department of Trade and Industry is given information about the malpractices that occur and is definitely dealing with them?
Lord Lyell: My Lords, the insolvency department is receiving information about malpractices; but it believes that these problems should be dealt with under the entire umbrella of the Cork report as a whole. I will inquire whether there are any other details that I can ascertain for the noble Baroness and I will write to her.
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: My Lords, does the noble Lord realise that there is great urgency about this matter? Unfortunately, one of the things that result from the present recession is the fact that many companies go out of business suddenly without warning and people who are dealing with them suddenly find that the companies have heavy debts which they are unable to pay. It is a tremendously urgent matter and unfortunately is one of the consequences of the present recession. I hope that the Government realise that this is something that could be dealt with more swiftly and better, because the problem is getting worse.
Lord Lyell: My Lords, the Government appreciate the urgency of the problem. I am sure that my noble friend and the noble Baroness, Lady Burton, will appreciate that this entire problem is part of a major jigsaw in insolvency, and that jigsaw covers the Cork report and one or two other things. But I take note of the urgency and the comments of my noble friend and the eternal vigilance of the noble Baroness.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords. the Minister has just referred to the jigsaw of the Cork report and an examination of insolvency. Does he realise that the Government take an extremely long time to solve puzzles and this happens to be one of them? Is he aware that a considerable amount of dust has accumulated on the Cork report which is in the library of the Secretary of State? Will he kindly dust off the report and tell us when we are likely to see action in regard to it?
Lord Lyell: My Lords, the noble Lord is always very flattering to me when he refers to legal matters. I have my copy of the Cork report. I shall forbear from
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reading to the noble Lord and to your Lordships the fascinating paragraph 1055 that covers much of the ground we have been over this afternoon. The noble Lord and your Lordships will appreciate that this massive report—I stress it is only part of the jigsaw covering the problems raised by the noble Baroness, and others—was a result of five years of comprehensive study of the whole of the law covering insolvency and other problems. But I will bring the concern of the noble Lord to my right honourable friend.
Lord Molloy: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that there is another element that I would ask him to consider? Many of the bankruptcies that take place are quite genuine in these hard times. People have no desire to defraud or cheat. Sometimes it happens; but there is another element where firms are created to go bankrupt and they work this racket very skilfully. They are aided—lamentably I have to say—by the national press and various magazines. Will the noble Lord be prepared to take on board and consider this element?
Lord Lyell: My Lords, not only have I taken it on board, but the Government and the Central Office of Information also have taken it on board. At a later stage I may discuss this with the noble Lord. I have a valuable little leaflet. If any of your Lordships wish to read it we can make it available in the Library.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, I hope that all those people will take on board one simple question. Looking at the complicated jigsaw, may I ask the Minister whether he will look into the matter and answer a Question after the Recess about whether the Government consider it possible that one section might be taken out of the Cork report so that the problems affecting private consumers over insolvency might he dealt with?
Lord Lyell: As of today, my Lords, I could not give the noble Baroness that guarantee; but if the noble Baroness will study Chapter 22 of the Cork report and start at paragraph 1048, I think she will find the answers and, indeed, answers to many other questions germane to the points she has raised this afternoon contained in a sympathetic statement by Mr. Justice Megarry, as he then was. She will find that the Cork report covers that point. It suggests, among other things, that it is extremely difficult to separate the interests of the consumers from other creditors: for instance, small traders who might be equally grievously affected by bankruptcy or by fraudulent practices. If the noble Baroness wishes to put down a Question. I invite her to do so and we shall attempt to answer it.

AIDS: Incidence and Control
3.27 p.m.
Baroness Dudley: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how widespread is the disease AIDS in the United Kingdom and Europe, and what steps are being taken to prevent it spreading in the community.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Security (Lord Glenarthur): My Lords, 14 confirmed cases of AIDS have been reported to the Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre at Colindale, and a further two cases are under investigation. On the basis of the information available to us there are some 60 cases within other member states of the Council of Europe.
The Medical Research Council has established a working party and co-ordinate research into the disease. The Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre is operating a national surveillance system, which includes making available a summary of information for doctors about the incidence, indentification and methods of control of the disease. Although there is no conclusive evidence that AIDS is transmitted by blood or blood products, the department is considering the publication of a leaflet indicating the circumstances in which blood donations should he avoided.
Baroness Dudley: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that Answer. Can he tell me whether there is a cure on the way?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, up to the moment it has not proved possible to identify exactly what is causing the disease. Until that has happened, I am afraid I could not say that we can produce a cure.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes: My Lords, will the Minister tell me whether any special action is being taken to inform dental and medical practioners of precautions that they should take? I understand that it is quite possible that a carrier could come into a surgery and that the dentist, the doctor or another patient could become infected.
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I do not know the answer concerning dental surgeons specifically, but the mechanisms by which the disease is transmitted, and the causative agent, as I have described to the noble Baroness, are not known. Although promiscuous male homosexual activity and intravenous drug abuse are risk factors, there is no evidence that the disease can be transmitted through non-physical contact.
Baroness Masham of Ilton: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord why we import blood compounds from America; and is there not a fear that this condition can be transmitted through anti-haemophiliac cryo precipitate, which is a blood compound?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I do not know the answer concerning the chemical to which the noble Baroness referred. I shall find out and let her know. We have to import Factor VIII, which is an agent used in the cure for haemophiliacs. We shall need to continue to do that until we are self-sufficient ourselves.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his earlier reply, but may I ask him whether it is now believed that this disease is transmissible in many more ways than was originally believed? Will the Minister issue instructions to practioners, or ask his department to look into the need to do so?
Lord Glenarthur: Yes, my Lords. I will do that.
Baroness Masham of Ilton: My Lords, may I ask the Minister whether he will be good enough to answer the first part of my supplementary question, which was why we have to import blood compounds from America and why we cannot manufacture our own?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, we need to import it because we have not got enough ourselves. We are trying to build up our own stocks. The noble Baroness might like to know that last year the Blood Products Laboratory manufactured 22 million international units of Factor VIII. At the same time, we imported 35 million international units in 1981 at a cost of between £3 million and £4 million.

UNCTAD: Belgrade Meeting
3.31 p.m.
Lord Hatch of Lusby: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will explain what policy they followed at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development in Belgrade.
The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Lord Belstead): My Lords, our policy was to recognise the interdependence of the economies of the world and of the many issues under discussion in Belgrade, and to seek a realistic and constructive outcome which would contribute to strengthening international economic co-operation and world economic recovery.
Lord Hatch of Lusby: My Lords, the Question on the Order Paper asks what was the British Government's policy. I hardly think that the noble Lord's reply constitutes an Answer to that Question. May I ask the noble Lord to put aside his brief for a moment and to take the House into his confidence? Was not this conference a wasteful fiasco for a month? Is it not the case that, on the side of the industrialised nations, Britain, America and West Germany were the main stumbling blocks to an intelligent dialogue with the developing countries? Was that not the sole cause of the fiasco but one of them? May I ask him, in particular, what the British Government representatives did in urging upon the conference the findings of the report of the Commonwealth Group, especially their recommendation that there should be smaller conferences on single issues?
Lord Belstead: My Lords, so far as policy is concerned, I think, if I may say so, that for the Government to say that we recognise the interdependence of the economies of the world—which is a great deal more than just a bland statement of the obvious: it is something which is extraordinarily difficult to achieve, and if only we could do so it would overcome so many problems of the world—and to say that we seek a realistic and constructive outcome at Belgrade, is a reasonable Answer to the noble Lord's Question. So

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far as concerns the charge of the noble Lord that it was a wasteful fiasco, resolutions were passed on trade matters, on commodity matters and on international finance matters. I think it is fair to say that the outcome of the conference, with some 20 resolutions adopted, compared favourably with previous sessions of the conference.
Thirdly, I refute the noble Lord's charge that the developed European countries were in some way responsible for what was not achieved at Belgrade. If the noble Lord wishes, I will back that up with evidence. Finally, it gives me pleasure to be able to agree with the noble Lord on just one point. Yes, there are problems with the way in which UNCTAD is organised. Its potential is not fully realised because of problems inherent in its methods of operation, and Her Majesty's Government intend to continue to urge consideration of improvements before the next conference.
Lord Brockway: My Lords, may I ask the Minister this question? Despite what he has said, would he not agree that this conference, like the eight conferences which have preceded it, has done practically nothing to deal with the problem of the 30 million people in the developing countries who die unnecessarily? Was there a single decision by this conference which would save one life? Is it not the case that the conference rejected the Belgrade Declaration on World Economy? Is it not the case that even with the weak, compromise statement (from which the USA dissociated itself) the United Kingdom, West Germany and Japan made reservations? What has this conference done to solve the problem?
Lord Belstead: My Lords, I think I must ask House to wait. There will be a White Paper issued which will give an account of the conference. The noble Lord asked the Government whether there was one resolution which would have saved one life anywhere in the world. The noble Lord knows very well indeed, from his interest and his experience, that many of the difficulties in the world are in countries which rely upon commodities for their trade. I would point out to the noble Lord that, out of the four major resolutions on commodities which were passed at Belgrade, one urged countries to ratify the common fund to provide finance for buffer stocks. We have already ratified the common fund, and we were trying to persuade other countries to do likewise.
Lord Brockway: My Lords, is it not the case that this conference failed to ratify the common fund for commodity prices, about which agreement was nearly reached a year ago?
Lord Belstead: My Lords, yes.
Lord Hatch of Lusby: My Lords, is the noble Lord asking us to believe that the success of a conference is to be judged by the number of resolutions passed? Would he answer my supplementary question concerning the Commonwealth report, which I understand the British Government urged on the conference but not strongly enough to have it accepted? When he says that the major issue at the conference was a recognition of the interdependence of
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the economies of the world have the British Government now become convinced of that about which some of us have been trying to convince them for the last four years—that the recovery of the industrialised world depends as strongly on increased purchasing power in the developing world as vice versa?
Lord Belstead: My Lords, certainly there is no question of suggesting to the House that the success of a conference is to be judged by the number of resolutions passed. I think the thing to do, if I may say so, is to wait until the White Paper is issued. But it is important that I should rectify one misconception on the part of the noble Lord. The United Kingdom tried (it is true without success) to gain support for proposals to improve the negotiating process made recently in the Commonwealth report entitled The North-South dialogue: Making it Work.It was not a question of not pressing hard enough. We ran out of time, and we were extremely sorry that this was so.

EC Fishery Ministers: Brussels Meeting
Lord Denham: My Lords, at a convenient moment after 3.30 p.m. this afternoon my noble friend Lord Belstead will, with the leave of the House, repeat a Statement which is to be made in another place on the Council of Fishery Ministers, 11th–12th July.
The Summer Recess
Lord Denham: My Lords, subject to progress of business, it is hoped that the House will rise for the Summer Recess on Wednesday, 27th July. I think I should point out to your Lordships—because to a certain extent it is a departure from usual practice—that the House will sit at 2.30 p.m. on that day. I hope to be able to make a further announcement next week on the date when the House will resume after the Summer Recess.

Merchant Shipping (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill [H.L.]
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, I beg to introduce a Bill to make provision for the service of improvement notices and prohibition notices in connection with statutory provisions relating to the safety of ships and hovercraft and other matters; to make further provision with respect to the ascertainment of ships' tonnages for the purposes of Section 503 of the Merchant Shipping Act 1894 and Section 4 of the Merchant Shipping (Oil Pollution) Act 1971; and for connected purposes. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a first time.—(Lord Lucas of Chilivorth.)
On Question, Bill read a first time, and to be printed.

County of Lancashire Bill [H.L.]
3.40 p.m.
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Aberdare): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That the Bill he now read a third time.—(Lord Aberdare.)
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: My Lords, it was I who moved the Instruction to the Select Committee on the opposed provisions of this Bill on 15th March last year. It is on that Instruction that the Select Committee has produced the Special Report which is now before the House. In view of that, I think it is suitable for me to express grateful thanks to the Select Committee for having gone so carefully into this tedious affair of the Burnley dogs. In particular, I think one must mourn the passing of Lord Hinton of Bankside, who was the Chairman of the Select Committee. For 10 days the Select Committee listened to counsel and petitioners on these clauses in the County of Lancashire Bill related expressly to the restrictions in the borough of Burnley upon the use of parks for the walking of dogs. I draw the attention of the House particularly to paragraphs 8 and 9 of the Special Report.
I am not going to dwell upon the unhappy saga of this affair that has bedevilled community relations in Burnley over the past six years; but I draw your Lordships' attention to the fact that it is now over 12 months since the compromise embodied in the report of the Select Committee was reached upstairs. In June 1982 the promoters and the petitioners, in front of the Select Committee, reached a compromise agreement on certain parks which were to remain closed and others which were to be open.
This Bill now goes to another place and the prospects appear to be that the Bill will not complete its way through Parliament for quite some time to come. Certainly it will not begin on its way there until after the Summer Recess, so here we have the settlement of a dispute between the borough council and a considerable section of the community of Burnley, which is now the basis of a compromise, continuing to be unresolved. Surely, when this House exercises its authority as a conciliatory body on private Bills, something can be done to offset the apparently unavoidable delays which private Bills encounter in going through Parliament. It is a good job these private Bills are carried forward from one Session and from one Parliament to another, otherwise they would never get through. The prospects of this Bill getting through in the months to come are not very favourable.
What do we expect the citizens to do? They have compromised themselves on this and the local authority have done the same. Why cannot the settlement that was reached over a year ago be brought into operation? What is stopping it? I know that to do it means anticipating the provisions of this Special Report which, if carried by the House, would alter the Bill; but I should have thought that all was now set for a peaceful and harmonious transfer of the arrangements which caused so much trouble in Burnley to the
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new régime of reconciliation there. Although it may not be the duty of this House to deal with the consequences of its own slow and cumbersome procedures, it may be that a Minister of the Home Office could take notice of the fact that we have this stalemate position in Burnley at the present time. Surely the order that caused all the trouble could be amended by agreement between the local authority and the Home Office, and so release this land, as agreed upon over a year ago, for the benefit of the wider community.
Therefore I appeal to whomever it may concern who will listen to this, either in Burnley or in the Home Office, or both, because the trouble here is the unenlightened way in which statutory notices are published by local authorities on the instructions of the Home Office. That is where the trouble started: nobody knew what it was all about until the order came into operation. So I do believe that it is somebody's duty to ensure that this business is now moved forward, and I make this very strong appeal to those concerned this afternoon.
When all this was going on before the Committee upstairs—the hours and hours that this Select Committee spent on a dispute which should never have come here at all—I was divided between a feeling of shame for community relations in Burnley and a feeling of pride in the patience of noble Lords, Members of this House, who sat and listened day after day for 10 solid days to what was said about the dispute in Burnley. It is, I suppose, a triumph for the democratic parliamentary procedure but—my goodness!—what a reflection upon the wisdom and sagacity of Lancastrians. If that is what they do, give me Yorkshire every time.
Lord Aberdare: My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, for those remarks which were full of his usual pithy sentiments. I will not enter into the controversy between Yorkshire and Lancashire; but, seriously, I am grateful to him for the thanks that he has offered to the Select Committee. Many of your Lordships give up your time on these Select Committees—I do not know how we would manage if you did not—and I am very grateful to the members of this particular Committee.
I am very pleased that the noble Lord mentioned the sad death of the Chairman of the Committee, Lord Hinton of Bankside, because although he was obviously very distinguished in his own life as an engineer, he was always ready to give up time to take the chair of Select Committees in this House, and we shall certainly miss him.
A noble Lord: Hear, hear!
Lord Aberdare: My Lords, as to the position on the compromise that has been reached, I believe it really applies to Scott Park, which is the one area where the Committee agreed that dogs should in future be allowed. Obviously the Committee themselves accepted that this would not take place until the Bill became law: this appears in paragraph 7 of their report—
"that the byelaw banning dogs from Scott Park would he revoked as soon as the Bill is enacted,".

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On the other hand, I see the force of the question of the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby: why do they not act immediately and allow the dogs into Scott Park now or get some amendment of the present byelaw? If I may be allowed to draw the attention of the local council to what has been said, I hope that will go some way towards satisfying the noble Lord's point.
On Question, Bill read a third time, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

Pool Competitions Act 1971 (Continuance) Order 1983
3.48 p.m.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Elton): My Lords, I beg to move that the draft Pool Competitions Act 1971 (Continuance) Order 1983 laid before the House on 10th May be approved. The draft order has been considered by the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, which passed no comments thereon. The purpose of this draft order and the background to it will be familiar to those of your Lordships who have attended these debates in previous years. The Pool Competitions Act came into force on 27th July 1971 and set up a system of licensing and control, administered by the Gaming Board of the so-called charitable and sporting pools. These are competitions for prizes, depending on sporting events (essentially football matches) and run for the financial benefit of organisations supporting charities and athletics or games.
The Act was introduced following a judgment by this House in 1970 that a particular competition of this kind did not constitute lawful pool betting, as the promoters had supposed, but was, in fact, an unlawful lottery, because prizes were not in the main for making forecasts—an essential feature of lawful pool betting—but for holding or selecting numbers which happened to be lucky in a particular week.
The effect of this judgment on the charitable and sporting organisations supported by these competitions, such as the Spastics Society and the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, could have been severe. They derive substantial income from this source. The Pool Competitions Act 1971 was therefore introduced as a temporary measure to safeguard the interests of the charities and sporting clubs concerned. It did not permit new schemes to be launched. There were at the time 18 schemes, but the number has since diminished to six.
The Act was to have effect for five years, but under Section 8 of the Act there is provision for its extension by order for up to a year at a time. The Act has, in fact, been extended annually since 1976. Last year, the then Home Secretary announced his intention to lay further annual orders as necessary during the lifetime of that Parliament. A discussion document on the future of pool competitions had been sent to relevant organisations and a copy was also placed in the Library of your Lordships' House. Since then, the comments on the discussion document have been considered and officials have had further meetings with representatives of the promoters and beneficiaries under the Act.
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Your Lordships will not be surprised to hear that our consideration of this whole issue posed a substantial dilemma—the same dilemma that has faced all Governments since the inception of the Act. There has been criticism during these debates in previous years; sometimes directed at the lack of a permanent solution, sometimes at aspects of the schemes themselves. The difficulties posed by this seemingly small issue are, on closer examination, not insignificant.
Some might think that the Act should be allowed to lapse; that it was intended as a temporary measure; that it created a privileged position for those who benefit by and operate under it and that this anomaly should now be removed. They would say that there is no evidence of any demand to make such competitions more widely available and point to the clear and unambiguous recommendation of the Royal Commission on Gambling that the Act should be allowed to lapse. This course would result in some saving in Gaming Board expenditure. It would also mean an end to these annual debates in this House and in another place.
There certainly is some logic in this suggestion, but against that we must consider the sums which various charities would stand to lose. To take the same two examples, in 1982–83 the Spastics Society derived £553,000 from these competitions; and the Imperial Cancer Research Fund some £600,000. It would be a rash act to deprive such deserving causes of these substantial sums.
As an alternative to letting it lapse, others might argue for some form of permanent legislation, whether confined to the existing schemes or open to all. This would also avoid the need for annual renewals and annual debates and remove uncertainty about the longer term. They would point to the deserving causes which benefit. Such legislation could either make the existing Act permanent or improve on it.
If it were simply a case of making the 1971 Act permanent, confined as it is to the existing schemes, it would involve no additional work once the amending legislation was passed and would not result in any wider expansion of the competitions. On the other hand, to preserve and make permanent what is patently an anomaly would also have disadvantages. If it was confined to the existing schemes, it would be discriminatory and might be thought unacceptable to your Lordships. If the new legislation were, on the contrary, to open the schemes up to all, this would not be discriminatory, whether it was done on the basis of existing controls or better. This also would avoid the need for annual renewals and annual debates. It would, however, create a new gambling outlet for which there is no demand.
I should stress that the Gaming Board, who would have to monitor and control the competitions, are opposed to their becoming more widely available even with tighter controls. Such a course would have financial and manpower implications for the board and perhaps for the Home Office as well. Stricter limits on such aspects as prizes or expenses could affect the viability of some existing schemes and, paradoxically, reduce the sums paid to the beneficiary. For all these reasons we have decided that permanent legislation is not a sensible option.

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We have also considered whether these competitions could fit within the framework of the lotteries legislation. Some of the organisations operating under the Act run lotteries as well, but these are not as profitable as pool competitions. The prize limits for lotteries are considerably lower than the level of prizes available in pool competitions, and I do not think we should distort lotteries legislation simply to accommodate pool competitions. In any case, although the competitions are in essence lotteries, they nevertheless have characteristics of their own. I am advised that, in consequence, they would probably have to be dealt with as a distinct gambling activity in any permanent legislation.
Faced with this dilemma, the Government have decided that, subject to the draft order before the House being approved, further annual orders will be laid as necessary during the lifetime of this Parliament. This option has the support of the promoters and beneficiaries under the Act. They have come to accept that the prospect of permanent legislation with minimal changes to the 1971 Act is remote. In addition, by proceeding in this way we ensure that no new gambling outlet is created. Parliament will have the opportunity to review the position annually and to end these competitions when it wants to.
It might be said that this decision is based on mere expediency. I would rather call it pragmatism and remind the House that it was on pragmatic grounds that the Act was originally introduced. I doubt whether your Lordships would wish, any more than we do, either to deprive deserving causes of significant sums of money at a stroke or to perpetuate an anomaly for which there is no wider demand.
In presenting our intentions to the House, I should also emphasise that we do not see a long-term future for these competitions. The number of schemes has declined to six since the Act was passed and may well decline still further over the next few years. Despite the large sums that beneficiaries derive from these competitions, the amounts are declining as a proportion of their total income, and this trend seems likely to continue. There will come a point when we no longer feel justified in laying further renewal orders before the House. I would therefore beg those who benefit from the Act to use the opportunity provided by this statement of our intention to reduce still further their dependence on income from these competitions and to find and develop other ways of raising revenue. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 10th May be approved.—(Lord Elton.)
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, the House will be indebted, as usual, to the noble Lord the Minister for the clarity that he always employs when he explains even such difficult problems as lie in regard to an order such as this. I do not think that one commends oneself to the affection of the House on a hot afternoon like this, if one repeats what has already been heard and does not add a useful comment by doing so. So I merely intend to say this on behalf of my noble friends.
There is no doubt that allowing the Act to lapse would, indeed, harm very deserving charities. It is
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equally true that having permanent legislation for the reasons that were advanced by the noble Lord the Minister would not be a correct solution. For my part, I can see no good alternative to the continuance order procedure being invoked and the matter coming before your Lordships year by year. It is not a tidy way of doing things and your Lordships may not like it for that reason. But your Lordships' hearts are so warm that, knowing that deserving charities are benefiting year by year when you continue the order so long as it is necessary, will. I have no doubt, compensate your Lordships for an untidy procedure. In those circumstances, we support the Motion.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Lotteries (Amendment) Bill [H.L.]
3.59 p.m.
Lord Irving of Dartford: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. The House was good enough to give a Second Reading on 9th May to a similar Bill which I introduced then. But, as with all uncompleted Public Bills including Private Members' Bills, it died on the dissolution of that Parliament. The Government, in the form of the Home Office and the Department of Trade, gave support to the Bill then and the noble Lord, Lord Glenarthur, was good enough to say that:
"the Bill was a modest Bill but one which could serve a useful purpose. It would open up a potential export market for some sections of the British printing industry". [Official Report,9/5/83: col. 377.]
He also said that if the Bill were to be reintroduced later in the summer the Government would continue to support the principle.
This Bill is to correct an anomaly identified in paragraph 12.201 of the final report of the Royal Commission on Gambling in 1978. The anomaly is prejudicing the export of material by certain firms in our domestic printing industry which specialise in the production of tickets for lotteries conducted wholly abroad.
There can be no justification for United Kingdom legislation penalising our export industry. This is not merely a theoretical fetter on export effort and potential but can be illustrated by one undertaking's performance. Since 1973, its export turnover, which recently rose to 41 per cent. of the whole, has totalled £10,783,000, and in 1981 it was £2,745,000 to 22 overseas countries, giving employment to 300 people. These achievements have been secured in the face of the strongest overseas competition and despite the effects of the recession.
The anomaly arises in Section 2(1)(a) of the Lotteries and Amusements Act 1976 and can be traced back through Section 42(1)(a) of the Betting, Gaming and Lotteries Act 1963 to the Lotteries Act of 1823, when, no doubt, exports were of much less consequence than they are today. The final report of the Royal Commission in 1978 could hardly have put the case for clearing the anomaly more forcefully and succinctly. In paragraph 12.200 it said:
"We received formal evidence from Kenrick and Jefferson, an old-established firm specialising in security printing, complaining that Section 42(1)(a) of the Betting, Gaming and Lotteries Act 1963"—

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which has become, as I have said, Section 2(1)(a) of the 1976 Act—
"as at present Interpreted, had prevented them from exporting lottery tickets. They said in their evidence: 'Being an ethical house we obey the law. At the same time we know that overseas lottery tickets arc printed in the United Kingdom, and subsequently exported'. Far from suggesting that the offenders be made to toe the line, it is our contention that the law should be changed in order that others may legally participate in this trade".
In the following paragraph the commission said:
"Our terms of reference are concerned with gambling in Britain, not with unnecessary hindrance to Britain's export trade. Nevertheless, it does seem absurd that a law which has remained unchanged since 1823 should he able to have this effect. We hope that the hindrance referred to by Kenrick and Jefferson will be quickly removed".
Moreover, the reality of the threat to the printing undertakings of this country is shown by the representations made by their overseas printing competitors to our industry's potential customers abroad, alleging that those undertakings are in breach of United Kingdom law in making printed lottery supplies. A letter dated 23rd June 1982, addressed to the Finnish Embassy commercial department from the European representative of an American printing company, actually threatened that if the British printing company got the order they, an American company, would initiate a prosecution in this country against them. On the last occasion I said I thought this was an impertinence. Whatever it is, I am sure it is a situation which ought not to be allowed to continue. There is also no virtue in our police authorities being required to investigate complaints of this nature—as, indeed, has occurred.
It can he added that the present anomaly in Section 2 of the Lotteries and Amusements Acts 1976 is contrary to the Treaty of Rome as—and I quote from the treaty—
"disguised restriction on trade between Member States".
Article 36 of the treaty says:
"The provisions of Articles 30 to 34 shall not preclude prohibitions or restrictions on imports, exports or goods in transit justified on grounds of public morality, public policy or public security; the protection of national treasures possessing artistic, historic or archaeological value; or the protection of industrial and commercial property."
This is the point. It says:
"Such prohibitions or restrictions shall not, however, constitute a means of arbitrary discrimination or a disguised restriction on trade between Member States".
The terms of the Bill have been limited strictly to curing the acknowledged anomaly. The source of the problem is in the opening words of Section 2(1):
"Subject to the provisions of this section, every person who in connection with any lottery promoted or proposed to be promoted either in Great Britain or elsewhere"—
"or elsewhere" are the two offending words—
"shall he guilty of an offence".
Put shortly, the new subsection (2A) proposed in the Bill removes the offences of printing and selling material to the promoters of any lottery conducted wholly outside Great Britain. It does not, for example, tamper with the offence of distributing in Great Britain tickets or chances in a lottery promoted outside Great Britain, such as the Irish Hospitals Sweepstake, for which tickets cannot be sold here.
It has been made clear that the Department of Industry and the Home Office are fully in sympathy
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with the modest purpose of the Bill, and the drafting of the Bill has been undertaken in consultation with their officials. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Glenarthur, asked that a technical amendment should be made at the Committee stage. I have incorporated that amendment in the new printing of the Bill.
What is plain is that, for the safeguard of the export potential of this sector of our printing industry, this alteration of the law is urgently needed. It should not await the uncertainty of the timetable for any future Government measure in this field. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord Irving of Dartford.)

EC Fishery Ministers: Brussels Meeting
4.7 p.m.
Lord Belstead: My Lords, with the leave of the House, I will repeat a Statement being made in another place by my right honourable friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food:
"With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement on the Council of Fisheries Ministers meeting in Brussels on 11th and 12th July.
"Together with my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Scotland and my right honourable friend the Minister of State in my department, I represented the United Kingdom.
"After further lengthy discussions the council could not reach agreement on the package of proposals for total allowable catches, quotas, associated conservation provisions and structural implementing measures which were under consideration. Nor was it possible, because one member state invoked its vital national interest, to reach agreement on interim measures which would have permitted fishermen from member states and from Norway to continue fishing for North Sea herring.
"However, the principal problem was on North Sea herring and it was agreed that a commission group of experts should be asked to carry out an urgent study of the allocation of quotas for this stock. This is a technical study and it is clearly established that the group will be concerned only with the application of the criteria laid down in the council declaration of 30th May 1980. The work will he completed in time to report to the council at its next meeting, now scheduled for 25th and 26th July. In the meantime, fishing for herring in the North Sea by those member states who have exhausted their interim quotas and by Norway will cease.
"I took the opportunity to press the commission on the need for more rapid implementation of the arrangements for enforcement. I am glad to say that the commission undertook to have at least some of their inspectors in post by the end of September and to have logbooks in operation before 1st November. These will he significant steps towards more effective control to which I attach considerable importance".
That, my Lords, concludes my right honourable friend's statement.
4.9 p.m.
Lord Bishopston: My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement which has been made in the other place. I shall put to him one or two questions as briefly as I can. I believe that they cover the main aspects of concern. Is the Minister aware that the House will view with some concern the breakdown of the arrangements announced as recently, as 13 days ago? Does he recall that on 1st July the Minister said that the common fisheries policy as a whole laid the ground for a fisheries policy for the next 20 years and that he was optimistic? That was despite the arrangements announced as recently as January.
On inspection, which is a most important point, does the noble Lord not agree that all the arrangements within the EEC member states are ineffective if there is inadequate policing by EEC members and by the United Kingdom? As the noble Lord knows, the United Kingdom has a very special interest because the fish are in what we still term as "our" 200-mile limit. What special action will the Ministry's fisheries protection vessels be taking—including the use of Nimrods? I noted in the newspaper today that Nimrods may not be used because they cannot fly low enough, although that statement is not borne out by my own experience of Nimrods when I had responsibilities for fishing.
With regard to trans-shipping, is the noble Lord able to say what checks are made in respect of the trans-shipping of fish to third country vessels, and what inspection is made of quota catches, whether they are trans-shipped or landed by member states? With regard to Scotland and herring—a most important aspect—is the Minister aware of the deep concern felt by our fishing industry as to its uncertain future and as to the need to reach an agreement to protect the industry's interests, especially off the West Coast of Scotland and in northern and central parts of the North Sea? Is the noble Lord able to say what consultation has taken place with the industry?
When it comes to the general fisheries policy, it is quite apparent that although the Statement deals with matters of immediate concern—such as herring—the Minister has admitted, in the very first paragraph of the Statement, that there has been no agreement with member states on a number of important aspects of the CFP. Can the noble Lord say what hopes he has in that direction?
Finally, I note from the last paragraph of the Statement it is suggested that no action may be taken on enforcement until, possibly, the end of September or from the 1st November—this is rather a long period at this troubled time, when every one of the member states is pressing for a share in the allocation. Will the Minister also bear in mind that, as two-thirds of the fish in EEC waters are within our 200-mile limit, we have a very special interest in the future of our industry, and that this needs to be borne in mind in any settlements which are arrived at?
4.15 p.m.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, I too should like to thank the noble Lord the Minister for repeating the Statement—which reveals what one can only call a frightful mess. 1 should first like to ask the noble Lord
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if he does not agree that we really must achieve majority voting when it comes to these vital questions. I do not know whether this is more of a reluctant compromise, but it is high time that we had majority voting or nearly unanimous voting. For just one country to upset the whole apple cart continually is not good enough if we are ever going to get anywhere; I assume that the one nation is Denmark.
I should also like to ask the Minister whether he is satisfied that the arrangements for the control of industrial fishing are satisfactory, because my information from the trade is that one really cannot control matters if one does not know what they are sucking up. The latest demand to separate the herring indicates the kind of catches that they make, 'to the immense detriment of the herring in the North Sea. As the North Sea has been over-fished for years—and we had a ban on it for a great many years but have now opened it again—can the noble Lord tell us whether the scientists are entirely sure that the quota was justified and whether they will be consulted by the commission of experts who are to fix the quotas in trying to allocate the quotas for agreement on 25th and 26th July?
Finally, is it not extraordinary that we set off to fish for this immensely scarce resource, which has been in great trouble, and yet there are no enforcement measures in being to enforce? Is there any truth in the newspaper reports that the Dutch are simply filling up their holds and proceeding home without regard to any quota whatsoever? It appears that the Minister's concern over enforcement is a little late, and I hope that he will be able to push the point very hard at the next meeting of the council.
Lord Belstead: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Bishopston and Lord Mackie of Benshie, for what they have said—albeit not without criticism—about that which occurred at the Fisheries Council on 11th and 12th July. The first point I would make in reply to the noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, is that the problem over herring, on which the meeting of three days ago foundered, does not mean that the common fisheries policy has foundered. It was always recognised that the setting of the North Sea herring quotas would be very difficult. Although that has proved to be the case, the other major advances, made on such matters as quotas other than for herring, access, technical conservation measures and structural assistance to the industry from the commission, are still valid and very much in place.
I agree with both noble Lords that an adequate inspection policy is needed. The noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, asked a specific question about what we are doing. The noble Lord will know very well from his own ministerial experience that the protection services are divided into five equal parts. All are vigilant at the present time so far as the weather allows them to be—and the noble Lord himself made the point about the restrictions on flying that there are from time to time. All I would say on the question of enforcement is that we attach importance to the undertaking that was given in response to my right honourable friend's initiative at the council about getting on with the setting up of the inspectorates, to be in place by the end of September.

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If the noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, will forgive me, I really must write to him with regard to the point he raised about trans-shipment, because I do not have an answer to that. But on consultation with the industry, perhaps I might return to the first point I made: that, of course, the consultation arrangements between my right honourable friend and the industry are, I hope, in as good working order as ever. I assure the noble Lord that we are not talking about a different situation now, so far as general quotas are concerned. We are talking about being unable to reach an agreement on the total yearly quota for herring at the present time. Without that, it was not possible to achieve an agreement on the whole package comprising all the other parts of the common fisheries policy. The Government hope very much that when the council re-assembles on 25th and 26th July these matters will be sorted out.
May I say in reply to the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, that I understand absolutely why he made the point about majority voting; but in case there is any misunderstanding, my understanding is that quotas are decided under Article 43 of the treaty—and that means by majority voting. Nonetheless, the Luxembourg Compromise was on this occasion invoked by Denmark. Her Majesty's Government have made their position clear on the Luxembourg Compromise, and that remains unchanged.
The noble Lord also asked me about the view of scientists. It seems to me that this is a matter which should be discussed within the council, and for evidence to be given by the commission to the council. The right thing for me to do on that point is to draw to the attention of my right honourable friend that which the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, has said, so that my right honourable friend will have his comments in mind when he travels to Brussels once again in 10 days' time.
4.19 p.m.
Baroness Hornsby-Smith: My Lords, while thanking my noble friend for repeating the Statement made in another place, may I ask whether he is aware that although this may deal only with herring, it had been a bitter blow to the fishing industry, which has such high hopes of the general EEC agreement made only a few months ago? If the Danes can get away with herring, then before long it will be another type of fish—and this is the fear of the trawlermen around our coasts.
Can my noble friend say what representations have been made either through the EEC or directly to the Danish Government? They, according to reports, have not only over-fished their own quota but have taken so many herring that they have the entire quota for all the EEC countries. It really is quite intolerable that this should have been allowed to go on when we have gone to such lengths to try to conserve herring. Perhaps if the Government do not feel able to go through the long and bureaucratic processes of the EEC they might take note of a trawlerman's comment, "I have told my wife that I will divorce her if she buys any more Danish bacon". If we stopped buying Danish bacon they would soon stop taking our herrings.
Lord Belstead: My Lords, I think it is important for me to make the point to my noble friend that those
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member states which have exhausted their interim quotas have had to stop fishing, and other member states will have to stop fishing as their interim quotas become exhausted. The daily catches reports are published; and all your Lordships will have seen, as I have, the reports in the newspapers today, which make it sound as if there is not very much moving in the North Sea so far as herring fishing is concerned. This again underlines the importance of the undertaking which my right honourable friend the Minister managed to secure at the council so far as concerns getting the inspectorates properly set up immediately. So far as my noble friend's general point is concerned, as to what is to be done, we really must wait for another 10 days until the 25th and 26th July; certainly the United Kingdom will be doing its very best to see that the whole package is agreed on that occasion.
Lord Glenkinglas: My Lords, will my noble friend thank his right honourable and honourable friends for the efforts they have so far successfully made? Will he ask them to bear in mind that it is not only the lack of herring which most of us feel rather strongly about, but also the lack of a great deal of employment opportunities which have been created in Aberdeen, Peterhead and Fraserburgh to process the herring and give employment and pleasure to the people who work and to people who eat the herring? Would my noble friend ask his right honourable and honourable friends to do everything they can within reason to frustrate the Danes, who have already tried to ruin salmon fishing?
Lord Belstead: My Lords, I will certainly draw the attention of my right honourable friend and my honourable friend, who have both been attending the council, to the words of my noble friend Lord Glenkinglas; and also to the importance which, he quite rightly reminds the Government, attaches to this matter so far as employment is concerned.

Lotteries (Amendment) Bill [H.L.]
4.24 p.m.
Second Reading debate resumed.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, all of us will want to pay a tribute to the pertinacity and indeed the expert speed with which my noble friend has operated, because on 9th May this year (at col. 377 of Hansard) he concluded the proceedings on the Second Reading of this Bill in that Session with the words:
"I cannot hope that the Government might find time for the Bill before the end of this Parliament, but I will certainly be back with it in the next Parliament".
And here he is moving this Bill for which he has taken responsibility.
The issue is a very simple one but a very real one, certainly for printers in the United Kingdom. It is this: whereas lotteries are controlled in this country when they are run in this country, and they are controlled by legislation, and whereas foreign lotteries not within the control of this country are forbidden to operate in this country, we have by some mismanagement of legislation procured a position where printers in this country cannot without breaching the law—indeed, without committing a criminal offence—print lottery

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tickets or advertisements for lotteries which are run abroad.
It is interesting to see how this sort of thing can occur and go on for a long period of time. My noble friend indicated that the source of the trouble was an Act of 1823. It so happens that there was an Act in 1976, and your Lordships might have thought that the matter would have been raised then. But the 1976 Act was a consolidation Act, and, as your Lordships will know, consolidation means consolidating what is there and not amending what is there. There was an Act previous to that, in 1975, but that dealt purely and specifically with the instruction of local authorities in the management of lotteries, so that was not a suitable Bill to deal with this. Before that there was an Act in 1963, and that, too, was a consolidation Act. so that was not a medium for putting right this wrong, either.
But I should not like your Lordships to think that in the past we have been so unintelligent or so lacking in initiative as not at least to raise this problem in the 20th century. It was in fact raised in 1934, on a Bill which dealt with lotteries and gaming. by none other than the Duke of Atholl. On that occasion, on 31st May 1934 (at col. 719 of Hansard), the Duke of Atholl raised the matter on a Bill which dealt with these matters and said:
"Supposing there was a sweepstake in some foreign country: there is no reason why our printers should not print the tickets so long as they are honest people and it is not against the law in this country. I am not quite certain whether it is covered in a later Amendment I am going to press.".
The Marquess of Londonderry was in charge of that Bill for the Government, and he was completely put off by a noble Lord who had the title of Viscount Bertie of Thame. He interrupted his line of thought by an entirely different question which your Lordships may not think was in the slightest degree relevant. He said:
"May I ask the noble Marquess whether foreign premium bonds which might be printed in this country for foreign Governments would not come under this Bill?"
That seems to have put the Marquess of Londonderry completely off of his stride, because he said that he would make inquiries into both matters.
I have tried to do some research, but no answers to those inquiries seem to have emerged in 1934. So, as I ventured to say on a previous occasion, that is a lesson for all of us in your Lordships' House: when you ask a Minister a question, it is rather necessary, especially when he says he is going to look into it, and especially so when that occurs on Committee or Report stage, to bear in mind that that may only be an excuse for seeing that your question is never in fact answered or your amendment never dealt with. That was the lot of the Duke of Atholl when he raised this matter in 1934. Here we are, 50 years later, trying to put right what, if only his question had been answered then, might have been dealt with on that occasion.
There is no doubt that it is right that this Bill should receive a Second Reading. I do not think I need add anything to the remarks of my noble friend to persuade your Lordships to vote for the Second Reading.
Lord Elton: My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Irving of Dartford, on introducing this Bill,
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and, on grounds similar to those already adduced, I am glad to inform the House that the Government support both its purpose and its content.
When the noble Lord introduced a similar Bill last Session my noble friend Lord Glenarthur said that the Government supported the Bill in principle but that there were some amendments they would wish to see made. The noble Lord pronounced himself willing to accept these and they are incorporated in the Bill now before your Lordships' House. The noble Lord has been kind enough to proffer his thanks for the assistance he received. I should emphasise that the amendments do not alter the purpose of the Bill.
There is little new I can say about the Bill. As the noble Lord, Lord Irving of Dartford, has told your Lordships, its purpose is to remove a restriction in the Lotteries and Amusements Act 1976 to enable printers in Great Britain to print and supply lottery tickets and associated lottery material such as advertisements for use in the promotion of a lottery wholly outside Great Britain. It is, at present, an offence under the 1976 Act to print any ticket for use in a lottery promoted, or proposed to be promoted, except as provided for in that Act. Lotteries promoted outside Great Britain are, as provided by the Act, unlawful. This is not a new restriction but is one that has existed, as the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, said, for many years.
The restriction on the export of lottery tickets no doubt made sense when such export was perhaps the first stage before re-importing the tickets to this country as spurious foreign lottery tickets. However, such a restriction no longer seems appropriate when many countries run large national lotteries of their own; lotteries, moreover, which require specialised printing of a kind which British companies can provide.
The existing legislation was never intended to prevent or restrict legitimate commercial export activities; indeed, we are anxious that it should not. But it is important that any relaxation in the law, such as that proposed in this Bill, should not undermine the controls which protect the public. We therefore had to be satisfied that there were adequate safeguards to ensure that tickets for foreign lotteries could not be distributed in Great Britain or simply exported and then imported. That has been achieved. We have consulted the Gaming Board, which has no objection to the proposals in the Bill.
Although this may appear to be a modest Bill it is one which nevertheless could serve a most useful purpose by opening up a potential export market for some sectors of the British printing industry. That can only be good.
I leave it to the heir of the Duke of Atholl, to whom the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon referred, to convey any necessary thanks to him for his comments. I conclude by again congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Irving of Dartford, for introducing the Bill, and I wish it a safe passage through your Lordships' House and through another place.
Lord Irving of Dartford: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Elton, for his support of the Bill and for the felicitous terms in which he has given that

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support. Like him, I hope that the Bill will have a safe passage through this House and through another place.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

Appropriation (No. 2) (Northern Ireland) Order 1983
4.32 p.m.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (The Earl of Mansfield)The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (The Earl of Mansfield) rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 23rd June be approved.
The noble Earl said: I beg to move that the draft Appropriation (No. 2) (Northern Ireland) Order 1983, which was laid before this House on 23rd June, be approved. The order is being made under paragraph 1 of Schedule 1 to the Northern Ireland Act 1974.
The purpose of the draft order is to authorise the issue of £1,483 million out of the Consolidated Fund of Northern Ireland and to appropriate this sum for the purposes shown in the schedule. Noble Lords will recall that sums on account amounting to £1,139 million have already been appropriated for 1983–84 by virtue of the Appropriation (Northern Ireland) Order 1983, which was approved by your Lordships' House on 14th March. The House is now being asked to approve this further sum of £1,483 million, which represents the balance of the 1983–84 Main Estimates for Northern Ireland departments and brings the total Main Estimates provision for the year, therefore, to £2,622 million.
The Main Estimates represent the detailed spending plans of Northern Ireland departments for this financial year. These plans were set out in broad outline in the Northern Ireland section of the Government's Public Expenditure White Paper which was published in February and in the statements of 14th December 1982 and 1st February this year by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.
Detailed information can be found in the Estimates volumes themselves, copies of which have been placed in the Printed Paper Office. Noble Lords will note that the information contained in this year's Main Estimates has been expanded in order to give more informative details of the services being provided.
Noble Lords have indicated in the past that these debates could and should give an opportunity to take a broad view of Northern Ireland's expenditure plans and some of the policies underlying the plans. First, on the broader front, I am sure that your Lordships are well aware that the Government's overall priority in Northern Ireland has been, and remains, the maintenance of law and order. However, it is expenditure on economic, social and environmental programmes in Northern Ireland with which we are concerned in the draft order before us. In national terms, policies are designed to provide a sound basis on which to generate economic improvement and sustained growth, and Northern Ireland must operate within this national strategy. Within Northern Ireland we are continuing to give priority within these programmes to measures designed to promote viable long-term new jobs and to
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maintain existing ones. In the social and environmental fields we have selected housing as the third area of priority in Northern Ireland services. I will, of course, say more about our efforts in these areas.
First, let me turn to agriculture, which is the largest single industry in Northern Ireland. Expenditure on fisheries and forestry is covered in Class I of the Northern Ireland Estimates, and total provision for this year amounts to some £63 million, covering a whole range of agricultural services—education, research and development, drainage, fisheries, forestry and support to the agricultural industry.
I should make it clear to your Lordships' House that the necessary provision for the special measures amounting to £12 million of aid to the industry announced by my honourable friend the Minister of State in January last is not contained in the Estimates now before us but will be taken in Supplementary Estimates. Pending approval of Supplementary Estimates, expenditure on these measures will be met by advances from the Northern Ireland Civil Contingencies Fund.
Trade, industry and employment services are covered by Class II of the Estimates, which, of course, brings us to the related problem of unemployment, which we must face and which will undoubtedly be discussed here this afternoon. It is right that we should do so. After law and order, unemployment is the major problem of our time, and has particularly been so in Northern Ireland.
In our efforts to encourage investment in the Province, we have established levels of incentives and support for industry which are unrivalled in the rest of the United Kingdom. Details of the various incentives available and the amounts provided for each are to be found under Votes 1, 2 and 3 of Class II in the Estimates.
In March of this year the Government introduced a series of new measures which strengthened the package of incentives even further. We introduced a tax incentive; we abolished the rates on industrial property; and we introduced new schemes to encourage improved efficiency in local industry. This constitutes a carefully balanced package which we believe represents an excellent basis for encouraging future investment.
Inevitably it will take some time before these new measures begin to bear fruit in the form of new investment and new jobs. In the meantime, the Industrial Development Board will continue its efforts to promote new jobs in the Province. Noble Lords will be aware of the IDB's strategy document, which was published earlier in the year and which sets out its short-term objectives and targets. The board is energetically pursuing those objectives and building up its contacts with industry at home and abroad. Special emphasis is being given to encouraging local companies to improve the design and marketing of their products: in this context, the IDB has mounted a series of seminars designed to bring together local companies and potential buyers.
On the small firms front I would mention the work of the Local Enterprise Development Unit. Since its formation in 1971. LEDU has, against a difficult economic and political climate, promoted over 15,500

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jobs in the Province. I have already visited the unit and met its senior executives. I may say that I found their commitment and efficiency most impressive. The unit last year formulated a strategy for the next three years which, through the introduction of innovative incentives and more aggressive marketing, aims to increase its job promotion potential. Indeed, the implementation of this strategy has already seen, in the last financial year, the promotion of some 2,550 jobs. This represents the highest number of job promotions achieved in any year since the unit came into existence, and it is from this platform that I hope to see LEDU achieve even more commendable figures in the current and subsequent years.
Noble Lords should be aware that these Estimates contain only a token provision for support to Harland and Wolff. Because of very difficult market conditions and uncertainty over future orders, Ministers have not yet taken decisions on Harland and Wolff's funding requirement for the full year. In the meantime the company is being funded on an interim basis. We hope to decide within the next few weeks on total funding for the year, and the House will be advised of the outcome as soon as possible. A Supplementary Estimate will follow in due course.
While we must continue to give priority to the development of permanent viable jobs in the private enterprise sector, the Government recognise the need for shorter-term measures to help counter unemployment. In Class II Vote 5—functioning of the labour market—some £100 million is sought to cover the whole range of employment and training services provided. Within this range of services which exist with this objective, I should like to refer particularly to the Action for Community Employment Scheme, or ACE as it is more commonly known. This offers substantial financial aid to sponsors who undertake either a full-time or part-time basis—people who have been unemployed for a year or more. The help offered is a 90 per cent. subsidy on wages and an overheads allowance. In order to protect jobs the projects must be additional activities which would not be done within a reaonsable period in the absence of the scheme.
Hence the community benefits in two ways: by the opportunity for longer-term unemployed to return to useful work and by the tangible benefits and amenities created under the guidance and through the involvement of local people. The response of the community to this scheme has been very encouraging. Currently over 1,000 projects have been approved, which account for over 2,500 people already in employment, and a further 900-plus jobs are on the way; and we are well on the way to meeting the scheme's target of 4,000 jobs by next year. The cost of this scheme in 1983–84 is estimated to be £10.4 million.
I should now like to turn, to what I have already referred to as the third priority area in Northern Ireland—housing—which is covered in Class V in the Estimates. As I have stated earlier, and as noble Lords will already be aware, the Government have afforded top priority among their social and environmental programmes to tackling the serious housing conditions in Northern Ireland which have been well catalogued
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and described over the years. Noble Lords will also recall that, reflecting this priority and the strategy for reducing unfitness and for shortening the urgent waiting lists which have evolved from it, expenditure on housing has increased substantially in recent years. The provision now sought for housing underlines the Government's continuing commitment to the Province's housing needs and the programmes necessary to implement the agreed strategy. This present provision of over £180 million provides real evidence of the Government's determination to help the Housing Executive make inroads into the Province's housing problems through a twin attack on unfitness and the urgent element of the waiting list. The high levels of expenditure on housing are also of major significance in sustaining employment in the Province's construction industry.
In the current year the Housing Executive hopes to achieve its target of letting contracts for 4,500 new public sector dwellings. Thus, expenditure on new building should rise from the 1982–83 outturn of approximately £93 million to something over £100 million. The drive to improve the Housing Executive's own stock will also continue, but expenditure is expected to settle back somewhat from the peak of£69 million achieved in 1982–83 to about £58 million as part of the process of achieving stable programmes. Expenditure on house renovation grants will increase from £34 million in 1982–83 to about £40 million in 1983–84, but, in spite of this, demand for grants is now outstripping the available resources. As a result the Housing Executive has had recently to introduce a priority scheme of granting approvals.
The allocation to the voluntary housing movement reaffirms the Government's commitment to that sector and recognises the important contribution that housing associations are making to the housing effort. The provision (that is to say, £38.2 million) will enable expenditure on schemes for inner-city rehabilitation and provision for special needs, such as for the elderly and handicapped, to be increased from £21 million in 1982–83 to £25.2 million in the current year. In addition the allocation will, together with anticipated receipts from sales of equity, enable expenditure by the Northern Ireland Co-ownership Housing Association on its equity-sharing scheme to rise from £8½ million in 1982–83 to £15 million in 1983–84.
The Government are confident that the impact of the housing strategy, including the very considerable effort now being made by the private sector, will result in substantial improvements to Northern Ireland's housing conditions. As noble Lords will be aware, the Estimates also provide substantial sums for the other social and environmental programmes. For example, over £550 million is required for education, libraries and arts services, while just under £580 million is sought for health and personal social services.
I should like to conclude these opening remarks by saying something about the work of the Northern Ireland Assembly. The Assembly was elected last October and is carrying out its consultative and deliberative functions effectively and conscientiously. The work that it has completed is impressive and includes considering and reporting on draft Orders in Council, statutory rules and Government discussion

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papers. When reports have been approved by the Assembly, they have been laid before Parliament.
My right honourable friend the Secretary of State has twice addressed plenary sessions of the Assembly and other Ministers have spoken on seven occasions. The six departmental committees of the Assembly have met the Ministers responsible for their respective departments on a total of 14 occasions as part of the process of establishing a frank and constructive dialogue between the Government and elected representatives. The committees have, in addition, received written and oral evidence from a wide range of interested groups and have made fact-finding visits to several locations within Northern Ireland and on one occasion to Great Britain. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State has met the Security and Home Affairs Committee of the Assembly once, although security responsibilities are not among those currently available for devolution. All this work is valuable, and the Government hope that in time the elected representatives of all the constitutional parties will come together to seek agreement on devolution in the Assembly.
As your Lordships know, this is the first occasion on which I have had the opportunity to open one of these appropriation debates. In these remarks I have tried to outline reasonably briefly the main features of the draft order before us and to expand upon some of the main policy issues underlying the provision sought.
I believe that on these occasions it is normal for noble Lords to express their views on a great many matters affecting Northern Ireland, and at the end of the debate I shall try to reply to as many as possible of the points which are raised. I shall, I know, be greatly assisted by those noble Lords who have kindly taken the trouble to let me have in advance an indication of the topics, or at least some of them, that they will be raising this afternoon, and I am very grateful to them. Any points which are raised but with which I do not manage to deal this afternoon will be the subject of correspondence in due course. It is in that spirit, so to speak, that I commend the draft order to your Lordships.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 23rd June be approved.—(The Earl of Mansfield.)
4.50 p.m.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, the House will be grateful to the noble Earl for the information that he has given regarding this draft order. I should certainly like to welcome the noble Earl in his new capacity. As Minister of State he has responsibilities in connection with all the Northern Ireland problems, and I am certain that the House will echo what he has said about the importance of agriculture to Northern Ireland. I gather that he is dealing in particular with Northern Ireland agricultural matters.
As the noble Earl has said, the booklet of estimates is a mine of information. In fact, one could speak for a very long time on practically all the items listed in the booklet. It shows the massive financial assistance that is given to Northern Ireland—over £2½ billion in the estimates as a whole. This reflects considerable public spending involving interventionist policies, grants policies and subsidies policies. I am not at all querying
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these, except to say that Treasury figures show that, for 1981–82, identifiable public expenditure, per head, was 47 per cent. higher in Northern Ireland than in the United Kingdom as a whole. As I say, I am not complaining about this. I should only like to see that policy transferred to the United Kingdom as a whole, though we realise that there are special problems in Northern Ireland.
Undoubtedly, all the development that can take place is welcome. That is why we gave support to the interim proposals brought forward in March. I believe that everyone will recognise that the problems of Northern Ireland are linked to the general economic problems of the United Kingdom as a whole. In particular, there is the problem of making Northern Ireland attractive to industrialists who may wish to set up business there, and that aspect is linked to matters with which we cannot deal this afternoon.
One point on which I have asked whether the Minister can give me some information relates to the heading Class I in the order and to agricultural support. I note under Vote 2, relating to animal health, Item A5, that last year expenditure arising from brucellosis was £1.2 million and from tuberculosis £0.6 million, whereas in the estimates for the forthcoming year those figures are more or less reversed. Obviously, those who are framing the estimates have to work on information given and plan in advance; and so I would ask the Minister whether the switch round, with more support to deal with tuberculosis and less support to deal with brucellosis, indicates something significant of which we should be made aware.
I want to raise another query regarding Class I, and I am sorry that, so far as I am concerned, this particular point has come up only within the past 48 hours and therefore I have not been able to give the noble Earl any advance notice of it. I gather that the food processing industries in Northern Ireland have been growing—and that will be generally welcome—but that they face the problem, which most food processing plants face, of seasonal supplies. There is the problem of how to maintain a steady flow of supplies, or alternatively how to cope with the problem of storage facilities, whether it involves vegetables or fruit—and in Northern Ireland the problem particularly concerns fish.
While I feel sure that there is a general welcome for the EEC grants to fishermen to assist them in their catches, which are a great help to the smaller Northern Ireland fishing ports, in many cases the processing plants are unable to store for some periods each year. This means laying off personnel, and often the cost of that is more in terms of unemployment benefit than would be the case if some financial assistance were given. I would ask whether the Government will look at the possibility of giving some assistance to the processing plants to help them over this problem—either aid to meet cash flow difficulties or help with the necessary storage facilities.
In Class II (trade, industry and employment) the total estimates provide for an overall decrease of £77 million. There may well be a simple explanation for this, but Vote 2—that is, general support for industry—is down 26 per cent. on the previous year.

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There is a decrease in loans to industry shown under Item A2 of £12 million. There is also a drop of a further £12 million in industrial development grants shown under Item A3. In view of the need for maximum industrial development in Northern Ireland. I would ask whether these decreases have any significance, bearing in mind the general problem of the economic situation of Northern Ireland and the appalling figures of unemployment.
I note from the Economic Assessment No. 37 of the Northern Ireland Economic Council, issued in April—which, incidentally, I felt contained a mass of very useful information—an unemployment figure of 115,000, or 21 per cent. If my memory serves me correctly, that is 9 per cent. more than the unemployment rate in the rest of the United Kingdom. The report to which I refer makes it absolutely clear that this figure takes in only claimants for benefit. It leaves out those who, for various reasons, do not claim, and those who are on special training and employment schemes.
In some areas of Northern Ireland the unemployment rate is over 30 per cent. In Strabane there is nearly 50 per cent. male unemployment, and one must recognise the conditions that must exist in an area with such an unemployment rate. The report shows that in September 1982 there were only 452,000 people in employment. 11,000 fewer than in December 1981. As I think I stressed during a previous Appropriation Order debate, there has been a great drop in the number of people employed in manufacturing industry in Northern Ireland. There are only 96,000 employed in manufacturing industry. That figure is less than the total number of people out of work. Between 1980 and 1982 manufacturing production fell by one-fifth. With these terrible figures—I shall not go through different areas—idle hands, together with all the other problems that exist in Northern Ireland, are obviously contributing to some of the difficulties that we have to face in other directions.
I note the conclusion of the report of the Economic Council that it is likely to be 1984, and possibly 1985, before there is any marked decline in unemployment. The report states:
"It will take several years to reverse the sharp decline which has taken place over the past few years".
It also states:
"Some radical and substantial economic measures will be required if the Northern Ireland economy is to move to a more normal situation over the next few years".
I note also, in the No. 1 issue of the IDB Northern Ireland News—that is, the Industrial Development Board for Northern Ireland—that attention is drawn to the staggering fact which I have already mentioned; namely, that in 1970 there was a total of 177,000 people employed in manufacturing jobs in Northern Ireland but by 1982 the figure had fallen to 95,000. I should like to quote from the No. 1 issue of the IDB Northern Ireland News:
"The staggering figure of 60,000 new job creations over the next five years would barely alleviate the situation".
It is for that reason that we have given support to the various measures which have been proposed by the
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Government to assist industrial development in different ways.
When we last debated the Appropriation Order in March, the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, said that he would peruse the document to which I referred, which had been issued by the Northern Ireland Committee of the Irish Congress of Trades Unions. I should like to know whether the noble Earl has been able himself to peruse the document and whether the Government have seen in that document some measures that could be adopted to assist Northern Ireland.
The noble Earl referred to the position of Harland and Wolff. I am not certain whether his comments were optimistic or pessimistic. He said that the Government would be looking at the situation and would report to Parliament. Does this mean that there is the possibility of orders for Harland and Wolff? Or is there grave doubt about the possibility of orders? I should like the noble Earl, if he can, to state exactly what is the situation.
We also raised in the last Appropriation debate the position of the Learfan company. Can the Minister report any progress? Has the certification of airworthiness yet been given by the United States Administration? I note also provision in the estimates of £7·3 million for Shorts. Can the noble Earl say whether the hiccup which I gather arose when United States representatives recently visited Shorts has been cleared?
I should like to mention a few matters relating to mineral exploration and energy. Under Vote 3, there appears the Item C4 on mineral exploration. The Times of 4th July carried a report that a Sheffield-based firm, Burnett and Hallamshire Holdings, has submitted a proposal for open-cast mining near Lough Neagh. It says that 300 million tonnes of coal are available. The cost of the work is stated to be £50 million and the company is said to be hoping to win approval for a pilot scheme within "the next few weeks". Is there any possibility of this? What is the actual position?
It would seem that the report refers to the lignite deposits, mentioned by myself and other noble Lords in our last Appropriation debate. On that occasion, the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, said that there were recoverable reserves of 100 million tonnes of lignite. We notice that the Sheffield-based company refers to 300 million tonnes. The noble Earl also said that the Government were currently looking into the possible use of these resources, particularly in view of the high cost of electricity generation in the Province. Any developments along these lines would be welcome. It is undoubtedly important that any coal or other deposits found in Northern Ireland should be developed.
I note in the Estimates that the high cost of electricity generation requires the provision of no less than £62.5 million subsidy to keep the charges to the level of the highest comparable charges in England and Wales. This links with Vote 1 of Class III, relating to the possible introduction of supplies of natural gas. This was debated on the last Appropriation Order. On that occasion the noble Earl. Lord Gowrie, said that, although broad understanding had been reached with the Government of the Republic in May last year,

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important issues remained to be resolved. I note that in a Commons Written Answer of 5th July this year, Mr. Adam Butler. Minister of State, said that discussions had not yet reached agreement. He emphasised that an early decision was required one way or the other because of the particular importance to the gas industry. With that, all noble Lords will, I think, agree. The Minister also said that arrangements were in hand for a meeting of Ministers of the North and South to deal with the matter. Can the noble Earl say whether actual plans have been made for this meeting, if it has not yet taken place, and what are the prospects?
This leads to the other energy problem. We understand that a report has been submitted by the National Coal Board on possible coal gasification. It is suggested that this production of town gas would be far cheaper than using natural gas. The snag, we understand, is that this could only be dealt with in Belfast.
There are three energy issues, lignite deposits, natural gas and coal gasification. I understand that an energy report was to be issued today by Northern Ireland Ministers. Naturally, I have not seen it. I hope that it will deal with these three problems. We have to ask whether there is a sound energy programme for Northern Ireland. There are three potentials to which I have referred. I should like to know whether there is a definite programme.
To revert to Class II, Vote 4 deals with tourism. All noble Lords will agree that tourism is important to Northern Ireland. Is there any particular reason for a decrease of two-thirds in the grants to catering compared with last year?
The noble Earl has referred to the provision of nearly £100 million for many schemes of training and temporary employment. I must emphasise that training is never wasted. It has great value when recovery comes. However, by itself, it does not provide any employment. Only measures for new employment can provide jobs for people undergoing training.
There is another matter in Vote 5 to which I should like to refer. In relation to the Fair Employment Agency, covered under D2, I note that the Irish Times carried a report which, it was claimed, was based on an article in The Listener,which I did not see, stating that, with one exception, every senior editorial post in television and radio in Northern Ireland was filled by Ulster Protestants. If this information is inaccurate, a reply by the Minister would be welcome. If it is correct, I must ask what action is being taken. Has the Fair Employment Agency been asked to look into the matter?
During the debate on the economy and industrial affairs on the Queen's Speech, the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, dealt with a number of points that had been raised about genuine and fake jobs. He referred to infrastructure projects in Northern Ireland. I should like to quote from columns 352 and 353 on 29th June, when the noble Earl said that the Prime Minister's point about sustainable employment,
"could not he better illustrated than by experience in Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland is a place where relatively small market towns arc linked by major motorways, admirably produced and enjoyable to drive along, but not capable of sustaining jobs once the infrastructure has been improved in that way. It is not S0 much a
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distinction between real and fake jobs, as that all jobs must be sustained by the wealth generated to create them". [Official Report,29/6/83; col. 352.]
Certainly, in the light of what the Minister has said this afternoon, he does not accept that as being justification for not moving on developing infrastructure in Northern Ireland. Expenditure of£99 million on roads, lighting and other services for the infrastructure has our full support. We hope that the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, was not suggesting that these were matters that should not be supported.
There are only a few points remaining that I wish to make. Class VI relates to water and sewerage. I regret that I have not been able to raise the matter in advance with the Minister. Northern Ireland has always made the most of its large supplies of water for industry, food processing, fishing and tourism. I am informed, however, that over recent months, there have been a growing number of complaints of water supplies affected by agricultural seepage from manure, cleaning of silos and so on. If this information is correct—the reports that I have been given suggest that it is correct—there would be great damage to a natural asset. There is need for action. I should like to know whether the Government have any proposals, if they accept that the complaints are justified.
I accept, on behalf of these Benches, everything that the noble Earl says about the value of the work of the Assembly and echo his hope that all parties will eventually co-operate. I agree that visits by Ministers and the reports that have been issued have been valuable. But, in view of some of the very substantial figures given in the Estimates—for example, roads and transport, £125 million; education, £557 million; water and sewerage, £78 million: and health and personal social services, £579 million—to what extent are the points contained in these Estimates matters on which the Assembly should give its views, and to what extent are some of the relevant points dealt with in consultation with district councils?
I come to my last point. I understand that there is a £60 million EEC package for new projects in Belfast. I also understand that £20 million will be spent in the current year and the balance of £40 million by 1985. My simple question is this: although these grants for new projects are to be welcomed, with whom will they be discussed? Will it be with the Assembly, with the Belfast Council or with whom? Naturally we welcome the order and I am certain that the Minister will do his best to answer the many points that I have raised.
5.11 p.m.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, I, too, should like to start by congratulating the Minister on his new job and on the way in which he has obviously worked hard to familiarise himself with the problems. I should also like to thank him and his department for the great trouble they took to assist and the hospitality they showed to, a visiting sub-committee of the EEC Scrutiny Committee, of which I am a member. We went to look at the special problems of Northern Ireland with regard to agriculture. It is that about which I should like to speak. I shall not follow the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, in his extensive and very valuable review of the whole field.

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However, I, too, regard the 40 per cent. extra money spent per head in Northern Ireland as very worthwhile in view of the extra problems which they experience in every field. These problems also apply to agriculture. The noble Viscount. Lord Brookeborough—a member of our sub-committee—persuaded the department to take us on a very thorough tour to show us these special problems which affect agriculture in Northern Ireland. As a result of my own experience I knew something about them before we went, and particularly that Northern Ireland was extremely hard hit when we went into the EEC and has not really been compensated for the damage done to its intensive pig, poultry and, indeed. dairy industries.
After the war Northern Ireland led the way in using its natural assets which for agriculture included a very good port at Belfast and its nearness to the United States and Canada, which were a source of cheap grain. It built up a considerable competent and efficient industry for the intensive production of livestock which, of course, was exported to this country. But when we entered the EEC all that changed and instead of being the nearest country to a source of reasonably cheap grain, it found itself the most distant country from the source of grain in Europe and, for example. in East Anglia. Since then it has operated at a distinct disadvantage compared to the rest of agriculture in the United Kingdom. I think that with great profit and assistance to the appalling problem of unemployment, the Government might assist rather more than they are doing in that area.
We went to see the poultry and pig production, and were very impressed by the competence of the family farms that we visited and, indeed, by the competence of the co-operative bodies which were doing the marketing and in some cases the financing. All of that is good. but it is extraordinarily difficult to overcome the extra cost of basic foods, which is due mainly to transport. I know that, for example, the Government assist with a subsidy on the transport of eggs to this country. but that is not the main cost of the transport—an egg is easy to transport. The main cost arises over the transport of food into Ireland. I also know that the Government have assisted with the cost of the transport of EEC wheat into Ireland. But I should like the Minister to give his views on whether it would not he fair for these competent and intensive farmers to receive a subsidy on transport. which at least would put them on level terms with the same producers in the rest of the United Kingdom.
The problem of unemployment will be exacerbated as more and more of these people and the processors go out of business. I am sure that that would not be profitable and, as the noble Lord. Lord Underhill. said. it would cost a lot less to keep them in business than the cost of unemployment benefit for the employees and farmers themselves.
The other factor which impressed us greatly was the competence of both the department and the small family farms of Northern Ireland. We were taken to see several of these farms and the people and the farms were very impressive. They were all small farms. A big farm in Northern Ireland comprises 100 acres, but very few people are employed. They are mainly family
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farms, and certainly the farms we saw are examples of the countryside and social set-up which many people would greatly envy. The small farms that we saw with these exceptional people—and they are an example which could he followed—were taking full advantage of the less favoured area grants to improve their farms. We saw some very well-equipped dairy farms. Most of the work was done by the farmers themselves, with the result that re-equipment did not cost them very much after grant. All that was involved was a great deal of hard work, which is a tremendous virtue. The set-up was good. The advice offered by the advisory services was obviously good. The dairy and pig production looked as though it would produce good food at a reasonable price and would maintain the structure in the countryside, which is necessary if the whole set-up is to continue.
I trust that the Government are helping the Northern Ireland department to extend the less favoured areas. We saw farms which were being turned over to the production of beef, again with the aid of the subsidy, part of which our Government pay and part of which the EEC pays. These farms were being turned into very competent units of agriculture and very desirable family units in the countryside. In other words, we saw a tremendous amount of good work going on, and I trust and hope that the Government will back the department in its efforts to extend the less favoured areas.
Drainage is probably the main problem. This is country with a very stiff and impervious subsoil which needs to be drained. But the farmers there recognise this and are willing to play their part in work and in money to get the land into a productive state. I think that it is enormously useful. I think that this is certainly far better than more people becoming unemployed, with the already appallingly high rate of unemployment in Northern Ireland. I congratulate the Minister on the competence of his department, and I trust he will ensure that his colleagues in the Government will give full backing to the excellent work that they are doing in that Province.
5.20 p.m.
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: My Lords, it is with great pleasure that I take part in this debate, being one of the Members of Sub-Committee D who visited Northern Ireland last week. One of the responsibilities which that Committee has taken—and I think others have too—is to visit the areas where we want to find out more about how things are going, and also to discuss with the people on the spot how the work of the EEC grants and EEC activities affect the area in which they are living and working.
Last year I was one of the small delegation which went to the South of Italy and an area in Provence in France which are also less favoured areas. It gives one an opportunity of studying closely what is being done through the CAP in many parts of the European Community, and I am sure it is a valuable experience. I should like to support all that the noble Lord, Lord Mackie, has said as to the interest which we had in what we saw in Northern Ireland. My impression was the same as his, that here was a small country struggling hard under difficult conditions, apart from the political conditions about which we all know all

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too well. It has also difficult conditions in the soil and its type of farming, and in my opinion they work extremely competently.
We saw there what family farms really mean. Just as in parts of Scotland, particularly the Highlands and the crofting areas, we all know about family farms, so in Northern Ireland I was tremendously impressed by the way in which these families are tackling their farms and working closely together with their neighbours and, above all, with the Department of Agriculture. I was impressed by the close liaison between the farming community and the Northern Ireland Department of Agriculture. In talking, as we all did, to the officials as well as to the farmers I felt strongly that here was really good co-operation, a really good combination, and that it was working extremely well.
We have discussed in your Lordships' House many times the different aspects of EEC agricultural policy, and also the policy connected with social developments in different parts of Europe. I felt strongly that in Northern Ireland, while I absolutely agree that everything that can be done to help from the common agricultural policy is well worth doing, certain aspects of agriculture and farming could be classified to some extent as also worth supporting from the social point of view.
It is clear that if the family farms in Northern Ireland were to founder in any way, or not to be able to carry the expenses and the work of the families, then it would be a disaster if those people had to give up. I presume they would simply have to go into the towns, Belfast or elsewhere, where there is already high unemployment, and the value of what had been done on the land would be lost. Not only that, but from a social point of view it would be a disaster.
One can look upon the assistance being given to the farmers in Northern Ireland not only from the point of view of what they produce, which is valuable and good. but also because it means that these people can live a happy and delightful life on those farms provided that they get some help for the cultivation, some help for the improvement, of both the housing and the land. I was impressed by the housing in these areas. I inquired how it was that the houses seemed to be so extremely good—and they were excellent—and I was told that this was one of the things which the Government in Northern Ireland in the past had been extremely keen to do.
In fact, someone told me that when the first Lord Brookeborough was Prime Minister in Northern Ireland he was offered help either for railways or roads. He discarded the idea of railways. He encouraged the development of roads and, above all, encouraged the grant aid to people to improve their houses. The result is that the housing we saw—we went to about 5 or 6 farms—was extremely good. The people living in these houses were obviously keeping them in excellent condition. It was a happy and satisfactory result of this policy which has been carried on there for a long time.
We were in the County of Fermanagh which, as your Lordships know, borders on Southern Ireland. I was impressed by the fact that I do not think I heard anybody talking politically to us about anything to do with agriculture, or making any sort of complaint about problems which obviously must arise there since
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we were on the border. They just live a perfectly normal life competently and efficiently, and in close co-operation with each other and with the agricultural organisation of the whole of Northern Ireland. I was tremendously impressed by this, and I thought that the help which they get through the various ways in which the EEC operates is very well worth while. I do not think that I have ever seen any assistance better used than what we saw in the short two days that we spent there.
The noble Lord, Lord Mackie, has mentioned the other places we went to. We saw, of course, the egg packing station, the piggeries, and so on, which are very well done too. We went to no less than two agricultural colleges, where again I had the impression that these were highly practical. The young people there were there because they were themselves engaged, or would be engaged, in their family farms. They were working closely together with the people running the colleges as well as with their own families and the work which they were doing on the land.
This development in Northern Ireland may cost a certain amount of money. We have heard from the noble Earl, Lord Mansfield, that a lot of money is involved in this, but it is well worthwhile. If all the money used in Government departments and elsewhere were as well spent as it is in Ulster I think that we should be very happy indeed. My impression was that here was a competent, well organised community happily working together. I hope that we shall continue to help Northern Ireland in every way we can, because I am sure it is a good investment, it is well worthwhile, and highly satisfactory from every point of view.
5.29 p.m.
Lord Dunleath: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Earl once again for having followed the precedent of the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, in writing to us in advance seeking our views as to points we might raise during this debate. I should also like to take the opportunity to welcome him to his new post in the Northern Ireland Office. I do not think that I have met him since we overlapped at the same house at school when he was in the library as the Viscount Stormont and I was a lower boy. I cannot recall whether I actually fagged for him, but if I did he cannot have been a hard taskmaster otherwise undoubtedly the experience would have marked itself indelibly on my mind. It was a great pleasure, therefore, to see him again when he came to address the agriculture committee of the Northern Ireland Assembly, appropriately enough at Stormont, a couple of weeks ago.
On the subject of agriculture, Class I, in Vote 2, reference is made to marketing and I should be interested to know if Her Majesty's Government have any new ideas in mind for the development and improvement of marketing in agriculture.
Turning now to the subject of less-favoured areas, which has already been mentioned, I took the liberty of raising this matter on the Appropriation Order on 14th March and the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, said that inevitably all boundaries carry the likelihood of dispute. Indeed, we have often referred to it as the

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"line of discontent". But I am wondering if the best course of action might not be to appoint an independent appeals body which would adjudicate on whether the areas classified as "less favourable" were fair and just.
Our dispute with Her Majesty's Government is that they appear to be delaying confirmation of their willingness to make their contribution to the cost of increasing the less-favoured areas. This was the impression we received from Mr. Dalsager when he addressed the agriculture committee a few weeks ago. I strongly stress that than early decision on this is necessary, because many farmers are losing money every month because—though they qualify to be included in the new less-favoured areas—the failure of Her Majesty's Government to persevere and pursue this matter to its conclusion means that they are still having to pay, for instance, co-responsibility levy which otherwise they would not have to do. I hope that the noble Earl will act as a new broom. As he will be aware, the total number of less-favoured areas in Scotland is 92 per cent. It may have been due to his influence that such a high percentage was realised in Scotland. If that is so. I hope he will employ the same magical touch now that he is responsible for Northern Ireland.
Under Class I. the only other point I make is that there may be an argument for setting up a contingency fund so that quick aid could be given to various farming enterprises when, season by season, they look like running into difficulties. I am thinking of last year about the potato growers. Soon after the Assembly started to meet, we were urging the setting up of a stock feed scheme for potatoes, to take surplus potatoes off the market. In the event that was introduced, but I respectfully suggest that it was far too late in the season. Had it been introduced early in the year, when it was apparent that there would be a surplus of potatoes, it would have made all the difference.
Under Class II, I welcome the assistance that has been given to industry as is reported in the Industrial Development Board's news: the corporation tax relief of up to 18 per cent. for new approved projects, 100 per cent. de-rating of industrial premises and so on. I also welcome the setting up of the IDB. It would not he fair of me at this early stage to ask the noble Lord what he thought the prospects for success of the IDB were, but I hope that the next time we have an appropriation order debate he may be able to give us some idea of his projected feelings about it.
One other thing under Class II that I would mention is that it might he desirable to carry over any under-spend from year to year, not only to recover the money that has not been spent but to encourage providence on the part of the departments, to remove the incentive to spend lavishly during the latter part of the year in order to spend the whole budget so that the allocation next year will not be reduced.
Under Class III the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, mentioned natural gas or coal gas. The Coal Board maintains that coal-generated gas is cheaper than natural gas from Kinsale. I am in no position to adjudicate on that. I merely say that an early decision is most urgent, because the gas industry is declining at an alarming rate.
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I diverge here for a moment, having been bold enough to mention the noble Lord. Lord Underhill. If I heard him right—I may not have because I was writing a note at the time he was speaking—I believe he said that there was an article in The Listener,which he had not seen and I have not seen either, claiming that in the entire broadcasting staff in Northern Ireland there was only one Roman Catholic. That is a most scurrilous allegation. if it was made. It does not take any great gift as a detective to realise that the head of religious broadcasting in BBC Northern Ireland is a Roman Catholic because he is a priest called Father Skelly. One of the chief news presenters for BBC Northern Ireland is a Roman Catholic. He is a personal friend, and there are many more who I know are Roman Catholics—but I have never been so impertinent as to ask because I consider that to inquire into people's religion is reverse discrimination.
To make an allegation of that sort is absolutely appalling, and if I were still a governor of the BBC—I have not been for over 10 years—I would urge a rigorous internal examination with the editor of The Listener to give evidence. As it is I shall make a point of obtaining a copy of that issue of The Listener and I shall make a strong complaint, perhaps even to the Press Council, because it has no right whatever to propagate totally erroneous and damaging information of that sort. I resent it extremely strongly.
Returning to the subject of the debate, under Class IV, I should be interested to know whether the road fund tax is able fully to fund road works in the Province. In other words, do road works have to be subsidised from other sources or is there a surplus from the road fund tax? Furthermore. I should be interested to know whether the new Foyle Bridge at Londonderry, over which there has been some controversy. is being funded from the road fund tax. If so, is the cost of it detracting from other normal road works?
Another point in this connection is that if there is to he no toll on the new Foyle Bridge, which is costing many millions of pounds. why then should there be a charge for using the water ferry to Strangford? Both, surely, are extensions of the road system. Why should an expensive bridge be free of charge when a comparatively inexpensive boat should bear a fee, which was recently approved to be increased by up to threefold over the next five years? Under the same class I should like to know (if it is possible for me to be told) when the new Belfast City rail link will be completed because this will greatly enhance the value of the Belfast to Larne railway line and will help to maximise the success of Northern Ireland railways, which had a surprisingly good year last year, showing a very respectable profit.
Under Class VI, I quite agree that river pollution must be tackled in a most rigorous manner. Farmers are blamed for the emission of slurry and silage effluent, but I should like to say—and I know this for a fact—that the complainants about polluted water courses are, in the majority, farmers and they complain to a certain extent because there are maverick farmers who are careless and who allow their silage effluent to escape into water courses. But there are other farmers who were ill-advised, perhaps unintentionally, when they originally constructed their slurry tanks or retention tanks or their farmyard

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drainage systems; because I think that neither they nor the Ministry of Agriculture (as it was then) advisory officers realised just how penetrating silage effluent can be. It is corrosive, it can find any hair-crack and it can cause far more damage than almost any other form of polluting effluent. It takes only a small quantity of silage effluent to make a river completely dead.
Therefore, I suggest that, whereas persuasion has been the main policy of the authorities up to now, persuasion should be continued but the farmers should be advised as to how they can prevent pollution. If they had been wrongly advised in the first instance on the lay-out of their farmyards and slurry and effluent disposal systems and were granted-aided for the same, they should once more be grant-aided to make modifications to prevent that problem from occurring in the future. If they fail to be amenable to that advice, they should be prosecuted without any hesitation whatsoever.
Under Class VIII I should just like to make brief reference to Lagan College. I am not asking any question about this subject because I realise that there may perhaps be negotiations in progress at the moment over its being awarded state-aided status, and I would not like to rock the boat. I would merely say that I hope that the department will take a favourable view of this. I would say to the noble Earl on the Front Bench that a very warm invitation would be extended to him or to any of his colleagues in the Northern Ireland Office if they would like to come and visit the college. We have had a number of visitors there, all of whom have been most impressed. I myself am most impressed—not least because the young pupils there are actually polite, which is something that one does not always find in schools nowadays, unfortunately.
In Class XI, the Northern Ireland Assembly has received reference in the debate this afternoon. I would endorse the opinion stated that it is doing a good job in its scrutineering role. There is still not complete accord as to how progress towards devolution should be achieved; but there is one thing that all parties in the Assembly have in common and that is their concern over security. Many of us ask why it is that recently an extradition treaty should have been agreed between the Republic of Ireland and the USA while we have so far failed to get the Republic's Government to agree an extradition treaty between themselves and the United Kingdom.
I have been told that the backing of warrants is in fact a closer way of dealing with extra-territorial terrorist situations, but I can only say that over the last years it has not proved to be effective. This is a matter where I think that all of us in the Assembly would like to see Her Majesty's Government putting on more pressure with regard to the Government of the Republic of Ireland so as to try to make sure that terrorists, from wherever they come, are brought to justice. Finally, I should like to thank the noble Earl and his colleagues for their attention to the affairs of Northern Ireland. Even if they are sometimes barracked when they come to address the Assembly, their presence there is in fact greatly appreciated.
5.46 p.m.
Baroness Ewart-Biggs: My Lords, I, too, should like to start by congratulating the noble Earl on his new
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appointment. It is very nice to welcome him to what can be rather a small group of noble Lords involved in Northern Irish affairs. Nevertheless, though quite small it is also select. So it is very nice to welcome him. I am certainly not going to make a long speech. I was not even going to comment on any of the details contained in the Appropriation Order; my noble friend Lord Underhill has done that very extensively. But I would like to take this opportunity to remark on one particular issue which very much influences Northern Ireland's economic state, and that is the Community funds which go to Northern Ireland. In so doing, I should also like to comment on that vexed question of additionality and to ask the Minister a particular question on it.
Additionality has long been a point of very great contention between the Commission and the national Governments, and it would certainly take a very much braver person than I to go into it in very great depth. But, as it relates to Northern Ireland, we are confronted with a very simple question; namely, whether European Community membership has meant that Community funds coming from the Community's social and regional development funds have afforded extra help for the development of the Northern Ireland economy over and above what might otherwise have come from the Exchequer or, on the other hand, whether it has not meant that.
The answer, in one instance, at any rate, is that it has meant that; and I think that it is a matter of great relief that the initiative which was launched in (I think) 1979 by the Northern Irish Members of the European Parliament to channel Community funds towards Belfast housing has come to fruition. The noble Baroness, Lady Elliot. waxed very lyrical about farmhousing in the countryside. But I fear that the same cannot be said for housing in Belfast. It is a very great relief to hear that £60 million from the European Community has been made available, that it has had the blessing of our European partners and that, although it is technically aimed at urban renewal, these funds will be used for improving Belfast's deplorable housing. Furthermore, it is perfectly clear that the Government have undertaken to ensure its additionality.
Having conceded that in this particular case European funds have indeed been treated as additional, we should perhaps now look at the whole principle of additionality with regard to Northern Ireland. But first it is important to point out that the problem really lies simply in the fact that the principle is regarded in a very different light as seen from Brussels, Whitehall and Northern Ireland. This, in my view, is what constitutes the misunderstandings and the mistrust which are so detrimental to a good relationship in this triangular partnership.
Thus, seen from Brussels, money in considerable amounts is committed to projects and schemes in the Province, which is recognised by the Commission as a hard hit area. These funds are therefore seen as a form of positive assistance, agreed by the European institution and based on an assessment of the region's true needs. It is most certainly meant as additional to whatever is provided by the national Government. But, as seen from London, these funds are regarded as a way to relieve the problems of the Chancellor of the

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Exchequer by giving him revenue with which to finance his spending.
In this context, in respect of Northern Ireland it has to be understood that there is a forward programme of Government spending which is quite separate from the other United Kingdom domestic Exchequer items. This spending programme does not necessarily increase as a result of any increase in European transfers into the Exchequer, based on Northern Irish applications. Thus, from London, this money—earmarked to make a contribution to the national Budget and thus only indirectly to regional policies—merely helps to sustain national aid to regions like Northern Ireland.
What it really boils down to is that, whereas on the one hand Northern Ireland is treated separately within the United Kingdom's domestic financial arrangements when dealing with Europe, on the other hand Northern Ireland is in fact but a small part of the United Kingdom/Europe package. The relevance of additionality therefore applies to the United Kingdom overall rather than to Northern Ireland, and while this may satisfy the Treasury it does not satisfy either the Northern Irish, who feel cheated of the funds they know were destined for them, or the Community, who feel that regions such as Northern Ireland should experience the direct benefit of these additional resources.
Therefore, arising out of this imperfect situation this is the suggestion I should like to put to the Minister. Does he not think that in order for funds to flow additionally to Northern Ireland from Europe changes could he made to permit the relevant departments of Government in Northern Ireland to provide the matching amounts necessary to attract European support in the first place from within the Northern Ireland grant in aid? That, of course, would constitute, from the Treasury's point of view, a difference in presentation as well as in principle; but it would not necessarily cost them any more. Also in European Community terms it could mean a significant step towards clarity and satisfying the mechanisms for the use of European Community moneys. Finally, from the Northern Irish point of view, it would make them feel as though they were being treated on their own needs, and they would thereby recognise the benefits of Community membership in a greater way.
This in turn—and I have said this before in your Lordships' House—would add to the trust and reliance that the Northern Irish people have in the European framework. They will find it perhaps a means of finding agreement on not only economic issues but eventually also more far-reaching matters and political issues, because one does not have to think very hard to realise that the Anglo-Irish framework has not provided a recipe which is entirely the right one.
Finally, my last point concerns the initiative suggested by the European Parliament last March to make an inquiry into the economic and social situation in Northern Ireland including the internal political crisis. Your Lordships will know, in spite of the rather unexpectedly harsh reaction of the British Government against this proposal, that Mr. Niels Haagerup, the very much respected Dane in whose
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hands the inquiry will lie, nevertheless intends to start his work in September. For my part, I certainly do not see this initiative as an interference. I cannot see anything in the least bit threatening about it. After all, as I have just been outlining, we are delighted to accept economic intervention—in the case I was mentioning, in the shape of £60 million to give the people of Belfast better homes—and we certainly do not look upon that as unwelcome interference. So I really do not think that the Government are in a very strong position in objecting to an EEC initiative which is designed to examine how their own money is being applied.
In addition, it must be true to say that the report will also serve to inform our European partners a little as to our problems in the Province. We often do not attract as much sympathy and understanding in this regard from our European partners as we should like, and such a survey can but promote an awareness which would help us. So I hope that the noble Earl the Minister can give us an assurance that the Government will see that Mr. Haagerup and his delegation will he accorded all the help and support that this important mission deserves.
5.56 p.m.
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, I am addressing your Lordships as another member of the EEC Sub-Committee D who had the privilege of making this recent trip to Northern Ireland. I was the food processor on the sub-committee and I rather suspect I was brought along by the farmers to teach me a little bit about farming; but, however that may be. I am sure that my arguments with them will continue. I, too, would like very much to congratulate my noble friend on his new appointment and to thank him and his department for their welcome. I should also like to thank my noble friend Lord Brookeborough, who set up the whole arrangement in the first place.
I have a few points to make; I shall not go over other ground. It is quite clear that the British Government are well aware of the problems of Northern Ireland and are doing the best they can to alleviate those problems in agriculture as well as in other areas: the sorts of figures that my noble friend and the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, produced show that to be the case. But the point of Sub-Committee D going there was, of course, to try to get the message through to Europe.
I hope very much that we shall find some way of having the results of our experience fitted into a report because, as your Lordships know, the reports of all our sub-committees are very well read throughout the Commission and indeed in the European Parliament. They are said to be among the most unbiased and well-informed reports that come from any of the Parliaments anywhere within the Community. So they have acquired a great standing and I would hope very much that we shall find a way to include our experience in a report. My own feeling is that it would be inappropriate to make a special report on Northern Ireland, but if we could find some reports referring to similar or related problems within the Community it may be that we could make a composite report on those parts of the Community where there are agricultural difficulties owing to their special position and their special location.

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My noble colleague Lord Mackie pointed out the sea transport difficulties and suggested that a subsidy might he made. I found myself very much recognising that difficulty when I got to Northern Ireland—though it was not my first visit by any means—by seeing it set against the farming problem, because it is exactly the same problem as we have in the Isle of Wight. It is now a very much greater problem than it was 30 years ago because of the almost staggering increase in the numbers of big lorries and roll-on roll-off ferries.
In earlier days the relative transport costs for different parts of the United Kingdom were not so marked because many of the ports around the coast found that the cheapest way of getting goods transported from one place to another was in small freighters. That meant they were in exactly the same position as the major areas such as Northern Ireland, which was cut off from the mainland, the smaller islands like the Isle of Wight, or indeed, as my noble friend will recognise, the smaller islands of Scotland for which he has recently had responsibility. The important point is that there is a much greater difference between transport costs for these more remote areas than there was 30 years ago and earlier. So it requires to be dealt with.
The Isle of Wight has exactly this problem, but on a much smaller scale. We were told about the cost of raw materials going into Northern Ireland, particularly when they have to import EEC grain instead of getting it across from North America at much reduced prices, and we, too, have that problem of getting raw materials in and then getting the finished products out. Again, we also have a higher unemployment problem, though happily it is not so marked. So it is a real problem and it particularly applies to Northern Ireland, because it is also at the periphery of the European Community in relation to what one might call the centre of gravity of the Community in the heartland of mainland Europe.
It was most useful to me as a food processor—albeit as a countryman, having been brought up in the country—to see farming close to. I learned a great deal, not only from the Northern Ireland farmers but also from my noble colleagues who farm too. I saw them poking things and digging in the ground, and the noble Lord, Lord John-Mackie, was not content to dig down into the clay, but dug even further to see how far it went. At one stage, I though that he would fall into a large hole. As an outsider, I was also extremely impressed. as was the noble Lord, Lord Mackie, by the competence of these farmers and by the way in which they coped with their difficulties, many of which are forced upon them by the disciplines of the common agricultural policy. The cheerfulness with which they viewed the issue was most heartening. They obviously had their difficulties, but there was a cheerful atmosphere which I personally much appreciated.
Nearer to my own speciality, if I may put it in that way, I was most impressed by the work at the Loughry College of Agriculture and Food Technology in County Tyrone, where the food technologists are positively seeking to develop new processed foods. Because of the costs of getting fresh eggs, for example, from Northern Ireland to the European Market, they are saying to themselves, "If we cannot economically get our fresh eggs out, let us find ways and means of
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processing them in a new way that nobody else has thought about, so that we can then sell the processed articles." They are encouraging entrepreneurs to set up and to develop the results of their scientific studies.
For example, they have packaged scrambled eggs. I do not think that all my noble colleagues much liked the scrambled eggs which we tasted, but it was a move in the right direction and a little more work could bring it on a little bit more. They are also doing things with the parts of a meat carcase which will not sell very easily, or which are not very pleasant in their original form. So they are doing a great deal of good in that respect.
The important point is that the researchers are taking the initiative. They are seeing a problem, they are taking the initiative and, having got the scientific work done, are then going out and finding a Northern Ireland entrepreneur. They made the point that they were not thinking of selling their patent to Japan or anything like that. They wanted these methods of processing foods to be developed within Northern Ireland, so as to bring more employment and more income from overseas into that country. I agree with my noble friend Lady Elliot that the total impression of this visit was of money well spent by the Government in encouraging people to take the sort of attitudes that I have been describing. She was absolutely right on that.
Finally, I was as impressed as I was earlier, when I last had a connection with the Northern Ireland Government nearly 15 years ago, in connection with another job that I was then doing. At that time, I was particularly impressed by the way that the structure of government in Northern Ireland seemed to be in the right balance with the rest of the United Kingdom. It was neither too big nor too small, and it was powerful enough to do a good job, but far enough away from Whitehall not to have to refer to it all the time. Altogether it was a much happier, more hardworking and more efficient group of people than any major local authority in the rest of the United Kingdom.
It is a great credit to the successive Governments since we have had direct rule that they have preserved that cadre of excellent people in the Northern Ireland civil service, and have enabled them to go on roughly as they were doing before when they were governed locally from Stormont. The overall impression of efficiency, of good humour and of getting on with the job was really magnificent to see, and I congratulate my noble friend the Minister on taking over this team and on already having impressed them as being somebody with whom they want to work.
6.6 p.m.
Lord Mais: My Lords, may I add my congratulations to the noble Earl on his recent appointment. May I also apologise for putting my name down so very late in the batting order; but I particularly want to take this opportunity to draw attention to some of the problems which affect the new university at Coleraine. I do so because they have a very large number of young people there, and they are the type of young people who will be needed in Ulster in the years to come. As I understand it, the present position is that it has been decreed that they will be amalgamated with the Belfast Technical College. This does not meet with much

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favour from either the university or the technical college, but the fact remains that it has been decreed that the amalgamation shall take place. I recently heard that there has been some disagreement over this, and exactly what will happen now I do not know. But what I do know is that it is rumoured that the University Grants Committee are likely to cut off their grant to Coleraine unless they comply with the Government's wishes.
I have had a good deal to do with that university, and what impressed me more than anything else about the establishment were the characteristics of all the students there; the fact that they were all very well turned-out and very articulate, as you would probably expect from that part of the country. They were a very well disciplined body, and the relationship between the staff and the students was very good indeed. It would be a tragedy, particularly at this stage, if that university were either closed or restricted in its present activities. It would cause a great deal of distress. Students would leave or would be got rid of—whichever way you look at it—before they obtained their degrees, and at this particular moment we do not want more unemployment in that troubled land than there is already.
Discipline is better there than I have seen in any other university—and I am pro-chancellor of one. I only wish that we had the same type of student and the same attitude to life as those students at Coleraine have. If the university is closed or restricted in its activities, that will undoubtedly result in a very large number of splendid young people being unable to complete their degrees and being thrown on to the labour market. That is a market where there are practically no jobs going, whether or not you have a degree, but you have a slightly better chance of getting a job if you have a degree.
It is, I know, a difficult problem. The University Grants Committee have been told that they must make cuts. The university with which I am connected has suffered in the same way as other universities. The suffering will be felt largely by the students. The students at Coleraine are just the sort of people Northern Ireland wants at the moment, and will want in the future. If the university is closed, those students will become disillusioned and ready listeners to the particular kind of propaganda talk to which they will obviously be subjected.
I would earnestly ask her Majesty's Government to consider, whatever the University Grants Committee may think and whatever allowance or allowances are available to the University Grants Committee, whether support for the new university at Coleraine for an interim period, anyway, should be part of the defence or stabilisation of Ireland, particularly Ulster. It would be far better than paying unemployment benefit. Far from the students becoming good citizens with the right outlook on life and prepared to work hard, they will become fertile ground which undoubtedly will be worked by those who bring disruption and murder to that very unhappy land.
As I have said, I put down my name late to speak in this debate, but I felt that this was an opportunity to draw the attention of Her Majesty's Government to
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the fact that there is more to keeping Coleraine University intact than just the question of money. Money is short. I know, and all the universities are trying to get what they can. However, I would earnestly request that so far as the new University of Coleraine is concerned it should he treated as a special case.
6.12 p.m.
Lord Moyola: My Lords, I should like to begin by offering my congratulations to the noble Earl on his appointment to the Northern Ireland Office. I hope that he will have a very interesting and rewarding time. Even more strongly, I hope that we in Northern Ireland will benefit from his wise advice and ministrations. I owe the noble Earl, I am afraid, a number of apologies. First, time has marched on. I shall probably have to leave before the noble Earl replies to the debate, as I have to catch an aeroplane fairly soon. I hope the noble Earl will also forgive me for not having given him notice of what I intend to say.
Until I arrived at the House last night I had not intended to take part in our debate this afternoon. I then heard the news about the appalling murders which took place yesterday in Northern Ireland—the murders of the Ulster Defence Regiment men and two other people at Crossmaglen. I mention this, first, to express sympathy to the families of the victims. I mention it also for two other reasons. The first and most important reason is that I want to say once again how grateful all right-thinking people in Northern Ireland are to the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the army for what they have done over the years. I wish that I had known about these appalling incidents before I left home, for I should have brought with me some facts and figures to highlight how extremely successful the RUC and the army have been over the years. I am afraid that their praises are sung not nearly loudly enough or often enough. Unhappily, their praises are very seldom sung by Northern Ireland politicians. Therefore, I feel that those of us who come from Northern Ireland should take the opportunity to put our appreciation on record.
The other reason why I raise this matter is that I am on record on several occasions in your Lordships' House as saying that I am opposed to political initiatives or so-called solutions. They always seem to generate a period of violence and sometimes death. Certainly they generate destruction and difficulties. It is an open question whether yesterday's debate on hanging in another place would have been regarded by the terrorists as requiring some form of initiative. It certainly seems to have stirred the terrorists to this dastardly act of defiance. I am not suggesting that the debate should not have taken place. That would be nonsense. However, it is an example of the unforeseen dangers which can overtake any initiative, however far away, which in any way concerns Northern Ireland. I must add that I am more than thankful for yesterday's vote against hanging. I should like to express my appreciation of the very forthright stand taken by the Secretary of State, which I am certain was absolutely right.
I should like to touch very briefly on agriculture. Northern Ireland has had very generous and kind support for its agriculture from this side of the water. I was particularly pleased to hear the remarks made

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about the need for aid to the pig and poultry industries—the need for cheaper cereal imports for Northern Ireland. The pig and poultry industries are both fading away: they have declined steadily over the last 10 years. Unless we can get grain for these industries at the same price as people pay in this country, those industries will continue to decline. That would mean more unemployment. As has been mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, they are small farmers. Small farmers exist only by means of intensive farming, which leads them very quickly into pigs and poultry.
I should also like to mention the less favoured areas. I raised this matter in your Lordships' House about 15 months ago, but no decision has yet been taken. This is a vitally important matter for farmers in Northern Ireland because of their distance from the markets. All I can say at this stage is that I hope that the new Minister will be able to get some action taken on this vitally important matter. I wish him well in his new appointment.
6.19 p.m.
Viscount Brookeborough: My Lords, I must apologise to the Minister for the fact that my name does not appear on the list of speakers. I thought I gave my name to the Whips Office last week when I told them that the Minister had kindly agreed to our subcommittee having a debate on Northern Ireland agriculture. I apologise to the House and to the Minister.
Before I join in the debate on the Appropriation (No.2) (Northern Ireland) Order 1983, I should like very solidly to support what has been said by my noble friend Lord Moyola. All the people in my area were absolutely horrified by the foul murder yesterday of the four UDR men. It was in our area that the murders were committed. Our deepest sympathy goes out to their relatives and also to the relatives of the other two men who were foully murdered in County Armagh. I cannot convey to this House the effect on the community, even after all these years of horrors, of destruction of this sort. It is also impossible to convey to this House our admiration for and the esteem in which we hold the Royal Ulster Constabulary and its Reserves, the Army and the UDR. We really do admire them for all they do throughout the whole year.
I should like to start by welcoming my noble friend Lord Mansfield on his appointment, and to thank him very much for everything he did for us in entertaining us at Stormont House, and in introducing my fellow Members to the heads of his department and also to the elected heads of all the organisations of farming in Northern Ireland.
The noble Lord, Lord Underhill, raised the question of Northern Ireland costing 47.5 per cent. more than the average—and this is the important point—for the rest of the United Kingdom. This is undoubtedly true and even I cannot contradict it—but it should not be thought that Northern Ireland costs 47.5 per cent. more than any part of the rest of the United Kingdom. There are plenty of other parts of the United Kingdom with shipbuilding, steelmaking or coal mines, and with unemployment near the rate of Northern Ireland's,
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which are costing more than Northern Ireland as a whole.
The figure of 47.5 per cent. for the whole of the United Kingdom is taken as an average and does not—I repeat, does not—include in any way grants to steel, to coal, or to other nationalised industries. While it is quite correct to say that Northern Ireland costs 47.5 per cent. more than the whole of the United Kingdom, it is quite unfair to suggest that Northern Ireland is the most expensive, and an unbelievably expensive, part of the United Kingdom. Such a claim does a great disservice to the unity of the United Kingdom as such, and I believe that the Government should do something separately to cost other parts of the United Kingdom.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, if the noble Viscount will kindly give way, my intention was not to criticise the extra cost but to point out the benefits of public spending, which I should like to see in the rest of the United Kingdom.
Viscount Brookeborough: I am sorry, my Lords, but the noble Lord has taken me wrong. I am grateful to him for raising the subject because it is one I have meant to raise many times. I am also very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, for raising the absolute fib and distortion of facts concerning the BBC and television, and should like to support the noble Lord, Lord Dunleath, in his protest in that respect.
Noble Lords before me, in my sub-committee, have fought the case for Northern Ireland agriculture with tremendous vigour—much more vigour than I myself could tight with, or it might be thought that I was being partial or was an interested party. At this stage, I must say that I am an interested party, because I am both an Ulsterman and have something to do with agriculture. I should like to thank the Government for giving this House an opportunity to debate the problems of Northern Ireland at this time. Above all, I should like to thank the Select Committee for allowing Sub-Committee D to examine the question and problems of Northern Ireland.
The duty of Sub-Committee D of the EC Select Committee is to examine the problems of agriculture over the whole of the EEC. In Northern Ireland, our agricultural problems encapsulate some of the contradictions which exist and have been built up by the operation of the CAP over time. The first concerns our intensive industry of pigs and poultry. Our pig and poultry industry is built up in an area which is in opposition to the general intention of the CAP—which is that agriculture shall be pursued in such a way that the climate best suits a particular crop. As your Lordships have heard, with pigs and poultry the raw material is a very long way from its manufacturing source in Northern Ireland. In spite of very generous aid by the Government, there is still a grave danger to the jobs of the 10,000 people who are still employed in the pig and poultry industry in Northern Ireland.
The issue here is very simple; it is financial and social. Will we pay more to have people on the dole or pay less to have people still in employment? That is what will be the end result. I recognise that the aid has been extremely generous, but I reckon it is still necessary for it to continue in some way on a

939
permanent basis, to give confidence that the Northern Ireland farmer will be put at the same level as somebody in, say, Liverpool or Glasgow.
The next industry which further emphasises the problems or contradictions is the grass-based industry, because, here, we are totally in keeping with the general policy of the CAP. There is no crop that grows better than grass in Northern Ireland; indeed, there is no other crop to grow. We are faced, in the case of milk and beef—with milk, in a massive way—with a colossal surplus. I want to know what we are to do in those areas where there is no alternative to the surplus of milk and beef which is being created at a time when the whole of the future of the common agricultural policy—and indeed of the EEC itself—is being threatened by the cost of massive surpluses and when our sub-committee is trying to deal with the problems of the surpluses in the dairy industry.
Finally, I wish to deal with the question of an extension of the less favoured areas, which other noble friends have mentioned. With increasing unemployment in the EEC, the emphasis of the CAP has changed in favour of attempting to maintain the social structure of the Community. The extension of the LFAs is one of the weapons that can be used to maintain that social structure in these rather remote areas. Despite Northern Ireland's case for the extension of these areas, and despite the fact that it was made more than two years before the United Kingdom's case was presented, we have still not had a resolution. The United Kingdom's case was stated and presented in December1982, but at no time have Her Majesty's Government made the commitment of saying that they will fund the national part of the aid, which is necessary before EEC aid is made available. I would press my noble friend the Minister equally to press his colleagues to get that commitment from the Government. Without it, the EEC itself will not be very quick in making its commitment.
I should like to thank noble Lords who have taken part in this debate of the sub-committee on which I have the honour to serve. They have done us proud in Northern Ireland. I do not believe that any of us—and I listened with great interest to the noble Lord, Lord Mais—have any apology to make for taking quite a long time to deal with the Appropriation Order for Northern Ireland, and I have great pleasure in commending it to your Lordships.
6.29 p.m.
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, I should like to begin by thanking noble Lords for their welcome to these Estimates, and also for the very valuable contributions which every one has made to this debate. Speaking personally, perhaps I might also thank those noble Lords who have welcomed me to my new position in the Government. In many ways, it seems a home from home because I am dealing particularly with farmers and their problems in Northern Ireland. Before, part of my remit was to help deal with the problems of farmers in Scotland. The danger, of course, in comparing the apparently similar difficulties is to say that the same geographical isolation, the same comparatively harsh climate, and
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in many cases the same lack of alternative enterprises for farmers, require similar solutions. That I shall resist.
The noble Lord, Lord Dunleath, reminded me, if not the House, that he and I were in the same house at Eton and he said he did not know whether he was my fag. It seems, therefore. that I must have been a benign fagmaster. Well, I cannot remember either, and therefore he at least must have been less repulsive than some small boys. At any rate, through both of our characters, it would seem that Henry Mulholland's school days were rather nicer than Tom Brown's.
Coming to this debate, I am very grateful to the Members of Sub-Committee D who have spoken, and I say that for two reasons. First of all it is very heartening for the officials in my department to have the advantage of the advice and the encouragement of a group of your Lordships who have the expertise and the experience which the Members of Sub-Committee D have. I have no doubt that their visit will stimulate considerable thought and discussion for the future. But I should also like to thank the noble Lords for the kind words they have said about the officials and the way in which they go about their duties. Again speaking personally, it is always to be welcomed if the way in which one carries out one's duties commends itself to people who come completely from the outside and bring to bear a fresh mind.
Noble Lords have raised a formidable number of points, which I will not be able to deal with all that extensively tonight without wearying the House. What I think I had better do is to deal with as many of them as I can, until I become hoarse and perceive that the House is looking bored, and I will then stop and continue by correspondence. I think that is probably the kindest and most effective way of going about my task of summing up the debate.
Matters were started, if that is the word, by the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, in a good agricultural manner when he asked about expenditure on brucellosis and tuberculosis. He is quite right that expenditure on brucellosis eradication in 1983–84 is expected to be less than in 1982–83 because the incidence of infection has been reduced to a low level. Tuberculosis infection has, unfortunately, not fallen quite so fast, and in an attempt to speed up eradication the frequency of testing has been stepped up. That will result in some initial increase in expenditure with regard to the detection of reactor animals.
The noble Lord went on to ask about storage of fresh food, and he raised the question of assistance for the storage of fresh food destined for processing. The Department of Economic Development's standard capital grants scheme, which is the equivalent of the regional development grant scheme in Great Britain, enables grants to be made towards capital expenditure incurred in carrying out what is called a "qualifying industrial process". The storage or preservation of fresh food would meet the criteria for assistance when it is directly linked to a qualifying process; in other words, storage accommodation used for fresh foods awaiting canning.
The selective grant assistance schemes administered by IDB are in principle more flexible, but grant-aid towards the cost of food storage facilities is likely to be

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made available only where they enable significant export opportunities to be exploited or where again they form part of an integrated processing and manufacturing operation. Any such assistance would have to he individually negotiated and the level of assistance offered would be determined by the merits of the project, and in particular by the number of jobs it was expected to generate in the Province.
Then the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, went on to Class II and particularly the decrease of £77 million. That, as I tried to explain earlier, is mainly due to Harland and Wolff. Only a token provision has been made pending a decision on the level of funding in 1983–84. Loans to industrial undertakings in 1982–83 included a single large loan to Learfan, and provisions for 1981–83 and 1983–84 are of the same magnitude.
The noble Lord went on to ask about the Kinsale natural gas project. The up-to-date position is that my honourable friend will be meeting Mr. Bruton, who is the Minister for Industry and Energy in the Republic of Ireland, very shortly to conclude one way or the other negotiations for gas at Kinsale. I appreciate that the Northern Ireland gas industry cannot bear further delay and negotiations must be brought to a conclusion in the near future. It has not, up till now at any rate, been possible to secure from the Republic of Ireland a price for gas which would be a basis for development of a viable gas industry in Northern Ireland. Unless—and this is really what it comes to—the Republic can make improvements in the price offered there may he no realistic alternative but to reactivate the plans for the closure of the industry in Northern Ireland.
The noble Lord, Lord Underhill, and several other of your Lordships made reference to employment in Ulster Television and, I think, a commercial radio station. I do not have the facts at my disposal. It would be unwise of me to make any comment. What I shall do is to study the remarks that have been made and then cause inquiries to be set in hand.
The noble Lord, Lord Underhill, asked about lignite. The Government consider that 100 million tons of the Crumlin lignite deposit is proven; anything else involves speculation, and that of course involves any additional deposits which might lie beneath the bed of Lough Neagh. The Government have not yet received applications from the mining company for planning permission and mining licence. I believe that applications will come in the near future. I understand that the applications are likely to be in respect of a pilot pit.
The noble Lord asked about Harland and Wolff and the level of funding so far as 1983–84 is concerned. The noble Lord will appreciate that these are sensitive to the prospects of new orders. The total provision for 1983–84 cannot be finalised until certain of these are clarified. What the Government have agreed to do in the meantime is to provide interim funding to meet the company's requirements. A statement will be made as soon as a decision on the 1983–84 funding is possible The yard is continuing to search for new orders. Market conditions for bulk carriers and tankers are extremely depressed, as your Lordships will realise, and are likely to remain so. There is intense competition from the Far East for any type of ship
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order. What I am saying underlines the necessity for the yard to make itself more competitive.
The noble Lords, Lord Underhill and Lord Dunleath, referred—and I am flitting like a butterfly from subject to subject as, indeed, did they as they went from Vote to Vote—to agriculture and to silage effluent in particular. I must confess that I was surprised at the apparent amount of silage effluent which pollutes fresh water in Northern Ireland as compared with Scotland. But I must contain my surprise. The policy is to seek to educate farmers on the highly polluting potential of agricultural waste. The noble Lord, Lord Dunleath, was absolutely right in describing the highly corrosive and damaging quality of silage effluent. Those farmers who know, or ought to know, and who are persistent offenders, can be prosecuted, particularly if they are clearly negligent in fulfilling their responsibilities. Prevention of pollution is seen as the most appropriate means of meeting what is obviously a most unsatisfactory situation for agriculture. I think it is right to say in defence of the industry that the weather conditions this year, in particular, have been extremely adverse. I see the noble Lord is nodding, and I am comforted by that. I do not think one should altogether blame the farmers this year.
The noble Lord, Lord Underhill, asked about tourism and what is apparently a large decline in the provision of grants to the catering industry. The reduced provision for accommodation grant in 1983–84 reflects the action taken in January 1981, following a review of policies and priorities in tourism, to suspend consideration of further applications for assistance under this scheme, which at that time operated on a non-selective basis. This has resulted in a progressive rundown in the amount of grant paid out under the scheme over the past 12 to 18 months. The scheme was re-introduced, but on a selective basis, in January of this year, and to date more than 300 proposals have been submitted to the Department of Economic Development, which is now considering them. The impact of these projects which are approved for grant will, in the main, not be felt in the current financial year.
Finally the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, asked about Shorts and about Learfan. As regards Shorts, the noble Lord will know that the market for civil aircraft of all types remains quiet because of the economic recession. I suppose that any upturn will be dependent on an upturn in the world economy; in particular, the economy of the United States. Nevertheless, the market for commuter aircraft, which is the type produced by Shorts, is predicted to grow for the rest of the decade. The performance of Shorts to date has been encouraging. At the end of May, 11 SD360s had been delivered and the company had won a total of 46 orders and options from 40 operators for this aircraft.
As regards Learfan, development of that project continues satisfactorily despite some minor setbacks and some slippage in the scheduled dates. Type certification by the American Federal Aviation Administration is now expected by early 1984, with full airworthiness certification following within a further few months.
The noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, courteously said that he would have to leave towards the end

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of the debate. Since there are so many members of Sub-Committee D who have taken part in the debate, and in view of their interest, I will endeavour to answer some of the points which the noble Lord raised, particularly as some of them have been touched on by other noble Lords. First, there was the matter of the extension of the less-favoured areas. It is very much to be hoped that the proposals which are presently being considered by the commission will shortly be put to the Council of Ministers. But, obviously, until that happens I cannot give any guarantee on when the Council of Ministers will come to a firm decision.
The next matter concerns additional aid from public funds according to whatever it is that the Council of Ministers agrees. I remind noble Lords that the Government have made no commitment to provide additional aid from public funds for the extended areas. The areas which originally benefited from the United Kingdom schemes for disadvantaged hill areas continue to benefit under the European directive on less favoured areas, and that, of course, goes for the co-responsibility levy for milk producers.
I come now to what I call the intensive industries in agriculture, particularly the pig and poultry industries. Noble Lords will be aware that there was a successful negotiation of the transfer of 50,000 tonnes of wheat from intervention to Northern Ireland. The first tranche (perhaps "cargo" would be a better word) has arrived, I believe on 6th July, and 6,000 tonnes have been sold. Therefore, the Government are helping with the special disadvantages which are relevant particularly to the west of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and which affect feed costs. However, it would be unrealistic if I did not say that it is for the whole of the industry and the United Kingdom to come to terms with marketing problems, and to deal with them, and also to bring the supply and demand into some sort of balance. Unless I said that there would be a danger that this debate would not be balanced, either.
The point was made, I think by the noble Lord, Lord Dunleath, that there is bound to be considerable dissatisfaction about the drawing of the boundary line when and (I suppose I must say) if the new less favoured areas are agreed. What in fact he was asking for was some form of independent panel to consider appeals. It would be premature to make any announcement about representations on less favoured areas until the United Kingdom case has been finally decided in Brussels. I am bound to say now, with some experience in two parts of the United Kingdom. that this kind of trouble—and it is very troublesome for the individual farmer—is better dealt with on an ad hoc basis than by means of a highly formalised appeal structure. But I have no doubt that that is something which will be considered and which we shall have to go into in the future.
The noble Lord also asked about marketing. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Energy, when, in his previous existence, he was Minister of Agriculture, provided the encouragement and the funds for the formulation of the Food from Britain campaign. That organisation has got off to an extremely good start. It is presently determining its strategy for the use of these funds. I know that it is
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going to pay particular attention to the special problems of Northern Ireland in marketing food and food products, and I look forward to renewing those contacts with the organisation which I had in my own previous existence.
The noble Lord asked about the increase in the proportion of agricultural land when the extension comes about. My information is that 487,000 hectares in Northern Ireland are presently included in the less favoured areas. The extension would add a further 335,000 hectares, so that then approximately 75 per cent: of the agricultural land area would be covered. I resist the tempation to debate with the noble Lord the proportion of Northern Ireland as opposed to Scotland. It is my experience that different parts of the United Kingdom apparently steal a march on each other when it comes to helping their farmers. But it is inadvisable to discuss one particular type of apparent advantage.
The noble Lord asked whether it would be possible to set up a contingency fund for commodities which might run into crisis. There are so many rules which prevent that. To illustrate that, our normal accounting rules would forbid it: the European Community constraints on state aids would also forbid it, as, I think, would public expenditure priorities. Support for potatoes, for instance, is not a matter in which the European Community engages except in the lightest of regimes. It is in any event a matter for the Ministry of Agriculture. Fisheries and Food and is not carried on the Northern Ireland Vote.
The noble Lord also asked about road fund tax and roads. Vehicle excise duty was £42 million in 1982–83 and it is expected that in 1983–84 £47 million will be received. If a comparison were made (and I think it is mildly dangerous to do so) the amount estimated to be spent on road maintenance in 1983–84 is £41 million. But there is no direct relationship between these figures, and nor is there any connection with the cost of building the Foyle Bridge. It is the task of the Secretary of State to draw up spending programmes and their priorities when he knows the total allocation for Northern Ireland. That total allocation is set during, and as part of, the examination of United Kingdom spending programmes as a whole.
The noble Lord also referred to the suggestion that gas from coal would be a cheaper alternative to natural gas from Kinsale. A paper recently circulated by the National Coal Board claimed that a coal gasification plant to provide a supply of gas for Belfast only would be viable. My honourable friend is having that claim urgently assessed by independent experts. Of course until he receives a report from his experts. neither he nor, certainly, I is in a position to comment on whether the National Coal Board's proposals do in fact represent a properly worked out and realistic basis for a viable gas industry for the Belfast area.
Finally, the noble Lord, Lord Dunleath, asked about extradition between the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. There is a facility for having arrest warrants backed by courts in the Republic, but a number of suspected offenders wanted by the Royal Ulster Constabulary have not been extradited under this procedure on the grounds that their offences were politically motivated. I think that we must hope that the recent decision by the Irish Supreme Court to

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extradite Dominic McGlinchy will mean that there will he fewer refusals in future.
The noble Baroness, Lady Ewart-Biggs, asked—
Lord Dunleath: My Lords, I am extremely grateful to the noble Earl for his very full reply, but can he just say whether Her Majesty's Government will give an assurance that they will confirm their contribution towards the cost of the less favoured areas so that the European Agricultural Commissioner, as he said, will be able to continue and confirm the extension of the less favoured areas?
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, I have already told the House of the attitude of the Government to the extension of the less favoured areas and any possible funding. There is no connection between the two so far as the Commission is concerned. It is the Commission's duty to produce the proposals and it is the duty of the Council of Ministers to pronounce upon those proposals. Further than that I cannot and will not go.
The noble Baroness, Lady Ewart-Biggs, asked about additionality. In the final analysis, Northern Ireland benefits from all receipts. There are two categories of receipt: those which are passed on as cash additions to Northern Ireland recipients and those which are retained by the Government and shown in annual Supply Estimates as appropriations in aid. The former category represents a substantial amount and provides very real and direct benefit to recipients, while receipts in the latter category permit a higher level of public expenditure than would otherwise be feasible. But in general the treatment in Northern Ireland of receipts from the European Community is the same as it is in the rest of the United Kingdom. The anticipated level of receipts is taken into account when decisions on public expenditure allocations have been taken: and therefore those receipts enable the level of public expenditure in Northern Ireland to be higher than would otherwise have been possible.
I was very interested in what my noble friend Lord Mottistone had to say about sea transport. That is a difficulty to anybody in business. It affects those in Northern Ireland and of course in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. I can say to my noble friend at this juncture that the Commission is shortly to review all the measures in the Community which assist or improve agricultural structures. I have no doubt that both at official level and when the matter is being discussed in the Council of Ministers we shall ensure, as has been ensured in the past, that the problems of agriculture in Northern Ireland are fully understood by our Community partners.
The noble Lord, Lord Mais, asked me about the university. I bear in mind that he has an honorary doctorate of science at the New University of Ulster, so it behoves me to be careful in what I say, I fancy. The detailed reasons, as he will know very well, for the merger were spelt out in the Government's document, Higher Education in Northern Ireland: Future Structure.In essence, the Chilver Report, to which the Government's paper was a response, identified major problems of financial and academic inability being faced by the university, and indicated that these problems would become more serious with the advent
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of the downturn in numbers of 18 year-olds in the late 1980s and early 1990s and the likelihood of a continuation of reduced levels of funding for higher education. The Government's view, which is shared by the University Grants Committee, was that there was no other feasible course of action which would guarantee a future for university level education on the Coleraine campus. The new institution will, by virtue of its size and the detailed planning of its provision, be able to meet any foreseeable downturn in demand or finance and to meet the changing needs of students in the next two decades. I have noted the noble Lord's other comments.
I think that I have dealt with most, if not all, of the points which have been raised. My noble friend Lord Brookeborough asked why special expenditure support cannot be permanent and thereby give more certainty to the industry. The clue lies in the use of the word "special". The needs of the industry change from year to year. One cannot speculate as to the future. Support arrangements provided by the Ministry of Agriculture, and indeed the Community, are subject to change. Each year we have to work within the overall Government expenditure policies and our assessment of the relative priorities within Northern Ireland.
Judging from the various speeches which have been made, I believe that all noble Lords realise the amount of money which, very properly, is being devoted to Northern Ireland and its problems to try to carry out the various priorities which the Government have established and to which I referred at the beginning of my opening remarks. I very much hope that this debate will reassure the House that those priorities continue, and that the Government are determined to carry them out. For myself, I regard the debate as being extremely valuable. I shall look with close attention at the Official Report and I know that thereafter my education will have been most considerably advanced.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Animals: Scientific Procedures
7.1 p.m.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby Lord Houghton of Sowerby rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are aware that their proposals in the White Paper on scientific procedures on living animals (Cmnd. 8883) are meeting with a mixed reception, with some strong criticism of the so-called "pain clause" (paragraphs 24–26), "permissible purposes" (paragraphs 27–34), and "project licences" (paragraph 37), and what method of consultation they propose to follow to obtain the greatest measure of agreement on these important and sensitive parts of the White Paper.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. First, I believe that I should welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Trumpington, who, if I am correct, is on the Government Front Bench for her first major assignment in your Lordships' House since her recent appointment. She has exchanged her accustomed seat and her freedom for the dicipline of where she now sits. Henceforth she will find herself uttering

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ministerial pronouncements on behalf of Her Majesty's Government, enslaved by departmental policies and procedures, but nevertheless enjoying it very much: at least I hope she does.
Just before the election there was published a long awaited White Paper dealing with scientific procedures on living animals. We had been waiting a long time for this White Paper. We knew that there had been a brake on progress by the work being done in the Council of Europe on a draft convention of some importance to all the European countries. Although we were impatient, we understood about the delay in the Council of Europe while so many different viewpoints were reconciled in order to get an agreed draft convention. I think that the election coming on rather earlier than was expected must have put very heavy pressure on the Home Office to get the White Paper out before polling day. After all, it was important that the Government should be seen to be doing something to fulfil the election pledge given on this subject in 1979, when they said that they would up-date the Cruelty to Animals Act 1876 dealing with this matter. They got the White Paper out just in time. This is a notable landmark on the way. It is not of course the finished product. We still await a Bill, and it is to that Bill and preparations for it that my Question relates.
Much work has gone into the White Paper, and I must pay tribute to the care and attention that must have been given to what is a very complex subject by those who were responsible for preparing the document for the Government. There are quite a lot of good things in it, and they are very welcome. But I think the main point is, now we have the White Paper, what do we do with it? I must be careful not to convert a Question into an attempt at a full-dress debate on the White Paper. That would not be suitable for either the time or the occasion. But what do we do with the White Paper now that we have got it? In many cases where White Papers are issued Governments arrange for debates on them in order to gain an indication of the feelings of the House on the matters within the Papers. That procedure probably has become more conventional in relation to Green Papers rather than White Papers. Nevertheless, it is sometimes useful to test opinion in both Houses, if need be, on a complex and controversial subject before proceeding to the final preparation of a Bill.
So my present point is about procedure. What is the timetable? If we knew something of the timetable it would help to arrange the consultations that are needed in order to bring to bear on the final product as much agreed opinion as possible. The White Paper gives until 12th August for written representations to be submitted. With the interruption we have recently had, and the Summer Recess which is coming on, it is a difficult time of year to impose a short period during which representations can he submitted. Nevertheless, I have no doubt that the various organisations and bodies representing animals and the scientific and commercial interests will do their best to get their papers into the Home Office within the timescale.
Well, what then? What is the Government's intention about the Bill? Most of us concerned with this matter were acutely disappointed to find nothing about it in the Queen's Speech. Whether this subject is
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intended to be among those things referred to by Her Majesty in the phrase,
"Other measures will be laid before you",
I do not know. Is it the Government's intention to introduce a Bill this Session—this Session being an extended one which will go well into 1984? Are we going to get a Bill in this Session, or have we to look ahead to the 1984–85 Session? These are important questions, because upon the answers, or the approximate answers, will depend probably the timescale for consultation. I hope that we are to get a Bill during this Session. To have to go into 1984–85 would be too long to wait for the culmination of so much work that has been done and preparation that has been made for fresh legislation.
This is a turning point in the history of scientific procedures on living animals. We do not want undue haste. We should rather have more time in which to do a good job than to have a scrambled job in order to fulfil a particular timetable. But I should be very glad if the noble Baroness would kindly tell us how she sees the programme.
On the assumption that there is a reasonable period—say, between now and the end of the year—for us to collect the voices on the various matters in the White Paper, how are the consultation and the consideration of the various points of view to be undertaken? It would be very odd indeed if after a White Paper which, so far as I am aware, has been formulated following no recent consultations with interested parties, and upon which there will be considerable differences of opinion, we proceed to a Bill without any further conversations with Ministers about it. It cannot all be done by correspondence. After all, we are part of the process of formulating legislation and proposals and we should expect to have consultations with Ministers at an appropriate stage.
In order to bring those consultations within reasonable compass, it would be desirable for the various groups of representative bodies, so far as possible, to begin to work together. That is why in the Question I have asked what method of consultation the Government.
"propose to follow to obtain the greatest measure of agreement on these important and sensitive parts of the White Paper",
to which I shall come in a moment.
I have strong connections with the animal protection movement or the animal welfare movement. It is a very difficult area for any reasonable person to try to operate because animals generate internal combustion in many human beings. All can tell from reading the newpapers from time to time how restive the animal welfare people can become. The noble Baroness is coming very close to an area where passions run high and emotions go deep. Out of it one has to try to rationalise opinions and to translate something into sensible legislation. This is the most difficult problem of all. To define in statute law some of the things that have to be defined will be extremely difficult. We know that the 1876 Act has worked, as is often said, because it has been so adaptable. It has allowed a wide area of adaptation to be followed to meet the flexible requirements of changes in scientific research and in many other aspects of scientific development.
I have written to the Minister asking if we can arrange something so that the animal welfare movement, to take it as one group, can be brought together for discussions with the Minister to state how it feels on several proposals in the White paper. Could the same thing be done for scientific and commercial interests? The Minister tells me that this is a little premature. His approach is to say, "Let us wait until we get the representations and see the measure of disagreement. We may be able then to decide better how to resolve the disagreements and get the largest measure of harmonious acceptance for the provisions of a new Bill". I agree with that. I am not trying to hasten the Minister before he is ready. I am preparing the way. It would be wise if he had an idea of how he was going to operate. This is very important.
What are these sensitive areas? I have referred to them. I do not propose to argue the merits of them. I wish merely to refer to them so that we know the kind of difficulties that we face. There are three in number—in simple terms, pain, permissible purposes, and public accountability. It is in that field that the main differences and difficulties about the proposed new Bill will arise. Take pain, for instance. How much? How severe? How long? Pain that endures? Prolonged pain? What is pain?
There are the questions of distress and suffering. We have been talking about pain for years. Many of us, in the meantime, have been feeling it. If, however, you are defining in the statute law what is permissible as to the amount of torture that can be inflicted on an animal for what are said, in the White Paper, to be the proper interests of man and animal, that is a proposition of considerable complexity and ethical importance. The White Paper does not take the control of pain beyond what is now the practice of the Home Office. That is not far enough.
If we are to enlarge the field of permissible purposes—that is what the White Paper does and is, indeed, what various advisers to the Minister have already proposed—we must relate the extension of the field of protection to the amount of pain that may be inflicted on those within it. If there is stronger control of pain, then the area of permissible purposes can be widened. If the control of pain is to be no more than it is now, then we are all in difficulties in extending the field of permissible purposes. That is the relation between those two.
The third area of difficulty is what we call public accountability. How far is the Home Secretary going to take responsibility and account to Parliament for what is done, a great deal of it at public expense and on behalf of man and animal. I know that the Home Secretary was a little reluctant to accept the proposals of the Select Committee on the Halsbury Bill when we proposed to assign to him responsibility for justification of some of the experiments that would be permitted under the protection of the new law.
I know that the Home Secretary may feel that he does not want to take on a load of accountability that may expose him unnecessarily to questions and debates in Parliament as to the exercise of his discretion or his judgment in matters of this kind. But who is going to decide what is justifiable in this difficult field of science and research? It is said that when
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Queen Victoria was supporting the Bill that preceded the Act of 1876 she declared that it was her desire that we should control the sovereign state of science. Have we got a sovereign state of science within the secular state, the layman's state, the political state, the social state, the moral state? Is the field of science supreme and independent? Or is the public, through Parliament and through the Home Secretary, to have some control over what it does and what goes on within it? This is the issue of public accountability.
I think that I have said enough without arguing for or against them to suggest to the noble Baroness that, on the main areas (two of which can be regarded as connected) of pain, permissible purposes and accountability, we want a better Bill than the White Paper fore-shadows. That is the issue. I am sure that the representations that will come to the Home Secretary will indicate pretty clearly that there is a strong desire for that.
Looking at the situation, the prospect of difficult representations coming forward and the need to narrow gaps and differences, so far as possible, between one interest and another—without reconciliation, a Bill will have to be bulldozed through Parliament in extremely difficult circumstances in order to get something on the Statute Book at all—I would respectfully suggest to the noble Baroness that it is better that the legislation should start in your Lordships' House than in another place. This is probably where a Bill of this complexity and this difficulty could better begin, with consideration being given to it by Members of your Lordships' House who served on the Select Committee. The noble Lord, Lord Adrian, the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, I myself and other noble Lords, who served on the Select Committee, have gone through the drill on this Bill probably more intensively than anyone else in Parliament. With all the expert help and wisdom available in your Lordships' House, we might put a Bill in better shape to send to another place than another place could do to send here. I leave that idea with the noble Baroness.
Therefore, I conclude by saying that in the end we must resolve what can be tolerated in the form of suffering by living animals in the proper interests of man and animal. This is a very difficult judgment to make. That is why I plead that there should be the maximum attempt at a reconciliation of differences of opinion, in order that in the 18 months ahead we can get a Bill which will be a most significant sequel to the 1876 Act, which has never been amended in a single particular from the day it was passed through Parliament until tonight. In those circumstances we embark upon an important job, and I urge the Government to take all possible steps to make a thoroughly good job of it.
7.21 p.m.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, we are particularly grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, for having asked this Question in the House tonight at a time when we certainly should be considering the White Paper. Of course, we are also extremely grateful to him for his work on this particular subject over the years. He is one of those who has helped to bring the status of animals and their welfare

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into the centre of politics, and I cannot but think that that has been a good thing. We welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Trumpington, to the Front Bench to deal with this matter. Her views on whether it is a good thing that the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, has brought the matter into the centre of politics may be sightly different—I do not know. Nevertheless, I am sure that she will deal with the matter with her usual competence and good humour.
However, it has come into the centre of politics because it has come into the centre of people's consciousness in this country. A leader in The Times Higher Educational Supplement said recently:
"No longer is it possible to smile politely while raising a metaphorical eyebrow when animal rights are defended, and then to steer the discussion into more 'sensible' channels. Nor is it possible to discuss animal rights as an interesting and important, but essentially long-range and rather theoretical, ethical speculation. It has become clear that this is an issue on which very many people, although confused, are also deeply disturbed."
If they are deeply disturbed, it is something of which this House and another place should rightly take notice; and if they are confused, it is something on which your Lordships' House, in particular, may be able to help.
Over the years, particularly since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, we have had a growing divorce from our roots—from the countryside, from growing things and from the rest of the animal kingdom. It has been bad for our animals; it has been had for ourselves. But I think that we are now having a reaction. That reaction is shown by the general public opinion to which I have referred, and we now know that the arguments which used to be thrown out so easily, putting down people who protested about the way in which some animals were treated, will no longer do. For instance, we now have polls to show that people are prepared to pay higher prices for food which is produced in less cruel ways. I think we also have sufficient evidence that people realise they can buy all sorts of other things—including health, and certainly including cosmetics and probably a great many other things—at too high a price by way of the suffering of animals.
In this matter it seems to me that as legislators we should be in accord with public opinion, perhaps leading but basically in tune with what people think. This means setting up a flexible machinery which will respond to the feeling of our democracy on this particular matter. By "a flexible machinery" I do not mean something that will respond to every particular scandal which is raised in one of the more popular papers, but a general determination to make the people who produce our merchandise, and also our scientists, the servants of society as well as of knowledge.
Our ethics demand—and I think particularly our Christian ethics demand—that if we do evil (and the infliction of pain is in itself certainly a form of evil) it should be for an end that can justify it. It is often thought that the end does not justify the means, and should not be allowed to justify the means. That, of course, is complete nonsense. As we know, every time we have any form of surgical operation performed on ourselves or our loved ones harm is done and pain is inflicted in order that good should come about.
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Therefore, in trying to frame the limits within which our work on this matter should take place, we have to set certain levels that should not be exceeded. Pain should not be inflicted beyond certain levels unless that particular pain can be justified. This was very well put in the paper produced by the British Veterinary Association and others in their paragraph 6, headed, "Pain, Anaesthesia and Analgesia". They said:
"If a procedure is likely to cause pain, suffering or distress of more than momentary duration or trivial intensity, which cannot be alleviated, prior authorisation by the Secretary of State should be obtained. Such authorisation should only be given when the procedure is judged to be of exceptional importance in meeting essential needs of man or animals".
That was not produced by any extremists group; it was produced by some very responsible people, including the vets, for whom in this field we all have the highest regard. As far as one can see, it has been largely ignored in the White Paper. That is where I should most like to support, both personally and on behalf of my party, the plea put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, tonight.
There is one other minor point which I should like to mention before I sit down. We have, as I said, spoken about the stringent controls on cosmetics. In the White Paper they have been selected for particular attention. I am just the slightest bit cynical about this because, as we know, the cosmetic argument (and I have deployed it in my time) is a very easy one to deploy. These days cosmetics are regarded, to quite a large degree, as frivolous and not as an essential in the lives of anyone, and, therefore, they can be taken out and used as an example of something where certainly no kind of animal suffering should be encouraged. But between the work that is done on diseases, where there is very wide agreement that animal experimentation is justified, and the other extreme of dealing with cosmetics there is a whole range of other matters which need just as much attention, just as much testing and just as much weighing up as to whether the pain to which we submit animals is justified.
If a washing up liquid is being tested in order that I can buy it more cheaply and in order that when I wash up, it cleans my saucepans rather more quickly, that is just as much an object which should be weighed in the balance against the pain which animals have to put up with in the production of that better washing-up liquid as is the case with a lipstick or any other form of cosmetic. The cosmetic target is an easy one, and it is not really a worthy one. We need a much better judgment across the whole level of products.
What I think the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, and certainly I and a great many other people are asking for generally is no more than what would be recognised as reasonable by the great majority of people. There are, of course, a handful of bigots on both sides. There are a handful of bigots who think that nothing else is more important in the world than the stopping of pain for bunny-rabbits, and there are a handful of bigots who think that science is such a god that it must be pursued, and that truth and facts must be pursued no matter what pain is caused on the way.
Both those views are rejected by the great majority of people in this country. I think that is entirely clear. Therefore, what the people of this country are surely asking from the Government in producing a new

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scheme is flexibility; is procedures which will allow the pain inflicted on animals to be tailored to the needs and to the urgency of what must be achieved. I hope that in answering this Question and in finally drafting their Bill the Government will let the common sense and compassion of the ordinary man have their say in this matter.
7.32 p.m.
Lord Zuckerman: My Lords, I begin by apologising to your Lordships' House for the fact that I cannot remain to the end of this debate, and in particular to the noble Baroness. Lady Trumpington, because I shall not be here to listen to what she says in summing up. I shall read with great care what has been said. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, in the way that has been done by the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, for having drawn the attention of your Lordships' House to this White Paper.
At the same time may I also say that I greatly welcome the Government's White Paper. I think that it sets a very good stage for the introduction of new legislation for which so many of us have been hoping for so long. None of us was alive when the original Act was passed by this House, hut, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, I am not surprised that it has taken so long to get to the point we have now reached. I know I am no exception here in caring about the welfare of animals, except in so far as I did once have a licence to do animal experiments under the 1876 Act. It is many years since I 'surrendered it, but let me assure your Lordships that I was aware when I was first allowed a licence by the then Home Secretary—this takes me way back; I shall not attempt to hazard a guess at the number of years—that there was much public disquiet. There has always been public disquiet about inhumanity to animals.
I am aware, too, that there have already been many attempts to improve the Act as it now is. I am quite sure that the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, knows why it has been so difficult to get to the position we have now reached, which I think is a major step forward. As a naturalist as well as a scientist, and in my long association with the Zoological Society of London, about which the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, knows full well, and he and I have also had friendly exchanges about the question of badgers—I have always been concerned that only the best and most humane procedures should be tolerated not only in the conduct of experiments in which animals are used but equally in the conditions in which any animals are kept—any exotic animals, any domestic animals. However, that is a separate issue and I shall not dwell on it. The Government have already taken some useful steps to see that the worst practices are held in check.
At the same time, I have been conscious of the difficulty of passing a new Act to update the legislation under which experiments on living animals are now being conducted. That is why I more than welcome this Government's White Paper. It is a major step forward. While I join with the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, in hoping that in subsequent discussions which relate to whatever Bill is laid before your Lordships' House we shall have a full opportunity to consider all the matters to which he has referred, and I would myself add certain others on the basis of my
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experience of having been a working scientist under the Act, your Lordships should not be unaware of what is stated in paragraph 8 of this White Paper. It is most important.
It is those fundamental inquiries which this Act permitted that underpin the knowledge on which we secure the health not only of ourselves but also of our livestock and of the exotic animals that may be kept, I hope always in the right conditions. As the White Paper says, there are many and essential inquiries which would not be possible without the use of animals for the purpose of research.
I shall not spell out what is said in the paragraph. It is only too obvious to your Lordships that many and essential inquiries would not be possible without the kind of experimentation in which animals are being used by responsible and proper scientists. There may be some improper use, and I agree with Lord Houghton's fears in this matter. The son of a very great Member of your Lordships' House, of a great experimental biologist, will be speaking after me. The knowledge which he gained underpins our entire understanding of the operations of the nervous system.
Obviously the White Paper is only a prelude to the introduction of new legislation. And clearly, too, while it pays tribute to all the various inquiries that have been made in the past about the improvement of the 1876 Act, and the inquiries which Her Majesty's Government undertook in the preparation of this White Paper, I assume—and I am certain that I assume correctly—that Her Majesty's Government will be consulting further in the way that the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, implied is so essential with the various bodies concerned; both those whose activities are dependent upon the use of animals in research, and those concerned that the unnecessary use of animals is prevented.
It is clear—and I say this without qualification—that no experiments should ever be allowed that do not satisfy whatever criterion about pain—a most difficult criterion, we all know, to establish—is laid down and becomes law. It is not only pain, as the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, said. We have to be quite clear about what are permissible purposes. He rather lost me when he spoke about public accountability, because I did not quite know which particular public he was going to turn to, and who was going to be responsible for the Government in taking advice on that matter of accountability. However, this is an issue to which I am certain he will return, when, as we all hope, a Bill is laid before the House and that Bill comes up for its Second Reading and then for the Committee stage.
I am confident that, in the preparation of a new Bill, close attention will also be paid to the respective functions of the Home Office and its inspectorate and to the duties and responsibilities of the Home Secretary's advisory committee and of what I understand is likely to be its successor body, the Statutory Animal Procedures Committee, to which reference is made in the report. I became aware only this afternoon, after I had spoken to the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, during the course of proceedings in your Lordships' House, that these various papers had already been submitted. I had not seen them. Indeed one was put into my hands as I walked into the Chamber this evening. These various

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submissions have been made by bodies that have an interest in the subsequent deliberations on the Bill.
I fear that there may be differences; indeed, some have been indicated already in matters of detail, but there is an enormous measure of agreement with the Government's White Paper, and in what those who are concerned and what the public want. We should emphasise those areas of agreement and try to put into proper perspective the small differences in detail which will have to be debated fully in your Lordships' House.
As is stated in paragraph 16, the Home Secretary will be required to consult the new committee on animal procedures before formulating the standard conditions to which all licences will be subject and before granting project licences in particular. I suppose it would be administratively impossible, or certainly very difficult, to consult the procedures committee about every application for a licence which the Home Secretary receives. In its advice, therefore, the committee has a very difficult role to play. It can hardly impose stricter conditions than those now embodied in the Council of Europe conventions.
Equally the eminent individuals who, according to the White Paper, will be appointed by the Home Secretary "in a personal capacity" will have to recognise—I speak as a scientist—that very rarely, if ever, does the course of any scientific inquiry proceed from a clear starting point to a pre-determined goal. In the course of any work which is undertaken by a good scientist, observations will emerge which may reveal a new and different goal and may certainly qualify the goal that the experimenter had in mind at the start. More than that, they may even indicate that the wrong questions had been put at the beginning of the inquiry. A degree of flexibility, therefore, is essential in the conduct of research. This is something that I trust the advisory body, or bodies, to whom the Home Secretary and his officials will be turning, will bear in mind. If they are the kind of people I hope they will be and people in whom, I trust, the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, will have confidence, they will recognise this fact.
I do not propose at the moment to touch on the difficult question of confidentiality which surrounds so much of the applied work done by pharmaceutical firms and equally—this was referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley—the firms which produce cosmetics, which are in such demand in the market place. Much more important is the point that came up in the previous debate on Ireland to which the noble Lord, Lord Mottistone, referred—that of food processing. We have to recognise that in food processing and distribution, this country, including Ulster, is totally urbanised. We depend entirely upon processed food. We depend on food which contains food additives, which may be preservatives or additives of a different kind. It is unthinkable that those who are responsible for seeing that the country is truly and properly fed should be inhibited from making quite certain that what is purveyed has been properly tested.
However, these are all matters that will emerge at the Second Reading of the Bill, which I hope the Government will produce soon. I am sure that my
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noble friend Lord Houghton will use all his influence to see that this is done without too much delay. These are matters which will come up and in which most of us will have a part to play. We shall certainly be extremely interested. All I need now say in conclusion is that, whatever their interests in the matter, everyone should be pleased that the nettle has at last been grasped and that new legislation to control the use of animals in experiments will in due course be introduced.
7.47 p.m.
Lord Auckland: My Lords, the House will be very grateful, not for the first time, to the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, for allowing this very important debate to take place, whatever conclusions some of us may reach in the long run. I should like at the outset to offer my congratulations—it is the first time I have had the opportunity of doing so—to my noble friend Lady Trumpington on her elevation to the Front Bench, I am sure that the House will recognise that she will treat this matter with sympathy and conviction which always marks her contributions.
We have at least two very distinguished scientists taking part in the debate—the noble Lords, Lord Zuckerman and Lord Adrian. I intervene briefly for two reasons, albeit at a late hour. First, I have served on a hospital committee for a number of years. In mental health particularly, drugs have to be used which involve the use of animals. Also I am a member of the all-party parliamentary Chemical Industry Committee, though I am neither a scientist nor a chemist. I have visited a number of pharmaceutical establishments in this country and at least one large one in one of the EEC countries. I have seen for myself one or two of these experiments taking place.
I would make the general point that if one compares the experiments which are carried out in this country—and, in such experience as I have had, those in the EEC—with the types of experiments carried out in some of the countries in the Far East (pictures of which have appeared in some of the tabloid newspapers), while in no way allowing apathy to creep in here, I believe our record has much to be commended.
It is a relief that the White Paper has at last appeared, the first since 1876. I agree very much with the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, when he presses the Government for an early Bill. It may be that a full-scale debate—and it is a great pity that this vital question comes on at such a late hour—on the White Paper will be needed before the Government produce a Bill. Even if it does not appear in the next 15 months, I would urge the Government to press on and at least to let us have one in as short a time as possible. It is not an easy matter on which to legislate. Even those of us who are not scientists recognise this. The thing has to be got right.
If I may comment briefly on one or two paragraphs in the White Paper, undoubtedly paragraph 30, on cosmetics, is the one which causes the most concern. If, as I understand it, animals are going to be used for experiments on cosmetics, I would hope that this would be confined as far as possible to skin diseases such a psoriasis and impetigo. These are distressing

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conditions and anybody who has suffered from them or who has seen people, and particularly children, who suffer from them will recognise this. It is my belief that these are the only justifications for cosmetic experiments. I cannot, certainly at this moment, think of any others; but I believe that these are important matters. But this is obviously something which will have to be discussed very fully when the White Paper is more fully debated.
The question of supervision, I believe, is very important. So far as I am aware, the Home Office inspectorate can visit any laboratory without prior notice. This should certainly be the case. It is absolutely essential that this should be done and I am very glad to see in the White Paper that there is planned a tightening up of the scandalous state of affairs where stolen pets are picked up and sold to laboratories. Of course, it would be very naive to expect a complete assurance that no stolen pets find their way there, but I hope that my noble friend the Minister can give a guarantee that the Home Office inspectorate, or whoever will be dealing with this matter, will make quite sure that this provision is carried out to the letter.
This is an emotive subject. I think that we would all wish that experiments on animals could be discontinued. What is absolutely vital is that experiments should be humane, and be seen to be humane, and that, wherever possible, the absolute minimum use of experiments takes place. In conclusion, I believe that this White Paper is a considerable step forward. Once again, I hope that legislation will emanate from it very quickly because this is a matter of considerable seriousness and urgency.
7.55 p.m.
Lord Adrian: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, has asked a very timely Unstarred Question and I think we are all grateful to him for doing so; as, indeed, I am grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Zuckerman and Lord Auckland, for the things that they have said about this in their speeches. In his Unstarred Question Lord Houghton indicated that the Government White Paper had a mixed reception. I do not think that that is in any way surprising in view of the very many interests that it had to satisfy. I would have expected Lord Houghton to be critical of some of the proposals in the White Paper, although I had hoped—and my hope was not unfounded—that some of the proposals would meet with his approval.
For myself, I should like to say that I believe that the Government's proposals are mostly along the right lines and that such problems as remain should not be insuperable. Indeed, I believe that that is the opinion of scientific and industrial interests. Although we have waited, patiently I hope, for this White Paper, in terms of the result I think that the waiting has been very well worth while. I should like to congratulate the Government on having squarely faced the dilemma of this extremely contentious matter.
If they can in the end devise new legislation which will, in the words of the White Paper, give better protection to animals without—and I repeat, without—prejudicing benefits to man or animal which
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flow from the use of animals by scientists, all reasonable men will be grateful. I think that that would be a worthwhile achievement and one to which I believe this White Paper points.
The noble Lord, Lord Houghton, has singled out three issues in his Unstarred Question: pain and permissible purposes and public accountability. Although he considered the timetable of legislation primarily, I should like to speak briefly on two of these. On what has become known as the pain condition, it has always been my belief that the administrative application to licences of a condition limiting pain and suffering is the best course to adopt. I very much welcome the Government's intention to continue this course. I do not doubt that it has been applied without exception to all licences since 1929 and I do not doubt either that in general it has been very effective.
But I wonder whether there are some procedures, which will come under the new proposed legislation, which will in fact stretch present interpretations of the pain condition. To continue, as before, applying it to every licence could, I believe, give rise to the worry that either the pain condition could, under some circumstances, relatively rarely, be ignored or that, in practice, the definition of "severe pain" has been set out unreasonably high. It seems to me that more thought is needed in this matter and there might be greater reassurance for genuine public anxiety in a system where the few necessary exemptions were noted and justified than in a system which simply denies that severe and enduring pain is ever allowed or could ever legitimately be allowed.
I am wholly in agreement with what has been said: that unjustifiable pain should be avoided as far as is humanly possible. The difficult question—and the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, stressed its difficulty—is where it becomes unjustifiable. That is the question that we have very seriously to address. I have no quarrel with the list of purposes for which procedures will be permissible; nor do I agree that it is widely increased in such a way that there will be an increase in painful experiments.
However, I am glad that paragraph 32 makes it clear that important scientific work may not always have an immediately identifiable application. This makes it imperative that addition to knowledge and scientific research is an important permitted purpose. But—and here I speak personally, perhaps—with respect to teaching I find the Government's attitude perplexing, and especially on the particular matter of teaching physiological sciences to medical students and B.Sc. students, which is what I have been involved in for most of my career. It appears that to do any practical work for students involving animals will need personal licences—for which, incidentally, a fee may be charged. But I am not clear whether teaching such students will be an allowable project.
In recent years, under the 1876 Act, the conditions under which such students can do non-recovery work on anaesthetised animals have become very restricted, and the proposals in the White Paper do not appear, in my view, to improve the situation. I would hope that the Home Office could take further advice from those concerned with teaching medical sciences and

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reconsider their rejection in paragraph 40 of the White Paper of the recommendations on student licensing which have been more or less unequivocal and consistently dealt with by the Littlewood Committee, the Select Committee on the Halsbury Bill and their own Advisory Committee.
Central to the Government's proposals, I believe, is the new licensing system, and the approach of personal and project licensing is one of many possible systems. It has many merits, but I believe it has dangers, and one's ultimate judgment will depend upon the way it is administered. Licence holders have learned to rely on the wisdom and good sense of the inspectorate, and will no doubt be able to do so in the future. Indeed, I believe the inspectorate has carried out its difficult task with great skill and understanding. Under the new proposals project licences will have to be allowed by the inspectorate and, if asked, by the new statutory Animal Procedures Committee, and the administrative practices of the inspectorate and the committee will be crucial.
In that context it is reassuring that the committee, as well as the inspectorate, will have the necessary scientific expertise, but the powers of the inspectorate and the committee could be used (I do not say they would be) deliberately or inadvertently to restrict the freedom of the scientist to decide the direction of his work, and even a committee of fair-minded men is not infallible. I believe that no Government should lightly take away an existing freedom. I would hope that in the terms of reference of the Animal Procedures Committee they might be warned against the temptation to direct the course of a scientific inquiry.
Equally, I am convinced—and here I have to declare an interest since I am a member of the Home Office Advisory Committee—that that committee's recommendation in paragraph 65 of their report was the right one. We recommended there a mechanism for making representations by an aggrieved applicant against a licence refusal. The power to reject a project licence, and therefore to block a particular line of research, makes an appeal mechanism very important, and I believe that its absence from the White Paper is disturbing. I fully agree that scientists can reasonably be asked to offer justification for what they propose to do. Indeed. I believe that in practice this is very often what is done in applications today. But I believe that scientists ought to have the right to make representations to the Animal Procedures Committee in the case of a refusal to license a project.
The noble Lord, Lord Houghton, asked what methods of consultation the Government propose in order to obtain the greatest measure of agreement on these proposals in the White Paper, and I shall listen with particular interest, as I am sure we all shall, to the noble Baroness (whom I, too, am delighted to welcome to the Front Bench) when she speaks about consultation, because I know that industry and the scientific societies, including the Royal Society, would like to contribute to any further consultations. I hope that their thoughts and their anxieties will not go unheard. They are much affected by these proposals, and they have given very serious thought to the issues involved.
8.5 p.m.
Lord Bishopston: My Lord, we are all grateful to my noble friend Lord Houghton of Sowerby for giving the House yet another opportunity to discuss this important matter and to hear the views of her Majesty's Government. We are all indebted for his vigilance, perseverance and tenacity in matters of animal welfare. As other speakers have, I welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Trumpington, to the Front Bench. We hope she will show the same degree of independence in the future as she showed when she sat on the Benches behind the one on which she now sits. I have no doubt she will take note of the views of all noble Lords who have spoken this evening.
I believe the discussion we are having tonight is opportune in view of the long delays, to which reference has been made already tonight, in taking action to update the legislation of 1876, although there have been various small improvements from time to time. Indeed, paragraph I of the White Paper begins by saying that Her Majesty's Government will introduce new legislation as soon as parliamentary time permits. This seems rather slow progress in the light of the fact that, of course, the last Government were elected on the basis of a manifesto which promised:
"We shall update…the legislation on experiments on live animals".
So we hope there will be some time in this Session for action to be taken. As paragraph 2 of the White Paper says, "This will be the first legislation of its kind", when it comes, "this century". It seems now, 83 years afterwards, that we ought urgently to review, to repeal and to revise much that is out of date. The march of science is such that surely many living animal experiments (now numbering about five million) are no longer necessary, and, where they are, there must be methods to by-pass some experiments and to ensure that pain and suffering are minimised.
Paragraph 3 of the White Paper is important. I am not sure whether there is something sinister about the reference to the United Kingdom's large pharmaceutical industry, when it says:
"The United Kingdom has a large pharmaceutical industry which makes a big contribution to our balance of payments and employs 67,500 people. In devising new controls it is very important not to put industry at risk unnecessarily".
This kind of comment makes one wonder whether there will be a proper balance of the interests of all concerned in this matter of animal welfare. The White Paper rightly states that the Government have a duty to safeguard the community from avoidable harm and to enable science to continue to make progress in saving life and alleviating suffering. This requires research and testing to proceed, but, of course, with adequate controls.
There is a great deal of controversy regarding what research is necessary and what should be allowed. That, of course, is one of the themes put forward by my noble friend Lord Houghton and by others. The Government may boast of legislation they have passed and of the wider opportunities it gives: but in this area, as in others, inadequate investment, insufficient research, lack of up-to-date techniques, insufficient inspectors (which is most important) and lack of enforcement makes legislation rather a mockery. I

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understand that there are 15 inspectors to cover about 500 laboratories, so although legislation may require—and, indeed, the White Paper requires—that there should be adequate inspection and enforcement, this really depends on resources which the Government say in other connections they do not have. So, if they bring forward legislation, we hope that they will also provide the means whereby it can be really effective.
I was prepared to make some detailed comments on the three aspects which my noble friend used as the basis for his Question tonight. But some of those comments have been made by the noble Lords, Lord Zuckerman and Lord Adrian, in particular with their special knowledge and concern, so I shall just summarise some of my comments. On the pain clauses, the White Paper seems to give no indication about the progress being made concerning pain restriction. It makes great play of the fact that the draft European Convention allows exceptions to the pain condition, but it seems that those exceptions have not been allowed in this country.
Here again, as in all legislation, definition is most important on the aspects of these paragraphs. The Home Office has never satisfactorily defined the concepts of such words as "severely" and "enduring" in the sense of pain. It has been left to the researcher to interpret them, and the researcher would consult the Home Office inspector. But, as I said, in 1981 there were only 15 inspectors to cover 500 laboratories, which means that, to a large extent, the legislation is ineffective.
The other aspects of permissible purposes are important, and it has been suggested that the Government could have used the permissible purposes section as an alternative approach to controlling animal experiments, given that the pain approach is so vague, but they seem to have missed the opportunity. Of course, as others have mentioned, particularly obnoxious is the fact that experiments are still being allowed in the cosmetic and tobacco industries. It may still be true to say that smoking can endanger your health, but it also endangers the health of animals.
With regard to project licences, paragraphs 37 and 38, in theory paragraph 37 is an improvement. At present, a researcher applies for just one licence which covers both him and his experiments. To obtain a licence, a researcher approaches the Home Office inspector for advice on his application and then sends an application to the Home Secretary. The licence usually lasts for a number of years. Now the Government propose that two licences be issued to cover a person and the other projects.
The weakness in this system is that the project licence must have a sponsor who must be either—as required in paragraph 38—a professor in the relevant discipline or some other person in authority. The sponsor must be acceptable to the Home Secretary, but the question arises: how is he chosen? One wonders what reaction there would be if the person concerned had some doubts about animal welfare experiments. But, in all these things, definition is a most important matter and there needs to be some tightening up of these aspects if any legislation is to be effective.
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My noble friend rightly draws attention to the limited number of important aspects of the White Paper. However, we should not debate these issues in a vacuum and it has been essential for other noble Lords and myself tonight to widen the debate a little in order to get our perspectives. This has been greatly helped by the comments of noble Lords who have spoken from immense experience.
It would be helpful to the House, and indeed to many who are concerned in the country, if the noble Baroness could say what is the state of play since 1876. I shall not ask her to cover too long a period, but I notice that in another place on 19th November 1982 the then Minister, Mr. Raison, at col. 560 of the Official Report, when talking about the Government's programme and policy on this matter, said this:
"As soon as my right honourable friend the Home Secretary had reconstituted the advisory committee on animal experiments in 1980, with wider terms of reference, he asked it to make a comprehensive study of the framework of legislation to replace the 1876 Act. The advisory committee presented its report towards the end of 1981 and that is an important factor in the Government's deliberations".
We have gone from 1981 and are now well through 1983, and it would be helpful if the noble Baroness could enlighten the House on the Government's intentions.
The Labour Party and many other bodies have produced detailed proposals and we believe that there is room for further consultation. This should not take too long, because a lot has already been said and written and we certainly need progress in the very near future. The Prime Minister's delight at espousing Victorian values has surely been helped by our use of legislation based on the concepts of the 1870s. But it is not good enough when we are going towards the 21st century and concern for animals should animate us all.
In the debate at about this time last night I quoted John Donne's memorable comment that,
"Every man's death diminishes me".
I believe it is equally true to say that the death of every man and the suffering and death of every living creature diminishes us all. I am sure that we await the noble Baroness's comments tonight to see what further progress may be made in ensuring less suffering for everyone.
8.17 p.m.
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, may I start by thanking all those noble Lords who welcomed me to this Dispatch Box. Actually they were wrong. This Question was pipped at the post by a Question earlier this week, so this is my second time here. But I am grateful for their kind remarks.
I recall with pleasure the collaboration between the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, myself and others which led to the preservation of the curlew during a debate last year. I cannot say that I have relished in the same way the prospect of replying to the Question of the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, today. Partly this was because the subject matter is, unfortunately, not a heart-warming one and arouses so many violent passions that in any other place I should fear at the number of friends I might be losing and opponents gaining as soon as 1 opened my mouth. I would also

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add that I feel I am responding to a Question which, with all respect, has been asked a little prematurely.
As the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, said, comments upon the White Paper have been requested soon. As a matter of fact, the date is 12th August—not, perhaps, the most appropriate date in the circumstances. It also happens to be slap in the middle of many people's holidays and I understand that most of the responses so far have been requests for an extension of the deadline. So I suppose the simple answer to the noble Lord's Question is that the Government have very little formal idea of the reception the White Paper is getting. Therefore, I dispute his assertion of a mixed reception. The general election campaign may also have contributed to the general hush on its appearance. But the Home Office's ears flap widely and, one way or another, the Government were pretty well aware of the sort of criticisms mentioned by the noble Lord even before he drew them expressly to the attention of this House.
Not all that the Government have heard has been criticism. however, and I most grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Zuckerman, Lord Adrian, Lord Auckland, and others, for their helpful speeches this evening. After all, the Government's proposals are similar in many respects to those put forward jointly by the British Veterinary Association, the Committee for the Reform of Animal Experimentation, of which the noble Lord is chairman, and the Fund for the Replacement of Animals in Medical Experiments. There are some differences and, as the noble Lord points out, they are important ones; and they will undoubtedly continue to provoke criticism. But I think the fact that the White Paper has not been greeted by an outcry demonstrates, even allowing for the general election factor, that in many respects it has been well received and is seen by many people to represent a fair and sensible balance between the interests of science, industry and animals.
Before I deal briefly with the points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, and others, I should like to answer his point about consultation. The Government are anxious to ensure the greatest possible measure of agreement, although it would be illusory to expect that we shall obtain unanimity. But, despite the range of anxieties which have been expressed here, I really do not think we shall have the full picture until comments have come in from the wide variety of interested organisations. It is only when we have them that we can decide exactly how best to proceed. All I can promise is that consultation will be of the fullest kind.
With regard to joint representation from animal welfare bodies, which was touched upon, the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, I cannot commit the Government to any particular form of consultation, but I think it must be obvious that little would be gained by talking to a lot of groups, supposedly representing similar interests, which all disagreed with each other. It is much easier if broad interest groups can reach agreed views, as the BVA, CRAE and FRAME did so successfully.
The first of the criticisms made by the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, was about the pain
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condition. That point has been touched on by most speakers. As the noble Lord said—and I could not agree more—trying to decide what is the acceptable level of suffering which a sentient being without a choice should be asked to endure on my behalf is a horribly difficult issue. The Government's approach is to say, first of all, that no animal should be required to suffer anything at all unless there is no scientific alternative and unless it is one of the permissible purposes.
Having reached that point, the Government do not then think that it is possible or advisable to distinguish formally between types of purposes for which an animal should only be permitted to suffer a pinprick and those for which it may be required to undergo more prolonged or intensive pain or distress. It may seem easy to say that a new shampoo is worth much less suffering than a cure for multiple sclerosis, but it is not as simple as that in practice. If we were to attempt to grade work according to whether we thought it was useful, essential, urgent, exceptional, et cetera,we should be in grave danger either of unwittingly preventing a really important discovery because the research gave no promise of one at the outset, or of devaluing the grading by accepting that more or less everything was essential and exceptional. It is far better to say that work within the areas of permissible purposes may be carried out and then stipulate, as all licences do now, that no animal shall be required to suffer severe and enduring pain.
The noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, asked whether the pain clause would be a statutory requirement and legally enforceable. That is very much a question for the lawyers. We have not yet made up our minds, but we shall bear in mind what the noble Lord has said.
The noble Lord, Lord Adrian, asked the Government to reconsider the question of an exemption to the pain clause. The Government were strongly opposed to the provision for an exemption which is contained in the European Convention. We cannot go back upon our stance. We cannot offer less protection to animals in the future than we have in the past. Our new legislation cannot be regressive. I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Adrian, but I really do not think that researchers have been unduly inhibited in the past, nor need be in the future. The admission of only one or two exemptions in the legislation would, I am convinced, lead to the gradual erosion of the system protecting animals which has been so carefully built up and so scrupulously maintained.
With regard to the subject of permissible purposes, the main thing to say here is that, as the White Paper makes clear in paragraph 28, the list of purposes contained in the European Convention is only a basis for the Government and that they may have to modify some of them, possibly in the light of the comments we hope to receive by or shortly after 12th August.
I was interested by the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, and the noble Lord, Lord Auckland, concerning the retention of cosmetics testing. I do not think I can usefully add to what the White Paper says on this issue. The main points are that the term "cosmetics", as defined in the European Directive with which we must comply, covers a wide

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range of substances, not all of which are by any means trivial. There are very few cosmetic tests. I have the percentages from the Cosmetic Toiletry and Perfumery Association. Only 0·56 per cent. of animal tests carried out in 1981 were for the cosmetics industry. Small as it was, this percentage represented a decline from 0·68 per cent. in 1980. The cosmetics industry has to guarantee the safety in use of such products as shampoos, toilet soaps and dentifrices which are likely to be in contact with eyes or skin or which could be swallowed. The industry has an absolute duty under the EEC cosmetics directive to market products which are safe in use.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: My Lords, will the noble Baroness permit me to say that these percentages, small though they are, are considerable in terms of numbers? Some thousands of animals are involved in the 0.6 per cent. of the total number of animals involved. We are talking in millions. The number represented by a small percentage is rather greater than many people would imagine.
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby. I give the percentages merely in order to show that from the point of view of the cosmetics industry this is a very small percentage in terms of actual experiments and that they have to carry out these experiments in order to protect themselves before they market new products which could be harmful.
The noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, questioned the use of "unnecessary" products. Some of the same arguments I have just put forward apply to other goods which may not seem essential, in that they appear to duplicate existing products. What they offer may be an improvement. They may clean better or be less potentially harmful than other products on the market; or they may work significantly better for some people than available alternatives. Either these products are adequately tested or they fail to come on to the market altogether. That may not be a matter of great concern to your Lordships or to me, but we should not presume that nobody is concerned about it.
Turning to the subject of scientific research, I listened with great interest to the noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman. Again, the White Paper really says it all. We cannot stop our research—or, rather, we can, but we do so very literally at our own risk. I could presume to wonder whether the two persons who recently had their arms sewn back on would have received the necessary medical expertise for this delicate operation had not a great deal of research involving animals taken place over the years.
Turning to the subject of public accountability, the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, took me a little by surprise when he raised this issue, since the Question on the Order Paper refers to "project licences", not public accountability. But the two are in fact connected and I should like to comment on project licences, first because they were touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman, and secondly because they are, I know, a matter of great concern to potential licensees. This is partly because we have been putting out feelers about the way in which the new system might work in practice. Because our own ideas
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are not fully worked out, a certain amount of scepticism has been encountered. It is an area where we are very reliant upon consultation. We cannot just work out a paper scheme and thrust it upon people. The Government are well aware of the fears that laboratories will be filling out thousands of project licence application forms; that the new system will not be sufficiently flexible to cover changes of direction in research; and that the new sponsors will lead to breaches of commercial confidentiality.
All I can say is that officials are working to devise a system that will be practicable for both licensees and the inspectorate, while at the same time providing sufficient information for the Home Secretary to know what is proposed in every project—however widely or narrowly that has to be interpreted—and to be satisfied that it is justifiable within the limits of permissible purposes. When the Home Secretary is in that position, I believe that the anxiety expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, will be allayed.
With regard to other points which have been raised, the noble Lord, Lord Zuckerman, mentioned the subject of food processing. I do not wish to dwell on this matter. Suffice it to say that in some instances we have a clear duty to ensure that foods are safe, and this may involve tests of preservatives and the like on animals. My noble friend Lord Auckland commented on the role of inspectors; and the noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, also commented on ineffective legislation concerning that same matter. The White Paper promises to increase the strength of the inspectorate, because of their new duties. It has been suggested that there are not enough inspectors to fulfil their role adequately. We should bear in mind that some 90 per cent. of experiments are carried out at about only 10 per cent. of registered places; and that the large-scale establishments are frequently inspected, usually without notice, so that inspectors really get to know what is going on in those places for which they are responsible.
I entirely reject the suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Bishopston, that present legislation is ineffective and that the inspectorate cannot and do not exercise adequate control. I am happy to say that I believe the noble Lord is alone in that view.
Lord Bishopston: My Lords, may I intervene very briefly?
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, I would much rather the noble Lord did not. As my noble friend Lord Auckland said concerning stolen pets, there are always allegations about stolen pets being used in laboratories. Proof of actual instances is very rare. At all events, the Government are anxious to take the maximum steps to prevent the possibility of such a traffic.
In reply to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Adrian, about appeals, the noble Lord urged the Government to give their views on an appeals system for licensees whose projects are refused. The Advisory Committee recommended some form administrative mechanism, not a statutory one, and so it is hardly surprising that the White Paper does not cover it. I very much doubt whether a formal mechanism will

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prove necessary. As the noble Lord, Lord Adrian, is aware, licensees keep in close touch with the inspectorate, which can advise on ways in which the work of the licensees can be modified to meet the requirements of the Act. It is therefore very unusual for a licence to be refused outright. In the same way, I doubt whether projects will often be refused, because the informal discussions which take place with the inspectorate will lead to adequate work being proposed and will enable the scientist to make his views well known to the inspectorate and, directly or indirectly, to the Home Secretary.
The last Government promised in their election manifesto that they would update the law, but work was delayed while the United Kingdom played a leading role in shaping the draft Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Vertebrate Animals, work on which was not completed until April of this year. The convention now awaits the approval of the Committee of Ministers. The United Kingdom will not be able to ratify it until new legislation has been introduced, and in fulfilment of their manifesto commitment the last Government announced their plans for legislation in the White Paper Scientific Procedures on Living Animals,published on 12th May, which we have been discussing this evening.
As I have already said, the Government are most anxious to obtain views from all relevant bodies. Consultations will obviously follow—and a Bill will come before your Lordships as soon as parliamentary time permits—but it is not for me to comment on when that start will be made.
While it is never possible to please all the people all the time, your Lordships can rest assured that the Government will do their best to ensure that future legislation will protect animals while at the same time permitting the necessary research to advance knowledge helpful to both humans and animals.
Lord Bishopston: My Lords, before the noble Baroness sits down, may I assure her that we do appreciate the assurances she has given? However, the assurance that there will be more inspectors is not quite the same thing as an assurance that there will not be an inadequate number of inspectors.
House adjourned at twenty-four minutes before nine o'clock.