Lords Sitting of 29 November 1983

Preamble
The House met at half-past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Peterborough.
The following Lords took and subscribed the Oath or made the solemn Affirmation:
Shane Hugh Maryon, Viscount Gough;
Roger Edward, Lord Mostyn.

The Pearson Commission: Recommendations
Lord Graham of Edmonton: 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 when they intend to act on the main recommendations of the report of the Royal Commission on Civil Liability and Compensation for Personal Injury (the Pearson Commission).
The Lord Chancellor (Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone): My Lords, of the 188 recommendations of the commission, some have already been acted on including some of those on damages, work injuries, sea and inland waterways and occupiers' liability. The Government have not yet taken a final decision on the implementation of other recommendations including those on road injuries and product liability. For a wide variety of reasons the Government have decided not to implement certain other recommendations.
Lord Graham of Edmonton: My Lords, will the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor confirm that Answers to previous parliamentary Questions relating to the state of the art defence are still Government policy? Will that topic still remain on the agenda of the Committee of Permanent Representatives? While the Government wait for harmonisation of the EEC directive, can the House be told what steps are being taken to discuss with commerce and industry the undoubtedly heavy costs which will eventually flow from strict liability?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I think I can confirm that it is part of the Government's policy to maintain the state of the art defence. I do not think, without notice, that I can give a full account of the various consultations which have taken place with industry, but they have been pretty extensive. Of course at the moment the state of the art defence is one of the obstacles to the European Directive which is under consideration at Brussels. That is the best answer that I can give to the noble Lord's supplementary question.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, does the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor recall—
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undoubtedly he does—the debate that took place in this House on the Pearson Report when considerable attention was given to the "no fault road compensation scheme"? In view of the large number of persons who suffer injury, for which there is no compensation, arising from road accidents, will the Government move fairly quickly on that item?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, the road compensation scheme is probably one of the most controversial of all the Pearson recommendations. Simply in terms of manpower it would cost a thousand new jobs, 200 of which would be medical. I wonder whether that is the best way in which to use 200 doctors. At 1977 prices it would cost £64 million a year and I am wondering whether £64 million—if one is going to spend it on the disabled—is best spent in that particular way. There are two alternate views and doctrines about how we ought to deal with disablement. One such view was put very well by the noble Baroness. Lady Lane-Fox, when we had the vaccine damage debate. The view put forward then was that we ought to use our resources to help all disabled people depending upon the nature of their disablement and the extent of their disablement. The other view is that we should select particular groups of disabled people—for instance, people who are vaccine damaged or people injured on the roads, as the noble Lord's supplementary question implied—and concentrate on particular groups of the disabled not according to the nature or extent but according to the cause of their disablement. I belong to the "Lane-Fox school"; but the Government have not yet adopted quite the same view.

Pilotage Regulations
2.41 p.m.
Lord Gainford: 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 intend to change current pilotage regulations.
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, successive Administrations in recent years have envisaged such changes. My right honourable friend is now giving most careful consideration to new policy initiatives and he hopes to be able to make a Statement before long.
Lord Gainford: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that reply. Can he assure me that there is no danger of there being an increase in the cost of pilotage off British shores within the next few years?
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, I do not think I can give my noble friend Lord Gainford a total assurance. However, some two years ago, in August 1981, my noble friend Lord Trefgarne said that he hoped that any change would not reflect further expense upon the shipping industry. I am quite sure that that would be our policy today.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the House will be encouraged to know that there is to be an early Statement by the Government on this important issue? Is he further aware that pilots around the coast—certainly in Wales and the Merseyside area—are deeply concerned that there should be some early Statement by the Government? Could he give the House an indication when the Statement will in fact be made? Will it be within the next month, or will it take longer than that?
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord the Leader of the Opposition for his question. The short answer is that a Statement will probably be made next year. Some very delicate negotiations with the pilots, the pilots' association and other interested parties are currently in hand, and they are taking some little while to resolve. I would not expect my honourable friend to make a Statement until well into next year.

Magistrates' Courts: Financial Cutbacks
2.44 p.m.
Baroness Nicol: 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 what effect restrictions on local government spending are having on the functioning of the magistrates' courts.
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, the magistrates' courts service is financed as to 80 per cent. by a specific grant and has thus largely been protected from the general pressure to cut expenditure. It goes without saying, however, that the magistrates' courts are not exempt from the continuing need for economy.
Baroness Nicol: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor for that reply. However, is he aware that in at least one area of the country the effect of the cuts on the magistrates' court is that the police have been asked to reduce their input of cases to that court by 15 per cent.? Is the noble and learned Lord further aware that the enforcement of arrears in that same area is almost at a standstill? Therefore, the alternative to prison, which is available to the magistrates, has ceased to mean anything.
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I am not aware of the particular area to which the noble Baroness refers. If she will give me some evidence about it, I shall have it looked into. However. I think that the noble Baroness should bear in mind that the current expenditure on magistrates' courts between 1979 and estimated 1985–86 has gone up from £72 million to £93 million, to £107 million, to £118 million, to £129 million, to £135 million, to £140 million. There are 19 major court systems already in the plans up to 1985–86 and I have 31 more in the pipeline.
Lord Harmar-Nicholls: My Lords, can my noble and learned friend say whether anybody anywhere has the power to tell the police to reduce what is called their "input" when they are carrying out their duty?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I am just waiting to see what the noble Baroness tells me in answer to my invitation.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, notwithstanding the impressive statistics produced by the noble and learned Lord, is he aware that, in addition to the complaint made by my noble friend, probation officers throughout the country are deeply concerned about the effect of these economies upon the probation service? Is he aware that the community service, which indeed the Government so keenly support, is also affected by these economies? Would the noble and learned Lord be prepared to make his own inquiries to find out whether these important services are affected?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I should hardly have described a rise from £72 million to £140 million as economy. The Question I was asked refers to the functioning of the magistrates' courts. If the noble Lord on the Opposition Front Bench puts down a Question about the probation service or the community service, I think that they would be very suitable subjects for a Question. I must say in parenthesis that, although I am answering for the Government, as all Ministers do, the noble Lord is as well aware as I am that this is a Home Office question and if my noble friend Lord Elton were here he would probably be more forthcoming than I am.
Lord Avebury: My Lords, in his original reply the noble and learned Lord said that 80 per cent. of the expenditure on magistrates' courts comes from central Government funds, which means that the remaining 20 per cent. is financed by the local authorities. In fact, he did not answer the noble Baroness's Question as to what effect the restrictions on local government spending had had on that 20 per cent. I wonder whether he would address his mind to that question.
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, that extra 20 per cent. is not entirely financed by local authorities. It comes out of the rate support grant which, as the noble Lord knows, is very largely central Government money from a different source. However, the short answer to the noble Lord's question is that if there is any effect on the magistrates' courts, it must surely be purely marginal.
Lord Diamond: My Lords, while the whole House will be most grateful to the noble and learned Lord for the current costs which he has supplied to the House, is he in a position to help the House by giving the realistic figures—that is to say, the comparison at constant prices?
The Lord Chancellor: No, my Lords, I am not. However, if the noble Lord tables a Question to that effect, he shall surely have an excellent answer from my noble friend.
Baroness Macleod of Borve: My Lords, in reference to the answer given by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor, can he confirm that it is now policy to replace police court staff with civilian staff in magistrates' courts?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I could not without notice, but I think that the answer is, Yes.
Earl Fortescue: My Lords, are the Government aware that the problem outlined by the noble Baroness does not apply in Oxfordshire, which is the only county about which I am in a position to speak? Any reasonable request from the magistrates' courts committee in that county is almost always agreed to by the county council.
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I am glad to hear what my noble friend says, but I do not think we can go through the country area by area.
Baroness Nicol: My Lords, the global figures given by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor are convincing, but nevertheless the local interpretation is what matters in the application of law and order. Will the noble and learned Lord therefore agree that if I write to him—he will understand that I do not wish to name this area because it would be an invitation to crime in that area—he will perhaps investigate this matter?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, the matter will be investigated, but by my noble friend Lord Elton.

Heating Allowances for the Elderly
2.51 p.m.
Lord Hill of Luton: 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 what is the legal basis for the reduction in the heating allowances of some elderly persons.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Security (Lord Glenarthur): My Lords, the Supplementary Benefit (Housing Benefit) (Requirements and Resources) Consequential Amendments Regulations 1982, approved by your Lordships on 30th July 1982, introduced some changes to the rules governing help to supplementary benefit claimants who pay for their heating with their rent. As part of these changes, claimants who pay a fixed charge for their heating and who do not need any extra heating can no longer receive extra heating additions. In the Government's view, it would not have been right to have continued paying those heating additions to claimants who did not need to pay for extra heating over and above that provided by the fixed charge.
Lord Hill of Luton: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the relevant part of the regulations which he has quoted is so obscure as to suggest that only the draftsman can understand it? Secondly, is the noble Lord aware that neither of the Ministers who, in this House and the other place, put these regulations to Parliament for approval made the slightest reference to the power which they apparently give to reduce the incomes of some elderly and infirm persons who need
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additional heating by almost £2 a week, and that that was done without explanation or warning?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I am afraid I must agree with the noble Lord when he says that the rules are complex: complex they certainly are. So far as his second point is concerned, the change in the supplementary benefit rules did not take heating additions away from claimants who needed extra heating. The only losers (if that is the right word) are people whose landlords provide full heating for a fixed charge. In those cases that charge is fully reflected in the housing benefit they receive.
Lord Molloy: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that in addition to the valid and important points made a moment ago by the noble Lord, Lord Hill of Luton, there is also a grave anxiety arising among the poor, the crippled, the invalid and the elderly as to how the Government are going to help them when the increases in gas and electricity take place? Can the noble Lord give the House some indication of what help will be afforded to those in the categories I have mentioned when the increases take place?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, the Government are spending well over £350 million this year on extra help with heating costs for those most in need. These supplementary benefit heating additions have just been increased in line with the increase in fuel prices to May of this year, which was 8.6 per cent., and are now at their highest ever level in real terms. They should, as in the past, be increased again next year in the light of increases in fuel prices, to which the noble Lord referred, during the 12 months ending May 1984.
Lord Stallard: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that much of the confusion has arisen because the implementation of the supplementary benefit regulations and the changes to the heating additions made in the supplementary benefit regulations were introduced at the same time as the partial operation of the housing benefit scheme? This has caused a great deal of confusion. Is he aware that that confusion has been made worse because many local authorities up and down the country put different interpretations on the regulations depending on their particular policy arrangements? Is he further aware that this has meant that many elderly people have lost heating additions of up to £4.65 per week in some areas? Does he agree with me that the time is now right for the introduction of a comprehensive fuel strategy covering all fuels and all aspects, including insulation and conservation, and with a mind to the ever-increasing punitive burden of standing charges on elderly people?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I think that the answer to the last supplementary that the noble Lord asked was covered when I answered his noble friend Lord Molloy. To go to the first part, housing benefit has of course resulted in a reduction in supplementary benefit payments to some people because their housing requirements are now met by the local authority. Although this may have meant that some claimants needed to make changes to their budgeting arrangements, the introduction of housing benefit has

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not, in itself, affected the sum which claimants have available for living expenses.
The noble Lord also asked about the difficulties (I think that was his word) in the transfer to the local authorities of this responsibility. It is true that at the end of July roughly 20 per cent. of all authorities had not fully completed the changeover to housing benefit, but even at that time the cases outstanding amounted to only 5 per cent. of the total number of claimants involved.
Lord Kilmarnock: My Lords, have the Government made any calculation of the cost to the public utilities of abolishing standing charges for pensioners?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I am sorry, but I did not hear the last part of the noble Lords' question.
Lord Kilmarnock: My Lords, my question was whether the Government have made any calculation of the cost to the public utilities in this country of abolishing the standing charges for pensioners.
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, not that I know; but if there is one, I shall let the noble Lord have it.
Lord Molloy: My Lords, to avoid adding to the difficulties and complexities outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Hill of Luton, and my noble friend behind me, in so far as the gas authorities and the electricity authorities say, and have told the Government, that they do not want to increase prices, is it not obvious that the thing for the Government to do is not to put up the prices, and not to give people the problem of trying to work out how to get the extra couple of shillings to pay for the increases, but to stop the increases? Is that not the real answer?
Lord Glenarthur: No, my Lords. Apart from anything else, that is rather a different question. I should say again to the noble Lord that the sums of money which this Government are spending are over £350 million a year, which are far higher than the sums spent by any previous Government. We introduced extensions to the criteria for the payment of heating additions in 1980 so that pensioners over 70, or families with children under five and on supplementary benefit, now get a heating addition automatically.
Lord Glenamara: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that what he refers to euphemistically as "adjusting their budgeting arrangements" means the difference between getting by and poverty, penury, and hypothermia for tens of thousands of old people this winter? Is this not a disgusting and disgraceful thing for this Government to do?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I am afraid that the noble Lord is overstating the case. The fact remains that those who lose out (if that is a form of words which is acceptable to the noble Lord) are those who were in fact over-provided for in the first case.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, is it not a fact that, although the noble Minister has made a great
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boast about the additional assistance given to pensioners, that assistance is in fact limited. as he said, to those in certain categories? People between the ages of 65 and 80 get very cold indeed, and need additional assistance as well. As my noble friend Lord Molloy said the fact that additional charges are going to be levied on all people. including pensioners, through the action of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in relation to the gas and electricity industries, is going to cause much distress and heart-searching to many old people. Will the noble Minister respond to the request by my noble friend that the Government look at this again and allow the electricity and gas corporations to hold prices for another year?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, that really is another question, and I do not think it is one that I ought to go into now. Of course, as I said just now, the increases that take place in the prices in both the gas and electricity industries will be reflected in the rises that take place inline with inflation up to May next year.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, we shall have a chance of discussing these matters further in the debate next week. But, arising out of the Question posed by the noble Lord, Lord Hill of Luton, and without going into the rights or wrongs of the matter, does the Minister feel able to accept that, whatever the Government may have explained. the matter is not clear to many people who are involved, who are terribly worried about this and have difficulty in paying their bills at present? Would the Minister feel able to ask his right honourable friend whether the publicity about these matters in the press could be considered again so that it is both in better English and more easily understood by people who are frightened at the thought of winter?
Lord Glenarthur: Yes, my Lords, we share the concern of all those who are worried about the effect that winter could have on the elderly and infirm. If there is a form of words that can be used to make it more clear we shall consider it. But I should not like to be drawn on whether or not there would be a change in the end.
Baroness Fisher of Rednal: My Lords, will the noble Lord enlarge on his reply when he said that the elderly had been "over-provided for"? Does he mean that we have kept them too warm or does he mean to say that the weather is not so cold? He used the phrase "over-provided". The provision was through the DHSS without being too generous to the old-age pensioners.
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, if the phrase "over-provided for" is capable of misinterpretation. I apologise. I share the noble Baroness's concern; but the fact remains that those who have now lost in the way that I described were getting double treatment to some extent in what amounts to a complex area and one that I should be delighted to talk to the noble Baroness about later or perhaps answer her in writing. This is a difficult subject. The fact remains that some people were receiving double benefit and that has now gone.
Lord Hill of Luton: My Lords, does the Minister deny that there are some ageing and infirm people who have lost nearly £2 a week as a result of the approval of these regulations? Secondly, will he ask for his right honourable friend to arrange that housing authorities, who are aware of old people needing more than the common level of heating provided for others, should notify the names of those people to the local office of the DHSS so that the position can be remedied? Finally, is the Minister aware of the case which I brought to the notice of the department: that an old lady of 85, nearly blind, suffered that reduction of just under £2—£1.90 in fact—as a result of the application of these regulations? No amount of debate will persuade one that that is right in modern conditions and modern circumstances.
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I am afraid that I cannot, without notice, say categorically whether the figure that the noble Lord quotes is right or wrong. But any claimant whose fixed charge does not meet all his or her heating needs can still be considered for a heating addition under the normal rules. Indeed, many claimants in this position are better off under the new arrangements than before because they can now get both heating additions from supplementary benefit and a further rebate of a percentage of the amenity charge as part of their housing benefit.
Lord Stallard: My Lords, may I take the noble Lord back to the point that I raised in my first question about the different interpretations being put on these regulations by local authorities throughout the country? May I ask him to reconsider sending out some notes of guidance for clarification to local authorities and publishing the information more widely than it is at present?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I shall certainly consider that and see what we can do to help.

Business
Lord Denham: My Lords, at a convenient moment after 3.30 this afternoon my noble friend Lord Gray of Contin will, with the leave of the House, repeat in the form of a Statement an answer to a Private Notice Question in another place on the National Graphical Association dispute.
It may be for the convenience of the House if I announce that dinner will be available at the usual time of 7.30 this evening.

Inshore Fishing (Scotland) Bill [H.L.]
3.6 p.m.
The Minister of State, Scottish Office (Lord Gray of Contin): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
The regulation of inshore fisheries in Scotland has a long history. Scottish sea fisheries are governed by provisions scattered through an extensive body of legislation ranging from the Fisheries Act 1705 to the Fisheries Act 1981. Deriving from the parent Acts are
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a large number of orders and by-laws. In this way the Secretary of State has available to him a great number of powers relating to inshore fishing.
This extensive body of law has taken shape in response to differing circumstances and for differing, though related, purposes. It is time to stop grafting new shoots on to what is now a very venerable trunk and to start afresh with a completely new plant. This Bill provides for the repeal of the existing outdated legislation governing inshore fishing and its replacement by a readily comprehensible and enforceable regime, suited to modern conditions in the fishing industry.
The conclusion that a fresh start was needed was first reached some years ago now. In 1967 the noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock, set up a committee under the chairmanship of Lord Cameron to review the regulation of Scottish inshore fisheries. That committee reported in 1970 and concluded that the legislation was difficult to understand, obsolete in certain respects and irrelevant to modern conditions. Lord Cameron recommended many changes. While the Government were considering this report we joined the EEC and that in turn created radical changes not only in the law but also in fishing patterns. It became clear that a comprehensive revision could not take place until we knew the final shape of the common fisheries policy. That policy was concluded only earlier this year and so it is with, I think, commendable speed that the Government have reacted by bringing before your Lordships our proposals.
Apart from the decisions on the common fisheries policy, there was one other development in the last four years which has had a part in shaping the scene. For nearly 80 years it was generally believed that there was a prohibition on trawling within three miles of the shore. In 1979 however the Sheriff at Dingwall decided that the ban applied only to bottom trawling and that midwater trawling for pelagic species was permissible. This has meant that, particularly on the west coast, pelagic trawlers have been able to come right up to the shore to take fish, a development which has increased the number of incidents occurring between static and mobile gear fishermen.
Following the Dingwall judgment and by way of preparation for the situation, once the common fisheries policy had been decided, my noble predecessor as Minister of State asked a committee of officials to reconsider the findings of the Cameron Report in the light of the many changes and developments since 1970. That committee issued a report in 1981 as a departmental consultation paper on which the views of the industry and other interested persons were sought.
It will be no surprise to the House to learn that a wide variety of views and reactions were submitted. We have given very careful consideration to the representations received, and it is on the basis of all this preparatory work that we have brought this Bill before the House.
Having sketched in very briefly the background, I should like to turn to the Bill itself and to outline some of its main aspects. This Bill is designed primarily to achieve two main objectives: these are the protection

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and conservation of fish stocks, particularly immature and breeding stocks, and the minimisation of conflict between static and mobile gear fishermen. It is the habit of fish to breed and to grow in the waters close inshore and, if I may borrow a term from another important primary source of food, it is these stocks which are the seed corn of the fishing industry. As such they are especially vulnerable to unregulated exploitation.
At the same time, and often in the same areas, we are seeing increasing conflict because of the incompatibility of pursuing static and mobile gear fishing. The Government recognise that both types of fishing have important roles to play and that fishermen in both sectors have a perfect right to earn a decent livelihood. Because that right can be threatened in the current circumstances we are aiming to create conditions which will provide fairness and equity in our inshore waters.
The Bill is very short because it is, in a sense, a neutral measure. It does not make any proposals for regulation but simply creates the context and framework within which the Secretary of State may make orders for regulating the fisheries. The choice of structure is deliberate because we want to avoid becoming locked into regulations which, although they may be appropriate for today's fishing patterns, might not be appropriate in future years. We want to create a system which can respond flexibly, quickly and sympathetically to the changing demands of the fishing industry.
The heart of the Bill is in Clause 1, which enables the Secretary of State to make orders regulating fishing in the waters around the coast of Scotland out to a distance of six miles from the baseline. We have chosen this distance because it is within six miles from baselines that almost all the static gear fishing is carried out. This is also the area within which only British fishermen may operate. While it is true that for the major part of the Scottish coast United Kingdom fishermen have exclusive rights out to 12 miles, there are areas where other EEC fishermen have specific rights in the 6-to-12 mile belt. There are, of course, already existing United Kingdom and Community laws for regulation of the more complex position where United Kingdom and other EEC nationals have rights. The clause provides for the prohibition of fishing for all fish, or for some kinds of fish, or fishing by specified methods. These prohibitions may be applied at specific times of the year and there is also scope for exceptions to the prohibitions.
In fact, it is the Secretary of State's intention to create what have been called static gear reserves and fish nursery areas. That is to say, he proposes to designate certain areas of the sea within which it will be illegal to fish by trawl, seine and other mobile gears. For the convenience of the House, I intend to place in the Library between now and Committee stage a copy of my right honourable friend's initial proposals for these static gear and young fish nursery areas. It is also our intention that the views of fishing organisations both at local and at national level be sought in this connection.
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We shall also repeal the existing provisions. In particular, we intend to dispense with the restrictions on the use of certain types of trawl gear within three miles of the coast. Scotland has a large coastline and there are many parts of it where static gear fishermen do not fish or where there are no concentrations of immature fish. It is, therefore, unreasonable to prevent the mobile gear fishermen from having access to these waters. It is also a wasteful use of our enforcement resources to have to police a three-mile limit around the whole of the coast.
In deciding upon a strategy of static gear reserves and young fish nursery areas, we are conscious that other schemes had been put forward by some of the interests involved. In particular, there have been calls for some kind of local or area management of the fisheries. We gave this proposal very serious consideration, but decided in the end that it would be wrong for the Secretary of State to devolve his powers in this respect and, even if he did, that the creation of these local committees might well give rise to more problems than they would solve. There could be problems of demarcation since the fish stocks might well not correspond as neatly to the committee areas as we would wish. There would also be difficulties if a committee in one area adopted a more restrictive or a more relaxed line on particular issues than a committee in another area. Indeed, we took the view that such a measure would create as many problems as it would solve.
The Scottish fleet has historically been a nomadic fleet and we have no wish to compartmentalise its operations. Nor would we wish to run the risk of certain areas of the country being discriminated against by other areas of the country. It therefore is appropriate that these matters should continue to be decided centrally.
Turning now to Clause 2, I would point out that with the removal of the ban on trawling within three miles of the coast it will be necessary to extend the protection for fixed salmon nets, which currently applies to certain areas of the waters around Scotland. Clause 2 makes a general prohibition on the use of mobile gear within half a mile of any fixed salmon net and ensures that the existing legal protection is not lost with the repeal of the old legislation.
Clause 3 of the Bill describes the offences created by failing to comply with orders made under Clause 1 and makes provision for the penalties to be imposed. Clauses 4 and 5 describe the powers of British sea fishery officers to enforce the legislation. These provisions correspond to provisions already enacted in other fisheries legislation, as does Clause 6, which relates to offences by corporate bodies and the recovery of fines. Clause 7 defines the terms used in the Bill. Clause 8makes provision for repeals and consequential amendments including the repeal of obsolete and spent legislation as detailed in the schedules. Clause 9 provides for the coming into force of the Bill on a date to be appointed by the Secretary of State. This will also allow for the current legal regime to remain in force until the new provisions can be effected.
Finally, I turn to the Schedules. Schedule 1 specifies certain minor and consequential amendments and Schedule 2 the repeals, in whole or in part, of those

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redundant pieces of legislation which are replaced by the Bill.
My Lords, I have attempted to set out concisely our aims in bringing this Bill before the House. I have no doubt that noble Lords have studied the Bill carefully and will have points to make both today and later in Committee. This is an important measure both for those in isolated coastal communities who depend for their living on static gear fishing and for those who prosecute fisheries in the larger vessels, away from their home bases. It should not be forgotten that these latter fishermen are equally dependent on fishing. The essence of the problem is therefore not only to strike a balance between these competing interests but to maintain that balance through future years. I believe that in this Bill we have the necessary tool with which to do that job. I therefore commend this Bill to the House. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord Gray of Contin.)
3.20 p.m.
Lord Ross of Marnock: My Lords, I think we are grateful to the noble Lord the Minister of State for his explanation of the Bill. He said that his explanation was concise. He is quite right about that. But I think he should have read his words more closely when he said we now have a readily comprehensible new regime. Might I ask him this, first of all? Where is it? I defy any noble Lord to read this Bill and tell us what the new regime is. It just is not there. This is purely and simply an enabling Bill—enabling the Secretary of State to do what he likes.
I agree with the noble Lord that it is time something was done. As a matter of fact, I agreed to this somewhere around 1967, when I set up the Cameron Inquiry into fishing regulations. I now find my past catching up with me all the time in this place. I may say that the committee reported in December 1970 and the report was addressed to me, but by that time I was no longer Secretary of State, as the noble Lord on the other side will recollect.
To suggest that he is now carrying out with speed the wishes of the Cameron Committee report of 1970 is stretching it a bit much. These things could have been done, and in fact I am sure many of them have been waiting in the pigeonholes of St. Andrew's House to be done, over a long time. I agree that they have to be done. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Cameron, happily, is still with us despite the fact that it is 13 years since he put his name to this report. He is still a judge in the Scottish courts, and more power to his elbow because his work for Scotland, not just judicially but in many other realms of public service, has been quite amazing for a man of his age. He is a man of considerable stature. I do not know what he will think of this Bill.
The noble and learned Lord was faced with about 24 Acts of Parliament stretching, I think, from George II in 1755 right up to 1968. We have added a few since then. Stemming from them were by-laws, mainly from the 1885 Act. There were about 84 bylaws, and that is not counting the other three that were purely by-laws repealing former by-laws. So there was a growth that required to be modernised; but to say
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that it was just lopping off and starting with a new trunk is wrong. By the way, you do not start with a new trunk; you usually plant something. What we are doing—at least, I hope so—is saving what is worthwhile and planting something new that is worthwhile.
But we have to appreciate the need for the regulation in the first instance. In the early eighteenth century there was considerable concern—and this is a theme which runs through all the regulations in respect of inshore fishing—about the new coming in and the old being worried and concerned as to what was going to happen to their existing livelihoods. It affected established communities; and I think that it was in 1862 that a Royal Commission was set up which condemned Acts of Parliament which had previously just been published. It is interesting to see what was said then, because the Government are in danger of having the same said now. They said:
"The Acts of 1860 and 1861 arose out of and conflicts engendered among rival sets of fishermen, by the influence brought to bear on Parliament by the large body of drift net fishermen, fish curers and other vested interests."
They introduced regulations bringing in the circle net, which was an early form of seine net. This has gone on all over the years.
But we look at this Bill, and what does it do? It gives power to the Secretary of State by order. We will never see this again: not even an affirmative resolution or a negative resolution, but purely by way of a statutory instrument he can make these changes contain something that has been entirely opposed for a long time. The Secretary of State, if he likes, can continue it, affecting the livelihoods of communities up and down the coasts of Scotland. Do your Lordships think it is right and fair for the Government to come along and say, "Here we have a comprehensible, new regime"? It is nothing of the kind. I should like to quote to your Lordships what some of the fishermen themselves have to say about it. By the way, the only speed the Government are to be commended on is the speed with which they introduced this Bill. This is the 29th. I should know that, because it is the day before St. Andrew's Day. They would not have dared to bring this along on St. Andrew's Day; but the Government got as near as they could to keep the Scots busy.
The Bill was printed only on the 17th of this month, and this is the 29th. The 17th was a Friday, by the way, which means that most Scottish Members of both Houses would probably have seen it after that weekend. The Minister of State thinks that we have all read it and studied it and have had a chance to discuss it with fishermen, and so on. I have barely had time to write a letter or telephone people and get a reply back. I have complained about this before. If this House wants itself to be taken seriously so far as Scottish affairs are concerned, then they should not push us around like this and expect us merely to be rubber stamps in respect of anything that the Government do. Please let it not happen again. Here we have two Bills on the one day, and we have seen them for only about a week. It is not good enough. I do not blame the Minister; he is new to it. But he should have known from his short experience of the Scottish Office. It is probably not their fault, either, but the fault of the people who run this place.

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What have the Scottish fishermen to say about this?
"What we have now is a situation in which interested parties will seek to gain an advantage over others by attempting to persuade the Secretary of State to enact legislation favourable to them".
So here we are, in the same situation as that which people were complaining about in the year 1862. That was the Scottish Fishermen's Organisation; and the same point is made by the Scottish Fishermen's Federation and by the Clyde Fishermen's Association. All agree that there should be modernisation; all agree that there should be a new Act; but nobody agrees that this is the kind of Act we should have. The consultations with the fishermen should have gone down to the points of detail, and the nursery bays and the restrictions to be introduced should have been in a schedule to the Bill. That was one of the recommendations of the Cameron Report. The report suggested what should be in the Bill. That was 13 years ago. There have been 13 years to think about it, and the Secretary of State has been working on it closely for three years and not just since the completion of the EEC negotiations.
I wish to say that many of the Scottish fishermen are not looking to the House of Lords today: they are wondering what is happening in Bergen, wondering about the quota they are going to get in negotiation and what we are going to give away to the Norwegians in respect of our fish stocks here, to enable us to fish. It is, of course, important for us to fish in Norwegian waters for cod, haddock and other fish.
This is exactly what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Cameron, said in his conclusion. He said that the new legislation should also,
"Schedule and define all major plaice nursery areas"
and provide for this, that and the next thing. There is nothing of that in here.
There was one other important thing that was said by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Cameron, at, I think, paragraph 143—because much has been said by the Minister of State about the protection of static gear. What did the noble and learned Lord, Lord Cameron, say about that? They considered the matter, the pros and the cons, and said:
"Consideration must however be given to the fact that selective restrictions would create many anomalous and inequitable situations because it would be virtually impossible, without recreating the total coastal reservation, to provide reserved areas for all creel, line and ground net fishermen."
They pointed to the practical difficulties of it, and in paragraph 146 said:
"On balance therefore we have come to the conclusion that the case for protecting the special interests of the static gear fishermen is not such as to warrant the imposition of restrictions on other methods of fishing".
They made a reservation in respect of the newer developments of fish farming and I think nobody would disagree with that. So the Government are not even carrying out one of the main recommendations of the Cameron Committee.
The Bill itself is non-controversial; but what the Government are going to do after it comes into force is very controversial indeed. For example, the Clyde Coast fishermen point out that they see no need for any static gear reserves in their area—that is, from
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Ardnamurchan Point to the Mull of Galloway. They say:
"Static gear fishermen and mobile fishermen have reached an understanding which allows for a constant exchange of information which reduces conflict".
They agree with the conservation aspects; but this important point about static gear is one of the most controversial that the Government have embarked upon. There is nothing in the Bill about it. You could not read Clause 1 and say that the Government are going to do that. This is what has come out of the Government's discussions following the 1981 consultations. The same is true about the Scottish Fishermen's Federation who say:
"We are totally opposed to the concept of static gear reserves",
and they represent over 1,000 fishermen in Scotland. They go on:
"The present restrictions on the use of mobile gear within three miles are outdated and should be removed".
The Government are going to do that, but we have not been able to tell what conditions, if any, there will be. There are some laid down by the Cameron Report.
What we have now is a situation which nobody wants. We have been through all this before. The fishermen's organisations used to be very divided indeed. I think that it took the efforts of the EEC to bring them all together for their own protection. I plead with the Government to change their minds about this. Why not introduce that schedule into the Bill right at the start? We shall then see it. It might take the Bill a little longer to go through this House and another place, but I can assure the noble Lord that there will be very considerable bitterness; and the reactions of the Clyde Coast fishermen, the Fishermen's Federation and the Pelagic Fishermen's Association are all the same.
May I quote from the Western Isles Free Press, which the noble Lord has probably seen. That says:
"John Nicholson, General Manager of the Stornoway Fishermen's Co-operative, said that all the arguments lead back to the need for local management. It was quite unnecessary to ban trawling within all areas at all times."
They went on to say:
"We have been working quite happily here on the basis of local agreement about where and when different kinds of fishing should have precedence".
But that will be thrown on its head by the central control of the Secretary of State.
The Secretary of the Highlands and Islands Fishermen's Association says that they are against static gear reserves and they have told the noble Lord, Lord Gray, so. It is not getting round to the problem of conservation and improving stocks. They are concerned about the lack of local consideration. The Secretary of the Mallaig and North-West Fishermen's Association said that the idea of area management would be much preferable. If static gear reserves were created, he feared that the reaction of trawlermen would be,
"Don't step out of there or we'll tow your creels away."
This is creating the very conditions that we hoped to get away from.
We have heard plenty about EEC fishermen coming into what, in modern terms, would be called "our waters". There is much bitterness within our own

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coastal fishing areas about what the Minister of State calls "nomadic fleets". You are foreign if you come from just a few miles away. What we have achieved is a friendly exchange and, with the recommendations of the Cameron Report being so opposed to the privilege given to static fishermen, the Government should not have embarked on this Bill. So I hope that the Minister's mind is not closed to that. We will try, somehow or other, to deal with this when we come to Committee.
It is a very important industry. It is an industry that has come through very hard times, but they are the kind of people who survive hard times and struggle on. It should be appreciated just how much of the white fish that we eat here in London is produced and landed by Scottish fishermen. With all the difficulties that they have, they should not have more put upon them by a Bill which claims to be modernising and simplifying, but which throws us, once again, completely into confusion. Of course, we shall support the Bill, but in Committee we shall need to go very much further in trying to get the Government to change their minds in relation to the structure of the Bill.
3.35 p.m.
Lord Grimond: My Lords, it is a very great pleasure, on this my first speech in your Lordships' Chamber, to follow two such familiar and doughty warriors as the noble Lords, Lord Gray and Lord Ross. I understand that one of the most valuable functions of this House is to scrutinise and revise legislation, but I take it that we are also prepared to ask from time to time whether particular Bills are necessary at all. One of the most telling arguments in favour of the Bill before us is that it repeals a great deal of previous legislation, but it has positive aspects of its own. It is extremely widely drawn, and under it regulations could be made about practically anything. It also gives extremely wide powers, though they may have appeared in previous Bills.
In an interesting debate last week initiated by the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, several speakers mentioned the handicap placed upon productive activities in this country not only by the great number of regulations, but by their constant change. Indeed, I think everybody now admits that the mass of regulations can be a very serious matter for those who are trying to make wealth. I have some sympathy for Lord Palmerston, who was once heard to remark rather testily:
"Surely, we cannot go on legislating forever".
Of course, he was wrong for as conditions change new legislation is needed. But it has become a mounting flood, together with the regulations made under it.
A short time ago I measured the thickness of the statutes passed in the year when I was first elected into Parliament and I then measured the thickness of the statutes passed in a more recent year. The latter year was two-and-a-half-times as thick. I may say that the first year was under a Labour Government and the second one was under a Conservative one. Some of your Lordships may be thinking, in your cynical way, that the only reason why the Liberals have not contributed to this flood is that nobody has asked them; and, if you are thinking that, I must confess that I think you are right.
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The fact is that legislating and regulating have become a national disease throughout the country. Yet the strange thing is that a great deal of it is clearly trivial and much of it harmful, while very important matters go untouched. For example, we await sensible proposals about local government finance, and your Lordships are now well aware that the reform of this Chamber has brooked no delay since 1910. Therefore, I think we are entitled to ask whether the positive aspects of this Bill are essential.
My first question to the Minister, which of course he dealt with in his lucid way to some extent, is whether the Government do not have adequate powers now to limit fishing. It is only a week or two ago since I understood that they limited sprat fishing in the Forth, in accordance with EEC regulations. But the noble Lord indicated that he felt that the Government's powers were either insufficient or too complicated. I ask him to say a little more about that at some stage of the Bill.
As he said, the Bill principally does two things. It virtually abolishes the three-mile limit and it gives Ministers power to forbid certain types of fishing in specified areas by sea-going fishing boats, where static fishing is carried on. As regards the three-mile limit, I do not believe that anybody will weep many tears over its abolition. The only question is whether it is worth doing. The three-mile limit is so widely disregarded that nobody will notice whether it is abolished.
As to the protection of static fishermen, this is needed in some places, in particular where static fishermen suffer from the depredations of trawlers, but I understood the Minister to say that this Bill is intended to apply only to certain areas of the coast and not to the whole of Scotland. Secondly, the lobster, crab, mussel and oyster fishers, and so on, who are meant to be the beneficiaries of the Bill, have expressed very grave doubts about it. They are in grave doubt. as I believe the noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock, said, as to whether legislation is the right way to tackle the matter. Many of them would prefer to go on trying to make agreements with the mobile seagoing fishermen. They fear that if these fishermen are kept out of certain areas it will be more difficult still to come to any sensible agreement over the areas which are still open.
I come next to an important question, which again was touched on by the Minister: the possibility of area agreements. I understood the Minister to say that he did not believe that at the moment such agreements could meet the case with which the Bill purports to deal. The Minister will be aware that in Orkney and Shetland there is a great deal of pressure for a management scheme. It is thought in Orkney and Shetland that it would protect stocks and the livelihood of the fishing communities and would also deal with one of the main problems with which the Bill is concerned. In the last Parliament the Secretary of State for Scotland assured me that he would carefully consider any local management scheme that was put to him. Does that undertaking still stand? Are the Government prepared to consider such schemes? They are, I know, acceptable to the EEC and I hope that they might be acceptable to the Government. Are conversations proceeding about such schemes, or are the Government waiting for the local fishermen's associations to

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make the first move? I should be very grateful for some information. It is highly relevant to the Bill, as the Minister himself indicated.
Many of your Lordships are very familiar with these fishing areas. I see that the noble Lord, Lord Boothby, has put down his name to speak. He is still widely respected throughout the Scottish fishing communities. On one occasion he said that Orkney and Shetland were too conservative to vote anything but Liberal, but that slight error has been forgiven him and I am very glad that he is still taking a deep interest in the industry.
All those who know the fishing communities recognise that the fishing villages have valuable characteristics which, if destroyed, can never be replaced. For many of them there is no possibility of any other employment. The Islands of Skerries, off Shetland, are merely clusters of rocks in the North Sea but their population, unlike most of Shetland, has remained almost unchanged for 150 years. The people are hardworking and comparatively happy. The reason for that is fishing; fishing has certain characteristics which make a human appeal that is not always recognised. First, it is to some extent in the nature of a gamble; it is more exciting than agriculture. Secondly, it gets the men out of the house; this is very important, particularly in wet climates. Therefore we should proceed very carefully over all fishing matters. If you destroy the livelihood of the three Skerries boats you will have to evacuate the islands; there is nothing else, conceivably, that the population can do. The situation in many of the other islands—in Whalsay and in Burra—is much the same. The Bill will undoubtedly create some difficulties for fishing, in particular for mackerel fishing. Like the noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock, I beg the Government to keep in the closest touch with the fishermen and make sure that the Bill meets the admitted needs with which it purports to deal.
Since I have for a very short time been a Member of your Lordships' Chamber I have been particularly heartened by many remarks, but by none more than hearing a certain noble Baroness proclaim at a quarter past six in the evening that as the hour was getting late she would curtail her remarks. This is a sentiment seldom expressed in the other place, even at a quarter past six in the morning. It is an example I hope to follow.
3.45 p.m.
Viscount Massereene and Ferrard: My Lords, your Lordships may imagine my surprise and delight upon entering the House to see that I was to speak after the noble Lord, Lord Grimond, who has just made his maiden speech. I feel sure that somebody far more eloquent and important than I ought to have been the first to congratulate the noble Lord. We all know that the noble Lord has been a very distinguished Leader of the Liberal Party for many years and that for about 30 years he was the Member of Parliament for Orkney and Shetland. Your Lordships' House will derive great benefit from such a distinguished Member. The noble Lord may derive some comfort from being congratulated by a Tory when I tell him that my grandfather—my mother's father—was for some time
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a Liberal Member of Parliament. If he were alive today, whether he would be a Liberal Member of Parliament I do not know. I hope that the noble Lord will play a great part in this House; his knowledge will be of great value to this Chamber.
Turning to the Bill, the noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock, gave it a rather cold reception. He called it an enabling Bill, which in a sense it is. The noble Lord objects to the Secretary of State having such all-embracing powers. However, this is essential in the case of fishing in the Western Highlands, especially in the Inner Hebrides, of which I have some experience. I had a lobster fishery there a long time ago. The various fishery associations will obviously lobby the Secretary of State and make suggestions to him. I am perfectly sure that the Secretary of State, whoever he may be in the future but certainly the present one, will listen very attentively and carry out many of their wishes, so I cannot see what the noble Lord is objecting to.
I have been warning this House for some time about the scarcity of fish in the Western Highlands: in the Inner and Outer Hebrides. I was extremely worried at the time that the herring disappeared. I warned the Government of the day that the herring would disappear. I do not like repeating what I said in this House a few years ago, but the two lochs which jut into my estate were nursery lochs for herring. The Government of the day allowed three factory ships to go there. and they loaded all the herring fry which had been caught by local boats. But it was a policy of madness, and in a short time there were no herring. We have the herring back now, though not in the plentiful numbers I remember. But they have come back, owing to the various regulations which the Government have imposed.
When it comes to boats—and I am now talking about inshore fishing. which is the subject of this Bill—it is true enough that there are not the number of boats that there used to be in the 1930s, but the modern boat, which, with all is gear, one might also call electronic, is so efficient and fast that it can catch far more fish than a boat of the 1930s: in fact, a modern boat can probably catch 20 times as much fish. As I recall, the local boats that I remember worked chiefly as sailing boats. They had some standing lugsails, and there were many more of them, but they certainly could not reap the harvest which the modern boats do. The Highlands Development Board—meaning well—have supplied on grants many boats for inshore fishing, but perhaps they have rather overdone that.
There is one question I should like to ask regarding "static" fishing. It does not strictly come into this field so perhaps I should not ask it, but in my area—that is, around the Isle of Mull—we are rather plagued by skin divers. I know this aspect does not come into the Bill and I apologise to my noble friend for mentioning it. But I have often wondered whether skin divers who are diving commercially should not be registered, as fishing boats are. Skin divers can completely clear the scallops, lobsters and all the other shellfish out of an area. As regards the two lochs that I have mentioned, divers have told me—because I myself do not skin dive—that they are now just like a harrowed wheat field which has not been sown. They are completely

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bare of everything because they have been over-trawled by boats and over-fished by skin divers. Perhaps in the future, the Government might try to regulate that aspect.
A matter that really worries me and which is my chief interest is the question of salmon and sea trout. Poaching of salmon now in the sea lochs around the West Coast is really appalling. This year especially, when we had a drought, the salmon could not get up the rivers and they were mercilessly poached from boats chiefly at night. It is difficult to prevent that happening. One certainly cannot prevent it as an individual and the police cannot prevent it because they do not have boats. We can stop people poaching at the mouth of the rivers or we try to—and we seize quite a few nets. But, when poachers operate a little further out, it is quite impossible for estate staff to stop them.
I understand that the fisheries service of the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food is now employing helicopters in conjunction with fishery cruisers to find out anyone who is poaching in the daytime. That is all right during the day, but one cannot do much at night with a helicopter.
With regard to penalties, I am all for those, as your Lordships might expect—but we do find on the West Coast that the sheriffs (especially one in Oban) often impose extremely small fines although the maximum fines are very big. I hope that in future the judiciary will impose not the minimum fine but will try to frighten those who carry out big poaching with bigger fines. I was told of one young man who obtained a new boat and bought a new car completely from poaching salmon.
The situation is especially hard on rod fishermen, who had a very bad year in 1982 and again this year. They bring in a lot of income to the country. If salmon poaching cannot be stopped, this country will lose a great deal of income, especially from foreign rod fishermen.
I have spoken long enough, but I wish to welcome the Bill. I only wish it had been possible to have brought it in even earlier. The Government have been extremely quick in producing this Bill, which is really surprising—that is, it is not surprising of the Government but it is surprising that they have managed to get the Civil Service to really get going on this. I am sure the Bill will do a great deal to preserve the fishing around the Western Highlands.

Messenger Newspaper Group: Dispute
3.56 p.m.
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, it may be for the convenience of the House if I now repeat an Answer given in another place about the dispute at the Stockport Messenger newspaper group. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Employment delivered a Statement which reads as follows:
"Before reporting on the current situation of the dispute between the Stockport Messenger Group and the National Graphical Association about the establishment of closed shop arrangements at the firm's subsidiaries at Warrington and Bury, I should
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advise the House of the further developments in connection with the High Court actions that have occurred since I spoke in the House last Wednesday. The court on Friday imposed a further £100,000 fine following the failure of the National Graphical Association to pay the fine of £50,000 previously imposed and to obey the injunction to refrain from organising unlawful industrial action.
"The court also ordered the sequestration of the union's assets. Later the same day the union appealed to the Court of Appeal for a stay of the High Court's orders, pending a substantive appeal against the orders which is due to be heard tomorrow.
"I understand that the Court of Appeal asked the union for an undertaking that it would pay the fines. No such undertaking was given and the Court of Appeal accordingly refused to stay the orders of the High Court, but did limit the sequestration to £175,000. I understand the commissioners have now secured this amount.
"I also advised the House last Wednesday that the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service was seeking to arrange a further meeting between the parties to resolve the dispute. Following certain preliminary discussions over successive days a meeting under the chairmanship of the conciliation service took place between the parties on Sunday in Manchester, and a further one took place yesterday. Regrettably, agreement did not prove possible.
"Nevertheless, the conciliation service continued until late last night and again this morning to explore whether an acceptable basis could be found for a further meeting today.
"The union made clear that they were willing to travel to Manchester for a meeting with Mr. Shah and his fellow directors. Mr. Shah confirmed his willingness to attend provided he could have assurance that the mass picketing threatened for Warrington this evening did not occur. The union were not able to give such an assurance. I much regret therefore that it now seems clear that it will not be possible for a meeting to take place today. I confirm that the conciliation service will continue the efforts that they have been making throughout the dispute to find an agreed solution, but it is clearly not helped by the further threats of mass picketing which have been made.
"I have to say to the House that mass picketing has no place in industrial relations in this country. Moreover, in this dispute mass picketing has already been determined by the courts to be unlawful, and is now positively frustrating the chance of a settlement".
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
4 p.m.
Lord Dean of Beswick: My Lords, may I first of all thank the noble Lord the Minister for his Statement delivered in reply to the Private Notice Question tabled in another place. Parts of the Statement refer to legal processes, and my information is that Mr. Shah has activated some other legal processes today. So I do not propose, nor would it be right, to comment on those.

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The Minister must be aware that this was a local dispute concerning the reinstatement of six workers. It has been escalated into a serious national dispute because of the effects of Conservative Government employment legislation. Is it not a serious fault that in these Acts a legal process is set in being that makes conciliation more difficult? Can I urge upon the Minister once again to continue to press the Secretary of State as a matter of urgency to seek to bring the parties involved in this dispute together in order to resolve the dispute in the interests of all.
Lord Rochester: My Lords, from these Benches I join in thanking the noble Lord, Lord Gray of Contin, for having repeated the Statement. I have little to add to what I said in response to the Statement upon the dispute last week when I spoke on behalf of my noble friends and allies. We share the regret expressed in the Statement that it has not been possible to reach an agreement.
Like the noble Lord, Lord Dean, I do not propose to get involved in the merits of the dispute, elements of which, as he said, are sub judice, save to make one thing abundantly plain; that is that in the serious situation which looks like developing in Cheshire tonight we regard the primary need to be to uphold the law. Will the noble Lord confirm that it is not simply unlawful, as the Statement puts it, but a criminal offence for pickets to obstruct the highway or the entrance to premises or to seek physically to bar the passage of vehicles? Does he further agree that Section E of the code of practice on picketing, approved by both Houses of Parliament, gives specific guidance that when people seek by sheer weight of numbers to stop others delivering goods what is intended is obstruction? Finally, even at this late hour we would urge those who may be contemplating taking part in illegal mass picketing tonight to desist from it.
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Dean of Beswick, and the noble Lord, Lord Rochester, for the way in which they have responded to this Statement, and for doing their best to keep this unfortunate situation as one of regret and not trying to make too much political capital out of it. I would, however, say to Lord Dean of Beswick that the law has become involved only because of the intimidatory picketing which has taken place, and indeed if this picketing were ended a settlement would be more easily achieved. I strongly refute his suggestion that this has anything whatever to do with the legislation which the Government have introduced. Indeed, I would further say to him that those who break the law must first of all act within the law. I am sure the whole House would agree with that sentiment.
To the noble Lord, Lord Rochester, I would say that it is correct—he is absolutely right—that criminal offences have taken place, and it is for the police to deal with those, as they have been doing. I would agree entirely with him in his attitude and the attitude he has expressed on behalf of noble Lords in his party.
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord two points arising from the Statement? First, would he confirm, notwithstanding what the noble Lord, Lord Dean of Beswick, said, that the 1980 and 1982 Acts in no way changed the law so far as illegal picketing was concerned; that in fact it has always been unlawful to do what was done in Warrington last week and what it is suggested is going to take place in Warrington this evening?
The second point is this. It has been suggested in the press and on television and radio that a special train is being sent from London tonight to carry demonstrators to Warrington and this has been arranged by the National Graphical Association. I have no idea whether this suggestion is true, but would he not agree that were it to be true it would be a serious matter for a nationalised industry to take to Warrington several hundred demonstrators who would be participating in what the courts have held to be unlawful assembly?
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Harris, for his comment. He is correct that the 1982 Act changed nothing which previously referred to unlawful picketing. So far as his second point is concerned, it just could be—I am being as charitable as I can be—that British Rail feels bound to ensure that ordinary passengers do not suffer because of the presence of pickets. Nevertheless, I can only agree with the noble Lord that if this special train is designed for the pure purpose of picketing then it is a very regrettable step.
Lord Jenkins of Putney: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the trade union solidarity which is being demonstrated by members of the National Graphical Association is the same trade union solidarity which the noble Lord would so warmly applaud, indeed has warmly applauded, when it has occurred in Poland?
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, I really think that the noble Lord is rather confused in his thinking on this issue. I would certainly not agree that it is the same solidarity.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: My Lords, is it not great confusion of thought to mix up trade union solidarity with a deliberate attempt at intimidation by the mass attendance of people whose purpose is intimidation, and which quite apart from any breach of the law is thoroughly uncivilised behaviour which must cast doubt on the merits of the claim of those who adopt it?
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, my noble friend is absolutely correct and I am sure that he expresses the sentiments of the whole House when we condemn any form of violence on picket lines.
Lord Marsh: My Lords, would the noble Lord not agree, on reflection, that it is impossible to keep politics out of this particular dispute, which has long since ceased to be an industrial dispute and is clearly being conducted in its implications as a direct challenge to the courts and Parliament?
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, I agree entirely with the noble Lord. What I said earlier was that I acknowledged that those who had spoken on behalf of other political parties in your Lordships' House had not sought to make particular political points out of it, and that I appreciated. But I entirely agree that the action itself is highly politically motivated.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: My Lords, would my noble friend the Minister not agree that, if the information given by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, is correct, a most serious situation has arisen, where it is impracticable for the court of its own motion to deal with those in open defiance of the law, because a nationalised industry will be assisting a party in legal proceedings, a party found to be in contempt, to continue and extend the measure of that contempt?
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, I agree with my noble friend that this is a very serious matter but I think it would be of little benefit for me to comment on a matter which is virtually for the courts.
Lord Ardwick: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that many of us would be relieved if every effort were made to minimise a horrible situation?
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, I am sure that every effort will be made, but I do not believe that this is a matter for Government action.
Lord Dean of Beswick: My Lords, may I once again reiterate to noble Lords, as I did last week, that my party is not prepared to instruct, encourage or suggest violence in any industrial situation? I think it is to be somewhat regretted that there have been undertones in some of the utterances in the Chamber today that that might not be the standpoint of my party. We completely and utterly reject that. We are saying that people must on all occasions act within the law as it stands. If there are bad laws they need changing. I rest my submission on that.
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, of course I accept that. I am delighted that the noble Lord joins me in total condemnation of violence on picket lines.

Inshore Fishing (Scotland) Bill [H.L.]
4.11 p.m.
Second Reading debate resumed.
Lord Boothby: My Lords, I revert to the rather more congenial subject of inshore fishing. I should like to start my very brief remarks by saying what a privilege I regard it for those of us here to have been present and, still better, to have heard the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Grimond. It was brilliant and, more than that, it was better than most of us expected—which is saying a good deal. It was a taste of the many delicious things which we all hope are to come. We thank him, and I thank him personally and deeply, for the privilege of being present when he made his speech. It was the most remarkable maiden speech that I have heard in this place or, indeed, in the other place.
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I have been addressing one or other of the Houses of Parliament on the subject of the inshore fishing industry for exactly 60 unbroken years, so it is with some emotion that I rise to make my last speech about it. Unlike the noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock. I regard this as a necessary Bill for Scotland. I do not agree with the arguments he advanced against it, but I do agree with him up to this point: it is essentially a precautionary Bill, a Bill of last resort. I hope that it will never have to be used. It is a necessary precaution for Scotland and of that I am satisfied, having lived for many years with the inshore fishing industry of Scotland and, indeed, of Orkney and Shetland. I am quite satisfied that the protection for the inshore fishing fleet provided by the Navy and the Air Force is more than adequate. We have the power, if necessary, to enforce this legislation and that in itself will ensure that it is never necessary to use it.
The whole future of the fishing industry in this country depends on, and revolves around, one word—"conservation". Nothing else matters. When I first became Member of Parliament for Aberdeenshire, East, we were exporting one million barrels of cured herring to Russia and the Baltic states every year. At the same time we were throwing thousands of herring into the sea because they could not be used. Then the Norwegians, the Danes and the Dutch came in. They reduced the mesh sizes and started catching immature herring wholesale to be used for industrial purposes—chiefly the manufacture of fishmeal. That was the warning signal, and it was the beginning of the end because the shoals began to diminish.
The person who first brought my attention to this was a practical fisherman himself of great skill; the late Provost Robert Forman, of Peterhead. He said, "Look here, if this goes on the herring fishing industry is in for a sharp decline. We must build a dual-purpose fleet so that we can have sea-fishing boats which can change overnight from driftnet fishing to seine net fishing for white fish". He enlisted my support; and over a period of three or four years we built up a very big fleet of what were called dual-purpose craft. When the final crash came in the herring industry, they saved the inshore fishing industry of Scotland.
I look back with nostalgia to the days when there was great spring fishing out of Lerwick, summer fishing out of Peterhead and Fraserburgh, and autumn fishing out of Yarmouth and Lowestoft. I used to go to all three, and it was a very exciting experience. Nothing like that exists today. Herring were cheap, popular and the main diet of a large part of the population of Eastern Europe—herrings and potatoes.
All that gradually went. All the worst of our fears were realised. I thought at one time that the inshore fishing industry would collapse altogether, and that it was doomed to failure. Then came the end of the deep-sea long-distance fishing industry out of Grimsby, Hull and Fleetwood to Iceland and Newfoundland. That will never come back. It has gone. The trawlers have gone—there are only two or three left. There is nothing left but the inshore fishing industry which must be bolstered at all costs.
When Mr. Heath took us into the Common Market he obliged us to sign the Treaty of Rome which we had

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no part in framing. We refused to take part in the negotiations at Messina, when it was drafted. In that treaty we gave the right to all the continental countries of Europe to fish up to our beaches with trawlers. That would have been the end of the inshore fishing industry. It was saved, if I may say so, by the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, to whom the fishing industry owes an irreparable debt. He was Secretary of State for Scotland at the time. He insisted on, and succeeded in getting, a 12-mile limit round the coasts of this country which saved the inshore fishing industry from total destruction.
Then began a most promising international move within the EEC which was brought to a brilliant conclusion by Mr. Peter Walker, whose final negotiations were skilful in the extreme and gave this country and the other countries of Europe a very good bargain. They began to see the point that if they went on overfishing as they were doing they would kill the fishing industry altogether. We should never forget the service which Mr. Peter Walker gave. He was the best Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food I have known during the whole of my parliamentary career.
Now things are getting steadily but slowly better. This season has been a good season for the fishermen. They do not say so—and one would dare to say so to them only at the risk of one's life—but they are making a lot of money. You do not say that, to an Aberdonian, anyway. You learn to keep quiet on that subject. But a lot of them do make a lot of money. There is oil, too: but you do not talk about money in Aberdeen; you just keep it very carefully. But the fishermen are doing well at the moment, and they are going to do better, I hope.
At one moment about six months ago I was frightened of the Norwegians. They were difficult. They would not enter into the agreement which had been negotiated in Strasbourg. They started fishing rather wildly, especially for herring in the North Sea, and for small herring at that. But now they are having a change of mind and heart. Their attitude is quite different. I feel much more hopeful that they will join the club. They may not join the EC. I do not blame them altogether for that, because the finances are not very satisfactory. But I think they will join the fishing club.
If we get all Europe working together, why, then, I am sure we have a bright future for the inshore fishing industry, with all that it stands for in the way of a wonderful life and the wonderful people that take part in it. If we do, I shall feel that I have not spent all my life in vain. I think that is just about all I want to say. I feel optimistic. I think that deep in his heart the noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock, does not feel as savagely pessimistic as he sometimes makes out in his public speeches.
4.24 p.m.
Lord Kirkhill: My Lords, I must apologise to the House for my failure to be in my place at the start of this Second Reading debate, but I plead, at least in partial mitigation, that some disconnected travel arrangements did not quite match the needs of the hour. I assure the noble Lord, Lord Gray of Contin, that no discourtesy was intended him. To speak
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shortly after the most distinguished maiden speech of Lord Grimond is indeed a privilege. It is an experience which I am sure that other noble Lords will share during the occasions which lie ahead.
Clause 1 of this Bill flows directly from the discussion document produced by the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries for Scotland in October 1981. The precursor to all that was the Cameron Committee deliberations of more than a decade ago, as the noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock, properly pointed out. Incidentally, the DAFS document followed a comprehensive review of all fisheries legislation applicable to Scottish inshore waters. As the clause confirms, the two principal recommendations which emerged from the consultative document were, first, that the Secretary of State for Scotland should be given new powers to designate certain areas around the coast of Scotland as static gear reserves which would become the sole province of the creel fishermen; and, secondly, that the present prohibition on the use of mobile gear within three miles of the coastline should be abolished.
The reaction to all this from some 1,000 Scottish fishing vessels of all sizes, and covering eight fishermen's associations, is one of some astonishment, not least of course because traditionally those who earn their living at sea, dependent upon each other as they often ultimately are for survival, would consider that in the event of conflict between static and mobile gear fishermen voluntary agreement between the parties operating in the locality is much to be preferred to the resolution of dispute by statutory regulation. Indeed, if there has to be legislation, what is required is a proper system of management which would give to all a fair share of the catch. I think that the Minister, despite his contrary argument earlier, should take this point on board. Surely, if continuity of supply is to be maintained, rather than the creation of these reserves, fisheries should be sustained on an area basis.
The Government should pay heed to the voice of criticism which has been raised on an almost all-industry basis against the principal provision contained in the Bill. Although at Second Reading Governments seldom have second thoughts, they must surely recognise the industry's additional but most genuine worry; namely, the powers contained in the Bill enabling the Secretary of State of the day to introduce static gear reserves without further consultation, should he decide so to do. I suggest to your Lordships that, in the best tradition of this House, come the Committee stage of this Bill such an arrogant assumption of power by the Secretary of State should be denied him.
4.28 p.m.
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, we have had a very useful debate on this Second Reading. I am grateful to noble Lords who decided to take part in the debate for the contributions they made. I should particularly like to associate myself with those who have already congratulated the noble Lord, Lord Grimond, on his maiden speech. Apart from anything else, I welcome being joined by a near neighbour from the other place. We represented seats not too far apart and shared many concerns for the area. It was also a great privilege for me to take part in a debate to which the

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noble Lord, Lord Boothby, contributed. He was one of my boyhood heroes and one of my heroes in my early days in politics. It is a great distinction for me to participate in a debate with him.
The noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock, who spoke at the beginning of the debate, asked me a number of questions, and I shall do my best to try to answer them. Whether I shall be able to satisfy the noble Lord is an entirely different matter, but I shall certainly do my best. He asked me why no regime was actually specified in the Bill. A general enabling measure is needed in the first instance in order to give the necessary flexibility and adaptability to the future regimes, and we believe that it is right to proceed in this way by enabling legislation, to be followed by specific subordinate measures. As I have promised, I shall be placing proposals before the House prior to our consideration of the Bill in Committee.
The noble Lord also asked me about static gear reserves and nursery areas, and he suggested that these might have been spelled out in a schedule to the Bill. In our view such a proposal would be too inflexible, and it would be difficult to change areas once established. There are always changing circumstances within the industry, and we believe that flexibility is very important. The Government's proposals were included in the consultation paper issued to the industry, and revised proposals will be put to the House and the industry before the Committee stage.
The noble Lord also asked about orders under the Bill, and suggested that they would not be subject to parliamentary scrutiny. This is essentially a re-enactment of the present position, whereby by-laws made under the existing legislation do not require parliamentary approval. The orders are likely to be very technical, but they will of course be subject to the scrutiny of the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments. Such an arrangement has the virtue of simplicity, and can allow action to be taken quickly, if necessary. It is also very flexible.
The noble Lord referred to the Cameron Committee, and also mentioned static gear reserves. Static gear fishing has greatly increased since Lord Cameron reported in 1970. It now has considerable economic importance for certain isolated areas, and some measure of protection is required.
Finally, the noble Lord suggested to me that the industry does not like the Bill. It appears that the noble Lord disagrees with what I am saying, but he gave a number of examples of sections of the industry which do not like parts of the Bill. I shall give way to the noble Lord.
Lord Ross of Marnock: My Lords, the complaint is not about the Bill, but about what the Government are going to do with it. The Government can do anything they like, good or bad. There are one or two things which the Government have said that they are going to do which the industry does not like.
Lord Gray of Contin:Yes, my Lords, I would not try to deny that, but at the same time I am sure that the noble Lord would agree with me that it would be extremely difficult—indeed it would be highly unlikely—to be able to devise a Bill which would
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receive general acclaim from the whole of the fishing industry. The complaints about various parts of the Bill from sections of the industry arise frequently for different reasons. Some of the static gear fishermen are not too keen on the idea of static gear reserves, because they feel that they would lead to an inhibition regarding fishing elsewhere, while the trawlermen do not like static gear reserves for the simple reason that they are areas in which they would not be able to fish. So I think that there would be difficulties. However, I believe that we have been able to achieve a fair compromise, and I am sure that after the Bill has had the advantage of its Committee stage, in which we can consider it in more depth, we shall produce legislation which will be to the benefit of the industry.
The noble Lord, Lord Grimond, asked, why not use the existing powers, and he wanted to know why was it necessary to legislate at all. The situation here is that the present body of law, being venerable, was enacted in the face of circumstances different from those of today, and some tidying up and rationalisation is almost inevitable. The new powers will allow greater flexibility and greater simplicity, which will ensure a lessening of the burdens upon the industry; and I am quite sure that the noble Lord would welcome that.
The noble Lord also asked me about the Secretary of State's promise on local management. I do not believe that the Secretary of State should necessarily surrender to local communities his functions in controlling the fisheries. However, since we issued a paper on the future structure and management of the industry earlier this year, we have been discussing quota management with the Scottish Fishermen's Federation and with others, too, in the industry. There will certainly be a place for local advisory committees in the context of future quota management; and I can assure the noble Lord on that point.
The noble Viscount, Lord Massereene and Ferrard, asked me about control of skin divers diving for lobsters and scallops. The advice that we receive from scientists is that to have controls on the minimum sizes of these fish is the best way to achieve conservation. I am well aware that in the industry there are voices calling for the licensing of lobster fishermen so as to control the activities of part-timers, and we are looking at this very difficult issue in the context of the future structure and management of the industry.
The noble Viscount also raised the question of salmon poaching. We are aware of the increase in poaching, and we have provided additional patrols, by ships and aircraft, in order to try to control it. Some success has been achieved, but I have to admit that it has not been nearly as great as we should have wished.
The noble Viscount also raised with me the question of penalties for fishing offences. Inevitably this must be a matter for the courts. It is for Parliament to decide what punishment is available for the courts to impose, but it must always be for the courts themselves, in the light of particular circumstances, to judge how to treat a particular offence.
The noble Lord, Lord Boothby, gave us a most interesting talk on his experience in the fishing industry. It is true to say that in this House there are few people who have his experience and wealth of knowledge on the subject. We all listened with interest

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to what the noble Lord said, and I am sure that we also look forward to reading the report of his speech, since he raised so many significant points which doubtless we shall all want to digest in our own time.
The noble Lord, Lord Kirkhill, also put to me some suggestions, which I assure him I shall consider very carefully. Of course, I fully appreciate the problems that he has had with some of his travelling arrangements, which accounted for his not being able to be present from the beginning of the debate.
We have had a very useful Second Reading debate. We have aired the problems which exist within the industry, as well as the various aspects of the industry. Again, I thank your Lordships for participating, and I have pleasure in concluding the debate and commending the Second Reading of the Bill.
On Question, Bill read a second time and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

Tourism (Overseas Promotion) (Scotland) Bill [H.L.]
4.39 p.m.
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. I am delighted to have an opportunity, for the second time today, to present to your Lordships a Bill which deals with one of my own direct responsibilities within the Scottish Office—on this occasion, tourism. This is a subject which is of tremendous importance to Scotland and to the Scottish economy. The Government's election manifesto included a firm commitment to extend the powers of the Scottish Tourist Board to include promotional activity overseas. Our belief in the importance of the tourist industry is reflected by our bringing forward the necessary legislation this Session. The Tourism (Overseas Promotion) (Scotland) Bill before your Lordships today gives effect to our commitment.
The contribution of tourism to employment and revenue has for too long been overlooked or underestimated. In Scotland, tourism revenue currently amounts to some £760 million per annum and provides at least 50,000 full-time equivalent jobs. Tourists from overseas are disproportionately valuable to us. Though overseas visitors represent only 9 per cent. of all visitors to Scotland, they account for nearly 27 per cent. of all expenditure. Annual overseas earnings from Scottish tourism amount to £200 million. Tourism is therefore third after oil and whisky exports. The case for maximising the effectiveness of Scotland's overseas tourism promotion is therefore compelling.
Noble Lords may like to be reminded of the present arrangements for the promotion of Scotland overseas. Under the Local Government and Planning (Scotland) Act 1982, district and islands councils and area tourist boards in Scotland may promote themselves overseas subject to the consent of the Secretary of State. This consent condition is designed to prevent overlap or duplication of effort and to ensure value for money from local authority visits abroad. The Highlands and Islands Development Board also has powers to undertake promotions abroad at its own hand. The
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Scottish Tourist Board is now helping to co-ordinate local authority and area tourist board promotions on an all Scotland basis, and I believe a more effective programme of overseas sales missions is emerging as a result.
It is however with the private sector and with the sales efforts of the smaller tourist operators that make up the bulk of Scotland's tourist industry that I am particularly concerned today. Many of these small businesses cannot afford to promote themselves fully without some assistance from public funds. This is where we confront the statutory framework for overseas tourism promotion. Under the Development of Tourism Act 1969, responsibility for the overseas promotion of Great Britain and all its parts lies principally with the British Tourist Authority. The national tourist boards of England, Scotland and Wales are expressly prevented from acting abroad—unless as agents of the British Tourist Authority and using BTA funds. This means that the Scottish Tourist Board may not at its own hand incur expenditure on overseas promotion of Scotland or give financial assistance to Scottish tourist operators trying to sell their products abroad.
My Lords, times change. The arrangements which in 1969 were apt and effective, now seem unduly restrictive. Of the three countries of the United Kingdom, Scotland in particular now has a recognisable and commercially saleable image in a number of important and potentially very valuable overseas markets. For many thousands of expatriate Scots around the world, Scotland has a powerful attraction quite different from that of "Britain". And for many Europeans, Scotland has special scenic, historical and recreational attractions. Scotland and its wide range of matchless holiday opportunities has to be marketed vigorously if these markets are to be fully tapped. The products of the smaller operators have to be co-ordinated into a powerful and distinctively Scottish promotion programme if the Scottish tourist industry is to hold its own internationally.
Throughout the Government's last term of office, our consistent aim was to improve and enhance the Scottish Tourist Board's overseas role. The board has an intimate knowledge of the Scottish holiday product. We believe therefore it should have an effective influence on overseas promotion of Scotland. Various administrative changes have therefore been made within the 1969 Act to enlarge the Scottish Tourist Board's agency role in overseas promotions and to help the British Tourist Authority to take fuller account of Scottish promotion needs in its overall Great Britain programme. Chief of these changes was the appointment to the Scottish Tourist Board in 1981 of a director of overseas tourism, whose principal functions are to link the British Tourist Authority more closely with Scottish operators and to coordinate Scottish overseas marketing initiatives.
Our belief in the need to extend the Scottish Tourist Board's overseas role was confirmed by the findings of the committee of inquiry into local government in Scotland. chaired by my noble friend Lord Stodart, which reported in 1981. The committee recommended that the Scottish Tourist Board should itself have power similar to that enjoyed by Scottish local authorities to promote Scotland overseas. We are now to a

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large extent accepting this advice. We do not, however, advocate a total transfer of responsibility for Scottish overseas promotion from the British Tourist Authority to the Scottish Tourist Board. We believe this would deprive Scotland of access to those many markets where the saleable destination is and will remain "Britain". Rather, we are persuaded that it makes commercial sense to identify those markets where, in addition to marketing Britain, Scotland can be promoted effectively in its own right. We believe that substantial benefits will flow from more aggressive promotion of Scotland in these selected markets.
The Government believe that the best way to exploit these markets is to allow the Scottish Tourist Board to undertake at its own hand promotions of Scotland overseas. This is what the Tourism (Overseas Promotion) (Scotland) Bill before your Lordships tonight, is intended to achieve.
Clause 1 of the Bill contains the two main operative provisions. Subsection (1) lifts the 1969 Act restriction on overseas activity by the Scottish Tourist Board and enables the board to undertake, in its own right, promotions of Scotland overseas. I must make it quite clear that the effect of this provision is to allow the Scottish Tourist Board to supplement, not to replace, the efforts of the British Tourist Authority on Scotland's and Britain's behalf. The proposed extension of the Scottish Tourist Board's powers will not deprive the Scottish tourist industry of the excellent service it has received, and I am sure will continue to receive, from the British Tourist Authority. I am happy to put our appreciation of the work of the British Tourist Authority on Scotland's behalf very firmly on the record. Nor will the Bill in any way detract from BTA's powers under the 1969 Act to promote Scotland and Britain abroad. The BTA will be expected to continue to devote at least as much of its promotional spend and effort to Scotland as in the past. The extension of the Scottish Tourist Board's powers will mean, simply, that the authority will no longer be the only tourist board with power to promote Scotland overseas. The Government's intention is that, through this Bill, the Scottish Tourist Board should be able to provide supplementary promotion opportunities for those in Scotland who want to market their distinctively Scottish products in a co-ordinated way.
The Government are however conscious of the need to ensure that any overseas activities undertaken by the Scottish Tourist Board do in practice complement BTA's promotion efforts for Great Britain; that there is no wasteful overlap or duplication of effort between the two bodies; and that the overall Great Britain promotion effort by BTA remains properly co-ordinated. The Bill therefore provides in Clause 1, subsection (2), that the Scottish Tourist Board's power to promote Scotland overseas shall be exercisable only with the consent of the Secretary of State for Scotland who will, before giving or withholding such consent, consult the BTA. This consent condition is broadly similar to that already applying to Scottish local authorities and area tourist boards. It does not represent a BTA veto. But it will ensure that the Scottish Tourist Board's promotions of Scotland constructively complement the BTA's continuing efforts on Scotland's behalf.
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The Secretary of State for Scotland will be able to influence not only the content but also the scale of the Board's operations abroad through his financial control over the Scottish Tourist Board's grant-in-aid. The Government envisage the board undertaking an overseas programme costing about £200,000 per annum at 1983 prices. I am delighted to announce that, as from 1984–85, we will be making the Scottish Tourist Board an additional annual allocation of £200,000 for that purpose. The proposals in this Bill are therefore fully backed by additional resources. In relation to BTA's expenditure on Scotland's behalf—currently estimated at over £2 million per annum—the Scottish Tourist Board's programme will therefore be small. However, we believe that it will be cost-effective and that it will allow Scotland to penetrate the most promising overseas markets.
This view is shared by the British Tourist Authority itself. The present chairman of the BTA—Sir Henry Marking—has publicly expressed the authority's support for proposals designed to give Scotland some scope for self-promotion overseas, subject to the safeguards for British interests which I have described.
The proposals in this Bill therefore reflect the Government's aim to encourage the growth of Scotland's overseas tourism trade while guarding against fragmentation of the total Great Britain promotion effort abroad. This Bill introduces a much-needed element of flexibility into the current statutory arrangements, and I warmly commend it to the House. My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord Gray of Contin.)
4.52 p.m.
Lord Carmichael of Kelvingrove: My Lords, I am very conscious of the fact that, as I rise to speak in your House for the first time, we are approaching the end of one of the periodic seasons of maiden speeches, and I feel sustained only by your Lordships' long and renowned record of tolerance on these occasions, and can only hope that this tolerance will endure for the next few minutes. In one respect at least I am fortunate. The business of the House has brought forward this Bill which gives me the opportunity, so soon after my introduction, to speak on a subject in which I have some interest, and which of course is of very great interest to Scotland. As the noble Lord said, tourism is a growing and important industry for most parts of the world and, perhaps more than most, it is an important industry for Scotland.
This Bill, introduced by the noble Lord, deals specifically with extending the powers of the Scottish Tourist Board. The Development of Tourism Act 1969 is amended to:
"include the power"—
that is, the power of the Scottish Tourist Board—
"to carry on any activities outside the United Kingdom for the purpose of encouraging people to visit Scotland".
As the noble Lord said, to some extent it is based on the Stodart Report of 1981, and I am glad to see from the list of speakers that the noble Lord, Lord Stodart, will be speaking later. I shall be very interested to hear his comments as to whether he thinks the results of the

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inquiry and the very interesting report he produced have really been fulfilled by this Government Bill, which is really an amendment to the 1969 Act. The noble Lord particularly wanted the Scottish Tourist Board to have the sole rights of promoting Scotland abroad, although I think there is an argument for discussion in what the Minister has said. This is a matter we can examine when we reach further stages of the Bill.
The power of the Scottish Tourist Board to sell or to promote Scotland abroad is circumscribed by the condition which the Minister dealt with at some length—that the Secretary of State for Scotland must give his consent to the activities after consultation with the British Tourist Authority. The noble Lord who introduced the Bill will be aware that we must receive more clarification of this condition. We shall certainly go into it more deeply later. It appeared to me that the noble Lord was rather over-selling the Bill as against the statement made by his honourable friend the Minister of State for Trade and Industry in another place, who actually went out of his way to say that the powers granted by this Bill to the Scottish Tourist Board were very limited indeed. I think that this is a matter on which further clarification will be needed. However, this is perhaps not the best time or the best occasion for me to stray into controversy. I can only assure the noble Lord that we await his answers to some of these points.
However, one matter on which we must be agreed is the growing importance of tourism as an industry. I was pleased that he gave the figures for the Scottish industry over the past few years, which I had not been able to obtain. But I understand that last year tourism in the United Kingdom as a whole reached a figure of some £8½billion, and that approaching 1 million people were employed in the industry. I have heard estimates that by the end of the century tourism will be the biggest single industry next to armaments, and the end of the century is only 16 years away. I only hope that sufficient will survive in the world that people will want to reap the benefits of travel, leisure and relaxation, and so stop the continual arms escalation and make tourism by far the biggest industry in the world.
While accepting that there is an important role for a national body, such as the British Tourist Authority, in the setting of standards, the training of people in the tourist industry, the co-operation with the industry in all the grades that the noble Lord mentioned (including the operators, the road transport people, those running the railways, the airline people and the hotel people), and the important role of liaising with the Government on questions of strategic planning, I hope that we never lose sight of the importance of the local initiative which is essential for a good tourist industry.
Perhaps I could give an example; it is certainly not a Scottish one, but it illustrates the point. Many years ago, wearing quite a different hat, I had some little involvement in the transfer of the National Railway Museum to York. The primary purpose was not tourism, but was more tied up with railway finance. However, the citizens of York and the local authorities of York immediately saw the advantages to the city in having the museum there, and they gave the Ministry
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a great deal of help over getting it moved there. They saw immediately that the addition of an historic railway centre would add to their other splendid attractions, and would make the whole much more important than the sum of the individual parts. Their enthusiasm was very helpful in overcoming the difficulties, which I assure noble Lords are inherent in trying to move anything out of London to any other part of the country. I use this as an example to show the importance of local initiative by the local authority or by local entrepreneurs giving encouragement to the tourist industry.
My own city of Glasgow has made great efforts over the past few years to attract visitors from other parts of Britain and from abroad. The current "Glasgow Smiles Better" campaign and the "Come Home to Glasgow" campaign have both been very successful. For instance, I understand that the "Come Home to Glasgow" campaign has, on a count. attracted at least 10,000 new visitors to the city in the past year. However, it is part of a concerted plan that the whole of the Clyde area has realised that, with the decline of heavy engineering and the near death of the great shipbuilding industry, the problems were quite enormous.
When one thinks of the great ocean liners built on the Clyde which, at the fitting out stage, would employ up to 1,000 joiners, perhaps 500 of both electricians and plumbers, and many other trades as well, one realises the enormous gap that has to be filled in some way. I am not suggesting that tourism can fill the gap. What I am convinced of is that with the expansion of tourism, and if the opportunities are taken, we can certainly go some way and can make a positive contribution to filling the gap left by the decline of some of our traditional heavy industries.
Glasgow has worked closely and enthusiastically with the Scottish Tourist Board in promoting the city at home and abroad. The "Come home to Glasgow" campaign has been successful, and the cleaning up of some of our old and magnificent Victorian tenements has been a revelation to many of the citizens, giving them new heart. I only hope that the Minister will use his influence with his right honourable friend the Secretary of State to see whether we can have that campaign continuing.
The Glasgow marathon is now the third biggest in the world. It attracts many overseas entrants, who we hope will act as ambassadors for Scotland when they go back to their own homelands. Two new large modern hotels have opened in the last year, and the Scottish National Exhibition Centre is in the course of construction. The latest news I have is that the Burrell collection, which was opened only in October, has in the first 30 days attracted over 100,000 visitors, which is quite a staggering number by the standards of any other museum in the country. I am trying to emphasise the importance of local output and enthusiasm to the tourist drive. Nor is their drive or their enthusiasm selfish. Those who come to Glasgow or to Edinburgh because of their special attractions will almost certainly visit other parts of Scotland, and will, we hope, find something there which will bring them back in future years to spend at least some part of their holiday.

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I cannot recall any occasion when I have travelled abroad—even in the south, here in England—when someone in the company I have spoken to did not claim a Scottish ancestry, however tenuous. There must be a market, as the Scottish Tourist Board and as many of the local authorities have discovered, in Scottish people abroad coming back to find their roots. I am sure that the great reservoir of potential tourists all over the world would find the pull of Scotland for at least part of their holiday very strong. With the growing involvement of local authorities and the co-operation of the industry, I believe that an important contribution can be made to our economy.
The Bill, limited as it may be, gives the Scottish Tourist Board some powers to tell the world about Scotland. The Scottish Tourist Board know the people in the industry, know the local authorities, and are the right people to encourage this co-ordination. I therefore have great pleasure in welcoming the Bill on behalf of this side of the House.
5.3 p.m.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, first, I want to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Carmichael, on his quick promotion to the Front Bench and for his excellent maiden speech. It is a particular pleasure for me to welcome him because of a long personal association both with him and his family. The noble Lord has spent literally all his life in politics. He was brought up in the stimulating atmosphere of the Independent Labour Party in Glasgow; an experience which I shared and enjoyed. His father introduced me to the Glasgow town council nearly half a century ago—that great centre, that great training ground for future Members of Parliament, the Glasgow City Council—and the noble Lord, Lord Carmichael, followed his father to Westminster having served his apprenticeship in Glasgow. He has had experience in Government office, and I am sure that that experience and background will enable him to make a notable contribution to the affairs of this House, and we hope that he will exercise his talents in that direction.
I want secondly to welcome the Bill. It has been described with a certain lack of enthusiasm in certain quarters; but I noticed that the Observer headed a column the other Sunday, "Scotland declares UDI in tourism". I doubt whether even the Minister would claim that that ambition is achieved in the comparatively modest measure that he has before us. What causes me a little concern—and this was expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Carmichael—is that while powers have to be exercised by the Scottish Tourist Board in pursuance of this Bill, first of all before it can do the kind of thing it is now charged with, it has to clear it with the Secretary of State for Scotland. He, in turn, will clear it with the British Tourist Authority before he can do the things that he would obviously want to do. Perhaps the Minister will give us some greater reassurance in this regard.
Both the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Carmichael, have given some statistics with regard to the importance of the tourist trade. In Scotland it has a value of £760 million per annum and provides direct employment to anything between 60,000 and 70,000 people, and, as both noble Lords have said, makes some contribution to relieving the devastation which is
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caused by the deterioration in our traditional industries. It is estimated that overseas earnings of Scottish tourism are something like £250 million, which is a considerable contribution to the export industry.
There is one difficulty, and I come back to it, in relation to the British Tourist Authority. I hope that the Minister will clarify the point of the role of the Scottish Tourist Board. Recently there has been an announcement that the chairman of the British Tourist Authority is also to be the chairman of the English Tourist Board. This would almost suggest that his influence as a national chairman might be restricted to his concern for Wales and for England.
This seems to be the case in a similar arrangement in relation to the Arts Council. Those of us who live in Scotland will agree with the Minister that Scotland has something special to sell. I hope that our friends in this House who are English will not regard it as unduly arrogant to say so, but any of us who have the privilege of travelling extensively abroad—and I come from a recent Burns' supper in Tokyo at which there was tremendous interest and response to the Scottish image, and all that Scotland stood for—will recognise that there is a special Scottish dimension in tourism. But yet in the past few years in the promotional material of the British Tourist Authority I can give two examples which show that they are not fully sensitive to the special dimension of Scotland.
Not so long ago the British Tourist Authority published motoring maps for tourists visiting this country. The roads terminated at Oban. There was a suggestion that if you went beyond Oban you somehow or other fell off the end of Scotland. This indicated that all that glorious countryside of Scotland, Wester Ross, well known to the Minister, was neglected in that kind of promotion.
In material distributed by the British Tourist Authority in the United States there was also an interesting description of Barra as a, "rugge, uninhabited He bridean island". I am sure that the hotel keepers and all the bed and breakfast people in Barra must resent that kind of description; it does nothing for the tourism of the area. I can certainly commend Barra as an excellent place to spend a peaceful and relaxing holiday. But it is because of this insensitivity that the Scottish people are a little concerned and a little apprehensive about the British Tourist Authority.
Something that has been most encouraging in the past few years is not simply the support that the Scottish Tourist Board has given to the development of tourism, but the very substantial private investment in tourism. It is not often that I say kind words about privatisation, but one should consider the transformation that has been effected at the Gleneagles Hotel or at the Old Course Hotel at St. Andrews which were starved of investment when they were part of British Rail. They are now very lively and very attractive tourist centres.
Scotland has a good deal to offer not only in scenery and traditional hospitality, but I am sure the Minister appreciates its special contribution to golf.
There is a belief in the English Tourist Board that all visitors who come to this country necessarily come to

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London first and then should be syphoned off to Scotland. That is not true. People who want a carefree and fresh air relaxing holiday on the best golf courses in the world do not want to go to London first and then to Scotland. I hope that this measure will alter that misconception that people inevitably want to "do" London first. In my experience it is not true. With these comments in relation to the Bill, I support and commend it. I hope that it will have the effect that the Minister has described.
5.11 p.m.
Lord Stodart of Leaston: My Lords, may I, in my turn, add my warm congratulations on two fronts: first, to the noble Lord, Lord Carmichael of Kelvingrove, who has sat glaring across at me in another place for many years but who has, as is normal, been a great friend of mine personally outside the Chamber. In congratulating him on his maiden speech I would say that many years ago—and he touched on this himself—tourism might not have been regarded as the most appropriate subject for someone living in the City of Glasgow. I do not think that anyone who lives in Scotland today can fail to be impressed by the tremendous efforts that the District of Glasgow, as it is now officially called, is making and the success I believe it will have in building itself up as a great tourist centre. I should add, as a former Member of Parliament for part of the City of Edinburgh, that Edinburgh will have to watch its laurels.
Secondly, I offer my warmest congratulations to my noble friend Lord Gray. To achieve, as he has told the House, £200,000 for the Scottish Tourist Board at a time when there are cuts all round shows tremendous powers of advocacy and persuasion. I am quite sure that there will be celebrations at the headquarters of the Scottish Tourist Board tonight, for without that extra money I doubt whether the overseas promotion could have been done, even with the consent of the Secretary of State and even after consultation with the British Tourist Authority.
My interest in this debate is perhaps not altogether surprising. My noble friend has referred to the fact that it is only two years since the committee over which I presided made inquiries into tourism in Scotland, among other things. Some 12 reasonably intelligent people of widely different interests and widely differing political views one of whom, Mr. Clarke, is now a Member of the House of Commons on the Opposition Benches, and another of whom has found his way on to the Benches here—found what we regarded as some very strange inconsistencies. At that time any local authority, be it island, district or region, was able to promote its own particular beauties and attractions in any part of the world. Quite a number did so. Regions and district councils within the same region vied together, competing with one another, and totally failing to concentrate their efforts.
As my noble friend has told your Lordships, the Highland and Island Development Board had the right to promote abroad tourism in its area. Its evidence to us was that it worked closely and harmoniously with the British Tourist Authority, but on occasion it could
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and did send a representative to a world fair if the budget allowed that. It could, if it wished, hire a public relations firm in, say, New York or Tokyo to promote a particular event in its area. What it told us was somewhat ironical; namely, that when at an overseas event it was usually asked questions about places such as Pitlochry or Edinburgh, which were outside its area but in that part of Scotland which the Scottish Tourist Board did not have the same freedom to promote and were not allowed to promote unless on behalf of the British Tourist Authority.
Every chairman of the Scottish Tourist Board since it was set up has asked for autonomy in overseas activity. It is cynical to say so, but it may be true that power produces a thirst for more power, perhaps, so your Lordships should discard those particular views as being the views of interested parties.
I still recall the strength of feeling and the absolute and total unanimity among members of the Stodart Committee that there was no logic in what we had heard. If promotion abroad was allowed to the Highland and Island Development Board and was found by them to be invaluable, and if, in addition, as we were told, the fruits of their efforts were found successful by the area tourist organisations within the Highland area, why not cross the Highland line? So we recommended.
Perhaps we were thinking a bit too far ahead, and it may be that my noble friend thinks that the time for that is not yet. As he says, there have been changes since my committee reported. In 1981, a director of overseas tourism was announced and appointed almost immediately. Now, the Scottish Tourist Board can go further still. It can promote overseas provided (as the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, pointed out) that the Secretary of State consents and provided that the Scottish Tourist Board consults, but, I suppose, not necessarily requiring the approval of, the British Tourist Authority. The noble Lord, Lord Carmichael, said that he would be interested to know whether I thought that this Bill was quite in line with what we had proposed. It would be totally dishonest, after putting my name to the report, if I did not express preference for what we recommended.
Quite frankly, I am not much impressed—and, again, the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, referred to this—by what seems to be the apparently eternal claim that most people from abroad come to London first and that it is the job of the British Tourist Authority to pull them here. I do not doubt that this may have been true in 1969. I do not believe that the majority of the visitors to this country fly into Heathrow Airport out of sheer pleasure. I do not believe that they come there because they want to do so; and, having struggled in there, is it not going to be unduly hard work for them to go there again en route for Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen or Inverness?
Given more direct services into Scotland, which are bound to come, Scotland will take a higher place in the tourist table in its own right. Of that, I am quite certain. No market is static, not even a tourist one; and less well-known places in the world will, I believe, become more sought after.
My noble friend in his opening speech referred to his dislike of duplication. He said that the object of the

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Bill was to enable the Scottish Tourist Board to supplement, not to replace, the British Tourist Authority. I would say to him that I think that one can supplement without duplicating. I do not think that the Scottish Tourist Board would be so foolish as to want to fly its flag over premises next door to those of the British Tourist Authority in the world's capitals. But I see sense in the Scottish Tourist Board having perhaps a wing or a floor in the British Tourist Authority's buildings, doing their own thing and paying the British Tourist Authority a commercial rent for the job—just, incidentally, as does the Northern Ireland Tourist Board.
I listened, as we all did, to my noble friend's most persuasive speech. I think that he has achieved much. He will be the first to admit that there is still this rather strange anomaly between the powers of the Highlands and Islands Development Board and the Scottish Tourist Board. Personally, I think that they are too anomalous to remain for long and I suspect, and I hope that this will be only the first step in rationalising the situation.
5.25 p.m.
Lord Wilson of Langside: My Lords, not for the first time, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Stodart, in saying that both the noble Lord, Lord Carmichael of Kelvingrove, and the noble Lord, Lord Gray of Contin, have earned our congratulations this afternoon. I have known Lord Carmichael almost as long as I have known Lord Taylor of Gryfe but, as time has marched on, I shall not indulge in any reminiscences about the personal relationships which we have. We all hope to hear him on many occasions in the future.
The noble Lord, Lord Gray of Contin, is to be congratulated on this small step forward. It will have been quite a hard fight, I am sure, in the political and economic climate that exists today. It is not a big step but it is a step, and a step in the right direction. It makes one think—and the thought is perhaps provoked to some extent by what the noble Lord, Lord Grimond, said in his memorable speech earlier this afternoon—about the fact that we should require an Act of Parliament to give to the Scottish Tourist Board a power to carry on any activities outside the United Kingdom for the purpose of encouraging people to visit Scotland. I find much food for thought, in relation to the way in which we govern ourselves, in the fact that an Act of Parliament should be necessary for this purpose when we have already a provision in the Act of 1969 that the Scottish Tourist Board can act as an agent for the British Tourist Authority in this very matter.
Listening to the speeches and thinking of these aspects this afternoon, I was tempted to wonder whether there may not be a fundamental flaw in the administrative structure which we established in 1969 to promote the development of tourism to and within Great Britain. It certainly has some features which, when I looked at them yesterday, struck me as a little odd. Unfortunately, I cannot recall whether they struck me as odd in 1969 and whether, if they did, I then said so, as of course I should have done; because I was a member of the Government which promoted this particular piece of legislation.
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The structure consists of a British Tourist Authority and three boards. The peculiarity is that the functions of the boards in England, Wales and Scotland are identical with those of the authority in these countries. Each board has, as it were, a sort of concurrent jurisdiction in its own country with the authority. But the authority has exclusive jurisdiction in relation to overseas activities. My point in raising this aspect of the matter is that I am wondering whether this is the kind of set-up which has given rise to the difficulties which this Bill has been designed to meet. One can understand an authority being established to help to co-ordinate the activities of the three boards overseas. But the British Tourist Authority's functions go much wider than that.
I am inclined to wonder why and whether it is a good thing, or whether it does not carry within it the seed which promotes bureaucracy in its less acceptable forms. And, of course, something must be wrong in the way it has been working. That is why we have had to have this Bill, which of course we all welcome and wish well. I await with interest what the Minister will have to say as to why the Government did not accept the much more wide-ranging suggestion of the committee of the noble Lord, Lord Stodart, who have already been referred to, and why they regard it as being in the interests of both efficiency and economy that the present structure should be maintained. The recommendation of the Stodart Committee was of course a unanimous one, and I would hope that the Minister can elaborate on the reasons why these proposals were rejected.
5.31 p.m.
Lord Ferrier: My Lords, I make no apology for jumping in at this moment. I have been provoked to speak by the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, and to some extent by my noble friend Lord Stodart, talking about tourists coming to Scotland having to go through London. What is wrong with Prestwick? I daresay we shall hear more about that from the noble Lord, Lord Ross of Marnock, when the time comes, but it so happens that I have had two recent experiences which have a bearing on what has been said today.
I travel by train from Ayr on my way to Edinburgh—and incidentally there is no through service from Ayr to Edinburgh: you have to change stations if you do not want to wait for at least an hour and a half to change trains at the Central station. I found myself in a compartment with two American ladies who had arrived at Prestwick, with tickets to Edinburgh via the Central. They were not aware that there was a service from Ayr to Edinburgh viathe Central but that it is not co-ordinated in any way at all. However, they said they did not mind and they would only have to wait an hour and a half in the Central to get the connection via Shotts. It occurred to me then what a pity it is that there is no direct service between Ayr and Edinburgh which stops at Prestwick—any more, by the way, than there is a direct service from Edinburgh to Perth. You have to change if you wish to go from Edinburgh to Perth.
I wonder whether the tourist board would think of allotting a special task to one of their staff to keep British Rail up to the mark. I travelled yesterday in the

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day train from Stranraer to Euston. I joined it in Ayrshire and the windows were so dirty that you could not see out at all. It was a lovely autumn day but, except for the fact that there were cattle in the fields, the windows concealed the rest of the view from me altogether. I think that British Rail should have been on the mark about that.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, I wonder whether the noble Lord could get an up-to-date copy of the British Rail timetable. That shows that you do not have to wait an hour and a half at Glasgow Central in order to get a train. They run every half-hour to Edinburgh from Queen Street, and also every second train from Edinburgh to Perth is a direct through train.
Lord Ferrier: My Lords, I know about that: I travel myself. Are you aware that the bus which you have to take from the Central to Queen Street charges 25p and no change is given? It is no trun by the railways at all; it is run by the Glasgow Corporation. I have had trouble there, though not for myself, because I am wise enough to carry change; but there are people with children who are unable to find the change to pay the 25p. No, the service is perfectly possible; it would be possible for British Rail to introduce a through service via the Central. I think there is one train you do not have to wait about an hour for, but they do not co-ordinate otherwise. All I was saying was that I think it would be in aid of the tourist board if they had somebody to keep an eye on British Rail.
The noble Lord, Lord Stodart, referred to the Highland Railway. There again, that needs watching. I have not been on it recently, but it is the most magnificent scenic route anywhere in the world, perhaps, and I wonder whether more could not be made of it.
I have spoken about the through service from Edinburgh to Perth. The only other criticism of something which I suggest is worth watching is the design of the new sleepers, which are spoken of with rapture by many people. But I wonder whether the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, (shall we say?) has tried sleeping in one of the new sleepers. If so, I wonder how he fitted into the new bunks. As for my noble friend Lord Swinton, I tremble to think how he would even get in at the door of the sleeper. However, those are points of design which I think could be examined in terms of our sleepers and in terms of our tourist trade, which is what we are concerned about.
This train I travelled on from Stranraer to Euston did not stop at Prestwick. I have written to the Railway Board and asked them: "Why don't you stop at Prestwick?" They said, "Because if people want to go to London they do not want to get out at Prestwick". That is by the way, but the fact is that, although my train was an hour and a half late (it broke down on Shap), it did not stop at Prestwick. It is perfectly possible for tourists to go to Annan, to Dumfries and to Carlisle to switch on to other scenic parts of the line. I think that is much needed.
All I can say is that I should be delighted to help if I were asked to do so. I should be delighted if the railways people or the tourist board were to send someone to see me, because I am a lifelong supporter
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of railway travel and I should like to see it developed more than it is today. I look forward to hearing what my old friend Lord Ross of Marnock says about Prestwick.
5.38 p.m.
Lord MacLeod of Fuinary: My Lords, in the first place, may I express my appreciation of the promoter of this Bill, the Minister, in allowing me to speak although my name is not on the list? I shall reward him by speaking only very shortly, but I am speaking here mainly because of my interest in the tourist situation. I happen to belong to a group of people who, in the island of Iona, are responsible for an abbey; and from the end of May to the beginning of September people usually work out that 2,500 tourists come to the Island of Iona every week during that period; so perhaps I can speak on behalf of the tourist industry and the proposition. It is simply to say that, on behalf of the tourist industry and on behalf of the tourists who come, we very much appreciate this Bill. We appreciate also the extent to which the authority in England still continues to be concerned and at the moment is prepared to give a grant to Scotland and to allow Scotland to speak in its own name in this regard. I simply rise to say that, and I should have preceded it by saying how much I appreciated the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Carmichael of Kelvingrove, and how we hope he will often speak to us again.
5.40 p.m.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, this has been a most interesting debate and a great number of points of view have been expressed about a great number of subjects, particularly the fitting of myself and the noble Earl into the new railway carriages. I found them very comfortable, except that when you try to put down the blasted tray which is supposed to hold your tea it will not come over yourself at all. The old design, and the facilities provided in the older carriages, were extraordinarily useful and much more comfortable—
The Earl of Swinton: My Lords, I am sorry to ask the noble Lord to give way, but I am sure that if he and I travel in the same carriage we shall need a little more than the local brew of tea to see us through safely.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, I wholly concur with that. But I. too, must welcome the Bill, if only because it has led to an expression of a great number of very useful opinions in this House. It gives us a chance to stress the tremendous importance of tourism, not only to Scotland but to the whole country, at the present time when our manufacturing exports have fallen away to such an extent that, if we did not have the oil that we are at present exporting, we would be one of the poorest countries not only in Europe but in the developed world.
Tourism is of immense importance to the whole country and to Scotland. The figures given are quite interesting, in that 10 per cent. of the tourists who come to Scotland are from overseas. But they are much more important than just 10 per cent., because they spend much more. Their spending is something like 3 per cent., which is about three times the amount spent by the home tourist, which is where the figure of between £200 million and £250 million comes from.

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Then, again, North American tourists are alleged to spend five times as much, and they should be greatly encouraged. I understand also, although the report has not come out, that the trend this year is up and that we are up to about a figure of 10 per cent. for overseas visitors. We have done rather better in Scotland than last year.
Another encouraging point is that 50per cent. of Scots take their holidays at home in Scotland. It is a very good thing to go to a restaurant where the proprietor eats in, but it is a very bad thing to go to a restaurant where the proprietor eats out. So this is a very good point in favour of Scotland. The increase in Americans may well be due purely to the fact that the exchange rate is now very much more reasonable, which enourages them to come. They like to come for a lot of different reasons and I should like to back up what the noble Lord, Lord Stodart, and other people said about Scotland as a separate entity. I do not think that people necessarily want to proceed from London up to Scotland. I think that they come to Scotland for entirely different reasons. Nothing could be less similar than the environment of the Highlands of Ross and Cromarty and the regions of Soho or Piccadilly. This attraction needs separate promotion and it certainly needs much more co-ordination than it has had in the past.
I welcome the step forward—it is a pretty small one and I am sure that the noble Lord the Minister will not disagree with that—but it is a very necessary one. It is ludicrous that the Highlands Board should have promoted abroad, and that the local tourist boards could promote abroad, but that the very energetic Scottish Tourist Board was unable to spend any money there. The need for more promotion is very great, because large new markets are opening up. I was at the Inter-Parliamentary Union Conference in South Korea this year and there is an astonishing creation of wealth going on all over the Far East, starting with Japan but now spreading to South Korea, Hong Kong and Singapore. All round that area there is a great new market for tourism growing up and a great amount of new wealth being created. That must not be neglected and it needs to be promoted. They have no traditional links with Scotland, but they want to travel and see other parts of the world.
The Government need to do a lot more to promote tourism in Scotland. For example—and it is all part of the same thing—there is no official scheme to grade the quality, or to upgrade the quality, of self-catering cottages, boarding houses, bed and breakfast hotels and so on. If there was a grading-up scheme there would atleast be a weapon which could be used to keep them up to the mark, particularly in the most attractive areas of Scotland. People come for the great beauty around them and there is an automatic flow of tourists. But in some cases—not in many—the service leaves a good deal to be desired, and the Government need to provide money for this sort of thing to be exposed and to improve matters all over Scotland.
I do not want to go on, because it has all been said, but I should like to say a little about the money. The noble Lord really cannot say that £200,000 is a tremendous amount to promote Scotland throughout the world. It would pay the Government to spend more money on promotion. It is not money that has
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been thrown down the drain; it is money that will bring a return. If money is short, there are two ways in which to operate. Either you can cut back, or else you can go out to make more money. In the case of the promotion of Scotland, there is a tremendous future for bringing in money. As I said before, it is a separate market from the rest of the country, and certainly from London, and it would bring tremendous returns if the promotion were well done throughout the world. If my arithmetic is right £200,000 is about 0.1 per cent. No business promoting itself would consider that 0.1 per cent. was a big deal with regard to bringing in fresh business. I would say only that it is a step forward. I hope that the Government, encouraged by this first step, will take further steps and provide a decent amount of money to allow the Scottish Tourist Board to co-ordinate their efforts, in order to get the people and put in the work of getting more tourists into Scotland.
5.48 p.m.
Lord Ross of Marnock: My Lords, I think that the Government will be well pleased by the reception of the Bill. It gives to the Scottish Tourist Board a power which has been pressed for, over a long time, and I join those who welcome the Bill and the fact that we have made this breakthrough. My first task is to congratulate my noble friend the former Member for Kelvingrove, and now Lord Carmichael of Kelvingrove, on his maiden speech. The ultimate accolade in Scotland is to say, "I kent his faither." I can also say, "I kent his mither as well." His father became a Member of Parliament just a few months before I did in 1946. Before that, his father was very well known as the secretary of the Independent Labour Party of which I, too, had been a member, and he was always the election agent for Jimmy Maxton.
Neil has proved to be a worthy son of his father. I do not know whether people know it, but his brother-in-law is also in the other place, so politics has been in the blood. He was a very hardworking Member of Parliament. He held junior office at the Ministry of Technology and also at the Ministry of Transport, and there is no one who welcomes him more to this Bench than I do. Noble Lords will appreciate that when in future we discuss a long Scottish Bill a Division will not need to be called in order to allow Lord Ross of Marnock to get a smoke. Somebody else will be sitting in the Front Bench to look after everything.
It has been an interesting debate. We trod paths which I thought we would never reach: the merits of the old and the new British Rail sleepers, the trials and tribulations of the noble Lord, Lord Ferrier, and his American friends, and the defence of the new sleepers by the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie. I should mention, although I am probably out of place in mentioning it, that a very distinguished civil servant wrote an elegy on the old sleepers. When he spoke about the new sleeper the tag line at the end was always "Aye, but there's nae place to hang up my watch". I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, about the questionable value of that little shelf. As soon as you turn round you knock it up—and everything that is on it.
We may have done some good by mentioning British Rail in this debate, although we are giving a

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much more important power to the tourist board. I have a considerable interest in it; I was Secretary of State when it became a statutory body. Until that time the tourist board in Scotland was almost a self-perpetuating body. Lord Rosebery was the chairman when I took over. People have forgotten that Lord Rosebery was Secretary of State for Scotland in the months leading up to the declaration of a general election and the holding of Parliament in 1945. He thought highly of the tourist board. Its main promoter was Tom Johnston. In the early days the board did not get a very large grant-in-aid from the Government. On one occasion after Lord Rosebery had won a race at Newmarket he gave £1,000 to Tom Johnston to set up a genealogical society.
The noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, made the valid point that for hundreds of thousands of Scots and for the many, many more people of Scottish descent all round the world Scotland means something. So we have a ready-made market. I am glad that we have already tapped that market to a very considerable extent by means of the Highlands and Islands Development Board. We were shown to be growing up in Britain as far as tourism is concerned when we created the statutory boards and the British Tourist Authority in 1969.This was followed up immediately by special grants for refurbishing old hotels and building new ones. Considerable advantage was taken of those grants. They improved the hotel situation no end in places like Edinburgh and Glasgow; private developers took advantage of what was on offer. A certain amount of similar activity is still carried on—a great deal by the Highlands and Islands Development Board and some by the tourist board. We have every reason to be grateful for the success of the tourist board under its various chairmen. Alan Devereux, the present chairman, is certainly a headline hunter, but if he puts Scotland on the map I am content. Everybody who goes abroad is a tourist authority for Scotland. That applies even to Scottish football teams.
Noble Lords: Oh!
Lord Ross of Marnock: Noble Lords should have been with me in Spain for the World Cup and seen the welcome given to Scottish football teams and Scottish supporters. They would have been proud of the Scottish supporters if they had seen them going through the streets of Seville arm in arm with the Brazilians who defeated them. They created tremendous goodwill for Scotland and for Scottish football. The Aberdeen football team do the same wherever they go. That applies, too, to Celtic and to Rangers. We have every reason to be proud of the quality of Scottish supporters. I am not going to say anything about English supporters. Indeed, I am trying hard not to say anything at all about England! Scotland has a distinctive character. There are the glories of the Highlands and the heather. We have something which symbolises Scotland to put into any exhibition. It puts England into the shade. Let us be honest about it. When it comes to tourist or trade exhibitions, the fact that we have tartans and heather, which are recognised symbols of our country, is to our advantage. They are jealously looked upon by other people.
A noble Lord: And there are our golf courses.
Lord Ross of Marnock: But we do not take them abroad to trade exhibitions. I shall come to golf courses in a minute. The Scottish Tourist Board has been offering specialised holidays—golfing holidays, fishing holidays. Golf is cheaper in Scotland than anywhere else in the world.
A noble Lord: And better.
Lord Ross of Marnock: Of course; that goes without saying. We have not yet translated St. Andrews to any part of England. And we are not going to hand St. Andrews over entirely to the British Tourist Authority. We have got tremendous tourist advantages. I agree with those noble Lords who said that visitors do not necessarily go first to London. They go to London for perhaps different reasons. We are concerned that work should be done within the United Kingdom to ensure that we take full advantage of the tourist efforts which are being made by the local authorities and the heritage organisations. I happen to be the vice-chairman of the National Trust for Scotland. I know exactly what that trust means to Scotland and the attraction that it holds for tourists and people with specialised interests. I know, too, of the co-operation we receive from the Scottish Tourist Board and from the Countryside Commission in the work that we are doing. Many bodies are concerned with improving access for tourists and with improving the facilities for their entertainment and enjoyment while they are in Scotland. We should appreciate all that is being done.
It is right that we should extend this new power to the Scottish Tourist Board. If one thinks of it, we are only giving them the power which district councils already enjoy. When it is put into perspective, one sees that we are not doing anything that is world shattering. We are not giving the board as much power as the Highlands and Islands Development Board already enjoy, power which I gave to that board in 1966 when it was created. There were of course special circumstances in that case.
I say to the Minister of State that no good at all was done to this Bill and to the efforts which the Scottish Office have made to achieve this power by what was said in the House of Commons by the Minister—Mr. Lamont, I believe. I do not know whether he was trying to appease the English and the Welsh when he said that Scotland was getting only a very limited overseas power. The Minister said it more than once and he kept on saying it—so much so that a former Solicitor General spoke of the suspicions of the Scots about what is being done. The fact is that the main drive overseas will still be made by the British Tourist Authority. They are going to spend£2 million. The British Tourist Authority is to be reorganised. They will share headquarters with the English Tourist Authority. The chairman of the English Tourist Authority will become the new chairman of the British Tourist Authority. Although it is not on the cards yet, it may well lead to a merger. This tends to make the Scots rather suspicious as to whether the proper amount of attention will be given to Scotland's needs and Scottish potentialities.

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This brings me to the point which was made quite fairly by the noble Lord, Lord Stodart of Leaston, concerning what his committee said, which was fairly clear. It was less than fair to quote Lord Stodart, who supported the Bill, and, in quoting him, the noble Lord, Lord Gray, missed out one very important word:
"The Scottish Tourist Board should be given overseas promotional powers in its own right and be solely responsible for promoting Scotland abroad".
I should not have minded if they had been given the main powers in consultation with the BTA because I think the BTA will have a task to do for Scotland in areas we cannot always reach. But they have been given this very subordinate power after the trumpets have blared in Scotland for the great breakthrough, though we have at last what the Conservatives offered in their manifesto—£200,000-worth. That is a pretty small sum in relation to the job that should be done and is being done. It may be that the job is not being done properly on our behalf by the BTA. That sum is very small in relation to the job that should be done.
I should like to ask a direct question of the Minister. How much is the Highlands and Islands Development Board spending on tourism and how does that compare with what is being spent by the tourist board on the whole of Scotland? And I do not just mean overseas. They have had a tremendous success. Tribute has been paid to them by members of the House who come from that area and who know what happens there. They have had a tremendous success this year. Even in October they had 53 per cent. occupancy of some of their hotels which they still continue to support with grant.
Somebody mentioned Barra today. One hotel in Barra—and one was put up under the Highlands and Islands Development Board hotel scheme—probably employs the equivalent of the number of people in Birmingham who are employed by the motor industry. That is what a big hotel and a successful hotel can mean to a small place. Who was it that mentioned Barra? Who was it who said that people had never heard of it? Have they never heard of Compton Mackenzie? That is where he lived and where he wrote Whisky Galore; they have probably heard of Whisky Galore.
I am glad that we have this new flexibility for the board. I hope that it is only a start. When one considers that £200 million was spent by overseas tourists in Scotland this year and calculates what the Treasury's take-off from that expenditure was, then it can be seen that we are not spending all that much on the expansion of the industry. I hope to see a very considerable expansion, and I certainly wish well to the tourist board in their new ventures.
I suggest, too, that they have been successful in taking up the power we gave them two years ago for the creation of the new area tourist organisations involving local interests such as hotelkeepers and shopkeepers plus the local authorities. They have started well—probably better in some places than in others, but the information they obtain from tourists can be fed through to the Scottish Tourist Board in respect of where the board can project special efforts overseas.
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We have every reason to be proud of what we do in respect of tourism. We welcome the Bill. We have been wanting it. It is not that we distrust the British Tourist Authority, but we believe that we can do the job better because we know better just exactly what the advantages are of Scotland. I hope that this will be just the start of something and that we shall see the figures reversed. The Scots are the best ambassadors for themselves.
6.5 p.m.
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, first it is my very pleasant duty, for a second time today, to associate myself with those who have congratulated a maiden speaker. On this occasion, it is a great pleasure to welcome the noble Lord, Lord Carmichael of Kelvingrove to the House of Lords. We hope he will participate frequently—and not only in Scottish matters, though we are sure that Scottish matters will feature largely in his interests. I perhaps have a particular reason for welcoming the noble Lord because his brother-in-law who is in another place was for many years my pair. Therefore I have a special affection towards his family.
The noble Lord, Lord Carmichael of Kelvingrove, asked me for some clarification about the British Tourist Authority approval procedures and the relationship between the Scottish Tourist Board and the British Tourist Authority in that way. Let me emphasise that the purpose of consultation with the British Tourist Authority is to ensure that the Scottish Tourist Board in its own promotions does not duplicate what the BTA is already doing in the same place.
As to the actual decision on whether the Scottish Tourist Board goes ahead with a particular project overseas, that is the responsibility of and a decision for the Secretary of State and nobody else. The requirement is that the Secretary of State shall consult with the BTA. But let nobody make any mistake: the actual decision is that of the Secretary of State and nobody else. I hope that point is quite clear.
The noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe, was concerned, as a number of speakers were, about the possibility of a merger between the English Tourist Board and the British Tourist Authority. He suggested that, since there was one chairman, it seemed likely. I should make it clear to the noble Lord that the chairman, Mr. Bluck, has been asked only to examine the possibility of a merger. No decision whatever has been taken on this matter. Indeed, so far as the Scottish Tourist Board is concerned, we believe that this Bill strengthens its role substantially.
I accept that on occasion the British Tourist Authority has made mistakes. Some of the examples which the noble Lord gave are distressing to Scots—of that there is no doubt. But, by and large, the British Tourist Authority has done a very good job by Scotland. Its promotion of our interests has been most acceptable, and over recent years particularly the relationship which has existed between the BTA and the Scottish Tourist Board has been very good indeed.
My noble friend Lord Stodart of Leaston gave a welcome to this Bill, and I was most grateful to him for the comments he made. There is little difference

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between us so far as our attitude to the Bill is concerned; perhaps a little difference in emphasis here and there. My noble friend did point out that we did not go the whole way—and this was raised also by a number of other noble Lords—in following the recommendation of his committee. On the other hand, we have made a very significant step towards what his committee recommended. We believe that it would have been a mistake to go the whole way because it is still in Scotland's interest that we should be allowed access to areas which are notably British areas. We do not want to exclude ourselves from the potential of gaining from the spin-off from projects which relate principally to Britain. We believe—and Scots are noted throughout the world for trying to get the best of both worlds—that we have actually achieved quite a significant step in obtaining the best of two worlds so far as promotional activities are concerned.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, if the Minister will allow me, can he clarify one point? Did I understand him to say that out of the British Tourist Authority's spending abroad, £2 million could be attributed to Scotland?
Lord Gray of Contin: Yes, my Lords, that was a point I dealt with in my opening speech—and that is correct. I shall deal in a little more detail with the financial questions in a few minutes, when I shall be dealing with another point relating to finance which the noble Lord raised.
My noble friend Lord Stodart also suggested that it might have been better if we had gone the whole way forward and given complete autonomy to the STB. If I may add to what I have already said, we want to promote Scotland and Britain; it is not a question of promoting only Scotland. We want to supplement what is already being done by the British Tourist Authority and we believe we can do it better in this way and through this legislation.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Wilson of Langside, dealt with exactly the same point. He will forgive me if I do not repeat myself again, because what I had to say in answer to the point of my noble friend Lord Stodart is identical. There is also the point, of course, that at the end of the day the British taxpayer foots the bill and we must avoid wasteful duplication. We must ensure that we get the best value for the money spent. All those points are covered in the line which we have taken and in our decision to follow this form of legislation.
The noble Lord, Lord Ferrier, made some very interesting comments about the merit and demerit of British Rail. My noble friend Lord Lyell has handed to me an updated version of the railway timetable, which I shall pass on to the noble Lord, from which I see that there is a wide variety of services which could be available to him and that refreshments are available on a great many of them. The noble Lord asked me about the particular attitude of British Rail and how they might keep up to the mark as far as tourism was concerned. British Rail are, I think, very well aware of the importance of tourism, not just to the economy of Scotland but also to their own revenue, and I believe
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that regular meetings already take place between the Scottish Tourist Board and British Rail. I think that from those meetings British Rail will be kept very well aware of the sort of criticism which is made of them from time to time. But when we are making criticisms I do not think we should overlook the praise which is also given. No doubt those who read of our deliberations in this House will balance one against the other.
I turn to the noble Lord, Lord Mackie of Benshie, for whose welcome to the Bill I was grateful. He said it was a small but important measure. I would go a little further; I would say it is a small but very important measure—indeed a very significant measure. I would suggest to him that the £200,000 to which I referred is, of course, only supplementing what is already spent. He rightly made the point himself that £2 million is already being spent, and this £200,000 is being supplemented by the Scottish Tourist Board, which will benefit from the original sum that will continue to be spent by the British Tourist Authority. We believe that the Scottish Tourist Board, being based in Scotland and having a most direct knowledge of the best way in which Scotland may be presented and projected overseas, is well equipped to work along with the BTA in this effort.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, if I may intervene, can the noble Lord tell us how the BTA calculate the £2 million spent in Scotland?
Lord Gray of Contin: My Lords, I am afraid I simply cannot answer that question off the top of my head, but I will certainly be very happy to contact the chairman of the British Tourist Authority on behalf of the noble Lord, and when I have the information from him I shall be happy to forward it to the noble Lord.
The noble Lord made mention of the good season, and, yes, I can confirm that this has been a very good season. Final figures are not yet available, but, from my own travels around Scotland during the Recess, I can confirm that the number of times on which I visited hotels where I was told that they were either fully booked or practically fully booked was encouraging indeed. I think it speaks well for the standard of service which is being offered in Scotland these days.
I take the point that the noble Lord made when he suggested there were some areas where there could perhaps still be improvement. We can never be satisfied with the service offered. I know that some areas are conscious of this and the local tourist organisations will be doing their utmost to see that improvement is made.
On the question of grading accommodation, this is a matter which is being actively pursued by the new Scottish Confederation of Tourism under the chairmanship of the STB chairman, Mr. Devereux. I agree that this is a very desirable step forward and I am glad that SCOT is taking it seriously.
Lord Ross of Marnock also welcomed the Bill, and I was interested in what he said about the Scottish football sides which travel abroad, the fact that they are ambassadors and are now accepting the responsibility which they have. There was a time, regrettably, when this was not so, but I think we can all now be very proud of the way in which Scottish

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football supporters are behaving when they go abroad. I do not think we ever had any doubt about the merit of the teams, but some of the supporters were not exactly as we would have wished. I think lessons have been learned and there is a marked improvement which could be followed in other parts of the country. The success of Aberdeen Football Club is being put to good effect. I can tell the noble Lord that the Aberdeen Tourist Board have mounted promotions to Sweden and to Germany with considerable success. I have no doubt that other clubs will give this idea to other tourist boards, and it must be welcomed.
The noble Lord asked me the direct question about how much the Highlands and Islands Development Board spends on tourism. Of its total budget of some £36 million in 1983–84, approximately £7 million will be spent on tourism, and, of that figure, approximately £200,000 on overseas promotions. Add to this the Scottish Tourist Board's total budget of nearly 8 million, and I think noble Lords will accept that Scotland has done rather well in Government support so far as tourism is concerned.
My Lords, I am most grateful for the enthusiastic welcome that has been given to this Bill and for the very useful contributions which we have had from all those who took part.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

Housing (Payment for Well Maintained Houses) (Scotland) Order 1983
6.19 p.m.
Lord Gray of Contin Lord Gray of Contin rose to move, That the order laid before the House on 27th October be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move that the order laid before the House on 27th October be approved.
The purpose of the order is to prescribe a new multiplier of 12.7 to be used in calculating by reference to the rate able value of a house the amount of a well maintained payment under Section 21 of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1969. A "well maintained" payment is a supplementary payment made by the local authority over and above the basic compensation provided for in statute. It is an incentive and reward to residents to maintain their houses in good order even although the houses are sub-tolerable.
Local authorities are required, under Section 25 of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1966, as amended by the Housing (Scotland) Acts of 1969 and 1974, to make payments in respect of well maintained houses which fail to meet the tolerable standard and have been vacated in pursuance of a closing order or a demolition order or have been purchased compulsorily by a local authority in order to effect repairs. Local authorities are also required, under Section 30 of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1974, to make payments for well maintained, but sub-tolerable, houses in housing action areas which are made the subject of compulsory purchase for the purpose of bringing them up to the requisite standard.
The basis for determining a "well maintained" payment is that it should equal the rateable value of the house multiplied by a factor prescribed by statute. Since being set by statute in 1957 the multiplying factor has been 7·2, but there has been a steady increase to the value of the payments as an automatic result of rating revaluations. The increase from 7·2 to 12·7 is intended to reflect fully the increase in maintenance costs which has taken place since the multiplier was last reviewed in 1978.
Since the institution of "well maintained" payments in 1957 revaluation of Scottish rateable values has occurred on four occasions—in 1961, 1966, 1971 and 1978. It has, therefore, hitherto been unnecessary to adjust the multiplier of 7·2, set by statute in 1957, in order to maintain the value of "well maintained" payments.
In local authority expenditure terms the effect will be minimal because "well maintained" payments are a minor part of a local authority's slum clearance budget; indeed, we have reason to believe that if progress on clearance is maintained total expenditure by Scottish local authorities on these payments should only increase by around £75,000. I beg to move.
Moved, That the order laid before the House on 27th October be approved.—(Lord Gray of Contin.)
Lord Ross of Marnock: My Lords, I entirely agree with what is being done.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

United Kingdom Trade Patterns: ECC Report
6.22 p.m.
Lord Greenhill of Harrow Lord Greenhill of Harrow rose to move, That this House takes note of the report of the European Communities Committee on the United Kingdom's changing Trade Patterns subsequent to membership of the EEC. [7th Report, 1983–84, H.L. 41.]
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I am sure that we turn with reluctance from the pleasant and relaxed consideration of Scottish affairs to the more worrying question of the pattern of United Kingdom trade since our membership of the EEC became effective. I am afraid our report on this subject is a very bulky document and has a price tag which puts it quite out of reach of any casual reader outside the House. But it does record some interesting facts and gives a very good insight into the changes that have taken place.
Historically speaking, our belated accession to the European Community will be one of the landmarks of the latter half of this century. The reasons why we hesitated so long can be well understood in retrospect, given the attitudes which the Government and the people of this country took up in the aftermath of an exhausting but nonetheless victorious war—a war in which we felt in part let down by the Europeans and in part saved by the Americans. Eventually when we came round to joining the Community it had succeeded beyond all expectations. Fierce controversy preceded our accession and continued afterwards to the detriment of our interests. This controversy is not dead, although the opponents of membership seem to stop short of complete withdrawal. But a reform of the

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Community must surely be inevitable within the next few years and the reform will in part be shaped by those who have previously opposed our membership completely.
The inquiry which led to this report was started before the general election and was interrupted by it. For this reason it has taken longer than we would have wished and may in some respects be a little dated. But I believe its central message holds good and the report will always be a very useful source of reference. The purpose of our inquiry was to try to clarify one of the main issues in the controversy about membership and by so doing help accurate conclusions to be drawn and sensible judgments made in the future. The main issue which interested us was how far membership of the community has affected the pattern of our external trade. Was membership beneficial or was it damaging? Did it help to solve our trade problems or merely create new ones?
Statistics have been used by the protagonists in this argument to reach absolutely opposite conclusions. Such independent studies as have been carried out on the whole have been designed for a specialist or academic readership. The sub-committee identified the need for an objective study for the general reader of the effects of membership on Britain's external trade. That is what we set out to do and your Lordships must judge how far we have succeeded. Personally, I found the conclusions of the committee less clear-cut than I had hoped, through no fault of the committee but because the effects themselves were so hard to unravel. I was also surprised to find the fact of membership so much less important in trade than I had once imagined.
We must thank our many witnesses for their cooperation. There was no shortage of persons who volunteered to come forward. I commend the evidence to your Lordships. It is almost all of an extremely high standard and expressed with great frankness. It is invidious to make a selection of the witnesses, but I believe that your Lordships will find of particular interest the evidence of the redoubtable Mr. Ian MacGregor, the then chairman of British Steel; the views of Mr. Sallitt and his colleagues; of BEAMA, and of Mr. Horton and his Chemical Industry Association partners. Particularly refreshing was the evidence of the enterprising representatives of the British clothing industry. Of particularly topical interest are the important but somewhat disturbing views of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders.
I do not suppose that I am alone in this House in having difficulty in finding a way through statistics. They are kept to a minimum in the report, but I should like to thank Government departments for their determined efforts to get their statistical products understood—certainly by the chairman. I also thank the distinguished economists who from time to time clarified and often confused the issues. We were piloted through these minefields by our specialist adviser, AnnMorgan, who was equipped with both the expertise and the common-sense needed. The committee have tried to set out their general conclusions in a way which will encourage and facilitate the debate. They are set out in paragraphs 95 to 102 and
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summarised in paragraph 103. I do not want to take up your Lordships' time by reiterating them. Members of the sub-committee participating in the debate will, I am sure, speak on those conclusions which interest them particularly.
I should like to confine myself to five points which are illustrative of our findings. First, what is clear at once is that the high initial expectations of a surge of increased trade with Europe following our accession were not fulfilled. The onset of the recession after 1973 of course obscures the extent of the change. It would certainly be true to say that our membership of the Community did reinforce the necessary and desirable shift of trade towards Europe which was already under way before we joined. But the advertised dynamic of membership cannot be identified. Europe was of course bound to replace many of our former traditional markets.
The second point I want to make is this. Membership of the Community itself was rarely considered by witnesses as a major influence on the flow of imports or exports. Far more influential than the fact of membership were the volatile exchange rates characteristic of the period and our woeful lack of competitiveness in many important areas. It is this lack of competitiveness which again and again is seen at the root of most of our trade problems, not only with Europe but with the other parts of the world.
Thirdly, most industrial witnesses nevertheless were of the opinion that membership had, on the whole, been beneficial. They usually expressed enthusiasm for the political aspects of the Community but were rather more uncertain and restrained from an economic point of view. Indeed, one of the witnesses, Mr. Grierson, a director of the General Electric Company, while yielding to no one in his political enthusiasm, went as far as to say that, from a trading point of view, membership was an irrelevance. None of the significant witnesses advocated withdrawal. As we say in the report:
"Quite simply membership is regarded as essential to the future well-being of British industry".
Fourthly, no more than anyone else was the sub-committee able to arrive at firm quantitative conclusions about the effect of membership on the pattern of trade. One cannot know what would have happened had we not joined, and truly comparable statistics are extremely elusive. But there can be little doubt that membership played an important part in sustaining trade and industrial activity in the United Kingdom in the recent difficult years and helped to attract investment to this country from overseas. It also encouraged some investment within the country.
Fifthly, opponents of membership have made much of the alarming growth of the adverse balance of United Kingdom trade in manufactures with the rest of the Community. From this it has been argued that accession has delivered a deadly blow at our industrial base. However, we concluded, with appropriate supporting figures, that this decline is not due to membership; other causes are dominant. This is confirmed by the fact that there is a comparable decline in manufactured trade with other industrial countries. This is shown on chart 4 on page xl.
It is of course an extremely serious matter. Earnings from service industries, buoyant as they are, cannot fill

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the gap. Your Lordships will also see in the report some interesting evidence from the invisible export committee. But the basic remedy for this adverse balance lies very much in the hands of our own industry. Good products, competitive in price, ingenious and modern in design, well marketed and well serviced, will go a long way to solve this problem.
On listening to witnesses one could not escape a feeling of disappointment that membership of the Community has not had a more beneficial influence on our trade. It has to be recognised that industry's response to membership was tardy in many cases, and even now the less successful business men have a great deal to learn from their more prompt and successful colleagues. Also the members of the Export to Europe sections of the Department of Trade are now extremely well equipped to help and advise. Having seen some of them at close range recently, I pay tribute to their enthusiasm and tenacity. Among many business men there are revived hopes for the future. These revived hopes spring in part from the fact that some of our industries are now markedly more competitive than they used to be. Competition from the Continent was in many cases a shock—a shock which was sometimes beneficial and sometimes fatal.
Now that the United Kingdom membership has been endorsed by the electorate, we are entitled to hope that the views of Her Majesty's Government will be more sympathetically received by other members of the Community and the Commission, now that our commitment is clearer. There is not much evidence of this so far but since the Stuttgart meeting the Government have a plan of action which has been published and which covers many facets of the Community's work. The recent news from Brussels is more encouraging.
Nowhere should the Government work harder than in seeking to remove the non-tariff barriers in trade and services constantly mentioned during our inquiry as a cause of difficulty. As the report observes:
"Trade is not yet free and the Community is not a common market."
There is at least a decade of hard work ahead, and the competitiveness of our industry is fundamental, as well as a solution to the damaging volatility of exchange rates.
The Treaty of Rome related to political and economic conditions at the time of its signature. These conditions have long been overtaken, and we live in a totally different world. There is an urgent need to see that this basic instrument of the community reflects contemporary conditions. Her Majesty's Government should work hard to see that it does, and it is in that direction that we should direct our effects. I beg to move.
Moved, That this House takes note of the Report of the European Communities Committee on the United Kingdom's changing Trade Patterns subsequent to membership of the EEC.—(Lord Greenhill of Harrow.) [7th Report, 1983–84, H.L. 41.]
6.38 p.m.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, the House will be extremely grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, for having introduced this
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Motion this evening. If I may say so, he has delivered his observations in a most thoughtful and moderate tone which becomes the gravity of the situation with which we are confronted in relation to the Common Market itself. I hope that the House will have the opportunity to hear the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Kaberry of Adel. I was not fortunate enough to be in another place at the same time as he was, but we know here of his distinguished career. We look forward eagerly to his maiden speech and indeed to his continuing and, in so far as possible, full-time attention to the affairs of this House. The noble Lord's speech will be very welcome indeed here tonight.
The speech of the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, and indeed the report itself, and its preparation, reflect an understandable anxiety concerning Britain's membership of the EEC. This impression is not in any way diminished by the knowledge that the European Commissioners are also extremely anxious about the Community, since, as we learned from the press the other day, even in these times of financial stringency, the Commission is devoting £3 million to advertising the virtues of the European Community prior to the EEC elections that are due to be held next year. Had the virtues of the Community by now been obvious, and well understood and experienced by everybody, it might have been unnecessary to undertake that kind of expenditure.
Two types of anxiety are reflected in the report. The first is the anxiety of the original and passionate protagonists of EEC membership as an essential prelude to eventual European union. The report itself, as well as at times interventions by members of the committee, show that those people involved were almost trying to prove to themselves that the hope to which they gave voice so long ago had turned into actuality. There is also reflected a wider anxiety, covering the whole perspective of our actual relationship with the EEC and with various other parts of the world.
As the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, has already said, the report did not really arrive at any firm conclusions. I put it to your Lordships that perhaps one reason why it was unable to arrive at any firm conclusions was that there was still a subjective wish to justify British membership of the EEC. I would make it clear that I am not in any way trying to deride that. People are entitled to their own passionate beliefs. If people have no aims, there is no progress, and therefore one can understand, especially after a period of about 10 years, the subconscious wish to be able to justify the high hopes that were once held.
The difficulty met by the committee in trying to arrive at firm conclusions arose to some extent from the nature of the data provided to it, in particular that from the Department of Trade and Industry. Wading through the mass of statistics that have been incorporated—only in part, one should imagine—in the report, one finds every now and again a queer, immediate shift from a rendering of actual figures to a string of percentages. If one wants to convert the percentages into actuality, one has to read across all the columns. Undoubtedly this has complicated the report. I am quite sure that the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, will agree with me that we are not all statisticians—not even distinguished Members of your Lordships'

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House—and I venture to suggest that these matters could have been presented with rather greater clarity than has been used in the report.
There have been two main developments in British trade and industry since we joined the Community. There have been two principal developments; for the moment I am purposely leaving out the question of the provision of services. The first development relates to agriculture; and I make no apology for introducing agriculture because it is dealt with to a very large extent in the report itself, replete with all kinds of figures that have been provided from the Ministry of Agriculture and elsewhere.
I believe it is important that at the outset we deal with the agricultural development and the industrial development quite separately. True enough, they are interrelated, but the first point that we must bear in mind, whether or not it may be palatable to all the various interests involved—and agriculture is not wholly unrepresented in this place, in the Cabinet, or in another place—is that the workings of the agricultural part of the European Community and those of the industrial part are quite separate and distinct, and are actually in conflict.
The agricultural system enshrined in the CAP completely violates every kind of competitiveness—free enterprise competitiveness—that is the characteristic, or is supposed to be the characteristic, of the industrial side. Therefore, there are two opposing philosophies within one system. Though I would not for one moment suggest the proposition, nor seek to argue its feasibility, what would happen to agriculture in Europe if it were openly exposed to the same degree of competitiveness as there is in industry?
Certain effects have arisen from the situation, and one of the trends has been a very considerable increase in agricultural trade and, indeed, agricultural exports. However, no understanding of the anxieties concerning the European Economic Community is complete unless one appreciates the cost of the common agricultural policy in both money and price terms. Any suggestion that this factor can somehow be overlooked and swept under the carpet is not conducive towards getting to the root problems of the European Community.
I shall not trouble the House with many figures; my noble friend Lord Stoddart of Swindon will later deal with this aspect in greater detail. However, according to the Economist, the total impact of the CAP, in terms of an average figure over all farms, means an annual subsidy of £20,000 per farmer. I emphasise: an annual subsidy of £20,000 per farmer. This has been achieved by the operation of the CAP, the extent of which every year has been criticised by succeeding Governments and by almost every party of state in the United Kingdom.
Does it not occur to someone that just as one may on occasion have to apply cash limits to Government expenditure so, too, one ought to apply cash limits to the common agricultural policy itself? For some estimate as to the effects of the CAP one has only to look—and your Lordships may care to take the reference because I am quite unable to read it all—at the Financial Times of 13th October where there
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appeared an article by Mr. Samuel Brittan who I can assure the House is not a paid-up member of the Labour Party or, for that matter, so far as I know, even a sympathiser. I am given to understand that he always has the reputation of being a financial commentator of the utmost rectitude. In his feature on 13th October he put the costs of EEC membership—and he is referring to the CAP—in 1980 in terms of £4,450 million and the benefits at £1,895 million giving a net loss of £2,555 million per annum. The source of the figures he quoted was the Institute of Fiscal Studies. Incidentally, those figures included not only the customs duties and VAT payments that have a direct impact on our budget, but they also reflected the higher prices paid by the consumer.
The reason why I mention the latter—the higher prices paid by the consumer—is that it is estimated that the prices we pay in the United Kingdom are, on average, some 10 per cent. higher than they would have been if we had not had the rather dubious benefit of the common agricultural policy. That means that wage claims, which have an impact upon industrial costs, are bound to be set higher due to the fact that the worker in this country has to pay rather more for his food.
Dealing with the industrial side, there can be no doubt that the stark effects are shown in the graph which is reproduced in the report on page xl; Chart 4 shows the balance of trade in manufactures by areas. The visual impact is immediately clear. Can it really be an absolute coincidence that from 1972 onwards our deficit in manufactures progressively decreased? Is it really conceivable that this is entirely a coincidence?
Unfortunately the figures shown in the report only go up to 1981 and they are not always shown in the DTI report in a comparable form. So I obtained some figures through the computer of the DTI which revealed the comparable figures in the case of manufacturing industry in 1972 as compared with 1982. Apart from two items there is very little essential move in any of the adverse or favourable balances. There is nothing of very great significance that can determine an immediate and easily perceptible trend, except in the case of manufactures. I am talking under SITC classification Nos. 6, 7, and 8 which cover manufacturing goods. In 1972 we had a trade surplus of £40.4 million; in 1982 we had an adverse balance of £4,802 million; and 1983 bids fair to have an adverse balance of £5,000 million. At the same time—and this is the other trend—whereas in 1982 in lubricants and mineral fuels (SITC classification No. 3) we had a surplus of only £101.7 million, in 1982 we had a surplus of £4,742 million. Those are the two principal changes that have taken place and they are quite unmistakable.
I repeat: Is it to be said that this is purely a coincidence? Evidently the report thinks that it is. Evidently the report attaches no particular significance to this progressive trend which is displayed by those two stark figures. It is said that there are alternative reasons for this. One is the onset of the recession. I cast my memory back to the time when we entered the Community and had the referendum campaign, the reason for our joining the European Community was precisely that in joining a larger unit of this kind it would be possible to avoid recession. That is what we

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were promised. Nor is there any real logical reason why there should have been a recession in Europe at all—there is no reason at all in the light of the fact that there are still very large unsatisfied demands in Europe and a large number of unemployed people who are capable of fulfilling those demands.
It can be said—and said with some justification—that one cannot altogether blame the Community for not having avoided the recession because, of course, as is well known and recognised now, it was unfortunately this country that led Europe into a recession, and in fact led the world into a recession. This was mainly because of the idiotic application of severely deflationary policies instanced in the first place by a ridiculous rise in interest rates of some 5 per cent. towards the latter end of 1979, and the application of disastrous monetary policies, which everybody now admits were wrong anyway.
In a way that perhaps supports the case of the committee and the arguments put forward by the noble Lord, to the effect that we cannot really blame this all on the European Community. I would say that there is justice in that, but that the Community was itself designed and the Treaty of Rome was concluded in the confident supposition that by the binding together in closer unity of all these nations recession could be avoided.
There are two sides to the equation involving the determination of the adverse balance of trade. An adverse balance of trade can be caused by a shortfall in exports, by a considerable surge in imports, or by a combination of both. As regards exports, it is perfectly true to say that the volatility of the exchange rates—but, above all, the disastrous level to which they were driven by an insane monetary and interest policy—undoubtedly had an effect on the competitiveness of British exports abroad. Of course, this was denied at the time and has been denied for the past two or three years, but the denials now, particularly from the Government, are not very obvious.
There is also the question of some degree of obstruction to British exports into Europe in the Community itself. In his evidence the noble Lord, Lord Kearton—and he will be speaking at a later stage in the debate—raised this; and, indeed, there is abundant justification for it. That is one of the characteristics which we have tended to meet in Europe. By and large, Britain honours her obligations to the letter and, apart from the slight hiccup over the tachograph, has honoured every obligation to Europe. She has been more communautaire than the rest. Very often it is in the rest—particularly in the case of France and, as I am quite prepared to show in detail, in the case of Germany—that there has been obstruction.
However, the other side of the equation is the terrific surge of imports into this country, which is beyond doubt. Once again, this has been due very largely to the effect of exchange rates, which have acted as a subsidy for imports into this country. As we all know quite well, there have also been hidden subsidies for energy and matters of that kind which, to a very large degree, have been dealt with in the national press. However, above all, owing precisely to the deflationary policies that have been followed, British industry's costs here at home for domestic consumption have been
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unnecessarily increased by reason of the cash flow difficulties that have been imposed upon British industry by a deflationary policy followed to its extreme by Her Majesty's Government.
I think I speak with common knowledge when I say that if one goes into a store to buy British products, time after time one finds that delivery will take five, six or even 10 weeks. The stores are not prepared to carry stocks because of their cash flow difficulties, which are an inherent part of a policy of deflation which is pursued by the Government; whereas our Continental competitors are prepared to send vast quantities of goods either on sale or return or on extended credit terms, and, therefore, firms here are more willing to stock them.
These are matters which of course have to be tackled at a national level, but they have their Community overtones. If it were so minded, even within the limitations of its devotion to free enterprise in industry, the Community has the institutional means of being able to carry through the necessary reforms to ensure a uniformity of exchange rates, a uniformity in terms of standards, a uniformity in terms of interest charges, and all the rest. But it is no nearer doing that now that it was 10 years ago. In fact, it is farther away.
The other factor which has operated and which is referred to in the report is investment. Unfortunately, it is a fact that since we joined the Community there has been a net outflow of funds for investment purposes into the Community of £2,691 million. On top of all this, over the nine years that we have been a member we have spent £2,659 million from the purse which has gone into Community funds. That is our net contribution, after rebates, for nine years. Many may think that we have paid a great deal for a very little—except, of course, the agricultural community.
What, therefore, should our verdict be? I do not think that we can isolate our membership of the European Community, or that we can exempt it, from a partial responsibility for the state of our trade with the Community or for our own state of affairs here. I think that other factors have exacerbated it. One of the factors that has exacerbated it more than anything else is the quite ridiculous provisions of the Treaty of Rome, which virtually are a sanction for free enterprise without restriction throughout Europe—free and open competition in the true, old monetarist conception of the term. We think that that has failed.
What we need in Britain—and, indeed, what the Continent needs—first is a radical reform of the common agricultural policy; and by "radical reform" I mean radical reform involving cash limits. Then we have to work together with our Continental colleagues—not necessarily confined to the EEC—to seek a plan which will involve the changing of the Treaty of Rome, providing for the planned co-operation between members states, their industrial enterprises and their financial institutions, and providing for a planned objective not only for Europe but for developing countries and the remainder of the world.
I am all for co-operating to the utmost with our European colleagues. I think it is vital that we achieve as wide an area of co-operation as we can. Yet I cannot help feeling that we have a responsibility to the

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Commonwealth as a whole, which comprises some quarter of the world's population and whose representatives are now meeting in conference at a most critical time. I cannot help feeling that, however much we may seek to co-operate with our European colleagues, the whole of our history beckons us to cement, to strengthen and to extend our relationship with the Commonwealth itself.
7.9 p.m.
Lord Ezra: My Lords, I should like to join with the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, on the way in which he presented this very important report. As someone who has been involved for many years in the operations of the European Community, the report struck me as being extremely well-balanced, judicious and careful in its findings. It was charting territory which is extremely complex to chart, because it was trying to identify the Community effect on trading patterns, which are inevitably influenced by a whole variety of factors. I believe that the conclusions reached are as fair and as proper as anyone could reach in a study of this sort on this subject. I believe that the work done by the sub-committee will considerably enhance the growing reputation of your Lordships' Select Committee on the European Communities.
It is a fact, as the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, stated, that unfortunately we joined the European Community too late. Had we joined it 10 or 15 years earlier we should undoubtedly have shared in the great period of growth that was witnessed during the 1960s. We of course had our period of growth then. I believe it would have been further enhanced. We should also have been able to have a moderating impact on the CAP, about which the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, spoke.
As it was, we joined in 1973 on the eve of the most serious adverse repercussions in the world's industrial and commercial affairs since the end of the second world war. The impact was almost instant, because no sooner was the ink dry on the document of accession than of course there was the serious blow of the oil price increase. So far as our trade pattern was concerned there is not the slightest doubt that that had the biggest impact in that year. I have the figures here, and in the year 1973 our oil, which we were then importing altogether—we had not, as yet, exploited the North Sea—cost us £941 million. In the year 1974 that was £3,357 million. It went up nearly fourfold. There is no doubt that that had much the most important impact at that time on our overseas trade.
The report presented by the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, did absolutely the right thing early on in paragraph 5 in identifying all the other factors which were certainly collectively, and possibly individually, more important in affecting our trade at that period than the single effect of going into the European Community. I should like to remind your Lordships of some of those factors. There were not only the oil crises of 1973–74 and 1979, and also the recession to which they gave rise; the policies which individual governments then adopted to deal with that recession, which of course varied and had a variable impact on
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their trading situation; the problem of inflation; and the problem of fluctuating exchange rates. It is difficult to distinguish the impact of these various factors.
The report nevertheless shows up one disturbing conclusion about which we are all aware. As a result of the combination of all these uncertainties and difficulties which have arisen in the decade since we joined the Community and which were largely outwith the Community in their cause, we have suffered substantially in our visible trading balance. As we well know, and as the figures show in the report at Table 4, it is clear that the rising earnings on oil, which has been so effectively exploited in the North Sea, have masked the declining contribution from our manufactured trade.
I should like to mention the figures which update Table 4 for the first 10 months of this year which I have obtained from the Department of Trade and Industry. If we take the overall balance as it was revealed in the October figures, we were showing a surplus of £3.6 billion for the 10 months of last year: for the 10 months of this year, that has fallen to £0.4 billion—that is, £400 million. If you take the oil, on which we achieved a surplus of £3.3 billion in the 10 months of last year, the surplus earned on oil in the first 10 months of this year is £5.3 billion, an increase of £2 billion. That is a fantastic improvement in performance, for which there must be congratulations.
If, however, we look at the manufacturing position, I am afraid to say that the position is bleak indeed. We see that for the first 10 months of 1982 the net surplus earned on manufactures was nearly £2 billion: £1,925 million. For the first 10 months of this year, regrettably, the balance on our manufactures is minus £2,092 million. That is a swing of no less than £4,000 million. I do not believe that this has ever happened in our industrial history before. I have looked up the figures for 1931, which the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, gave in answer to a question. The swing then was that in 1930 we earned £42 million on our manufacturing account, and in 1931 we lost £7 million. I do not know how these terms translate into today's money, but that is the only evidence of such a swing in peacetime in something like 150 years—the period for which the statistics exist.
We are, therefore—and this report has underlined it—for a whole variety of reasons which are not due to our membership of the Community but to wider factors external to the Community, worldwide factors, and some internal factors in our own country, facing this critical situation where we can put alongside the trend in our manufacturing trade the likelihood that the oil earnings will start diminishing in the next two to three years. We face a serious situation indeed.
If your Lordships would turn to Chart No. 3 on page xx of the report, you will see that that is a chart which shows the index of our performance in manufacturing trade. It starts at a figure of something like 220 in 1963–100 would represent a balance—and it falls to just over 100 in 1982, but in fact the position, as the report makes clear, fell to an index of 94—that is, we were showing this negative position—in the first three months of 1983, and the latest figure that the Department of Trade and Industry has kindly supplied me with shows that for October it had fallen to 89.

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I do not know whether this is a trend. Let us hope it is not. If it is, let us hope it will be reversed. But if this trend goes on, on the one hand, and if the oil surpluses begin to diminish, on the other, then this is the time when surely we ought to be addressing ourselves very seriously indeed to this question. I believe that the excellent report which the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, has put to us today should form the basis for a further inquiry, a wider inquiry, into our overseas trade. I put forward the suggestion for a special Select Committee on this subject on a previous occasion recently, and the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, said that he would sympathetically consider it. Therefore, I should not like to press him further on it; but shall merely say that I believe that the report which we have heard today should be the first step in trying to investigate fully, and to determine, the causes of and the possible remedies for the serious situation that we face.
There are some, of course, who would argue that an inquiry of this sort ought really to be addressed to the total economic and industrial structure of the nation. There is some substance in that, because obviously the two are interlinked, as our overseas trade accounts for something like 20 per cent. of our GNP. It is a large proportion. Nevertheless there are special aspects of the problem. Much work has already been done within the NEDO organisation into those industries which, in certain circumstances, could contribute more to export earnings. We should do well to bring those together. A great deal of work has been done to inquire into the impact of fluctuating exchanges. Indeed, your Lordships had a very informed debate the other day on the whole subject of the European Monetary System and the possible timeliness or otherwise of our joining that system to get greater stability of exchange rates. Here is a vitally important question to be further pursued.
There is the whole question of competing more effectively with imports, because that is the essence of the problem. It is the imports flowing in which are causing the difficulty, rather than the exports going out, which are continuing to rise. It is the ever-rising tide of imports that creates the difficulties. We should consider how we can compete with them more effectively.
Finally we should be considering whether the aids and the assistance which are provided for exports in full conformity with our various international treaties could not be increased and substantially improved. I believe that there would be merit in following this effective and balanced inquiry into our trading relations with the Community with a further inquiry, taking into account all the good work that has been done here and in no way duplicating it, and widening that out to cover the issue which is touched on in the report and which I believe should be delved into more thoroughly.
7.21 p.m.
Lord Kaberry of Adel: My Lords, I am deeply appreciative of the honour I have in being able to address your Lordships for the first time and I am equally aware of the obligations placed upon me on an occasion of this kind. I am, however,. helped very much by the wide-ranging subject matter before us which involves not only the future prosperity of our
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people. It not only concerns our manufacturers, traders and wage earners who struggle with many problems to overcome changing patterns of trade, but it is upon their success that all people in these islands depend for the increasing standards for which they all search.
We are considering a report which, in effect, is a report of an inquest on the pattern of our trade since we joined the EEC. Quite rightly it gives an open verdict and within the terms of such an open verdict the debate can range, I trust, widely. I hope it can, because, as I have seen, our patterns of trade in this country have been continuously changing from time immemorial. They are changing today and I hope that they will continue to change in the years to come.
I remind your Lordships, who must have personal knowledge, of the many changes in industry and trade which have taken place in the parts of the country which you know best. I recall that as a boy in Leeds I heard of the closure of the Leeds steelworks. Over the years I saw the disappearance of the famous Leeds engineering works, the products of which works had been spread over the whole of the then known world. I saw the decline of the railway foundries, the disappearance of many of our large tanneries, and changes in our chemical works. This was compensated in time and part by the rise of the readymade clothing industry, to which reference has been made already today. That was a success; now it largely depends on which manufacturer one speaks to to get a straight answer about whether it is a success.
That was followed by the rise in warehousing and administrative centres and other new buildings which took their place. It was the resilience of our people to adapt to change and to wage a continuous struggle to find newer forms of industry and trade. Perhaps the greatest asset we have and always have had is the innate capacity, knowledge and determination of our great wage earning forces in this country. They seek to make collectively the finest goods—at least we think they are—in the world and to sell them in the face of the most difficult competiton.
I hope your Lordships will forgive me if I refer especially to those qualities which still exist and have existed for many generations in that part of the country which best I know. In the cities, towns, villages and hamlets which bestraddle our Pennine range, they cover and have done over the past 150 years many industries which have been built up from small beginnings, largely without any of the governmental assistance which has been so readily and lavishly poured out in recent years. There was no limit to their horizon for selling and they were urged on by a spirit of independence, of competence and of adventure. There were difficulties in developments. I have no doubt that many of your Lordships can point to many skeletons of buildings across that range, but, by Jove, today there are many new creations taking their place.
I now briefly refer to the report. With respect and a degree of humility, I offer my congratulations to the chairman and members of the committee for the skilful way in which they carried out their duties. As one who for many years past in another place was a member of Select Committees, or as chairman of the Select Committee on industry and trade and on nationalised industries, I know a little—perhaps only

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in part—of the time which members spend on studying the vast number of reports that are showered upon them like confetti once anyone outside is invited to send a report. There are problems of waging the proper conduct of the examination of witnesses who appear before them. On this occasion the members asked 607 questions. They had answers some of which I would describe as being better than others, but they were all rather helpful in the process of coming to a decision.
After the time spent on this study from January to July this year the committee finally produced this most interesting document, and the least I can do is to thank your Lordships very much for putting before us the many problems which concern us today in our trade and industry. The report ranges over a wide spectrum of industries and finance. It covers (to show that at least I have read the report) questions ranging from the price of cereals to the price of suits in West End stores, from problems about ladies' dresses from the EEC and from sugar to men's shirts. I discovered the interesting fact, in the answer to Question 536, of what is called the "French shirt syndrome"; here it is said,
"No matter how much money a Frenchman has he buys five shirts a year".
A syndrome of that kind perhaps helps us better to understand other nationalistic syndromes which apply to other countries both within and without the EEC.
I must not venture too deeply on an occasion such as this into problems associated with membership. However, may it suffice for me to say that membership of the EEC is not—and was never planned to be—a king of leaning post against which some idle traders could lean and pick up the orders as they went past. That just does not happen. Rather, it should be some form of starting block to give them greater impetus in their urge to manufacture and to trade. The report brings in a large number of factors which apply to our trade worldwide as well as to membership of the EEC.
May I, with your Lordships' consent, briefly refer to one or two matters which have been referred to in previous Select Committee reports. For example, how necessary it is to have some common standards worldwide and to have some international authoritative body which not only can lay down the standards but in fact can have some form of enforcement. Reference has already been made to the urgent need to deal with non-tariff barriers to our trade. They are applied still in a very subtle manner, difficult sometimes to define. But clearly it is a problem which will have to be resolved if we are to have ultimately the fair trade for which we seek.
It is clear still that, despite all the rules and regulations in or outside the EEC, quicker and more effective action will have to be taken with regard to dumping. We have to deal with the unfairness of foreign tariffs, often unilaterally applied against us without any quick response on our part. I appreciate in that regard that we are conditioned in the EEC by our membership of it and that their speed becomes our speed. It is therefore necessary for us to have a lively body urging constant action by the authorities of the EEC. The fundamental facts of free trade must mean some fair trade on equal terms, with no national
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subsidies. Many people believe, even on the Continent, that there are too many hidden subsidies, too many hidden advantages given to our competitors in the EEC.
There is also the question of languages. I feel that our educational establishments could still pay greater attention to the universal teaching not only of the EEC languages but also of the languages of the Far Eastern countries, which would enable our representatives the more easily to penetrate into the interior of Japan or China whenever the conditions may prevail. Everyone reading this report is struck by the detailed attention that the committee pay to the necessity of doing something and of not just sitting back and making complaints about the situation as it is at the present time. I believe that the spirit which urged our forbears to go out to manufacture the best and to sell it in the face of the fiercest competition will still see us through many of the difficulties which confront us at the present time. I hope that this debate will never end—that it will not finish with the conclusion of the last speech made by your Lordships in this Chamber this afternoon. I am certain that trade organisations and all organisations associated with trade and industry will carry on the debate. I, for one, am deeply grateful to the committee for giving a lead, for setting out so clearly the many problems which confront us; and I shall rejoice to have the opportunity at some time in the future of taking part in a further debate on this matter.
7.35 p.m.
Lord Rhodes: My Lords, we owe our thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, for introducing this matter this afternoon. We who sat on the committee were privileged to sit under his chairmanship because he proved himself one of the best chairmen that ever I have sat under. To the noble Lord. Lord Kaberry, may I give a welcome from an old friend who spent a lot of time in his company in the other place. He has the best characteristics of a Yorkshireman; and, although his Government in 1974 tried to make me into a Greater Mancunian, I am very delighted to say that I still remain a Yorkshireman. I am very glad indeed to have the privilege of congratulating him on a very good speech and to hope that we hear him many times again. To the noble Lord, Lord Bruce (who is a lot younger man than I am) I say that I am not going to rake up the subject of whether we should be in or out of the Common Market.
I remind him that it takes a long time to change direction in human affairs. It took Moses 40 years to bring the Israelites out of Egypt; it took 40 years for the disassembling of Empire; and—mark my words!—it will take 40 years before the true integration of Europe comes about. We are in it and we cannot get out of it because we have nowhere else to go. If he had been able to accompany me to the Far East on the five journeys that I have made, he would rapidly agree with me that to take our place in world affairs we need the countries of Europe working together. It is up to Government—this Government—to do something about what we have in this report.
The noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, drew attention to the first paragraph in the study. He quoted the words:

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"The Committee therefore saw a need for an objective study of the effects of membership on Britain's foreign trade designed for the general reader".
It is a bit of a tall order for a general reader. Who is the general reader? The report is priced at £14·45. They are not queueing up at any of the branches of the Stationery Office, I am sure, to buy something like this at £14·45. But it is worth every penny of it to somebody who is in trade or who is a student of affairs in Europe. The primary object of any committee sitting upstairs, as we do, is surely to assist this House in carrying out its responsibilities in a particular field of inquiry. The committee sat upstairs for six months sifting through evidence and coming to what I think were first-class conclusions.
You cannot have discussion on a subject like this without its having repercussions outside this House. So you have in front of you the question of the dual role, and if we accept the fact that we need to be able to bring matters to the notice of people outside the House, then we have to consider how we can get the information to them. My complaint about the way in which Select Committees have been wrong is the way in which their reports have been distributed. What is the use of doing months of work if it does not get to the place where it needs to be read? If we accept that outside this House there is interest in this subject, we should make a new channel of communication, making this House more important, in terms of its usefulness, than ever before.
How are we going to do it? What happens when a report is being made? First of all, there is the oral evidence, which is typed out and available. The investigations leading to this report are nearly 12 months old. Is there a way of getting the information to the people who matter more quickly? What can be done? I do not know whether everybody here got through the post today this document from the London World Trade Centre Association: it makes a criticism of our report which, in my opinion, is absolutely first class. There is no doubt that it indicates a way in which we could spread the knowledge that is acquired, and the opinions that we have come to, to turn our conclusions into reality.
This report says:
"Clearly any attempt at direct contact with individual companies would require an enormous effort with a high level of likely waste. There is, however, a much more manageable channel through intermediaries. For trade and industry subjects, these would include business journals, including British Business and the Financial Times. Over 80 Chambers of Commerce are reached through the Association of British Chambers of Commerce—the CBI with over 200 individual associations, a relatively small number of other active trade bodies, departmental press officers—including, where appropriate, that of the BOTB".
I put that to the Government because of experience I have had in the past when I have pursued this question of where these reports get to. On one classic occasion when we did a report on textiles, 160 copies were sent to the Holborn Stationery Office—I am sure they are very, very interested in textiles in Holborn—but when they sent six to Manchester I thought it was a bit thick. If this is going on at the present time we would like to know about it; and in the hope that it may spur somebody on to take a little bit of action, I will have aword now about the summary of conclusions, paragraph 103, sub-paragraph (vii):
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"the British Government should in particular work for the removal of non-tariff barriers to trade within the Community".
It goes on to talk about what should be done also in the way of disseminating information and encouragement. This report is really a continuation of the report we produced on the internal market, and the same things are cropping up time and time again. This is one of the things that crops up not only in the internal market but also in the one that we are discussing.
The main feature of all barriers to trade is uncertainty. Administrative barriers are hard to estimate in advance and deliberate Government policies to restrict imports are difficult to detect or predict. Here one remembers in evidence what the French produced in terms of trying to obstruct the entry of video recorders into France. There was a flood of video recorders en route for France and they switched the port of entry from the normal one which could deal with the job to Poitiers, which had hardly an office at all and which effectively and successfully impeded the video recorders from getting into France for 12 months. There was a famous case called the Cassis de Dijon which left in its trail a whole series of doubts as to the legality of barriers and doubts about what firms were expected to do. This haziness has had a most unfortunate effect in that many firms have given up trying to find their way through this jungle of barriers.
It would be interesting if the Minister could tell us what action has been taken by the United Kingdom Government since we produced our report on internal conditions and internal trade and the one that we are discussing today. For instance, has the customs documentation been simplified? Have steps been taken to shift many administrative and financial transactions associated with Community trade away from the frontiers and to reduce the documentation to one sheet of paper?
If no representations have been made, what on earth were we doing when we were sitting for so long on the inward market report? We want to know from Government what action has been taken on these matters. Have any steps been taken to get rid of national differences in VAT procedures? These are matters of current importance. What are we doing about Italian state aid? If we cannot stop it, what about harmonising it? However, despite all these difficulties, there is no doubt, from the statistics available to us, that both for the United Kingdom and for the EEC as a whole trade liberalisation outweighs restrictive measures. Well over 40 per cent. of all United Kingdom trade is with other member states, as compared to 30 per cent. in 1973.
Another very important thing which readers of this report must take on board is that the witnesses who gave evidence before our committee said without exception that they were better off within the Common Market than out of it.
Unfortunately, there is a general lack of understanding by Governments and people of the advantgaes which are to be gained by having an integrated Community. Consequently, the political will is not there to achieve it. I say that we are in. We cannot come out. We have nowhere else to go and we should do all in our power to revive our situation. Otherwise the time will come when we shall regret this

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inaction. When much of our industry has disappeared, and the Pacific nations dominate the consumer and the consumer durable market, it will be too late to regret the fact that we have not done enough in our day and generation to make this integrated Europe work.
7.50 p.m.
Lord Hayter: My Lords, I confess to finding myself very cynical about lots of matters in connection with the European Economic Community, but I join the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, in saying how adroit, expert and tactful our chairman was throughout this committee and he has cured some of my cynicism. But I also follow the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, in talking about the dissemination of this report and I would be presumptuous enough to make a suggestion to a general reader who happens to come across it. There are 424 pages and I suggest that the first thing to do is to forget all about the statistical pages. That will solve part of the problem. Having done that, I suppose that, logically, one should also ignore the witnesses who claimed to be economists. Of course, some of them were brilliant, as the noble Lord. Lord Greenhill of Harrow, said, but they were so boring. If one does that, one gets to the rest of the report and is faced with the question: so what?
From an industrialist's point of view, the report makes most interesting reading. It is always good to know what the other chap has been thinking, and some of the witnesses were most frank about the conversations that they had had in the various committees, their associations and their board meetings. Then, again—a point that was mentioned in the excellent maiden speech—one can follow the subtle influence on industry of the country's foreign policy. I have been mixed up with a company which has been going for 160 years. and I read about how in Victorian times our thoughts were naturally led towards what I tactfully call the senior members of the Commonwealth. Then at the turn of the century we, for our part, turned to tsarist Russia and to South America and then, more latterly, to the Far East, the Near East and now, finally, to Europe.
I have to admit—I do not know whether with pride or with shame—that our company went into Europe a long time before this country went into Europe, because we suddenly realised that that was going to be the market of the future. The difficulty that arose from that was the simple one that we set up factories in Europe, to the detriment in a way, I suppose, of our factories here, because had we been in the European Economic Community our goods would have been manufactured here and we should have been concentrating on marketing in Europe as a whole.
Serving on this committee has emphasised to us, as one person after another has said tonight, the difficulties of the non-tariff barriers, of which, in my own case, I think standards the most important. Standards of design, standards of quality, standards of performance—all of these can he manipulated to make a very bitter experience for those people who are novices going into Europe. By the way, I forgot to give your Lordships one very good example about statistics, which, as our report said, show a lot of discrepancies because of trade definitions and revisions to
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more recent data. One of our best witnesses, the British Electrical and Allied Manufacturers'Association—gave an excellent example of this, when the export of mobile radar equipment worth over £1 million was, instead of being credited to them, credited to the car industry because it had wheels. That shows what can happen so far as statistics are concerned.
But, to get back to standards and to the bitter experience that can follow from them, there used to be talk in the old days about perfidious Albion, but I can assure your Lordships that we have nothing on France or Germany when it come to some of these troubles. The report states very clearly that trade is not yet free and the Community is not yet a Common Market, and I blame standards, administrative procedures and the state aids about which the noble Lord. Lord Rhodes, was talking. Of course, there comes into one's mind the phrase, "What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander", but long term I think most industrialists know that the famous word "harmonisation" will be the correct answer. When the time comes for a European standard in the various industries which are trying to make a living in Europe, then we shall have gone a very important step forward.
We have lost 15 years' momentum and we have to make up that loss. One of the reasons why we have to make up that loss is not only the economic one but the political one. A long time ago, I was privileged to hear Sir Robert Menzies speak in Australia about our entry or our possible entry—because we did not go into it at the time—into Europe. He said that it was a political concept, but one that had kept us free from war in this continent of ours for the best part of 40 years. That is why we have to support it and that is why we have to make our way.
The Motion asks that this House will take note of the report. I am sure that the House will take note of the report. I hope that industry, too, will take note of it, because there are points there of interest to anybody. And I certainly hope that the Government will take note of it. As has been mentioned, we had some excellent witnesses from the Department of Trade and Industry and it was they who saw, and indicated, the way in which they could combat the problems of the non-tariff barriers. They have a big part to play. Individual industries cannot do very much; even the trade associations can do but little more. But with the help of the Government, I am sure that we can make a really good contribution to the future of our conduct in Europe. We are there to stay and so we had better get on with it.
7.58 p.m.
Lord Molloy: My Lords, may I first congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Kaberry, on his maiden Speech and say how pleased I was to hear again that voice which I heard so often over very many years in another place, and I am sure that he will not feel too upset at hearing my voice again. The compliments that have been paid have been very well deserved.
With regard to the committee under the chairmanship of that very able chairman, I do not know whether to congratulate them or to commiserate with them. It has been an extraordinarily difficult task. One must be fair. What we all suffer from—some of it makes us angry, some of it makes us a little upset and

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some of it makes us feel deceived, whatever side we are on—is the enormous propaganda campaign, some of it downright lies, some of it pointing out so many wonderful things, as if we had been a little offshore island in the North Sea which the world had forgotten about. Now, after we had been tossed around for so many years, this wonderful EEC would allow us to join it and, therefore, to be successful.
But there would not have been many of those great countries in that EEC if it had not been for this country, and it would have been a totally different Europe altogether. I sometimes think that that should now and then be said.
We must never forget the political abomination which decided to wipe out an entire people by the million. They could have won, and almost did win, and there was no Common Market around at that time. We must never forget the role which this island played, followed later by the Soviet Union and the United States of America.
Therefore I agree with those who say that perhaps our greatest mistake was not to join the Iron and Steel Community right from the beginning. We made a massive contribution from 1945 to 1950, when France, Germany, Holland and Belgium were laid waste and the economy was run on a couple of fags, a bar of soap and a bar of chocolate. We made a generous contribution but we ought to have been in the Iron and Steel Community right from the beginning. We should have been the foremost member discussing the matters which resulted in the Treaty of Rome. But now we are in the difficult situation of knowing that all is not well. Nevertheless, we have to be realistic. This Chamber should acknowledge that it is not the EEC which has led to failure. The failure lies with the gross exaggerations of big business, which campaigned on the basis that all was going to be lovely if we joined the EEC. It is unfair to blame our membership of the Community. We must never again allow those who embarked upon one of the greatest deceptions I have ever known in my life to say such things. When asked, people say, "I voted to go into the EEC: I was all for it". The vote for entry into the EEC was overwhelming because of the power of propaganda. During that campaign the biggest casualty of all was truth.
The members of this committee have made, by their report, a sensible contribution which will help us to understand what really is the position. It would be quite useless now to say that some of us are for staying in the EEC and that others are against it. We are in Europe whether we like it or not. However, we should not be made scapegoats, as we already have been. During the summits to be held in May and June of next year the voice of this country has got to be asserted. Europe must remember that the ultimate ideal is a common market. Very few of the trade barriers have been removed. People say that we have got to remain in the EEC. We must resist that assertion and ask, "How on earth did we manage before we joined the EEC?" We must move forward to a new era and take a leaf out of the activities of EFTA, which is still doing many remarkable things. When one looks at the EFTA countries—we belonged to EFTA at one time—one sees the absolutely remarkable progress that they have made. They have moved into an
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alliance with Yugoslavia. This may be a pointer to the future. Instead of hurling terrible weapons at one another, the countries on either side of the iron curtain ought to begin trading with one another. The EEC has failed hopelessly in this connection.
I believe that we have to stay in the EEC. The Government have said that they will help people in all sorts of ways, by providing financial help and information. We all acknowledge that Britain's foreign trade has shifted towards the EEC. If it has shifted towards the EEC, one has to ask: from whence has it been shifted? We ought not to be too happy about the answer to that question. Britain's foreign trade has shifted from some of those countries which in our hour of need said, "We stand beside you foursquare". In other words, it has shifted from many parts of the British Commonwealth. Many Members of your Lordships' House know that when they go abroad on IPU or CPA delegations this is still pointed out to them. We cannot dismiss this as just an emotional spasm. They still feel very deeply about it. We should have created a balance. The EEC could have joined us in obtaining better trading arrangements within the Commonwealth and, indeed, within the EEC. It is not too late, I believe, to achieve that aim. I should much prefer us to work along those lines than to sustain the ugly, offensive practice of keeping prices up, resulting in butter and beef mountains and wine lakes.
I do not know whether the committee realise—when I read the report I saw no evidence of it—how much it costs to build these massive warehouses in which to keep the butter, the beef and the thousands and thousands of barrels of wine. When one realises that the cost of building those warehouses, storing the surplus products and maintaining security would keep London going for 18 months, it makes one think. So we have to say loudly and clearly that surely there must be a better way.
I hope that I shall not be regarded as being too heavily anti-Russian. I am not against the Russian people. I do not like the political system in Russia, but when I hear voices in Europe telling us that we must have nothing to do with those awful people in the Eastern states, but that they can help us out by buying millions of tonnes of our beef and butter which we will not allow the British or the French old age pensioners to have at a reduced rate, and then I hear that these magnificent administrators have discovered that they sold too much and must buy back from the Soviet Union at a dearer price than that at which they sold the beef and the butter, particularly the butter, it is far from good enough.
I do not suppose that many of my fellow Britons will read this remarkable report. A previous speaker said that its cost—£14.45—is a deterrent. That is perhaps the reason why people will not read this astounding report. However, the balance which is sought is sensible. Certainly the report is not sycophantic on the one hand or offensive on the other. The report contains points which we shall ignore at our peril. There is little doubt that the private enterprise system comes out of it very badly indeed. The leaders of industry in this country are shown to have very little initiative.
The figures which were read out by the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, were disturbing. We have heard statements

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made by Treasury Ministers on the Front Bench opposite. Somebody is not telling the truth. Either those Treasury Ministers were not telling the truth, or the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, who read out that data, was wilfully untrue. Therefore I ask the Minister to get hold of Hansard, take it to the Treasury Ministers who sit on the Front Bench and ask them either to confirm what they have said about this massive improvement or to admit that they, too, were led up the garden path and must withdraw some of the things they have said over the past 12 months. Either we have to accept what they have been saying or what the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, and this report is saying. When we had a big debate about the EEC before we went into the Community, truth was the greatest casualty. One of the great things about the report is that it shows no bias, it is courageous. and it is as factual as can be. Those qualities must be acknowledged.
An article which was published in The Times on 7th July had this to say:
"Britain has been slower to adapt its attitudes to a number of EEC markets than member states who have been playing the game longer".
One cannot blame the Common Market if our initiative is not there. On the other hand, the article went on to state:
"Britain exported over £13,874,000 of manufactured goods to the EEC last year. But, to the continuing embarrassment of the pro-EEC establishment, our net trading position has clearly deteriorated on the job-creating manufacturing side since we joined the market a decade ago".
The article continued with these words:
"Ten years of surpluses before entry have given way to ten years of deficit since".
Whether one is pro- or anti-Common Market, statistics of that kind can give pleasure to no one. One may be violently anti-Common Market but on reading such a statistic, one has to acknowledge that such a situation hurts and damages Britain; that it helps to create that most vile of all conditions—unemployment within the ordinary British family and the loss of work by the breadwinner. which is a very dangerous situation. So even those who are anti-Common Market should not feel too much glee at such facts in the report or in The Times.
If both the report and the debate in this Chamber are examined by Government Ministers in depth, they should give some indication as to what should be done to set matters aright in the forthcoming summits with regard to the EEC. I was never in favour of Britain joining but the vote to join was overwhelming, and therefore those who would oppose it afterwards can only label themselves as being totally undemocratic. Once we went in, we gave of our best.
Another point I should briefly like to draw to your Lordships' attention is the farce and tragedy of the European Parliament. Nobody knows who sits there. Nobody knows who they are. Nobody knows whether they make any speeches. They all seem to be doing their best to get into another place rather than stay where they are. It is a fiasco. It was not always like that, I can remember when I was a Member of the European Parliament. I remember that Conservative Members. Liberal Members and Labour Members—particularly my noble friend Lord Bruce of Donington
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—were almost hated by the commissioners. My noble friend's great crime was that he knew his stuff better than they knew theirs. The commissioners did not like me because I could not get out of the habit of that lapsus linguae of referring to them as "commissars".
The fact was that we could stand up and say—as we did very often from all parties in that European Parliament—"We are not satisfied with what has happened here today. We do not accept the commissioners' explanations. We believe that our country is not getting a square deal". Then would come the line that frightened and concerned them: "We will go back to our Parliament and explain what has happened". That used to have most beneficial effects—not merely beneficial for Britain but also for the principle of the European Economic Community. That has been lost and is probably gone for ever.
As the report before us is very comprehensive. I intended to speak about it at great length but I realise that other noble Lords wish to speak as well. There is one other element of which I should like to make mention: I should like to see more concern shown with regard to the handicapped of Europe. The handicapped people of Europe are an integral element of EEC social policy. But surely social policy does not amount to much if it is mentioned only once every five years.
I believe that the principle of reciprocity of our National Health Service ought to have much more attention within the Common Market than it has. It is a great principle and I hope that Mr. Ivor Richard, the Commissioner for Employment and Social Affairs, if he reads of this debate. as a former Member of the other place, will see to it that the principle of reciprocity within the NHS is given far higher status than it has at the moment.
To unite on health is the greatest cause and therefore must hold the prime position in all countries and all segments of public life within the EEC. If that aspect was given a much higher status and more attention throughout the Common Market countries, there would be a feeling that at long last, on fundamentals, we are getting together, because health is the handmaiden of peace and contentment.
The European Parliament needs overhauling. The British Parliament and other parliaments should see to it that we can no longer depend on cut throat competition and that what is really required in the EEC is ECP—namely, economic community planning. If there is proper, decent and sane economic planning within the Community, then we can make a success of it and we shall not I hope have to wait for the 40 years adumbrated by one of my noble friends earlier in this debate. If we are to make a success of it, it should not be for all the politicians and all the commissioners; and not for all the businessmen, bankers and financiers but for the real people who count: the ordinary folk. When the ordinary folk of all these countries can see that it is worthwhile joining and that it will achieve not merely an economic victory, it will make a massive contribution to world peace.
8.17 p.m.
Viscount Rochdale: My Lords, may I start by adding my congratulations to my noble friend Lord Kaberry of Adel for his very interesting and important maiden

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speech? The noble Lord, Lord Molloy, will forgive me if I do not follow him in everything he said. But I was extremely interested in what he had to say about the European Parliament. I agree with some of the points he made—particularly the point he made right at the beginning of his speech: that we should have joined the Community right from the word go, just as the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, said.
I was privileged to be a member of the sub-committee which produced the report. I should like to say straight away how much I valued sitting once more under the chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow. He carried us along through a very difficult maze of information, which is something that many chairman cannot so easily achieve.
As other noble Lords have said, and as the report says right at the beginning, we were trying to provide an objective study of the effects of membership on Britain's foreign trade designed—and this point has been mentioned over and over again—for the general reader. I believe that the report as it has appeared has demonstrated how important that need was. For myself, and no doubt rather naively, I hoped that we might go rather further and that we might even have produced a report that would be a sort of child's guide to the situation. But the report itself shows how very wrong I was; how impossible such a thing would have been. It leaves me in no doubt at all as to the complexity of the subject with which we are dealing. The very fact that the report brings out that complexity shows, to my mind, that it has done a very important job of work.
It is true, and this point has also been mentioned, that the outcome of the past two general elections has gone a long way to consolidate our membership of the Community as our permanent niche. Yet during those campaigns, and since then, one has heard over and over again opinions voiced to the contrary, sometimes, no doubt, put forward with sincerity, but, in my view, based too often on over-simplification of a very complex situation—over-simplification which resulted in a quite wrong expectancy of results in the early days; and over-simplification today of the reasons for our actual experience during the time of our membership.
The question we had to answer, to my mind, quite a simple question, was has our trade benefited or otherwise from membership? Was membership a help or was it a deterrent? During the course of the inquiry we, of course, had access to an enormous amount of statistics, but statistics that were by no means always calculated on the same basis, which made their interpretation exceedingly difficult. To my mind, it is that difficulty that has added to our problem.
Already there were in existence various trends, various changes, various motions affecting our world trading position which had nothing whatever to do with our membership of the Community. Let me just mention one or two. There was the growth in the world of the new industrial countries. There was the restrictive trading from some former Commonwealth markets. There was the erosion of the Commonwealth preference system. There was the fall in Britain's share of world trade. And in consequence of many of those trends—and there may be other reasons as well—there had been as a result a shift of our trade into Europe,
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which again had really nothing whatsoever to do with whether we were going to be a member of the Community or not. Those situations were there.
What I have mentioned are just a few of the underlying long-term changes affecting the pattern of our trade. Others are mentioned in the report, and have been mentioned in your Lordships' House this afternoon, which were going on long before our entry into the Community and obviously they blur any easy assessment of the consequences of our actual entry into the Community. That did not make our job in the inquiry any easier.
Looking at the situation once we had become a member, there are other factors which again make an easy and clear assessment of the situation more difficult. One of the most interesting points that the report brings out is the different ways in which membership is affecting different industries; and not only that, but the different ways in which membership affects different sectors of the same industry. It all makes a very complex picture, so that it is not easy to say that being a member has been an advantage or it has been a disadvantage.
Let me mention just very briefly two or three examples. For instance, the chemical industry, as the report says, has an almost uniquely successful record, both within the Community and elsewhere, and has been really little affected by membership. The steel industry, with all its problems, and its need, along with the steel industries of all the Western countries, to be streamlined, seems able now to find important export customers in Europe, always provided that its continued improvement of efficiency can be maintained. Then one looks at the mechanical engineering industries, the electrical engineering industries, and they illustrate the point so well of the widely different degrees of success, or lack of success, in Europe experienced by different sectors of those industries.
The motor industry, seemed to have a fairly neutral experience from membership; textiles had a not entirely unworthy record in Europe, but like textile industries of all the Western European countries it was more affected by other outside industry from further afield, from the Far East. No doubt these various industries are strengthened by common membership and working together.
The clothing industry, which one noble Lord has mentioned, shows an encouraging record and again one where membership no doubt provides co-ordinated defence against low-cost competitors from far afield. Of course, the clothing industry has done extremely well in pursuing and exploiting a very selective market in Europe, and I think it is to he congratulated on the success it is having there.
Having said all that, there are one or two industries I have purposely not mentioned. I have not mentioned processed food; no doubt the noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury. will be referring to that. But the different industries can show very different results, and this complicates a clear picture of advantage or otherwise. There are, however, certain common threads, I believe, in our experience which stand out and are very important. Undoubtedly membership has been a spur to competitive effort throughout British industry, and

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to greater efficiency. This, I believe, has been a valuable lesson.
Undoubtedly our membership has re-emphasised the enormous importance, particularly in a sophisticated market like Europe, of good marketing. While marketing in such circumstances may be easier for the large firms, marketing for the small firms, we learnt in our inquiry, is often very difficult. With world trading conditions as they are today, both these lessons—greater competitive effort and better marketing—must be of value generally to British industry, not only in Europe but for the trade that it is doing around the world. So our membership has taught some good lessons.
Again, having said all that, the really significant fact that comes out in our inquiry, with all its complexity, is that notwithstanding all the evidence we received. whether from those who have been and are successful in Europe or from those finding matters very difficult, from none did we meet other than a strongly voiced view, from the point of view of British trade and industry, that it would be nothing less than a disaster to contemplate withdrawal at this time.
It may be that when membership was being advocated in the early days, and no doubt advocated with great sincerity, the political advantages that might be experienced were sometimes overstated. It may be that as a result there have been disappointments. There have been disappointments. Unexpected obstacles have emerged. Many references have been made this afternoon to non-tariff barriers. All these have emerged. But, for all that, we found no case for thinking that a wrong step was taken at the time when the country decided to enter Europe.
I hope that this report will be carefully studied. It is expensive but it has an enormous amount in it of importance. I hope it will prove to be a valuable tool, helping to point the way as different obstacles are overcome, so that we can go forward as a unique world trading bloc of ever-increasing strength, perhaps with different countries specialising in different industries where best they can—whether by industries or by sectors of industries. That may well involve a degree of adaptability which in some cases could be a little painful: but specialisation is something that we heard about and is something that can pull together an industry as a body. I am thinking of the motor industry where parts are made in one country and assembled in another. and so on. It will produce a trading bloc in which British industry will be able to contribute to the full and to a very marked extent.
8.32 p.m.
Lord Sainsbury: My Lords, I venture to take part in this interesting and important debate because agriculture and food obviously play a part in the pattern of trade. Moreover, they are subjects which have concerned me for many years as a member of Subcommittee D. The report points to the level of agricultural self-sufficiency in the United Kingdom which has increased by a considerable amount during our membership of the Community. It is unfortunate that members of the Community have interpreted—in my view incorrectly—one of the objectives of the common
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agricultural policy as being the attainment of a high level of self-sufficiency.
I am sure that your Lordships are all well aware of the huge agricultural surpluses which have resulted from the operation of the CAP. Experience shows that a policy aiming for a high level of self-sufficiency, coupled with open-ended price guarantees, invariably produces surpluses. The high price levels have encouraged considerable productivity gains while demand for food has increased but little. I must emphasise that the increase in the level of self-sufficiency has been a consequence—some may say an unfortunate consequence—of the operation of the CAP. It is not explicitly stated in the Treaty of Rome as being either the objective or an intention of the CAP. The objectives of the CAP, as stated in Article 39 of the Treaty, include the stabilisation of agricultural markets and the assurance of the availability of supplies. As Mr. Buckwell, from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, so rightly pointed out when giving evidence to the committee, stability and self-sufficiency are two quite separate things. There are means of stabilising the market and ensuring adequate supplies at any level of self-sufficiency.
The increase in agricultural productivity and the production of surpluses have naturally affected the trade pattern, not only of agricultural raw materials but also of processed and manufactured foods. As is to be expected, the ratio of food and drink imports to consumption has fallen rather slowly from 1972 to 1978; but thereafter it fell sharply. In the past 10 years there has been a fall in the United Kingdom's volume of imports of all foods. Exports have more than doubled. although it was a doubling of a comparatively small figure. The United Kingdom's trade deficit for food rose in value but this was because prices of imported food more than trebled. Perhaps more significant has been the shift in the direction of the United Kingdom's trade towards the Community.
An interesting figure brought out by the report is that the Community now supplies almost half of all United Kingdom food imports. as against one-fifth or so in the early 1960s. This shift in the direction of trade has been to the detriment of many of our former trading partners. It is of concern that at a time of increasing protectionism and bilateralism these countries are losing their markets in Britain and in the EEC. The most current issue is of course that of the special access arrangements for New Zealand butter which are under review. The European Commission's proposal for reducing even further the import quota for butter will do serious harm to New Zealand's dairy industry and its economy. Britain, as opposed to most other members of the Community, has always been a net importer of food. Unfortunately, this has caused a conflict of interest between members because Britain, by paying the high prices for imports of products protected by the CAP, has effectively been making budget transfers to the Community. The reduction in the United Kingdom's imports has reduced the total amount of these transfers but not to an extent that is great enough to alleviate the conflict.
In discussions on the CAP, its effect on the food manufacturing industry is often overlooked. In particular, the industry is disadvantaged by EEC raw material prices which are sometimes considerably

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higher than world prices. For example, Community prices exceeded world prices on 1st December 1982 by 68 per cent. for common wheat and 149 per cent. for white sugar. Not only have there been these added costs to the industry but also sometimes increased difficulty in obtaining raw materials.
Although the food manufacturers justifiably complain about the operation of the CAP, they show a positive and commendable attitude towards membership of the Community. The Food Manufacturers' Federation is quoted in the report as saying:
"We happen to believe there is quite a bit wrong with the Common Agricultural Policy. We do not see the way to solve that particular problem is by coming out".
Certainly we all accept that the CAP is in drastic need of reform. However, despite the disadvantages incurred by this policy, membership of the Community does provide the food industry with valuable scope for improved export effort.
So often Britain's consumer interests are neglected when policy decisions are taken in Brussels. Although consumers may have benefited from a wider choice of foodstuffs as a result of food imports from the Community, they have certainly paid higher prices for some foods. The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has estimated this additional cost of food imports from the Community in recent years as being between £200 million and £300 million. Given these figures, it is possible to challenge that the CAP has achieved its objective of ensuring that supplies reach consumers at reasonable prices. Consumers would claim it has not.
In conclusion, may I add my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, and his colleagues. I hope the report, detailed and extensive though it is expensive as it is—will have a wide readership. It illustrates that in spite of all the Community's imperfections, our continued membership is so vital to the future of our economy.
8.43 p.m.
Lord Brimelow: My Lords, if this debate has demonstrated anything, it is our tendency to stray outside the strict terms of the subject under debate. I think that we have touched on pretty well every aspect of the Community of which we disapprove. The terms of reference of the report as stated in the sub-title are:
"The United Kingdom's changing trade patterns subsequent to membership of the European Community".
I emphasise the term "subsequent to"; it is not "consequent on" or "caused by". The temptation to explore whether a temporal sequence justifies the assumption of a cause and effect relationship is irresistible. Sub-committee B succumbed to that temptation and we have succumbed to it this evening. In that I see nothing bad. The exploration has shown that, in the matter of the trade patterns subsequent to our joining the Community, the terms "subsequent to" and "caused by" are not congruent.
In trade in agricultural products it is possible without difficulty to demonstrate that there is a causal relationship between the CAP and the changing patterns of our trade. The noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury, drew attention to that. I share the apprehensions he
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expressed about the Commission's present proposals with regard to our trade with New Zealand. But the sub-committee's report also showed that when we move from trade in agricultural products to trade in manufactured goods it is far more difficult to establish what the effect of our membership has been on the changing patterns of our trade. In many industries it is clear that membership has not been the dominant factor. From this I think one conclusion emerges. That is that the relationship between our membership and the patterns of our trade is not clear and is not the same in all industries. There is a temptation always to make simple assertions on that subject. Simple assertions are nearly always wrong.
I now pass to the one reservation that I have about the recommendations in this report. I was not a member of Sub-Committee B when the oral evidence was being taken. I became a member at its last session, when the draft was already being considered. I, too, pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow. I have worked under him in different capacities. I think he has steered the committee very well in producing this report. But I have one reservation about Recommendation (vii) in paragraph 103. That recommendation begins:
"the British Government should in particular work for the removal of non-tariff barriers to trade within the Community".
Several previous speakers have supported that recommendation. Given the complexity of the relationship between our membership and trade, the difference between industries and the difference between commodities within a given industry, I find that recommendation a little bit too sweeping.
Let us take for instance the motor industry. On page 173 there is a reply to Question 321 by Mr. Turnbull, the President of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders. He was very reserved on the question of getting rid of non-tariff barriers to trade in so far as the motor vehicle industry in this country might be affected. What he said was:
"it is always a possibility that the industry' will decline virtually to nothing with negligible investment in the motor industry in Britain. At that stage we would have to import substantially more vehicles than we do today. The balance of payments could change adversely to the effect of almost £7 billion, as we have already pointed out to the Treasury. This shocked the Chancellor and his colleagues but we have said it is a very real possibility unless we have some long-term strategy planning for the industry".
In other words, the establishment of a true common market, with no barriers at all, could be bad for the health of the motor industry.
The report is discretely reticent on the methods which have been used to give the motor vehicle industry such modest degree of protection as it still enjoys. The report is equally reticent on the very large sums of money that have been transferred to foreign motor vehicle manufacturers as a result of the high prices which they are able to obtain in this country. These are not consequences of our entry into the Community. In so far as Community-manufactured motor vehicles are concerned, they appear to be derogations from the conditions of the Treaty of Rome. Nonetheless, I think that the recommendation needs to be looked at a little carefully as regards the motor vehicle industry.
If your Lordships look at the evidence of Mr. Grierson on behalf of the General Electric Company,

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you will see that he, too, was somewhat reserved about the concept of a truly free common market. I have in mind his answer 390, on page 216. That is my reservation.
I should like to make one broader comment. With regard to many commodities, chiefly manufactures, it cannot be demonstrated that our membership of the Community has made much difference to the patterns of our foreign trade. Some people in this country have been tempted to argue on that basis that in relation to those commodities our withdrawal from the Community would not make much difference, either. That is a non sequitur. What the report brings out is that the patterns of trade are affected by many factors additional to the simple fact of being in, or not being in, the European Community.
Those who have thought with care about the consequences of withdrawal are aware that, after our withdrawal, the subsequent patterns of trade would be influenced not so much by the mere fact of withdrawal as by the trade stategies, and in particular the protectionist policies—if we were to adopt the alternative economic strategy—which we followed after withdrawal, and also by the reaction to our policies of our trading partners throughout the world, and not only within the European Community.
If we were to withdraw, we should be facing problems quite different in nature and in scale from those reviewed in the report which we have been debating tonight, and in my opinion the only conclusion which can be drawn from the report about the handling of a post-withdrawal situation is that we should need eyes on every side of our heads all the time.
My own approach to the European Community is sceptical and beady-eyed. I do not have a very high regard for the institutions of the Community. I follow the historian R. H. Tawney in the observation that institutions tend to develop into parodies of the hopes originally placed in them. But nothing in this report has undermined my belief that we are better off in the Community than we should be if we were to withdraw from it.
8.55 p.m.
Lord Hatch of Lusby: My Lords, I must start by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, for his chairmanship of the committee and the production of the report. I would also express my sympathy with the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, who once again, in yet another debate on economic issues, is having to sit on the Front Bench without the presence of the eager-beaver businessmen who give such support to the Conservative Party.
I should like to take up two points that have been made—first by the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, and then by the noble Lord, Lord Molloy—about the effect on the Commonwealth that is shown in the report of the changing of British trade as a result of membership of the EEC. But I do not want to pursue that aspect simply on the issue of the Commonwealth, because I should like to pass on from referring to those two noble Lords to what the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, said tonight, as he said it on a
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previous evening, in a wider context; namely, the effect of British membership of the EEC—and a variety of other issues, too—not just on the Commonwealth but on our trade with the whole of the developing world, indeed with the half of the world market which is at present closed.
The noble Lord will not be surprised if I repeat some figures. I have only one point to make, and it is contained in paragraph 8 of the report. on page ix. The paragraph states:
"Despite the changes in world trading conditions during the 1970s, certain long-term influences continued to affect United Kingdom external trading patterns in the same fashion as in earlier years, and in particular to promote the exchange of goods with members of the Community. During the 1960s, the importance of external trade relative to domestic output grew steadily; manufacturers accounted for an increasing share of imports; and the share of trade with other industrial countries, particularly the six original members of the EEC, the USA and Japan, rose while that with other developed countries outside Western Europe and with the rest of the world diminished".
None of us can be complacent about the situation that we are discussing tonight. Only this week it has been revealed that in the month of October there was a trade deficit—a trade deficit of£269 million. Already in the Autumn Budget Statement the Chancellor had reduced the budget forecast from a forecast earlier this year of a balance of £1½ billion to a balance of half a billion pounds. We now know that in October imports rose by £508 million or 10 per cent. to a record figure, while exports fell by 1½ per cent.
It may be that the Chancellor will achieve his revised objective—revised from £1½ billion to half a billion—but surely the trend is quite obvious and is bound to endanger the economic future of this country for the rest of this century once North Sea oil begins to decline. That surely is the danger to which we should be addressing ourselves and the issue about which we should be asking ourselves when we question what effect membership of the EEC has upon our trading pattern.
I am one of those who for over 20 years have opposed British membership of the EEC, but I have done so on totally different grounds from those of many of my own colleagues and, indeed, Members on the other side of the House. Some of my colleagues have supported British membership of the EEC as an internationalist gesture. I believe that it is the opposite. I believe that it is basically joining a rich white man's club, excluding many of our traditional trading partners who are neither rich nor white.
However, having joined the EEC and bearing in mind that the decision has been confirmed by the electorate—and we must fully admit that, although we are still entitled to criticise the effects of membership of the EEC—it is our job to ensure that the EEC performs its highest ambitions and does not just bumble along on the lowest common denominator. It seems to me that what has happened since we joined the EEC has borne out the fears of many of us that we were cutting ourselves off into a segment—admittedly a big segment—of world trade, but a segment that is circumscribed by the particular effects of the Industrial Revolution of last century which has given us a wealth which separates us from the vast majority of mankind.
There is a certain degree of complacency or limitation in the report which could be overcome by

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the proposal put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, for a committee of this House to look into the whole trading pattern of Britain including not only the EEC but also the EEC in relation to the rest of the world. As a member of the EEC I believe that we should be taking a lead. There are others in the EEC who would certainly support us—for example, those who have supported the concept of the Lomé Convention and who want to see the Lomé Convention greatly widened and greatly strengthened.
What in fact has happened has happened not just because we joined the EEC but because we joined the EEC and then removed all restrictions on the export of foreign exchange. That was done in 1979. What have been the results? The results are shown not just in the figures of the report but in the figures which I have given the House previously and which I make no apology for repeating. In the last recorded year the United Kingdom sent 18 per cent. of its exports to the non-oil developing countries. In the same year Japan sent 31.1 per cent. of its exports to developing countries and the United States sent 31.8 per cent.
. Why is there this disparity? Why is Britain with its long, historic relations with Commonwealth countries—previously with colonial countries—so far behind those who foresee that the future prosperity of this country and the people of this country, and particularly the future prosperity of the present generation—the younger generation of this country—depends upon our relations with the world that today cannot buy our goods? Since restrictions on the export of capital from this country were removed, although British domestic capital has increased by only 15 per cent. our outward direct investment in Western Europe—in other words, in our competitors in the developed world—has increased by 700 per cent. That is the kernel of the issue.
If we are to take the report seriously we must expand it—as the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, has suggested—into a whole examination of our export policies, the way in which we support our exports, the markets that we seek in other countries and the manner in which we enable, assist, and develop those markets which today lie fallow before us. We shall then be able to use this valuable report as a starting point rather than as a final document.
9.8 p.m.
Lord Kearton: My Lords, it was a privilege to sit on Sub-Committee B under the chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill. We dealt with a complicated subject. We had masses of documentation and masses of statistics, but the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, steered us through this maze with calm efficiency and courtesy which it was really an education to experience. The way in which he brought out the best in all our witnesses was also something which betrayed his long experience in the diplomatic field. It was also a pleasure to be here for the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Kaberry. The noble Lord, Lord Kaberry, was not only eloquent, but he demonstrated by his comments that he had actually read the report. At least, he had certainly read the part of the report which dealt with textiles, and he made some extremely interesting comments on it.
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It has also been fascinating to hear the different contributions, which have covered most of the points of detail in the report which one might have wanted to bring out. The oratorical styles in this House are extremely stimulating to listen to. Anyone who has come from the very calm atmosphere of business finds the cut and thrust of this House quite startling, although I have reason to believe that the cut and thrust in the other House is even more vigorous. However, in this House it is conducted with a charm and good nature which adds to its effectiveness. Therefore, in my few comments I shall try to use a rather broad brush.
Entry into the Common Market, with the elimination of tariff barriers, was a sensible thing to do. As the committee found, entry did not cause any violent shift in trading patterns. Trends which were already well established were moderately reinforced. The mutual trade between the other members of the Common Market and ourselves has expanded and will continue to expand, and any interference with this process could only be harmful to us.
It can be argued that in some areas our Common Market partners have been more vigorous in opening up our markets for their products than we have been in penetrating theirs. It remains true that nationalistic buying is still in evidence in some key activities, such as telecommunications. Each state in the Community reserves some products for domestic manufacture. It is also true that the dismantling of non-tariff barriers to trade has proceeded more slowly than was hoped, and in this country we maintain a reserve towards the European Monetary System which is deep-seated.
Among the members of the Community, no matter what is sometimes published, there has in effect been little abrogation of national sovereignty. Except in the area of the common agricultural policy, the Common Market is closer to a customs union than a truly common market. As the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, pointed out and as the report makes clear, the real upheavals in trade since our accession have been due to rises in energy prices, to our emergence as an important producer of oil and to exchange rate fluctuations. The high exchange rates of 1980 and 1981, coupled with high interest rates, followed nearly a decade when some branches of industry failed to keep up with overseas productivity achievements and product development. As a result, in the early 1980s there was a scrapping of some of our industrial capacity. There were essential productivity gains in the remaining installations, with the effect that we experienced a rapid fall in manufacturing employment and an increase in total unemployment conservatively calculated at 3 million.
The Government rightly take satisfaction in the fall in inflation since 1979, although it is still higher than is the case with some of our competitors; they take pride and satisfaction in the fall in interest rates, although they are still higher than is the case with some of our competitors; and they take pride and satisfaction in a recovery in output at a rate which, for the moment, seems rather better than that of some of our Common Market partners, although total output is only just regaining the levels of 1979. The Government also point out that investment has begun to show

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some improvement, although it is still below the spending of a few years ago.
It was obvious to the sub-committee that trade with our partners in the Common Market was subsumed in the larger question of our general trading competitiveness, and here, as various Members have said tonight, the outlook gives cause for some anxiety. As the noble Lords, Lord Ezra and Lord Hatch, have pointed out, we are currently propped up by the North Sea hydrocarbons. Gross oil exports amount to £12 billion a year and net exports—a direct contribution to balance of payments—to £6 billion a year. We are 70 per cent. self-sufficient in natural gas, saving us about £3.5 billion a year in equivalent imports. Yet, notwithstanding these advantages, we shall this year be running a deficit on visible trade of about £2 billion, which the estimated surplus on invisible trade of about the same amount will just about balance. The handsome surpluses of 1981 and 1982 will have vanished.
The pound sterling is currently bumping along at a rate against the dollar which is around the all-time low. Its rate against a relevant basket of currencies is also faltering. A low value of the pound makes imports dearer and exports more competitive, and in the past three to four years there is no doubt that our remaining industry has become leaner, fitter and more competitive than it was. Yet the experience this year is that imports, in volume, are 6 per cent. up on last year and export volume has hardly changed. As has been widely publicised, we have this year failed to match manufactured imports with manufactured exports. We look to a deficit of £3 billion or more. The graph of Chart 3 on page xx of the sub-committee's report has taken a sharp plunge downwards. The recent survey report of the CBI does not give much hope that the graph will show a reverse trend in 1984.
One of the good effects of the common agricultural policy, aided by the efficiency of our farmers, is that we are now more self-sufficient in food than for ages past, and that food imports now form not much more than 10 per cent. of our total import bill. Even this is about half covered by food and beverage exports. It is manufactures which dominate the visible import bill. They represent about 70 per cent. of the total. The deficit on motor vehicles and motor vehicle components will reach a record this year—over £2 billion. Without the rescue of British Leyland it would have been far worse.
Besides helping to finance our imports, North Sea resources also prop up the tax revenues. The total take from oil and gas this year will not be far short of £10 billion—about 8 per cent. of Government spending. To keep taxation within tolerable bounds—although industry would not agree that, so far as they are concerned, the bounds are tolerable—the Government are also selling off sundry capital assets. Without the windfall of North Sea revenues, the situation would be unsustainable.
But we all know that in the North Sea we are rapidly using up assets which cannot be replaced. It is an extractive industry. Extraction rates are now at, or near, their peak and will only be maintained at such levels for another two or three years. There seems
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bound to be a contraction before the end of this decade, accelerating in the next decade, so that we could be a net importer of energy within 10 years.
How shall we cover such a shortfall? It seems most unlikely that it will be by growth in the surplus on invisibles. The evidence of the sub-committee of the Committee on Invisible Exports was not very encouraging in this regard. The competition in international services is growing, just as the competition in manufactured goods has intensified.
We have a time bomb ticking away in the exhaustion of our North Sea assets. We need to increase our manufacturing strength, along with our manufacturing competitiveness. I strongly support the call made by my noble friend Lord Ezra three weeks ago and again today, and reinforced by my noble friend Lord Hatch, for a wide-ranging inquiry by a select committee on overseas trade in its totality. It could be—I say it could be—that a Government policy of benevolent neutrality in trade matters is not a sufficient policy to carry this country successfully through the transition from an oil exporting to an oil importing country.
If we are to maintain, and indeed increase, living standards and services in this country, it is difficult to see how this will be done without a big increase in efficient manufacturing capacity. The noble Lord, Lord Sieff of Brimpton, recently gave in this House some examples of such developments which his own company had inspired. We must find a way of encouraging other commercial and industrial managements to think and act in the same constructive way.
A select committee could explore all possibilities dispassionately on a non-party basis, and hopefully reach conclusions with positive recommendations which would bite. If we do not start expanding once more the manufacturing facilities of this country, and start immediately, then the time bomb of the North Sea assets will assuredly blow us off course, and blow us off course in a way which will make the recent recession but a minor happening in comparison.
9.18 p.m.
Lord Kilmarnock: My Lords, we are all grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, for introducing this valuable report with his usual lucidity and objectivity. I was a member of his sub-committee but I am afraid that other pressures did not allow me to be as regular an attender as I should liked to be, and it is more as an outsider than as a member of his team that I shall address myself to the report.
First, let me say how much I welcome the contributions of other noble Lords not associated with the sub-committee who have spoken so effectively this evening. The reports of the European Scrutiny Committee, as we all know, are often—and rightly—of a rather technical nature, and this tends to limit the debates on them to those closely concerned in their preparation. On this occasion the importance of the theme has attracted several noble Lords from outside the inner circle of the sub-committee, and this has added weight and breadth to the debate. I think particularly of the speech of my noble friend Lord Ezra, to which I shall refer later.

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I particularly enjoyed Lord Rhodes' reminder that it takes 40 years for real shifts in human behaviour to take place; but do we have 40 years to complete and extend the market? It is a matter of common knowledge—and indeed the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, said as much—that this report was originallay designed to give objective guidance to those striving to make up their minds whether Britain would be better off inside or outside the Community. It was impossible to set up any accurate yardstick of what would have happened had we not joined when we did. That remains forever in the realm of speculation. But the sub-committee looked painstakingly at the subsequent experience sector by sector, and concluded that in most cases membership had reinforced trends that were already established prior to membership. In the words of Dr. Shepherd of the University of Sussex in his submission,
"the gravitation of British trade towards EEC partners clearly predates British membership of the EEC, and was the consequence of GATT trade liberalisation, combined with the "pull" of high economic growth in the EEC".
This may make membership sound rather peripheral, but it does not mean we could have gone our own sweet way with better or even comparable results from outside the Community's garden wall. Though entry may have had fewer so-called dynamic effects than we had hoped for, there can be no doubt that the effect of withdrawal would be, or would have been, extremely adverse. This is quite clearly brought out in the report's summary of conclusions in paragraph 103(iii) where we read that witnesses,
"were almost unanimous in stating that withdrawal from membership would be damaging to the future well being of British industry".
That was also the conclusion of the electorate at the last general election, even though they did not have the benefit of the report. Does this mean that we can put Lord Greenhill of Harrow's book—for book it is—upon the shelf? No, it does not. It is obviously true that the report, in so far as it aimed to clear our minds over continuing membership of the Community, has been overtaken by events. But there is a great deal more to it than that because it is, after all, not only about trade with the Community, but about trade patterns with the world at large subsequent to membership. The noble Lord, Lord Brimelow, stressed that the phrase was "subsequent to" and not "caused by". Both the body of the report and the appendices are packed with extremely interesting data and opinions which deserve further study and leave us with much food for thought.
It emerges from paragraphs 15 and 102 that fluctuations in the exchange rate are seen as making a far greater impact on trade performance than the removal of relatively modern tariffs that came with membership of the Community. I quote:
"witnesses repeatedly stressed the importance of the rise in sterling, and its deleterious effects on their business".
But it is not only the rises but the violent fluctuations that cause havoc here. This is a point to which I shall return.
It also emerges from paragraph 23 that:
"One of the outstanding features of postwar economic development in major industrial countries has been the increasing importance of trade as measured by the ratio of foreign trade (both exports and imports) to domestic output".
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This is presumably a result of the rapid growth of EEC intra-industry trade in the 1970s to which our attention is drawn again by Dr. Shepherd on page 358. It means that the profile of products exported is coming more and more to resemble that of products imported. This appears to be accompanied by the growth of intra-firm trade as a result of the growing importance of multinational corporations in manufacturing investment.
Dr. Shepherd then wrote:
"This evidence of a rapid and profound change in the United Kingdom's rÔle in the international division of labour—particularly associated with increasing trade in the EEC (though the US and Japan are also important)—needs further consideration".
My immediate response is, "You can say that again!" It certainly seems to me to reinforce Lord Ezra's plea for a committee to consider these matters further.
Taking exports alone let us consider the Treasury's economic progress report No. 152 of December 1982, table 1. I have it here. We find that exports as a percentage of GDP have risen for the United Kingdom from 20.2 per cent. during the period 1960–66 to 28.8 per cent. in the period 1974 to 1980. To a layman this would seem to show that while our share of the world export market was halved in the past 20 years, our dependence upon exports has increased. Your Lordships might say that is fine provided that we can keep our current share, but one finds in the same Treasury tables that the ratio of exports to GDP has increased in France, Germany and Italy by roughly comparable percentages. We therefore are not the only people in the world—as we seem sometimes to imply—who depend on a high proportion of exports.
If this level of activity is to be maintained providing opportunities for all it seems axiomatic that world trade will have to expand. If we are locked into a mutual trading arrangement in Europe, valuable though it may be, even if the volume and speed of inter-change of those goods remains at the present level, we shall be extremely lucky to maintain even our present reduced share of world trade, unless there are other markets coming on stream. Lord Greenhill of Harrow's report is also suggestive here. At paragraph 89 we read:
"Our trade with non-industrial countries still consists principally of the exchange of exports of manufactures for food, raw materials and fuels, despite the increasing flow of manufactured exports from the 'new industrial countries"—
that is, the much feared NICs.
—"who are included in this group. By its very nature United Kingdom trade (or that of any other industrial exporter) with the non-industrial world generates a substantial export surplus on manufactures, just as it produces a deficit on food, raw materials and fuels".
This is admittedly the milk of pure classical theory on the international division of labour, but does it really reflect what is happening? The developing countries are obviously very important to us but if they cannot enter the world market neither we nor they will benefit. All your Lordships, I am sure, are familiar with W. W. Rostow's famous book called The Stages of Economic Growth, from which it is perfectly clear that a self-supporting agriculture with a surplus for export is a vital precondition of economic take-off. If third world agriculture does not get off the ground, nothing else will. Yet we persist with agricultural

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protectionism and subsidised over-production, to which my noble friend Lord Sainsbury made reference. This has a very damaging effect on tender economies highly dependent on their agriculture and commodity sectors. We clearly need to subject Community policies in this area to very hard scrutiny.
This is not a third world debate and the noble Lord, Lord Hatch, did not turn it into one; but I think it is worth directing your Lordships' attention to the ODI publication, Economic Prospects for the Third World: the 1983 Forecasts by Sheila Page. This, as its name implies, looks at things from the other side of the fence. The developed countries—we and others—take more than two-thirds of the exports of developing countries. It is our external demand which affects the developing countries most directly. By the same token, their imports depend on the purchasing power of their exports and the availability of grants and loans to finance their deficit. Both of these sources are threatened. Transfers from OECD and the OPEC countries have decreased and the median value of forecasts by OECD, IMF and UNCTAD show a decline in the availability of short-term financing while medium-term financing also looks like falling.
Current forecasts of world trade growth are not encouraging. In the slightly longer term the basket of forecasts shows average industrial country growth flickering around 2 per cent. for 1980–85—which is a decline from 2½ per cent. over the period 1973–80 and from 3½ per cent. over the shorter period of 1975–80, despite the oil crises. For the developing countries to achieve a consistent 2½per cent. growth rate, their exports would need to grow by 4 per cent.
Though the World Bank is more bullish than others, the European Community and UNCTAD both suggest that structural factors have permanently reduced normal growth rates, and the United Nations expects "slow growth in 1985–90 because of structural rigidities". The European Community believe that structural change and low investment could lead the European economy into a prolonged period of low growth and even of depression. GATT foresees the worst overall five-year performance for 35 years. None of these things is conclusive. Economic forecasters have perhaps a less good record than political pollsters, but the mood is important and is not without foundation. It does not point to a tremendous upsurge in world trade.
I am sure I have said enough to show that Lord Greenhill's report certainly should not be put on the shelf. It has raised issues which we really must pursue,
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and I will end my speech by putting four questions to the noble Lord, Lord Lyell. First, paragraphs 15 and 102 of the report both stress the adverse effects of a fluctuating exchange rate. The witnesses were businessmen, not politicians. In view of this and of the debate recently held in our Lordships' House in which a large majority of speakers, and not least the noble Lord, Lord O'Brien of Lothbury, advocated joining the EMS, do not the Government think that the time has finally come to stop shilly-shallying about this? It would be the greatest boon they could possibly confer on exporters, to whose performance they attach such importance. What is the hang-up?
Secondly, what about the export of services? The noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, touched only briefly on this, referring to paragraphs 84 and 85 of the report. I do not know if my noble friend Lord Ezra wants to; I hope he does. Annex A of the report submitted by the Committee on Invisible Exports makes interesting reading. The accepting houses do not seem to have done too badly, but what about the British insurers' heartfelt plea for the implementation of the Non-Life Freedom of Services Directive? The droit d'établissement looks very nice on paper but in some areas it is almost meaningless. What plans have the Government to achieve some progress on that?
Thirdly, in view of the forecast I have quoted in respect of developing countries and our trade with them, what steps do the Government propose to take within UNCTAD and other relevant bodies to ensure that the developing countries get a fair price for their agricultural produce and for their other commodities, thus enabling them to pay their debts and to participate to our mutual advantage in the more sophisticated areas of world trade?
Finally, does the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, not agree that the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, has made a very telling case for a committee to study these matters? I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Kaberry, who said that this debate will never end.
A noble Lord: Hear. hear!
Lord Kilmarnock: That may be so, my Lords, but it needs a structure, which can only be provided by proper evidence and a proper report. Let us then build on the foundation of the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, and extend the inquiry into our wider trade relations with the world as a whole. Will the noble Lord take this message to his noble friend the Leader of the House, where I understand it may not find an unsympathetic reception?
9.32 p.m.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, I, too, would like to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, on his report and indeed on the concise way in which he presented it to the House. I shall certainly deal in a moment with one or two points that he made, but before doing so I should like, with the greatest of pleasure, to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Kaberry, with whom I have—I hardly like to use the word "duelled"—had some discussions, particularly when we both served on the Select Committee for nationalised industries in another place.
I know that the noble Lord, Lord Kaberry, who has had great experience in many fields—not least in the law, where he has been not only a law maker and law practitioner but a law enforcer as well—is also a man of very keen mind, as indeed we saw from his speech today. I would also say to your Lordships that he is a man of great courtesy—and I say this very sincerely—and also of infinite charm. If any of your Lordships have the opportunity to travel abroad with him on a Boeing 747, or any other form of transport, I recommend it because his charm opens doors which would otherwise remain closed and you getthings that you would otherwise be denied. His charm, as I say, is great and renowned, certainly in another place. His speech in fact referred to the people he has always served and he referred, rightly, to their qualities of resilience and to the capacity of the British people to overcome all difficulties. I agree with him so much. They have always done so in the past, and will do so in the future. The noble Lord said that he would pronounce an open verdict on the report. I can assure the noble Lord that there is no open verdict in this House on his maiden speech. I feel sure the verdict of your Lordships' House is that he made a most significant contribution to the debate and that his future contributions will be very welcome indeed.
As I said, the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, made a concise speech and he made the point, quite rightly, that the high initial expectations of what membership of the EEC would bring have not been realised. The fact is that those expectations were raised far too high and they were expectations which could never have been realised. It is a great pity that more people did not realise that at the time when we went in, or indeed at the time of the referendum in 1975, because then those expectations would not have been raised and the bitter disappointment which so many of us feel now would not be suffered.
I have taken part in many debates about the EEC in a number of places, not only in the other place but out in the country as well. Over the years the debates about the EEC, certainly in another place, have reminded me of the story of the emperor's new clothes. The emperor is stark naked, but the populace will simply not agree that he is. The experts, the tailors and the courtiers told the people that the emperor had on his fine golden clothes. Although people saw that he was naked, they simply did not believe it, because they had been told that he was garbed in great and beautiful raiments. Eventually, a small boy blew the gaff and the emperor was ashamed.
During the debate tonight I have not had that impression. Indeed, the debate that we have had tonight has been a good one. People are beginning to
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confront the real problems which face this country within the EEC, and it is only by accepting the realities, by agreeing to the truth of Britain's situation within the Common Market, that we shall be able to take the corrective action which is so necessary.
Of course, as the committee pointed out, there has been a shift of imports and exports to the EEC since we joined. That was inevitable. It was bound to happen because, first, there was the removal of tariffs; and, secondly, we lost preference in EFTA, Eire and the Commonwealth. That made us less competitive there. Indeed, because we stopped buying commodities and goods, particularly food, from those areas they were not then in a position to take exports from this country. There was a virtual prohibition of imports of many basic foodstuffs from our traditional suppliers, such as New Zealand, Australia and Canada, which injured their ability to buy from us. Indeed, New Zealand's ability may be injured further because, as the noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury, said, the 87,000 tonnes of butter which they export to this country is now under threat, particularly from the French and the Irish Republic. If they lose those exports to this country, the economy of New Zealand will be decimated. They will be unable to withstand the shock. Once again, therefore, there will be a further shift of imports, because New Zealand will be unable to buy exports from this country.
The central issue remains the surplus or deficit on manufactures with the EEC and the ratio of exports to imports of manufactures in trade with the EEC compared to trade with the rest of the world. Many noble Lords mentioned that issue earlier tonight. We were told before entry that we should greatly strengthen our trading position and that this would offset the high food prices which would come about by entry into the EEC. In fact, the opposite has happened.
In 1970, the year before our application to join, we had a surplus of £1·9 billion in manufactures, at 1983 prices, with the EEC. In the first nine months of 1983 we were running an annual deficit of £7·8 billion in manufactures with the EEC. That is a total turn-round of £10 billion, equal to getting on for 1 million jobs. That is the situation which was mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, but I fear that his figures, as I thought I heard them, understated the position in relation to the deficit on manufactures. In another place on 16th November, in answer to a Question asking the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry to give the current balance of trade in manufactures for the past 12 months with the rest of the European Community, the Minister of State at the Department of Trade and Industry said:
"Since the second quarter of 1979 there has been a total deficit on trade in manufactures with the other countries of the European Community of £15·1 billion and a surplus with the rest of the world of £28·7 billion.
"In the year ending September 1983 there was a deficit on manufacturing trade with the Community of £6·4 billion".—[official Report, Commons; cols. 839 and 840.]
The deficit was not £2·2 billion but £6·4 billion. That is an absolute disaster.
Lord Ezra: My Lords, if I may enlighten the noble Lord, I was referring to the total manufactured trade of the United Kingdom, not only its manufactured trade

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with the Community. The figures I quoted reflected that position.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: Then I misunderstood the noble Lord, and I hope he will forgive me. His figures were correct for total manufactures, but he has enabled me to emphasise those figures, and I thank him for raising the point. That, therefore, is the real situation which we face. The export-import ratio for manufactures traded with the EEC fell by 40 per cent. to 74 per cent. between 1970 and 1982, while the ratio in the case of other countries fell by only 16 per cent. to 111 per cent.
The latest trade figures are even worse. I have no doubt that your Lordships saw them when they were issued on the 24th of this month. Including oil, the figures looked something like this: in 1981, we exported to the EEC £20,940 million worth of goods and we imported £21,718 million, a deficit of only £778 million. In the year up to October 1983 we exported £21,610 million and imported £24,832 million, a deficit of £3,212 million. And that includes oil. As the noble Lord, Lord Kearton, mentioned, we simply cannot go on like this. North Sea oil will indeed start running out before the end of the decade and, unless we can replace North Sea oil with manufacturing capacity which has been run down over a long period of time, then this country will face a catastrophe.
The situation in relation to trade with the EEC is a dangerous one. It is one that will have to be dealt with and we are entitled to ask the Government, particularly in the light of what the noble Lord, Lord Kearton, said, what exactly they will be doing over the next four years to deal with the situation when North Sea oil does run out and what they will do to rebuild Britain's manufacturing base—because our whole future depends on it, and the employment of our people depends on it.
For example, during the questioning by the committee of witnesses from the CBI, my noble friend Lord Stewart of Fulham asked the CBI about their claim that 2½ million jobs would be at risk if we pulled out of the Common Market. The deputy director of the CBI did not seem to be at all sure of himself, but nevetheless admitted to the view that the Common Market was a net contributor to job creation.
Unfortunately, that question was not pursued, but the committee might have pointed out, first, that only 10 per cent. of manufacturing output goes to the EEC; secondly, that only 5.5 million people are employed in United Kingdom manufacturing; and, thirdly, that we now import £3 worth of manufactures from the EEC to every £2 we export to it. whereas in 1970 we imported from the EEC only £4 of manufactures for every £5 we exported to the Community.
Under those circumstances it is quite impossible, as was claimed by the CBI and indeed by the Government, before the election, that there should be 2½million jobs at stake if we left the Common Market. That is a completely impossible situation. I wish that such ridiculous claims were not made by responsible organisations.
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If one looks at the position in straight terms of trade, if we came out of the Common Market there would be an increase in job opportunities. But we cannot look at it in such absurd terms and I hope that in future when the CBI—which is a highly responsible body—and the Government make estimates of the results of our terms of trading with the EEC, they will deal with the matter much more responsibly.
For example, on the question of cars alone, I used to represent in another place an area where cars were made—and I can well remember that in 1975, at the time of the referendum, the then chairman of BLMC sent out a letter to the car workers stating that if Britain did not remain a member of the EEC, the British car industry would collapse. As it happened, the British car industry just about collapsed because we did remain in it. As a result of EEC membership, we now import 10 cars from the EEC for every one that we sell to it. In 1970, we imported only five cars for every eight we sold. That again shows the extent of the disaster which has hit our manufacturing industry over the past 10 years. The fact that this House has been prepared tonight to begin to face up to the problems which confront us is, I think, entirely good.
Before I finish, I should like to say a few words about agriculture. The noble Lord. Lord Sainsbury, dealt with that aspect extremely well and put the situation as it really is. When he criticised agricultural self-sufficiency he was absolutely correct; it is bad not only for this country but for the rest of the world, particularly the developing world. So long as there is an open-ended subsidy of agriculture, the disaster of food mountains, the disaster of ruination for so many under-developed countries, will be compounded.
The enormous support given by the taxpayer and the consumer to agriculture grows every year; it is open-ended. It was estimated by Mr. Richard Body, who was then the Member of Parliament for Holland-with-Boston, in his book, Agriculture:—the Triumph and the Shame, that we were subsidising agriculture to the tune of£3,350 million a year; that was in his terms, £13,000 for every farmer in this country. Indeed the consumer and the taxpayer together were subsidising the farmer to the extent of 166 per cent. of the farmer's net income.
That is a nonsense situation because not only is it producing food surpluses, not only is it undermining many of the economies of the under-developed world, but it is altering our countryside, it is altering our environment, it is making use of land for growing grain which ought not to be used for growing grain; we are using grade 3 land and we are trying to grow wheat and grain on chalk land. It is a nonsence; it is a waste of money. It is a waste not only of this country's financial resources but a waste of the world's resources in fertilisers which, because they are in short supply, have their price pushed up, thereby making it not only dearer for us to grow grain but dearer for underdeveloped countries to grow grain as well. It is a policy, frankly, which is hurting the consumer. It is making each family in this country pay £5 a week more for food than they need to. As my noble friend pointed out earlier, it is forcing up unit costs and therefore putting pressure on wages; and that in turn affects our ability to export to the EEC or to anywhere else.

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This crazy common agricultural policy really has to be dealt with. I sincerely trust that the Minister, when he winds up tonight, will give the assurance that he will at least make it absolutely clear to the Government that we expect firm action to be taken by Britain at the earliest possible moment, at the summit, to ensure that there are fundamental alterations made to the common agricultural policy.
If we spent £3,500 million on investment in manufacturing industry every year we would provide very many jobs indeed. However, when it is suggested that we should subsidise the steel industry, that we should spend more on developing coal in order that we shall have adequate fuel supplies when North Sea oil runs out, or that, through the National Enterprise Board (which has now been disbanded) we should use money for investment in manufacturing industry, we are told that it is not right to subsidise single industries. Yet here we are subsidising a single industry to the extent of £3,300 million per annum. At the same time, we are limiting our ability to compete as we should be competing in the markets of the world.
I have very much enjoyed this debate. I hope we shall have many more of them because I believe the subject of Britain's membership of the EEC and our role in the wider world is something which should exercise the minds of your Lordships on many occasions. As the noble Lord, Lord Kearton, mentioned, I believe that our very future as an industrial country is now at stake. Indeed, if the future of our country is not to he safeguarded in this House, where is it to be safeguarded?
9.56 p.m.
Lord Lyell: My Lords, after three and a half hours of a fascinating, closely argued and very detailed debate I should like to start by saying how very useful it has been to have this tremendous opportunity of discussing the pattern of United Kingdom trade since joining the EEC. As I am sure all of your Lordships who have sat through the debate will be aware, all the contributions have been of a particularly high quality. Indeed, the tone was set by the notable opening speech of the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow. It is my first opportunity to add my compliments to the tremendous volley of deserved congratulations from all parts of the House to my noble friend Lord Kaberry of Adel on his remarkable maiden speech. As your Lordships have already heard, he has a very distinguished record of service, first as a lawyer in his native county of Yorkshire—a worthy representative of the White Rose—and I understand that at some stage my noble friend served in the Board of Trade. Of course, he has a long and distinguished service to his country, a particularly gallant record during the second world war, and has also served in another place in an earlier incarnation.
The United Kingdom has now been a member of the Community for more than 10 years. It is an appropriate time to look back and to consider what the effects of membership have been. Your Lordships' committee, under the able chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill of Harrow, has produced a most valuable report which will be an important work of reference in years to come. Of course, it contains a most thoughtful analysis of the available information
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and it reaches useful conclusions which help to explain past events and we believe will provide lessons for the future.
I find it most heartening that almost all the witnesses who gave evidence to the committee considered that membership had, on the whole, been beneficial. That is certainly the view of the Government. Of course, it is equally clear to me that the United Kingdom is now so much part of the Community that it would be disastrous for us to pull out. I noted especially that the witnesses were almost unanimous on that score. The noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, added his support to this particular aspect of the report. The noble Lord, Lord Brimelow, rightly pointed out during the course of his particularly relevant and welcome remarks that the fact that we cannot quantify exactly the benefits of having joined does not make any the less real and severe the damage which would result from withdrawing.
I hope that your Lordships will bear with me if in replying to this debate on behalf of the Government I begin by making a few general remarks on the committee's report. As your Lordships will have noticed, the shift towards exporting to the Community was already apparent in the 1960s. That trend has been consolidated since we became part of the Community. The share of our exports going to the Community has risen from 30 per cent. before our accession in 1972 to about 43 per cent. last year. But the report indicates that the number and complexity of factors which have affected the United Kingdom's trade patterns since we joined the Community are such that it is impossible to unscramble the effects of membership in statistical terms.
We have dealt in considerable statistics this evening, and your Lordships will be aware that any consideration of trade in manufactures between the United Kingdom and the rest of the Community must be set against the background of decline in the United Kingdom share of the main manufacturing countries' exports of manufacturers from around 20 per cent. in the early 1960s to around 10 per cent. today. When North Sea oil began to flow it not only affected the composition of our exports to the rest of the Community and elsewhere but also contributed to a rise in the value of sterling—which many sectors of industry saw as the main factor influencing their competitiveness.
We found the committee's analysis of trade in manufactures interesting, thoughtful and most original. Many of your Lordships have pointed out that before the United Kingdom joined the European Community the balance of trade in manufactures with the Community was in surplus each year. Since then it has gone into deficit. For the rest of the world there was a surplus before 1973 and an even greater surplus each year since. It is therefore maintained that this proves that membership of the European Community has been bad for United Kingdom industry. The report of the committee demonstrates that this view is both superficial and incorrect.
The fallacy in this argument lies in the grouping of the rest of the world as a homogeneous economic entity comparable to the European Community. This is not the case. The rest of the world comprises

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advanced industrial countries such as those in the European Free Trade Association, the United States of America, Canada and Japan, but it also consists of non-industrial countries. By its very nature United Kingdom trade with non-industrial countries must generate substantial export surplus on manufactures. just as it produces a deficit in food and raw materials. It is therefore quite wrong to include this trade in a comparison of trade with the European Community.
The committee has made a correct comparison between United Kingdom trade in manufacturers with Europe and with other industrial countries. In this comparison it is quite clear that our trade with the European Community has shown a similar pattern to trade with other industrial countries. It could be argued that this comparison of balances of trade is too seriously affected by inflation to be reliable. But a rough allowance for inflation can be made by using such a device as the ratio percentage of exports to imports. The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart of Swindon, among others, raised that topic. The deterioration in this ratio has been less for trade with Community countries than for trade with other industrialised countries.
Such indications, and the testimony of the vast majority, of witnesses who appeared before the committee, suggest that the cause of the difficulties of manufacturing industry lies elsewhere than in our membership of the European Community. Detractors of Community membership would do well to reflect on the fact that this comparison shows that between 1972 (our year before accession) and 1982 the ratio for United Kingdom trade in manufactures with the European Community declined by 27 per cent. and with other industrial countries outside the European Community it declined by 35 per cent.
I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Bruce—whose usual passionate speech I shall have much more to say about—will accept that tonight is not the time to go into all his figures. However, as is always the case in regard to my noble professional colleague, Lord Bruce, and as a normal courtesy, I shall certainly read all the statistics that he gave. I hope that I can digest them.
As the evidence which was supplied to the committee clearly indicates, the experience of the past 10 years or so has produced an almost unanimous view within industry that membership of the Community is crucial to its interests. As one might expect, the degree of enthusiasm differs between industries and also between firms in the same manufacturing sector. We found that spelled out in the 103 or so paragraphs of the report of the committee.
The opportunities which are presented by what many industrialists rightly regard as a major extension of their home market have been most readily seized by companies with positive attitudes to the Community, vigorous marketing strategies, and of course competitive products and prices. These companies have seen membership not as a panacea which would remove the need for competitiveness and effort, but as an opportunity to show that they could use these qualities to conquer new markets in Europe. Government and industry must now build on what such companies have achieved.
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I should now like briefly to turn to the comments in the report on individual sectors. First, I note, as indeed did my noble friend Lord Rochdale, that the committee praised the "almost uniquely successful record" of the chemical industry. I agree with that comment. I agree also with the views which were expressed by the chemical industry itself on both the beneficial effects on productivity which have resulted from Community membership and the catastrophic results to that industry which would follow withdrawal from the Community.
We should also consider steel and textiles, which are two of our other major basic industries. As your Lordships will be aware, for a number of years these two industries have experienced severe difficulties. How has membership of the Community enabled these sectors better to face the effects of the dramatic decline in steel demand throughout the industrialised world since the late 1970s and the relentless import competition from low-cost textile producers?
In the case of steel—which was once again mentioned by my noble friend Lord Rochdale—there was the three-month strike by the British Steel Corporation in 1980. This had a lasting effect on steel users, who naturally switched to foreign sources for steel. Secondly, and more generally, falling demand for steel has resulted in depressed prices and, regrettably, soaring losses by steel companies. That has not been unique to the United Kingdom, and it has led various countries to subsidise steel production in an attempt to retain their market share.
This trend has coincided with the emergence of a number of efficient and low-cost third country producers. The Community's response has been to take concerted action through the Davignon anti-crisis measures, which are designed to restore the steel industry's competitiveness and viability and to re-establish market stability. As I am sure various experts among your Lordships will be aware, this policy has three strands: first, production quotas; secondly, capacity cuts, the vast bulk of which will in the future fall upon other member states; and, thirdly, voluntary restraint arrangements with third countries. Such concerted measures, from which, I would stress the United Kingdom industry is deriving much benefit, would not have been possible without the Community.
I wish briefly to turn to textiles. We have seen very fierce competition from low-cost textile producers, and this has forced United Kingdom and other Community manufacturers of basic yarns and fabrics to concentrate more and more on producing higher value-added specialities. This rationalisation of product ranges and the concentration of production facilities led to an intensification of intra-Community competition. Of course, until around 1979 the United Kingdom industry sustained a creditable performance, but it subsequently lost its competitive edge in many subsectors. The industrysees the high exchange rates and, indeed, high inflation as the main contributory factors. But of course it is now—
Lord Hatch of Lusby: My Lords, will the noble Lord give way?
Lord Lyell: My Lords, I have to try to reply to the supporters of the noble Lord. If he can retain his patience, I will come to him at the end. I ask the noble Lord to retain patience. In common with most other industries, our textile firms will only prosper if they concentrate on producing products of the quality and the price which customers require.
The report also identified the mechanical engineering sector as one which has not yet succeeded in benefiting from the opportunities of the enlarged home market which is brought about by Community membership. Although of course this sector has made strenuous efforts to overcome competitive weakness by cutting costs, reducing over-manning and improving design, efficiency and above all productivity, I think that many people in the industry would agree that much remains to be done. Of course future growth prospects increasingly lie in the application and exploitation of new technologies and the introduction of modern plants and equipment. Government support schemes will play their part in promoting this process of change.
Various noble Lords who have spoken this evening brought the motor industry into the arena. This industry may at first sight seem only to have reaped limited benefit from Britain's membership of the Community. Although exports to Europe have grown, so too have imports. Helped initially by the dismantling of tariff barriers, imports from the rest of the Community far outstrip our exports. But there is little reason to suppose that imports from the Community would be much lower if Britain were outside the Community. The retention of tariff barriers would have been a greater impediment to British exporters over the past 10 years than to the more efficient continental companies wishing to sell in the United Kingdom.
As is borne out in the conclusions to the report, Community membership has helped to facilitate the rationalisation of the industry on a more European basis, providing vehicle assemblers with greater potential for economies of scale. At this point, I would briefly turn to the component makers in the motor industries. If they are competitive they are able to benefit from increased export opportunities. The Community market is becoming increasingly important for the British motor industry. This has been the only area of real growth.
However, here as elsewhere we come to the word which has featured in at least five of the speeches which have been made in the debate this evening. I am referring to competitiveness. That is the key word. Industry's ability to compete with European manufacturers would have been critical whether or not Britain was a member of the Community. The Government warmly welcome the great strides which have been made by British manufacturers in improving their international competitiveness. Only in continuing these improvements will our industry be in a position to take full advantage of the benefits and the opportunities provided by continued membership of the European Community.
I would stress to the House that the battle for competitiveness is being won. I would remind your Lordships that United Kingdom cost competitiveness has improved by over 20 per cent. since early 1981.
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This of course reflects lower wage settlements than abroad, higher productivity growth and the depreciation of sterling from its admittedly high level in 1979–80. But there have also been signs of improvements in non-price factors, such as design and reliability, which are a particularly important aspect of the competitiveness of exports.
I should like to touch on investment by overseas companies. Your Lordships will be aware—and it is certainly in the report—that investment of overseas companies in the establishment of United Kingdom-based operations is particularly welcomed by the Government—especially investment in manufacturing industry in this country. According to the last census of production in 1979, only 2½per cent. of manufacturing establishments in the United Kingdom were foreign-owned, but those establishments accounted for 14 per cent. of employment in manufacturing and no less than 22 per cent. of net capital expenditure. In the years 1980 to 1983 we expect some 45,000 jobs to have been created as a result of inward investment.
Of course, the point we should stress is that the great majority of new inward investment in manufacturing is made by non-European companies wishing to establish a manufacturing base inside the large European tariff-free market. In so doing, they produce goods that would otherwise be imported, and they export goods to other Community states. This is a very valuable twofold benefit to our balance of payments in manufactures. The evidence submitted to the committee by industry, the views of potential inward investors expressed to Government officials and of course independent opinion research all agree that our membership of the Community is a key factor in any decision by a non-European company to locate facilities in the United Kingdom.
I think that the question of the common agricultural policy was raised by virtually every speaker in considerable degrees of strength. Of course, we should have to look at the agriculture and food manufacturing industries aided and abetted by the very germane and valuable comments—for which we are grateful—of the noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury. When we do this we are faced—as, of course, the committee recognised—with the problem of assessing the effects of membership without knowing what national policy would have been had the United Kingdom not been in the Community. Of course, it is impossible to say what food prices or, indeed, the costs to the Exchequer would otherwise have been, and, while one can point to trends such as the growth in the United Kingdom's self-sufficiency in food, one cannot simply judge how far this is a result of membership.
However, I would stress two things to your Lordships in this especially interesting area. First, it is a key feature of the common agricultural policy that imports from other member states are cheaper than those from third countries. This has been a crucial factor in the development of trade patterns, leading the United Kingdom to take a higher proportion of its food imports from other countries in the Community.
The other point, which I would stress, is that it is recognised throughout the Community that the common agricultural policy needs an overhaul. A fundamental review is now taking place, with major

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decisions due to be taken at the Athens Summit in a few days' time. I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Molloy, referred to next year's summit. As he is aware, the Greeks still have the presidency and a summit is taking place in Athens very early next month. I would stress to the noble Lord and to your Lordships that the Government continue to press hard for action on prices and, above all, on surplus production. I hope that the noble Lords, Lord Molloy and Lord Bruce, and above all the noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury, will accept our strong insistence on this.
The question of the internal market was referred to. As your Lordships are aware, this was debated about a year ago and my noble friend Lord Cockfield made a powerful and impassioned reply. In its conclusions, this report calls for Government action on non-tariff barriers within the Community. As my noble friend Lord Cockfield made clear in the debate on your Lordships' very valuable report on internal barriers to trade a year ago, the Government are committed to making a reality of the internal market for goods and services. The Council of Ministers has, for the first time, this year devoted time to purely internal market matters. I believe that this confirms the importance that the Community as a whole gives to freeing trade from those obstacles that remain.
However, I would hope that your Lordships would agree that we must keep the problem in perspective. Forty-three per cent. of our total two-way trade is with our European partners. This suggests that a great deal of trade is already free and open, but, as we have heard from your Lordships—and indeed, we have to admit it—the situation is not yet perfect. We think that a good start has been made on removing obstacles to trade in goods, but progress on freeing the market in services has been lamentably slow. The Government will continue to push for action on both fronts. The noble Lord. Lord Rhodes, might accept that as an answer to his question.
The committee drew attention at the end of its report to the difficulties which were created for British industry by the high rates of inflation which were experienced in this country during the last 10 years, as was so well explained, as always, by the noble Lord, Lord Ezra. The damage which inflation inflicted on British industry and on society in general was substantial, but I am sure your Lordships would join with me in celebrating the fact that the fight against inflation is being won.
Rates of inflation which were up to 20 per cent. and higher are now a thing of the past. There is still more to be done, but I would remind your Lordships, in view of the various friendly noises that are coming from across the Chamber, that even at a rate of 5 per cent. inflation prices double every 14 years or so. From industry's point of view the important thing is that our rate of inflation is no longer widely out of line with that of our main competitors.
May I attempt to cover some of the points raised by your Lordships in the course of this debate. The noble Lord, Lord Molloy, in the course of a wide-ranging speech suggested that the Community might take a leaf out of EFTA's book by making agreements with Yugoslavia and possibly other countries. The noble
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Lord will be interested to learn that the Community indeed has a trade agreement with Yugoslavia, as with most other countries of the Mediterranean basin. The noble Lord, Lord Molloy, also mentioned the Commonwealth. The Community's Lomé convention with the African, Caribbean, and Pacific states provides a better and freer trade régime between the United Kingdom and Commonwealth countries than existed before we joined the Community.
The noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock, asked me four questions. I hope I can try to get some way towards them tonight. He raised first the question of insurance services. I am sure that he will agree with us that the industry expects a marked increase in the export of United Kingdom insurance services as and when the services directive is implemented. Any of your Lordships who have enjoyed listening, as indeed I have, to the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, over the years will be aware that this too is one of his especially dear projects. I would hope that this will be relevant to his questions as well.
Although this is bound to be compensated by the import of services from other European Community insurers, we confidently expect that the balance will be in favour of the United Kingdom. The net benefit to the United Kingdom balance of payments is expected to be around £70 million in the first year after implementation of the directive. The noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock, also asked me about the Select Committee. I certainly could not go any further than any of the remarks I made in the course of the last debate that we had when I was attempting to answer the question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Ezra. This is a matter for my noble friend the Leader of the House. The noble Lord also raised the question of agriculture in developing countries. I shall certainly pass on to my right honourable friend the Minister of Agriculture the germane comments raised by the noble Lord, Lord Kilmarnock.
The noble Lord, Lord Hatch, raised among other things the question of the white man's club. He likened the Community to a white man's club. He mentioned the Lomé Convention. As he and your Lordships will be aware, this provides non-reciprocally duty-free access to the industrial goods of the ACP states. It also provides many other provisions of great benefit to those states: such systems as Stabex, development aid and suchlike. This goes to show that the Community does not shut itself off from the rest of the world.
The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart of Swindon, and others of your Lordships raised the question of access of Commonwealth products, such as New Zealand butter, to the Community. I am sure that the noble Lord will be pleased to know that New Zealand butter imports to the EEC are regulated under quota and the United Kingdom is campaigning particularly strongly to retain New Zealand access to the European Community market.
The noble Lord, Lord Brimelow, raised the point of the motor industry. I was fascinated to read Question 321—the noble Lord mentioned that question—where I found some particularly germane comments. I will not weary your Lordships with them tonight. Perhaps we can all take our copies home and read them with a glass of milk later tonight. The noble Lord, Lord Brimelow, raised the question of non-tariff barriers

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and the motor industry. Surely the long-term survival of the United Kingdom motor industry depends on its being, above all, competitive and not protected by non-tariff barriers. I drew attention to this in my earlier remarks on the motor industry. I hope the noble Lord will accept that we can also argue that the retention of such non-tariff barriers would be a greater impediment to United Kingdom exports than to the efficient European countries selling their motor cars in Britain.
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, I hope that the noble Lord will not think me very impolite if I point out that he has been speaking for half an hour. There is a very important debate to follow and I wonder if he would bear that in mind.
Lord Lyell: My Lords, perhaps if the noble Earl would bear in mind that I spoke to his noble colleague. The debate continued for 3½ hours before I rose to reply. I am trying to restrict my remarks, but I hope the noble Earl might just accord me the thought that his noble friends Lord Bruce of Donington and Lord Stoddart of Swindon, though they made germane points, spoke for a total of 53 minutes. I am trying, with the courtesy of your Lordships, to reply. I can see perfectly well; though my sight is getting worse, I can see. If I could get on, I hope the noble Lord will think this is important. I have sat for 3½ hours and I hope the noble Earl will bear that in mind.
The noble Lord, Lord Bruce, in a particularly passionate speech, as always, raised many points. I hope I have covered some of them. I promised to read his comments very carefully and if there is anything I have missed I shall take care to write to him.
The noble Lord, Lord Ezra mentioned the question of competitiveness. I hope I covered that.
I know that it would be convenient and it is the wish of your Lordships for me to conclude my remarks. The importance of the United Kingdom's membership of the European Community cannot be over-emphasised. Besides being the world's largest trading unit the Community is able to play a much greater role in world affairs than any one member state could on it's own. I said at the start of my remarks that in 1973 when we joined the Community, some 30 per cent. of our exports went to European Community markets. Today the figure is close on 43 per cent. and six out of seven of the United Kingdom's top export markets are members of the European Community. While the winds of protectionism continue to blow around the world the United Kingdom's unrestricted open access to this vast market is invaluable.
We have therefore a crucial interest in the development of the European Community as a whole and to improve our position within it by taking full advantage of the trading benefits which continued membership of the Community offers. The Community must continue to move forward by becoming larger, by adopting new policies to promote Europe's development and by removing the remaining barriers which hinder truly free trade between member states. The Community must sort out the internal problems on the budget and on the common agricultural policy which are distracting it from making progress on these other fronts. We look to the
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European Council in Athens to take the decisions necessary to implement the declaration which was made earlier this year at Stuttgart which spoke of "broad action to ensure the relaunch of the European Community".
Lord Hatch of Lusby: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, was he aware when he referred to competition in textiles that seven times as many textiles are imported into this country from the developed countries as from the developing countries?
Lord Lyell: I was not, my Lords. I shall note the noble Lord's comments with interest and gratitude.
10.30 p.m.
Lord Greenhill of Harrow: My Lords, it is tempting to take advantage of the last word, but I will resist it. On behalf of the committee, I would like to thank the noble Lords who have complimented us on our report. The report, I hope, will continue to be useful but tonight it prompted a debate of the kind which we had very much hoped for. I should like particularly to thank the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, and the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, for the excellent start which they gave to the debate. I did not envy the Minister the task of replying to such a long debate, but he did so with his customary zest and fluency—which sometimes strengthens his arguments and sometimes conceals their weakness.
I leave the debate this evening with two impressions. The first is that some of the wasteful bitterness has gone out of the debate on the membership of the Common Market, and, more importantly, there is a general recognition of the very grave problems which face us which were so succinctly set out by the noble Lord. Lord Kearton. I only hope that this recognition will enable us to work together to try to solve them.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Mental Health: Richmond Fellowship Inquiry
10.32 p.m.
Lord Beswick Lord Beswick rose to ask Her Majesty's Government to what extent they agree with the report of the Richmond Fellowship Inquiry on Mental Health and the Community and particularly with the plea for essential funds to ensure progress towards the mental health service proposed in the report.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, my Unstarred Question relates to the Report of the Richmond Fellowship Inquiry on Mental Health and the Community, copies of which report are available in the Printed Paper Office. The report asserts that today the mental health services in our country are in a situation of crisis. After a wide-ranging inquiry, and, excepting myself, involving persons of considerable experience and accepted authority in their respective fields, the report sets out the facts and makes reasonably detailed recommendations as to how the essential community care should be structured, supervised and

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financed. It also recommends that there should be a Minister with clear, and known, responsibility for this work.
The noble Lord and his department have been good enough to consider this report, and what I am now asking is the extent to which they agree with it, and what they have done, or propose to do, to further its objectives. Alternatively, if they find themselves in disagreement with parts of the report, I wonder if the noble Lord will say which parts and why the disagreement.
The noble Lord has said, in answer to a parliamentary Question, that he is the Minister with this clear responsibility and I should like to thank him warmly for making it possible to come to the House at this late hour and answer personally the questions which we put. It would be good to think that this discussion will help make his responsibilities even more widely known, and it will we hope serve to increase public support for his efforts and even increase his influence for good.
The idea that a known personal commitment of one Minister to the development of a special field in social activity is surely borne out by the example of Mr. Alf Morris, a Member of the other place, who, when designated as Minister with special responsibility for the physically handicapped, made an impact upon the country. We should like to think that example would be repeated.
It was my noble friend Lord Longford who, in the course of his quite exceptional—and I am tempted to say, saintly—concern for the less fortunate among us, raised in this House on 31st March 1981 the issue of the alternative care of men and women who had been or could beneficially be transferred from the larger mental hospitals. It was the Minister's reply on that occasion which seemed to me to expose the serious nature and extent of the present problem. The Minister then said that from 1954 to 1979 the number of hospital places had been reduced from 145,000 to 76,000, but he was quite unable to show that the necessary alternative services had been provided.
I think it is commonly agreed that an enlightened forward policy will entail the closure of many large hospitals, though I should like to add that no-one should appear to deprecate the devoted service in some hospitals like the Maudsley and the Royal Bethlem. Nor should we under-value the available professional skills or the new drugs and treatments which have been developed. But there could and should be a more rewarding deployment of those skills in the new stage of development of our care of the mentally ill. That is what the report calls for.
I think it is instructive—certainly to me—to see how the attitude towards the mentally ill has developed and changed in the past two centuries. I wonder whether the Minister will agree with me that the paragraphs in the report which give a concentrated account of past attitudes towards, and treatment of, the mentally ill are—for the non-professionals at any rate—absolutely fascinating and most moving. Those paragraphs, incidentally, were written by Professor Wing, to whose unsurpassed depth of experience I know others would wish me to pay the highest possible tribute.
That account tells how, at the beginning of the 19th century we would have been talking of pauper lunatics, not of the mentally ill; there would have been parish overseers, the local bride wells and the private madhouses. The fate for some in those days was being chained in a coal cellar or some other out-of-sight places. Then came the Lunacy Acts of 1890 and 1891, and the custodial era. After the First World War there was the Mental Treatment Act of 1930 to supplant the Lunacy Acts. After the Second World War we had that great period of social reform in which I can recall some of us singing "Bread of Heaven" as we marched through the Division Lobbies to vote for an improved pensions system, family allowances, supplementary benefits and a truly national health service.
We are now faced with a new challenge. Those old large mental hospitals, which in their day were a great advance, are to give way to more enlightened community care. But the reason why the report uses the term "crisis" is because hospital closures are taking place before alternative care is provided. Where there should be a progressive step forward, there is, in effect, a shrugging off of responsibility.
The figures given by the Minister in that 1981 discussion showed that there were 69,000 fewer beds than in 1954—fewer beds, I emphasise, not fewer people needing care. The report states that the 69,000 figure is now nearing 80,000, and the closure programme continues. The question to which this inquiry tried to find answers is: what happened to those human beings hitherto provided for in the hospitals? Some are fortunate to have a home environment in which they can, at any rate, secure shelter. Sadly, in too many of those cases, the resultant tensions lead to a break-up of the home. A number of others find assistance and, in some cases, supervised accommodation in those voluntary bodies whose contribution and potential for the future is dealt with in the report.
The efforts of some of those voluntary bodies are frustrated by inadequate financial support. The Richmond Fellowship, for example, could make more accommodation available, but it does need the funding. Of those referred to it by the hospitals, at least three-quarters are without financial support. Some evidence suggests that local authority social service support is available for those who would—if I may put it in this way—be a public nuisance, but not for those who, given proper professional care, could recover to be useful members of the communty.
Then there is evidence, some of it reinforced by a recent article in the Sunday Times, that many other former patients of those large hospitals end up in squalid lodging houses or sleeping even more rough. The ultimate fate of some of these discharged patients is suicide. For others, it is re-entry into hospital. What there should be in a truly civilised society is a properly organised and suitably qualified supervision, guidance and, in cases, accommodation.
The Guardian of 25th October reports a speech by the noble Lord in which he announced the further closure of some 20 or 30 large psychiatric hospitals. If I may say so, he made a good case for those closures. But what of the alternative positive provisions? According to that same report, the Minister promised £25,000 extra to MIND. I am sure that the money will

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be well spent by that fine voluntary organisation, but in the context of that closure announcement it seemed a pitiful gesture.
I now ask the Minister specifically: when the department assembled for him the facts about that additional closure programme, did he require to be worked out the number of patients who would be affected, and did he satisfy himself that there would be effective agencies through which alternative care would be provided for an equivalent number of patients?
This report outlines a suggested structure for the alternative services required. It proposes a district joint mental health development committee. This committee would bring together the resources of the regional and district health authorities, the voluntary organisations and the social services departments of the local authorities. I now ask the Minister: does he agree with this concept? Does he further agree that, to make a reality of such a committee, adequate—and that means increased—funding must be made available? This report calls for a development fund, because savings from closures will arise in the future, but the costs for the alternatives come now. So we do need this development fund.
I understand that the Government are now considering a new management structure for the health service. Could not the district joint committees recommended by the report be fitted into that new structure? Would it not be possible, with a sound management system, to ensure through the joint committee that monies intended for mental health care are in fact used for that purpose? Can the Minister assure us that these joint committees in each district will have an effective place in this new projected system?
The Minister will also agree, I am sure, that the necessary extent and standard of care should be maintained in each and every district, and we should like to have the Government's view of the report's recommendation that this essential standard of service should be monitored by inspectors appointed by the Government. The precedent for this is, of course, that of Her Majesty's Inspectors in the education service. On this point, we were advised especially by a quite superb authority. I vividly recall with not a little sadness Lord Redcliffe-Maud, not many days before his death, reaffirming his support for this recommendation.
There are others to speak more qualified than am I, but I must acknowledge the generous assistance of the Richmond Fellowship which made this inquiry and report possible, and also the special contribution of the director of the fellowship, Elly Jansen.
Finally, I emphasise the extent of the human problem with which we are dealing. One woman in five and one man in nine will require psychiatric treatment at some time in their lives. The pain and the sadness caused to those who are near and dear to them is probably deeper, and in a most hurtful and special way deeper, than with physical illness. We never see in the public press pictures of the mentally ill gallantly overcoming their affliction, as we do so often, so beautifully and so encouragingly, with the physically handicapped. There is a reluctance on the part of the
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public to face up to the problems of the mentally ill. The figures I have been shown indicate that voluntary financial assistance is less easily attracted for this cause of the mentally disturbed.
For all these reasons, we feel that a new effort, an extra effort, must be made to make a reality of this concept of community care for the mentally ill. I hope that the Minister tonight will be able to convince us that he is prepared to make that effort.
10.47 p.m.
Lord Vivian: My Lords, I am sure that all noble Lords are most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, for putting his Unstarred Question as to what extent Her Majesty's Government agree with the report of the Richmond Fellowship Inquiry on Mental Health and the Community and particularly with the plea for essential funds to ensure progress towards the mental health service proposed in the report. The noble Lord has dealt with the wide-ranging report very fully, so perhaps your Lordships will allow me to state some of the reasons why I am particularly interested.
We learn from the report that since 1954 hospital places for the mentally ill have been reduced from 143,000 to 76,000 in 1979. Patients are in hospital for a shorter period of time and many of them are discharged still needing treatment which, it is agreed, is best managed outside hospital. Half of those in hospital with mental illness for more than one year are over 65 years of age. Many of these patients could leave hospital and live in hostels and attend day centres, thus becoming integrated again into the community, if local authorities and voluntary agencies had adequate funds to staff and develop such hostels and day centres. In the absence of these funds, local authorities are unable to accept this responsibility, so these people remain in hospital.
The report of the Richmond Fellowship inquiry points out on page 31 that when, as occasionally happens, services are available and working well, the social difficulties presented by severe mental illness are ameliorated and the individuals and their relatives are able to cope.
On page 31 of the report we are told, and here I start to quote:
"Many people do recover from severe mental illness and are pleased with the care they have received. However, it is clear to members of the Enquiry that services generally fall woefully short of achieving the quality of life for the mentally ill and their families that was envisaged when the run-down of the large hospitals began with such a fanfare. During the transition from care in large institutions to care distributed between many small local units, staffed by professionals with little training in common who need not be in close touch with each other, the problem of overall coordination has not received sufficient priority. Even within one administrative hierarchy such as a District Health Authority or a Social Services Department each small centre tends to develop its own traditions, select its own clients, guard its own autonomy and deny responsibility for what happens elsewhere".
The report considers that for the mentally ill—excluding the elderly mentally infirm or mentally retarded—we need to provide as an absolute minimum to achieve a decent standard of care the following services per 100,000 of the population: district general hospital beds, 50; day hospital places, 25; hostel-wards for long-term illnesses, 17; short-term and rehabilitation hostels, 4 to 6; and long-stay

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accommodation in staffed and unstaffed homes, and in supervised lodging, 15 to 24; while for day centre places the number is 60.
Many districts do not attain even those minimal standards and progress towards those figures has been very slow. It is demonstrated by the fact that for every 100,000 population, only 12 people are supported by the local authorities; and the amount of suitable places in residential accommodation and for day care has scarcely risen since 1975 and has now reached 11 and 17 respectively, as opposed to a recommended 19 and 60. Even minimal levels will not be reached by the end of the century.
In addition to those basic needs, we should be providing work day centres for skills which fall between occupational therapy and sheltered workshops; some high-level sheltered factories; and rehabilitation units where people can be prepared for independent living in group homes and bedsitters. There will also be a need for hostels which provide refuge rather than treatment. Obviously, the present system of financing care for the mentally ill has failed and there is a need for proper service provision with good organisation and adequate staff training.
In view of the few facts I have mentioned, I would follow the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, and ask my noble friend Lord Glenarthur to what extent Her Majesty's Government agree with the Report of the Richmond Fellowship Inquiry on Mental Health and the Community and, in particular, with the plea for essential funds to ensure progress towards the mental health service proposed in the report.
Finally, before resuming my seat, I should like to offer my sincerest thanks to the many doctors (there is one in particular) and the physiotherapists (again, there is one in particular) who have helped me. I would also wish to thank the matrons and sisters and the nursing staff of several hospitals I have attended. It is the result of their collective work that has enabled me to speak very briefly to your Lordships tonight in this Chamber, the greatest club in the world.
10.56 p.m.
Lord Winstanley: My Lords, I must begin by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, on two separate counts: first, I obviously must thank him for drawing the attention of the Minister (and thereby the Government) to this report, which is on a desperately important subject which requires some urgent action. The noble Lord, by his Unstarred Question, has at least enabled the Minister to let us know the Government's thinking on this subject at this time. I must certainly thank the noble Lord for that. Secondly, I should like personally to thank him for having played a very important and crucial role in the business of the Richmond Fellowship inquiry, and in the preparation of its report.
I, too, had the honour to be a member of this inquiry. It is true that while I perhaps made some contribution and was able to put a fair amount of time and work into it in the early stages, I am afraid that my staying power was not as great as I might have wished, and other work made it necessary for me, not to withdraw from the inquiry but to take a less positive role in it after it had started. But, very fortunately, by
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that time we had recruited the support and assistance of the noble Lord, Lord Beswick. Without the assistance that he gave us in the terminal stages, this report would not have appeared in the very clear form in which it does, and I do not think would have had the degree of influence which it now has.
In a sense, I have already declared an oblique interest in this subject as a member of the inquiry, and as such I think I ought to exercise a certain discretion and self-discipline with regard to my contribution to this debate. I know other members of the inquiry are to speak: the noble Earl, Lord Longford, who did so much to set up this inquiry and put an enormous amount of work into it as chairman, and the noble Lord, Lord Richardson, who brought immense professional expertise and experience to bear on this subject and gave us invaluable advice. In general what we really want to do, even at this very late hour, is to allow sufficient time to enable the noble Lord the Minister to give us a full reply to the points raised and the recommendations put forward in the report. Therefore, I will try to limit my remarks merely to three separate points.
First, and briefly, I think it would be right at this point to indicate that the recommendations contained in this report do have the broad support of all my noble friends on these Benches; I think it right that the Minister should know that. To move to my second point, I should like to underline as firmly as I can one particular recommendation which is contained in the report and which has been referred to already by Lord Beswick: the specific recommendation for the designation of a named Minister to have responsibility for mental health and all matters immediately connected therewith. That recommendation is found on page 92, Recommendation 1:
"The obligation placed on local health and social services under the Mental Health Act (1959) and the Health and Public Services Act (1968) should be reaffirmed by statute and the duty to see that it is implemented vested in a named Minister."
It is utterly clear, and that is the recommendation I should like to underline.
Recommendation 2 is very much connected:
"A development fund should be set up under the control of a designated Minister working with a Departmental Planning Board."
On that particular second elaboration of the functions of the named Minister, perhaps it is interesting to note that in this connection the Richmond Fellowship's inquiry is not the only fount of wisdom on this particular subject. The noble Lord will have noticed that the Scottish Association for Mental Health prepared a report on this very same subject back in August. It is interesting to note that in its report it clearly calls for the establishment of a development fund to pump prime initiatives. Indeed, many of its proposals are very much in line with the proposals in our own recommendations.
However, I leave those for the moment and come back to the specific recommendation for a designated named Minister responsible for mental health matters. As a doctor I am very well aware and conscious of the trend to end the separation of mental illness from illness in general. That trend has been going on for some years. The trend is gradually to close the old mental institutions and have the mentally ill treated in the normal way with other people in general hospitals.

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There has been a trend towards increasing acceptance in the community and by the community that mental illness is an illness and not a separate subject.
I have no wish to halt that trend but I believe that the existence of a named Minister with specific responsibility for mental health matters would be immensely heartening to all those who work in this field. That was most certainly the experience when a Minister was appointed with special responsibility for the disabled. That was not segregating the disabled in some special way. But if we are to make progress in this very important field of improving community care we are bound to be very dependent on the various voluntary bodies which work in this field. I refer to bodies such as MIND. the Richmond Fellowship, the Elizabeth Fitzroy Trust, and many others. I believe that the appointment of a Minister with specific responsibility would be immensely heartening to all those voluntary bodies. They would know that one Minister had responsibility and that there was one person to whom they could go with their appeals and anxieties.
I know that the noble Lord the Minister will recollect that in an earlier debate on another subject I referred to the need some day to break down this huge conglomerate, the Department of Health and Social Security, and perhaps hive off what are largely Treasury functions, such as dealing with pensions, and give us back a Minister of Health with Cabinet rank responsible for the National Health Service and for health, but for almost nothing else. I do not wish to re-open that subject now but this recommendation of a Minister being designated for a specific purpose is different and very much narrower. It would be encouraging to patients, to their relatives and to all the other people who feel that this part of the National Health Service has been a Cinderella, that it has been neglected and swept away. It would be an encouragement to them and to the voluntary sector upon which, I am sure, we shall be desperately dependent in the future. I should like to hear the Minister's reaction to that suggestion related, too, to the development fund, and I shall briefly return to the development fund in a moment.
My third and final point is that the whole purpose of the noble Lord's Question is to draw the Government's attention to this report and enable the Minister to give us his department's preliminary reactions, at least, to the important recommendations contained in it. I think it is right to say, as I have said before, that the Richmond Fellowship, and this inquiry, is not the only fount of wisdom on this subject. I have already referred to the Scottish Association for Mental Health, which has taken important initiatives.
My attention has also been drawn to a very interesting report which has been prepared by Mrs. Harrison-Gledhill, who is a professional counsellor and psychiatric therapist. She has prepared a report on the closure of the Camberwell Resettlement Unit. Some noble Lords will know the Camberwell Resettlement Unit. It was previously called the Camberwell Reception Centre but for some 25 years it has colloquially been known to those living in it and those dependent upon it as "The Spike". It is very much a home for the socially regressed and the incompetent and deals with single homeless people.
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Almost by definition, single homeless people are very often mentally ill. That is often why they are homeless. Because they are single, they need accommodation. Many of these people found that accommodation in the Camberwell Resettlement Unit which is now being closed. Because it is being closed, the department, the department's officials and others have the responsibility of resettling these people. I know that the report by Mrs. Harrison-Gledhill has been discussed within the department. I gave the noble Lord the Minister notice of the fact that I should ask him whether it had been drawn to his attention.
I notice that the report refers particularly to the resettlement of these single homeless people and to the efforts which officials are making. It says:
"Only a small percentage of those considered suitable for resettlement have been and have stayed resettled for more than six months. The staff spend their lives doing what daily experience teaches them is virtually impossible".
I am not in any way trying to depart from the main report we are discussing, but it is interesting that a specific report on a specific problem which arises at the same time perhaps gives further evidence in addition to our report, which is couched in much more general terms.
Later in the report of Mrs. Harrison-Gledhill she says that the staff in, I think, department SB3 within the Department of Health and Social Security,
"are confident that through their arrangements with private organisations they will find suitable accommodation by the time the unit finally closes".
That means that there is already an understanding that there have to be some arrangements with private organisations and so on.
The essential point that the Richmond Fellowship inquiry underlines is that there has been a gradual reduction in the number of mentally ill people in hospital and a closure of hospital beds, but there has been no corresponding increase in the back-up services in the community to care for the increasing number who are having to be cared for at home. In simple economic terms, now that new methods of psychiatric treatment are so complex and sometimes so consumptive of resources of one kind or another, it is desperately wasteful to spend scarce resources on, for example, rendering a schizophrenic patient stable to the extent that he can return to the community and then finding that there is no back-up support in the community. Virtually all the money spent in the hospital will have been wasted. It is that kind of waste that the inquiry wishes to avoid, as no doubt do the Government.
The suggestion for a development fund—which has also been developed by the Scottish Association for Mental Health—relates to the possibility of a better integration of official or statutory provisions with the provisions of the voluntary sector. This Government have a record which is very good in certain areas. I have been involved in certain new initiatives which the Government have taken regarding the restoration of areas of decaying cities. Projects which were to be undertaken by a Government department in partnership with local authorities have now been privatised to the extent that they have been set up under trusts to enable the public sector (Government and local government) to unlock private funds from local

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industry, local voluntary bodies and others who can assist in various ways. I am the chairman of one such trust—the Operation Groundwork Trust.
In this field we have to find more resources. One way in which new resources could be found at the moment would be by the kind of pump-priming exercise to which our report refers, as does the Scottish report. It would enable the voluntary sector to do a great deal more than it now does. Let us make no mistake: it is doing an enormous amount at the moment. MIND, the Richmond Fellowship and all sorts of other bodies are making an enormous contribution. Without that contribution, things would be very much worse.
But if we are to put things to rights, the contribution must be much bigger. I believe that the recommendation for a development fund, coupled with one particular Minister with specific responsibility, could really change the whole atmosphere and feeling in this area, so that those working in it would move ahead with new confidence that at long last it was not to continue forever to be the Cinderella of the health service.
Mrs. Harrison-Gledhill's report also contains some ideas for new methods of treatment, and I believe that our report emphasises the fact that we must look for new initiatives. We must find funds with which to promote new initiatives. Mrs. Hamson-Gledhill's report includes a reference to a fresh initiative regarding new methods of dealing with the socially regressed and incompetent. That is the kind of thing which we should not neglect. If we neglect it, we could lose opportunities which could perhaps change in a very important way the situation for the mentally ill and all those who are responsible for them.
I have spoken for too long, and I am very anxious to hear what the noble Lord the Minister has to say. I look forward to receiving a little encouragement from him.
11.11 p.m.
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, it is a special pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, whose contribution to our work was much more valuable than his modesty allowed him to tell us. It was also very pleasant to find the noble Lord. Lord Vivian. emerging as the first Conservative spokesman in the debate. He was at school with me, as was his old friend, the noble Earl, Lord Halsbury, though they were of course much junior to me. But, in so far as he belongs to my period, I am very happy to find him beginning a political career at a time when the careers of some of us are drawing towards a gentle close.
Of course I am grateful, as we all must be, to the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, for the lucid, attractive, and always forceful way in which he initiated this discussion. As the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, said, the noble Lord was all-important in our work. In fact in the later stages of drawing up the report he played a bigger part than I did. We are grateful to him for all he did in that regard, and for what he has said to us this evening. I echo many things that he has said, and perhaps in my own remarks I may repeat too many of them. However, in particular I want to join with him in paying tribute to two hospitals known very well to both of us, the Maudsley, and the Royal Bethlem.
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I must mention one remark of the noble Lord's which I think I must have misheard. He made a reference to someone—I could hardly think that it was myself—being saintly. There must have been something wrong there. Of course all the Members of the House are saintly in their better moments. But the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, will forgive me for saying that my feelings were not saintly—they were more devilish than saintly—towards the end of the last debate, as it dragged along its weary course towards a close. I mention that point only to dispel any idea that anybody here, and least of all myself, would wish to claim any degree of saintliness. I think that the gesture of tying one's shoe lace, which the noble Lord is now doing, is particularly effective as a form of tacit rebuke.
I am sure that all members of the committee are very grateful to the noble Lord. Lord Beswick, for his speech this evening, and in turn I am sure that the noble Lord and myself are extremely grateful to the members of the committee for all their labours. In addition to leading psychiatrists and the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, and myself, the committee included four other Members of your Lordships' House. The noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, has already spoken, and we looked upon the noble Lord, Lord Richardson, as a father figure. No doubt he will give a kind of paternal blessing to these proceedings as soon as I sit down. The noble Baroness, Lady Trumpington, played a very useful part. It has apparently secured her promotion onto a higher level altogether, and so she is not able to take part in this debate. I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, was anxious to participate. As we all know, she possesses as wide a knowledge—perhaps a wider one—of the social services as anybody in this House.
I also echo the tribute paid by the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, to the late Lord Redcliffe-Maud, who was much respected here. He worked as a member of our committee, coming up to London from Oxford almost to the day of his death. I can guess where he is at the present time, and I know he will be happy to look down on us and know that we are aware of what he underwent on our behalf.
We were indeed fortunate to be sustained, financially and otherwise, by the Richmond Fellowship, and, in that connection I would mention, as did the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, Miss Elly Jansen. She came to this country some years ago—although she is by no means an old woman, far from it—as a theological student and, as far as I know, she came without funds and built up this network of homes throughout this country and other parts of the world. I would also mention the help that we received from the Matthews Trust, whose founder. Peter Thompson, was also a valid member of our committee.
When I opened the debate on this subject—the debate which led to this inquiry and report—the Minister, who was here earlier this evening, was very sympathetic when speaking on behalf of the Government, and I would certainly like to acknowledge the goodwill shown throughout by the officials. I have no wish to reiterate what I said during that debate in March 1981. I would only say that the task is even harder than I thought and the need is even greater.
I am quite sure in my own mind—although the whole argument of the report does not rest upon

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this—that no considerable improvement of our mental aftercare provision is possible without a substantial injection of new money and new resources. I should be misleading the House if I gave any other impression. I am aware that the prospect of obtaining new resources at the present time from the present Government is not very encouraging. The outlook is bleak. Money is found for Fortress Falklands and money is found for prison building on a large scale. Large sums of money are involved. I am citing the facts. Indeed, as regards prison building, it would be far more profitable to spend the money on alternative means of treatment. I will not go into those matters now: they raise issues that obviously divide the country at present. I just wish to record the opinion that, until we are ready for a large allocation of resources to this and to the other social services, we must not expect very great improvement.
However, let us take the Government's policy as regards those matters. We are faced, whatever Government are in power, with the fact of mental illness. We have the fact stated by the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, that one woman in five, and one man in nine will receive psychiatric treatment at some time in their lives. In view of that, it might be thought that there would be a tremendous national demand for better treatment for the mentally sick. It would be an exaggeration to claim that such a demand shows itself at the present time. I would just linger on one reason for that which was touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, and which can be underlined to some advantage. No one, I hope, will underestimate my own concern for the physically disabled. Only yesterday I moved the First Reading of a new Bill to assist them, and that Bill will be taken fairly soon in this House. But the fact is that the physically disabled have wonderful champions in this House and elsewhere—people who are ready to stand up and share in the sufferings of the disabled and take pride, to use the biblical expression, "in their infirmity".
However, with the mentally ill it is quite different. They lurk in the shadows. Anybody in this House or elsewhere who is mentally ill, or who has relatives who are mentally ill, will hesitate to mention the fact. Some years ago I was chairman of the National Society for the Mentally Handicapped and I can remember the tremendous wave of encouragement that was given to the mentally handicapped when, in this House, Lord Grenfell, at that time treasurer of the National Society for the Mentally Handicapped, rose up on the Benches opposite and mentioned his mongoloid daughter. It cost him an effort, and some of his friends at least two whiskies and sodas before he spoke and another two afterwards. It was a great spiritual strain, but that made a difference, and all the more because it is so rarely done.
However, those are the facts. The mentally ill will remain for some time a weak lobby, and that means that those who sympathise with them, whether or not they have any sort of personal connection with this subject, must redouble their efforts to be of assistance.
The noble Lord, Lord Beswick, and other speakers have explained the contents of this report so lucidly that I shall not try to go over the ground again. I shall just mention two points, both of which have already been touched on, but I am bound to mention them
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again. One is the implications of this strange phrase "community care", which has become a shibboleth, but which could mean many wonderful things or be meaningless. I do not need to repeat what has been said by the noble Lords, Lord Beswick and Lord Winstanley, in particular, but, in fact, up till now it has been something of a snare and a delusion. We have had the easy part of the Mental Health Act 1959 carried out; we are beginning to empty the hospitals, and good luck to that policy. But we have failed—if not totally, then very largely—to carry out the other part: to build up community care. I know that the Minister is well aware of the strong case for greatly expanding community care.
I shall just touch on one proposal in the report which has been mentioned by other speakers—the proposal for joint mental health development committees throughout the districts. The success or failure of the attempt to make community care a reality will depend on these rather clumsily labelled committees. I hope that the proposal for these joint committees in the districts, which in itself will be quite inexpensive, will at least obtain the support of the Minister. I know that, within the confines of Government policy, the Minister is genuinely anxious to help the mentally ill. So perhaps he will find it possible to say something about that particular proposal when he winds up.
I come finally to the question of a Minister with special responsibilities for mental health. Few will deny that the appointment of a Minister for the Arts has been a far-reaching benefit to the arts and, through the arts, to the country. The same was said of the appointment of a Minister for the Disabled—in that case Mr. Alf Morris—though lately his role seems to have been rather smudged. I shall state boldly my own conviction that the cause of mental health, so long neglected, and, for reasons which I touched on earlier, always likely to be underplayed, would benefit enormously from the appointment of a Minister recognised in official circles and by the general public as a designated champion in the way, for example, that the Minister for the Arts is recognised now as a designated champion.
I am not now concerned with the precise level of the proposed Minister. I know about these levels from experience. I have been a Lord-in-Waiting, an Under-Secretary, a Minister of State, a Minister of my own department but outside the Cabinet, and a Minister with a department inside the Cabinet. I know the way that one can move backwards and forwards between those various situations.
The most successful Minister for the Arts, by common consent, was Jennie Lee, who started ministerial life, if I remember correctly, as a Parliamentary Under-Secretary in the Ministry of Education. So while the level is important it is not everything. Mr. Alf Morris, coming to his task admittedly with the great achievement of the Bill behind him, was equally effective although no more than an Under-Secretary. May I say respectfully to the Minister who is to reply, and who is liked by everyone, that it is not enough for us to be told that he has a special responsibility within the department.
Any of us who has been an Under-Secretary, or had Under-Secretaries under him, will know that that in itself does not give the Minister any great influence.

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Many years ago I was an Under-Secretary in the War Office and given the responsibility of recruiting. But no one thought that I had very much power over recruiting. I do not know whether it did any better or any worse in my time than at any other time, but I was not the Minister of Recruiting in the same sense that a Minister with responsibility for the arts is Minister for the Arts.
I am certainly not concerned with personalities. So far as I am concerned, the noble Lord might well be the ideal Minister, so I hope he will not think I have in mind some suggestion that he should be replaced by somebody else. Not at all. I am happy to see him sitting there, but it is no good his telling us that he is already Minister for the mentally ill. That means nothing if it is simply something that leaks out in the course of Question Time.
If we go back to the Gospels we find that Jesus Christ placed physical and mental illness on the same footing. A high proportion, something like a third of the miraculous cures, were mental cures. Today the language is different. We do not talk about casting out devils, or at any rate that is not the phraseology used in official circles, but the issues are not really changed. Christian traditions and modern psychiatric advances combine to produce profound tenderness towards the mentally sick among so many dedicated people.
Your Lordships may remember that one of the multitude brought to Christ his son who had what is called a "dumb spirit". I am now quoting from the Gospel.
"'Oft times' he said, 'it hath cast him into the fire, and into the waters, to destroy him: but if thou canst do any thing, have compassion on us, and help us'. Jesus said unto him, 'If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.' And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, 'Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief'".
The question today is whether we care enough, and whether we believe enough in our duty to the mentally ill. In this House at least I am hopeful that the answer is that we do.
11.28 p.m.
Lord Richardson: My Lords, the difference in the way that we should think about the mentally ill and the physically ill is very small; and the way in which we should attempt to relieve the mentally ill who have returned to the community is indeed compatible with the best medical principles as practised throughout medicine today. We believe—and in this of course the Government encourage us—that patients should not be in hospital longer than they need be, and that they should be cared for properly when they return to the community. This is widely accepted, and the periods in hospital for physical illness are always reducing.
What the Richmond inquiry has come up with, apart from their insistence, about which your Lordships have heard, is the importance of the organisation headed by a Minister, and funded in such a way that the funds cannot be diverted to other purposes, and it can be seen by all concerned that the funds are not so diverted, and that the Minister and those below him are profoundly dedicated and interested. This principle has been put to the House with great vigour by the speakers this evening. All I want to say is that the professional people, at a lower
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level, that of the patient, will have to implement the efforts that we so earnestly hope the Minister will tell us he is prepared to make, and they are able to do so; they are willing and know how to work as a team.
However, teams have to be trained. Although there is evidence of admirable training for the constituent parts of the team—namely, the doctors, the nurses and social workers; and. very important, the voluntary workers who do so much—there is, nevertheless, an important gap which needs to be dealt with. That is, to produce a common core of information and training which is common to all the professions concerned, so that they understand each other, and so that their disciplines will inter digitate and not be separate. A nurse should know the point of view of the social worker and not be solely concerned with the giving of her particular skills. The social worker should understand the place of the nurse. The doctor should be able to communicate, to explain and to understand the problems of the other professions and how best they can exercise their skills.
If this is done, as it can be, provided that there is confidence in the minds of these professionals that real support will be maintained and not diverted or amputated by cuts, then I have no doubt that great advances could be made in the care of people who should not be in hospital, but who should be, if not in their own homes, as near to their homes as they possibly can be.
A terrible burden lies on the families and on sufferers from mental illness; a burden that I am convinced is more than is felt by almost any form of physical illness. In the report the word "stigma" appears, and that appeared advisedly. I am trying to say that with co-ordination, proper appreciation of the skills of others and bringing them all together to bear on the patient, great things can be achieved. But they cannot be achieved at all—they can hardly be begun—unless there is the real confidence that those who are responsible for organising the service are profoundly prepared to see that it works. To put it in more practical terms: they must see that it works in accordance with the Griffiths' philosophy, and to see that it is properly financed. We all await the Minister. We have spent a great deal of time saying so and I will now sit down.
11.33 p.m.
Lord Wallace of Coslany: My Lords, we are dealing with a very important subject, unfortunately at a late hour, and in an Unstarred Question debate. The subject needs much wider discussion, although one should be very grateful indeed to all those noble Lords who have taken part in the debate so far.
It is not my intention to make a long speech. not as long as my speech in the debate of 31st March 1981. I reread the whole of that debate and congratulate the Richmond Fellowship on the way it used that debate to set up the inquiry which has resulted in such an excellent and positive report. It would be fair to say that in the last two years welcome changes have taken place in the mental health field, mainly as a result of the passing of the Mental Health (Amendment) Act, in the various stages of which this House played a very prominent part. But this Act, itself, asserting as it does patients' rights, adds to the problems that are fully faced in the Richmond Report.

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Reference has been made by my noble friend Lord Beswick to press reports, particularly in the Sunday Times of 20th November, which featured an article by a lady called Margery Wallace; but she is certainly no relation. She dealt with the pitiable position of,
"thousands of mentally ill people being abandoned in squalid lodging houses or even decanted on to the streets".
It is a sad story compared to the situation which exists in the 40 centres run by the Richmond Fellowship. We have been told that over the years the number of mental patients has been run down, so far as hospital treatment has been concerned, by about 70,000; and now a further 20,000 are expected to leave hospital as a result of closures. This will only add to present problems.
I agree that some of our old, outdated mental hospitals need to be demolished. There is one close to me, Darenth Park, which is going to be demolished. But the trouble is that, even so, patients will have to settle down in the transfer to the new units of accommodation within the hospitals and get used to their new surroundings. The nurses have admitted that. It will be difficult enough for these patients, but at least they will have skilled nursing staff available to assist them in the transition period. Release into the outside world, for many, unfortunately, does not mean the provision of care and reasonable accommodation. The release of many people from institutional care, some after a very long period, raises the problems of aftercare accommodation and employment.
Most of the people leaving a mental hospital after a lengthy stay face a very strange world and need care and guidance gradually to accustom themselves to a new and very strange environment. This is where the recommendation to set up a new organisation, particularly at district level, would go a long way to organise methods to provide that badly needed care.
In the debate on 31st March 1981, I referred to what happened in Norwich, where the local authority, the voluntary organisations and the health authority got together to produce transitional accommodation where female patients were able to settle down, to face the problem of buying things themselves and to do the little things which mean so much. And they were being helped by experienced nurses seconded for the job. That is an ideal scheme and such schemes are ideal. But unfortunately there is still a long way to go. The setting up of the suggested new organisation, as I have said, will go a long way to intensify efforts in the recommendation that has been advanced.
My Lords, there is a call for a designated Minister. It is a fact that the Minister responsible for the mental health services—and that by his own admission, probably at a very loose moment—is the noble Lord, Lord Glenarthur. It would be interesting and useful to the House if he could outline very briefly his present responsibilities in the mental health field. I ask this purely for information and no more. But, of course, what is needed is a Minister with complete responsibility for the mental health service and answerable to Parliament as such. In saying this, there is no personal reflection on the noble Lord, Lord Glenarthur, who himself, I know, is taking a very keen interest in this problem.
The mental health section, as the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, and others have said, is still the Cinderella
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of the National Health Service. It is true that some of the stigma unnaturally attributed to mental illness has been gradually removed, but too much of it still remains and a majority of people just do not want to know.
Furthermore, in the present public concern over the effect of cuts in the National Health Service—or, to be fair, and putting the Government's view, the drive for efficiency and economic management—the plight of mental hospitals and their related services tends to be overlooked when they are suffering at least as much as or, in some cases, more than general hospitals. This attitude is mainly because the local general hospital is regarded as part of the community, while the mental hospital is normally not discussed by the majority. I say "the majority" deliberately because it gives me the opportunity to pay to the valuable and useful work put in by friends of various mental hospitals tribute for the efforts they make, the funds they raise and the visiting that they carry out. These are extremely enlightened people doing valuable voluntary work.
The inquiry report does cast light on the importance of mental health care in all its aspects in the community, and its title, Mental Health and the Community, is apt and underlines the outstanding need for such an approach. Of course, finance is needed—and here I must admit that I lack a degree of confidence that it will be provided in the very near future; but you never know, and the need must be stressed.
In conclusion, may I say this? Here is a report compiled with sympathy and understanding with sensible, progressive and logical recommendations. Like my noble friends, I look forward to the reply of the noble Lord, Lord Glenarthur, which, I am certain, will be made in a sympathetic manner and perhaps will raise a ray of hope, or even a slight degree of optimism. I hope it will.
11.42 p.m.
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I think we are all grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Beswick for asking this Question tonight. When he started his speech, the noble Lord referred to the history of mental health as fascinating and moving, and we have heard some fascinating and certainly some moving speeches tonight. He is quite right in what he says: that to the uninitiated in this field it often seems a sad and even distressing subject to become involved in, and I must confess that to some extent I found this myself when I took up my present responsibilities. But I have to say that I have also found a great deal to be encouraged about in the way that the mentally ill are looked after. While I would be the last to say that there are no problems at all, I do not think that the situation is quite as bleak as some noble Lords have made out tonight.
The report with which this Unstarred Question is concerned, as the noble Lord is aware, was received by my Department in July and, as I said in your Lordships' House on 2nd November, is still being considered. As the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, will no doubt recall, my officials recently met him, the noble Earl, Lord Longford, the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, and the noble Lord, Lord Richardson, and representatives of the Richmond Fellowship to

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discuss the conclusions and recommendations of the report. As we said then, the Government's initial broad reaction is quite favourable. But I have to stress that consideration of the report has not yet finally been completed. Nevertheless, it is quite clear even now that it would be difficult to implement some of the recommendations it makes. In particular, those that involve additional expenditure or involve issues that we would normally expect health authorities to decide for themselves will require our particular concern. Our response will naturally also have to take account of the recommendations contained in the recent National Health Service Management Inquiry: the Griffiths report, to which the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, referred.
Your Lordships will be aware that the purposes of this inquiry were to review the initiatives that had been taken by the Government to improve health service efficiency and to advise on further action. The team has produced recommendations designed to improve accountability and to strengthen management in the National Health Service. Their aims—and ours—are to secure the best deal for patients and the community within available resources; the best value for the taxpayer and the best possible motivation of staff.
While none of the recommendations relates specifically to psychiatric services, most will have some implications for their future delivery. The report has been welcomed by the Government and its general thrust has been accepted. Consultations are now proceeding with health authorities and professional and other interests. At this early stage, it seems likely that such things as the extension of the accountability review process through to unit level, the initiation of cost improvement programmes, which will certainly help mental health, the taking of all day-to-day decisions at hospital or unit level, the greater involvement of clinicians in the management process and other items which I could list, could all impinge beneficially on the mental health services in this period of transition.
A number of your Lordships raised the matter of a Minister with special responsibility for mental health. As was stated, it is something which was raised on 2nd November when I answered a Question. I am sorry that some of your Lordships feel that more needs to be done on this account. I understand the motives behind their argument, but I think they will accept that there are obvious pitfalls in attaching a variety of specific labels to Ministers. They will undoubtedly multiply and, in doing so, may become devalued and therefore meaningless.
I was surprised to hear from the noble Earl, Lord Longford, that the country at large did not know that I have my particular responsibility until, as he put it, it leaked out at Question Time. I can assure him that it was only a very few hours after I reached my desk at the Elephant and Castle when both the voluntary and the statutory sectors got in touch with me. They have not ceased to do so since, and I enjoy meeting them, hearing from them and talking to them, and I learn a very great deal from what they have to say. So I hope I can reassure both them, and those of your Lordships who are concerned on this point, that my responsibilities for mental health take up a very large
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proportion of my time.
Perhaps I may come back to that in a moment, but the noble Lord. Lord Wallace, asked me exactly what my responsibilities are so far as mental health is concerned. I could elaborate at some length on what I am going to say, but I do not think I shall do so now. What I ought to say is that I provide something of a focal point within the department for the development and review of mental health services. This involves co-ordinating the contributions of the voluntary sector, the health service and local personal social services.
I have already made a number of visits around the country to form a first-hand impression of the problems faced in this field and, in doing so, I have met representatives of organisations such as MIND, the Mental Health Foundation and MENCAP. The noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, drew attention to the importance of these voluntary agencies. He is quite right. We really could not do without them, though I do not think I could agree fully with the noble Earl, Lord Longford, that with powerful bodies such as these the mentally ill do not have champions. They most certainly do.
The noble Earl, Lord Longford, and the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, also referred to the financial position generally. I think it would probably be worth my while pointing out at this juncture that the department's grants to the voluntary bodies—taking them as a separate issue in the mental health field—will amount to about £800,000 this year. So I hope that that indicates that we attach a very great deal of importance to all the work that they do, and do what we can to encourage them.
However, to come back to the point made by the noble Earl about labelling a Minister with special responsibilities, I am sure that that is a point which my right honourable friend the Secretary of State and my right honourable friend the Prime Minister will take into account. I do not think I can go further on this point than to say what I said earlier.
Perhaps I can list now those aspects of the report which the Government can commend. They are: the accent on comprehensive mental health services in every district; the emphasis on training of staff; the need for co-ordinated planning between health and local authorities; the involvement and greater recognition of the role of the voluntary sector; and the monitoring of service provision and standards.
May I now turn to some of the more specific recommendations contained in the report. On the question of a new development fund, the report considers that the present joint funding arrangements are unsatisfactory because local authorities and voluntary organisations have to take over revenue costs from health authorities after a "tapering" period. I am aware that there are difficulties at the local level over joint finance, and the point the report makes will be fully considered. Nevertheless, the Government introduced improvements to the system earlier this year. These should ease some of the problems that have arisen.
The report envisages the establishment of a new development fund, as described by the noble Lord, Lord Beswick. This would involve a substantial annual

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investment of additional funds made available by central Government over a considerable period of time. The money would be disbursed through joint funding arrangements so that revenue costs could be continued indefinitely.
I must point out that such a fund could only be financed from existing resources and would thus have to come from monies at present allocated to health and local authorities. There are two major obstacles to this proposal. First, it would have the effect of transferring responsibility for decisions on service needs and provision from the local level to central authority. This flies in the face of the long-standing policy of local decision-making being an essential part of community care. Secondly, it would single out mental illness for special treatment, even though there are of course other priorities—for example, mentally handicapped people, whom I also look after, elderly people and physically handicapped people. I really do not believe, despite what has been said in the debate tonight, that the Government could necessarily agree to set any one priority group ahead of the others, although the points which noble Lords have made will be taken into account.
Lord Beswick: My Lords, is it really proper to proceed with the closure programme if the alternative services are not to be financed because the money is not available?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, the closure of some of these hospitals will lead to the repositioning—if that is the right word to use—of a great deal of cash which is tied up in hospitals which do not necessarily meet the requirements of the people who are in them. To give an example of the kind of funds which will be made available from revenue, a couple of weeks ago I visited one of the hospitals in Surrey which is due to close in due course. I believe I am right in saying that the figure I was quoted for heating alone was £500 per patient per year. That is a fairly staggering figure. If it is possible to divert revenue which is being wasted in some respects in this way and to put it into the community, it may be one way in which we can meet the noble Lord's requests.
The report also recommends a departmental planning board specially for mental illness to assist the Minister with special responsibility for mental health in the task of allocating money from the development fund to improve mental health services generally. This recommendation goes hand in hand with that for a new development fund and also raises similar difficulties. On the positive side, my honourable friend the Minister for Health recently agreed to set up a joint working party with the local authority associations to consider improvements to the joint planning arrangements. This development holds out the promise of more effective and better co-ordinated planning for the future.
One of the other recommendations in the report—to which the noble Earl, Lord Longford, referred—is the setting up the joint mental health development committees. They would have the responsibility for achieving minimal standards for district services. The report envisages that they be given statutory force.
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The Government endorse the need for joint planning between health and local authorities, as I made plain just now, and recently passed legislation to give voluntary organisations places on joint consultative committees. It is a matter for a joint consultative committee itself to decide what committee structure it needs—so that if it does consider a mental health development committee to be more effective than a joint care planning team, it can no doubt act on the inquiry's recommendation.
The report goes on to propose—as the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, said—the setting up of an inspectorate to monitor services along the lines of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools system. Its function would be to extend the valuable work of the health advisory service and social work services. The report also mentions the strengthened inspectoral role that the Government have announced for social work service.
We shall carefully consider that proposal because it echoes the Government's desire to obtain effective and efficient services. However, we may well conclude that it will be better to rely on strengthening the existing mechanisms for monitoring service provision rather than creating new mechanisms; and the health advisory service already has an excellent reputation.
Another of the report's recommendations for which I have some sympathy is that the basic elements required in a comprehensive community service should be made mandatory. It is already our long-term aim that comprehensive mental health services should be provided in every district. But as the 1975 White Paper, Better Services for the Mentally Ill, made clear, progress towards them will take 20 to 30 years to reach fruition and will depend on the ability of the nation's economy to provide the necessary financial resources. It is in the long-term interests of all mentally ill people, therefore, that the economic progress this Government have made is maintained and built upon.
In order to improve accountability and clarify objectives, a system of annual performance reviews was introduced into the National Health Service in January last year. Mental illness provision is one of the subjects studied in preparation for the reviews and indeed it features in most of the review meetings themselves. Those are just the sort of meetings which discuss the kind of closure programmes to which the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, referred in his speech. I can certainly assure the noble Lord that I take a particular interest in the programmes which regional health authorities put forward when I undertake such reviews, which I do fairly regularly. Those reviews are also continued between the region and the district concerned. There is great merit in the review procedure.
I note that the report further urges that the obligation placed on local health and social services under the Mental Health Act 1983 and the Health Services and Public Health Act 1968 should be reaffirmed by statute. The report is almost certainly referring to the statutory obligation to provide aftercare services. The 1983 Act does partly reaffirm the statutory obligation to provide after-care, but there has been a duty placed on local authorities to make appropriate arrangements for mentally ill people for many years. It can be traced back to powers in the

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National Health Service Act 1946, which directions—issued in 1950—converted to a duty.
Those directions were renewed in a circular issued to local authorities in 1974 advising them of their responsibilities. We have consistently taken the view that Section 117 of the Mental Health Act 1983 does no more than re-state an existing responsibility and we therefore see no need to reaffirm that obligation yet again.
Several noble Lords are concerned at the need to promote good mental health positively. On this front the department are involved in such matters are improving the position for those people who care for relatives and friends suffering from mental illness. It may not have been a point brought out tonight but I believe it is one worth stating now.
We are discussing with the Health Education Council ways of promoting and increasing public awareness of mental health. We fund organisations active in the field of bereavement counselling such as CRUSE and the Widows' Advisory Trust, and we are looking into the special problems raised by disturbed adolescents—all areas, we think, where investment of time and money can have quite wide-ranging benefits.
Several of your Lordships have said some—I do not know if discouraging is the right word, but I think it almost amounted to that—things about the reality of the care in the community. I should like to respond to some of the points raised. First, it needs to be clearly understood that this is not a new policy: successive Governments for many years have embraced the policy that most people who need continuing care should be looked after in the community. Mentally ill people are but one of the groups that this policy involves. Most of our psychiatric patients who had been in hospital a long time and who could benefit from living outside hospital have already been discharged.
It also needs to be clearly borne in mind that the great majority of people who suffer from a mental illness either never go into hospital for treatment or, if they do, are discharged to home and family within weeks. Thus, most mentally ill people already receive the most natural form of care in the community—that is, of course, care.
The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, mentioned the figure of 20,000 who might be transferred from mental hospitals. He is not quite correct in that figure, I am afraid; I ought to tell him that of the approximately 70,000 patients at present in mental hospitals it is estimated that up to about 5,000 may benefit from living outside and it is on this comparatively small proportion that the "care in the community" policy focuses. That figure puts in perspective what I think was really a fairly misleading statement in the article in the Sunday Times that was referred to earlier, which more or less implied that hospitals were being closed willy-nilly, and the patients were being turned out into the streets. That is not the case.
The noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, asked about residential accommodation and the number of places there were. It might interest him to know that residential accommodation has increased by over 30 per cent.
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between 1975 and 1982, and day centres by about 50 per cent. over the same period. Day hospital places increased by about 150 per cent. between 1970 and 1981. The noble Lord also asked about the provision of psychiatric nurses in the community. I can tell him that staff numbers more than doubled between 1976 and 1981.
Because we were aware that the financial arrangements between health and local authorities designed to assist the move to community care were not working as well as they might, we introduced more flexibility into the system earlier this year. Health authorities can now guarantee continued funding to local authorities and voluntary organisations for people moving out of hospital, and this ought to assist progress considerably. We shall also shortly be issuing a circular to extend the joint finance arrangements to cover the costs of providing accommodation, for instance, through housing associations, and this too should help.
The noble Lord, Lord Richardson, spoke of the need for professional training on a multi-disciplinary basis. Perhaps I may say to him that the Government fully recognise the desirability of effective training for all staff involved in the provision of mental health service. I have read with interest the report's suggestions for improvement of professional training, and I am particularly impressed by what the noble Lord, Lord Richardson, said in calling for a common core of information to be available for the different professions. I am grateful to him for his contribution.
The noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, asked about Mrs. Harrison-Gledhill's report. May I briefly tell him that in 1981 the Government announced plans, as he knows, for the replacement of the Camberwell Resettlement Unit by small hostels run by voluntary organisations to be funded jointly by the DHSS and Department of the Environment. Work is well advanced towards completing the objective of closing the resettlement unit by the end of1985. Mrs. Harrison-Gledhill's report on the problems likely to be experienced during the closing down period and her suggestions for the future treatment of the socially regressed and incompetent have been studied in the various branches of the department with considerable interest. When officials met her in August last they made a number of comments which she agreed to consider. I have to tell the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, that we have not heard from her since. She has not come back to us so I cannot go much further on that tonight.
I close by stating my very real appreciation for the enormous contribution made and the effort that has gone into the production of the Richmond Fellowship Report. I and my ministerial colleagues will continue to give the report's recommendations our close consideration. We certainly do not profess to hold a monopoly on the fount of wisdom on this matter. However, I hope that I have demonstrated this evening the genuine efforts we are making to improve mental health services and that we are only too keenly aware of the issues raised in the report.
House adjourned at seven minutes past midnight.