Lords Sitting of 11 December 1986

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Rochester.

Diabetics: Disposable Syringes
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what progress is being made towards allowing doctors to prescribe disposable plastic syringes, particularly for those with diabetic conditions.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Security (Baroness Trumpington): My Lords, we are keeping the position under review.
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that somewhat cautious reply. Can she say whether the Government appreciate that to limit the supply of disposable syringes only to diabetic patients would be a tremendous help not only to those patients as regards their safety and comfort but also to hospitals and doctors through the saving in time taken up by filling out forms? Can my noble friend advise the House what the cost would be if that were allowed on the National Health Service?
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, we are spending about £1·2 million a year on the reusable syringes and needles which are currently prescribable. We estimate that making disposable syringes available on prescription will cost an additional £8 million to £10 million a year.
Lord Winstanley: My Lords, during this lengthy review, which has been going on for a very long time indeed, will the noble Baroness bear in mind the plight of parents with young children who are suffering from diabetes and who have to have insulin injections? Does she agree that such parents have burdens enough without the added one of having to sterilise syringes? If disposable syringes cannot be prescribed on Form FP10 for all diabetic patients, as I think they should be, can they at least be prescribed for diabetic children?
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, most child diabetics are under consultant care and if the consultant considers that it is clinically desirable for a patient to use disposable syringes, supplies can be arranged through the hospital service.
Lord Ennals: My Lords, bearing in mind that prescriptions can be made up at clinics though not by GPs, and bearing in mind that Mrs. Edwina Currie in another place gave a much more encouraging response
1246
than that which has been given this afternoon by the noble Baroness, does she agree that this is perhaps one of the most worthy causes and that it would be a lovely Christmas present for those people who are suffering?
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, perhaps I may just indicate where our priorities lie. We give very high priority to making blood glucose testing strips available on prescription because these give diabetics better control over their condition, and that can avoid or delay the onset of complications. However, I recognise that many diabetics would like to see disposable syringes made available on prescription, as they offer more comfort and convenience. I shall certainly make sure that all my ministerial colleagues are aware of the strong feelings that have been expressed by your Lordships.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes: My Lords, can the Minister comment on whether the £8 million cost is on the assumption that everyone will receive the syringes free, or has it taken into account the fact that the prescription charge is a fairly high one?
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, perhaps I may remind my noble friend that many people do not pay for prescriptions anyway.

New Scotland Yard: Building Repairs
3.10 p.m.
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what structural repair costs have been incurred on the New Scotland Yard headquarters building in Victoria Street over the last two years, and what disruption has been caused to those working in the building.
The Minister of State, Home Office (The Earl of Caithness): My Lords, the repair work which has been in progress since 1985 is to replace the original granite facings on the building with stainless steel. Payments to the contractors so far have amounted to £2,156,000. I understand from the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis that there has been no serious disruption to those working in the building.
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that helpful and informative reply; but is he aware that, whereas 20 years ago a speculative, cheap office building in a central shopping street close to the Houses of Parliament may perhaps have been suitable for the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police, today that building, with its long history of bits and pieces falling off, its leaking roof, its wholly inadequate car parking facilities for police vehicles and a major problem of security because of its long street frontage, is not adequate at all? Will the Government consider whether the GLC building could provide a home for the new facilities of the police headquarters?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, there are no plans to move New Scotland Yard from the present building, in which a large investment has been made to render it suitable for police use. As for the future of the GLC building, that is now in the hands of the London Residuary Body and it is up to that body to consider any offers.
Lord Mellish: My Lords, is the Minister aware that, if News International and all those involved in that dispute were to pay the police costs of £4½ million, that would more than pay for the work being done at New Scotland Yard?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, I think I answered that question from the noble Lord yesterday.
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, can my noble friend say whether the present headquarters is in time likely to be outgrown so far as concerns the number of staff required there and that therefore a move may be necessary anyway?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, as I said, at the moment no plans are in preparation for a move and indeed the commissioner's present policy on devolution of work should help to reduce some of the pressures on the staff of the headquarters building.

Schools: Parental Choice
3.13 p.m.
Lord Aldington: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are bound by the undertaking in Article 13(3) of the United Nations Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights 1966 "to have respect for the liberty of parents … to choose for their children, schools other than those established by public authorities …" and when this covenant was ratified by the United Kingdom.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Young): My Lords, the United Kingdom ratified the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights on 20th May 1976 and it entered into force for the United Kingdom on 20th August 1976. We entered no reservations on Article 13(3) and are therefore bound by it.
Lord Aldington: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that Answer. Does she think that it was right for the Labour Government in 1966 to join with others to spell out that parents were at liberty to choose schools for their children, even schools which were not run by public authorities? Does the Minister think that it was also right for the Labour Government in 1976 to ratify that matter? Is it not extraordinary that the leaders of the Labour Party now propose, in flagrant breach of that view, to eliminate this liberty of parents to choose schools for their children?
Baroness Young: My Lords, I entirely agree with what my noble friend said. I believe that the right of freedom to choose the education for one's child is very important.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, would the Minister agree that there is no breach of this undertaking if the Labour Party says that there should be no particular fiscal advantages to those pupils who go to independent schools? Would the Minister agree that Her Majesty's Government are also bound by the provisions of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which says that education shall be directed to the full development of human personality? Is it not difficult to conceive how that can be achieved if there is a system of apartheid in our education provisions?
Baroness Young: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, would not expect me to agree with the second part of his question. To talk about education in those emotive terms helps neither the pupils nor the education system of this country.

Unemployment in Rural Areas
3.15 p.m.
Lord Gridley: 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 action has been taken to provide work for the unemployed in rural areas.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of the Environment (Lord Skelmersdale): My Lords, the Development Commission, whose budget has been increased by almost 20 per cent. since 1983, now provides assistance to over 20,000 firms employing nearly 100,000 people. The farm and countryside initiative, launched jointly by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, the Development Commission and others in February this year, has made a good start with 60 projects employing 1,163 people, and a further eight projects have so far been approved.
Lastly, under the enterprise allowance scheme over 2,500 people have established businesses in the horticultural and agricultural sectors.
Lord Gridley: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his Answer and I congratulate the Government on their vision and competence in introducing this scheme. I should like to ask the Minister whether he can confirm that I am correct in thinking that this scheme will greatly assist the long-term unemployed to find employment, and that tourism in this country is likely to benefit, as well as the provision under the Community programme?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, the Development Commission's and COSIRA's various schemes make a major contribution to the provision of permanent jobs in rural areas, through the construction of advance factories, offering advice and assistance to small

1249
businesses and giving grants for the conversion of redundant buildings for industrial and other uses. So far as concerns tourism, this is a major method of reducing unemployment and COSIRA helps in this respect also.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, would the noble Lord agree that the incipient crisis in the agricultural industry is likely to worsen the employment position in the rural areas very soon? Could the Minister also say whether or not there is any truth in the report that as a result of government policies 10 per cent. to 20 per cent. of farmers in this country could well go out of business over the next 18 months to two years? This statement has been made seriously, and it is as well that the Government should face up to the position now. Therefore, could the Minister say how many people working in agriculture and connected industries are likely to lose employment over the next 12 months as a result of the policies of Her Majesty's Government?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, no; I am afraid I cannot say, because it depends on the development of the agricultural industry within the next 12 months to two years.
Lord Grimond: My Lords, while I appreciate that the Government cannot mention all that has been done in this field, perhaps I may ask whether the Minister will confirm that they are well aware of and are investigating closely the work done by the Highlands and Islands Development Board, which was not mentioned in his Answer and which has wide experience and considerable success in this field and from which many lessons could be learnt in creating rural employment.
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, we are aware not only of the Highlands and Islands Development Board but also of the Development Board for Rural Wales, which are both doing extremely good work in this area.
Baroness Seear: My Lords, could the Secretary of State for Employment tell us in what ways from his department rural employment is being encouraged?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, all the schemes in Action for Jobs—that is to say, 15 schemes, with the exception of Jobs Search Travel to Interview Scheme and Career Development Loan Scheme—are applicable to rural areas.
Lord Gisborough: My Lords, would the Minister agree that most of the work of the Development Commission goes into the provision of new factories and workshops in the wealth-producing sector and that this is of great benefit to the local economy? Would the Minister therefore agree that further finance for the Development Commission would be likely to be well spent in job production?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, yes. I must confess that like my noble friend I am a great fan of the Development Commission. That is why, as I said in my original Answer, its budget has been increased by
1250
almost 20 per cent. since 1983. In future years we shall obviously have to look at what we can do in that respect.
Baroness Seear: My Lords, in view of the silence of the Secretary of State for Employment do we conclude that his department has nothing to say about rural unemployment?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, I am answering the Question on behalf of the Government. The fact that my noble friend the Secretary of State for Employment happens to be sitting beside me is neither here nor there.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, we are dealing with rural employment, which involves agriculture. I assume that the noble Lord can answer questions which involve rural industry. Perhaps I may return to my original question and ask him whether it is the Government's policy to take agricultural land out of production. There may be arguments for or against that connected with the common agricultural policy. It is unfortunate that his noble friend is not answering the question because it is important that the Government should say whether it is their policy to take land out of agricultural production. That would enable Parliament and the country to decide whether or not the policy is a good one.
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, it is the Government's policy to reduce surplus food production.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, I must come back on that. Is the noble Lord saying that it is government policy to take land which produces food out of commission?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, no. I most carefully did not say that.

Business of the House
3.22 p.m.
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Aberdare): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
The reason for this Motion is that the British Railways (No. 2) Bill urgently needs the Royal Assent before the Christmas Recess. That cannot be achieved unless the Bill is returned to the other place today. Standing Order 147 requires that no Bill which has been amended in Committee may be read a third time unless the amended Bill has been lodged in government departments three clear days before Third Reading. Since the Bill was only in Committee yesterday, I seek your Lordships' agreement to dispense with Standing Order 147 so that the Bill may be given a Third Reading today. I beg to move.
Moved, That Private Business Standing Order 147 (Bill as amended in Committee to be deposited at Public Departments) be dispensed with to enable the British Railways (No. 2) Bill to be read a third time this day.—(The Chairman of Committees.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

British Railways (No. 2) Bill
Standing Order 147 having been dispensed with, Bill read a third time, and passed, and returned to the Commons with amendments.

Family Law Reform Bill [H.L.]
3.24 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor (Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [Parents not being married to have no effect in law on relationships]:
Lord Brightman Lord Brightman moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 1, line 6, leave out ("or not").
The noble and learned Lord said: I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: Will the Committee forgive me? I was slightly startled by the brief speech of my noble and learned friend on the Cross-Benches. I am rather tied up in white tape.
I am grateful to my noble and learned friend for moving the amendment in such a persuasive way. I can only surmise about some of the arguments he might have adduced in favour of his amendment. If I am right in my assumption, my noble and learned friend, whose experience is so distinguished in the Chancery Division, may have divined that the omission of the words "or not" would make remarkably little difference in the Chancery Division to the construction to be put on the clause. However, I shall ask him to consider whether outside those refined circles they do not serve a useful purpose. That at least is the view of the Law Commission. The words of the subsection probably received more minute discussion at its meetings than any others.
I agree, as a matter of legal construction, that probably no court would find much difficulty in construing the clause if the words proposed to be left out should be taken away from the Bill. The important point about which the Law Commission thought is one which the ordinary man will understand. The Bill is designed to deal with the case where the parents were not married at the time of the child's birth. Therefore the ordinary man reading the first clause will want to know that it is irrelevant in certain circumstances whether the parents were married or not, because it is the "or not" which gives the clause and the Bill its flavour.
With respect to my noble and learned friend's eloquent defence of his amendment, I suggest that nonetheless, despite the fact that every word he said was absolutely unexceptional, we had better leave it as it is.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I hope that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor will look again at this matter. If we leave out two words from our enormously overflowing statute book, that is two words to the good. The use of "whether" to mean "whether or not" is well attested. That meaning is given to us in the Oxford English Dictionary and in the Oxford Dictionary of Current English, which are available in the Library.
I noted one use by Addison, who may be a model for the parliamentary counsel's office: "A loud cheerful voice inquired whether the philosopher was at home". That means "whether or not", and everyone so understands it. I hope that my noble and learned friend will not close his mind on this matter.
3.30 p.m.
Lord Renton: I too, hope that my noble and learned friend will think again about that. Perhaps I may mention what appears to have been his chief argument, namely, a desire to help the ordinary man—by whom I suppose he means any man who is not a lawyer—to understand this matter. I suggest that the fewer words we use the easier the ordinary man will find it to understand.
Lord Brightman: I first apologise for not having developed the arguments in favour of the amendment. I had wrongly assumed that they were self-evident and required no introduction. I apologise for my mistake.
Lord Elwyn-Jones: Surely whether or not the words "or not" are included makes very little difference. It is a turn of phrase, if not a term of art, well known. The Law Commission approves of it. I support the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor.
The Lord Chancellor: With those powerful words from the other side of the House in my favour, I must tell my noble and learned friend and my noble friend that I am very reluctant to think about this matter again, not because I disagree with every word that they have said—because I do not—but because in this instance the matter is not worth discussing at great length.
Lord Brightman: I agree with the remarks which the noble and learned Lord has made. In the circumstances, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave withdrawn.
Lord Kilbracken Lord Kilbracken moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 1, line 8, after ("deduced") insert ("are married to each other or").
The noble Lord said: I regret that I cannot move this quite as briefly as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brightman moved the first amendment. However, I shall be as brief as I can.
I may be wrong, but it seems to me that the noble and learned Lord and I are on the same point in this amendment and Amendment No. 3. We are both concerned with the phrase in line 8 which refers to whether the father and mother,
"have or had been married to each other at any time".

1253
I comprehend that the purpose of the Bill is to include in that phrase all persons who have at any time been married to one another, whether that marriage has been ended by death or divorce, or whether it still subsists. It seems to me that the present wording,
"whether they have or had been married … at any time",
would embrace fathers and mothers who came into the first of those two categories but not those who are still married.
We do not say of people who are married, "Yes, they have been married to each other", but that they are married to each other; or we might say, "They did marry each other 20 years ago when they went through the marriage ceremony in the church". I would amend that to read that the father and mother are married to each other, or have or had been married to each other, at any time. That seems to me to embrace almost every possibility.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Brightman, wishes to change the wording to,
"the father and mother … were married to each other at any time",
meaning I suppose that they went through that marriage ceremony at some time in the past. I bow to the great and superior legal knowledge of the noble and learned Lord but I prefer my version. I beg to move.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: This amendment differs from that of my noble and learned friend Lord Brightman in that it seeks to add unnecessary words to the clause, whereas the amendment of my noble and learned friend sought to remove unnecessary words.
To be married to someone involves two factors. The first is that one has gone through a contract of matrimony with that person; and, secondly, that one has acquired the status of marriage. However, the second factor can arise only if the first has taken place; in other words, if one has been married to someone one is married to him or her. They were parties to a contract of marriage. Therefore these words are quite unnecessary. With respect, I agree on this occasion with the wording of the Bill.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: I ask my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor to consider this point. I may have misunderstood. If a person has been married to another, using the concept of this clause, at any time, irrespective of whether either or both such persons are now alive or dead, in what circumstances can the concept "or had been married" operate? Surely if one omits "or had" in line 8 one clarifies the clear intendment of the clause by the excision of an otiose alternative.
Lord Silkin of Dulwich: It seems to me that the intention of the clause is clear enough. It is to cover the present and past state of affairs. I should have thought that that could be covered by "are" or "were". In other words, it is combining the two amendments.
Baroness Phillips: I am not legally trained, but having been a rather hopeful teacher of English I must say that I do not always find Acts of Parliament as grammatically well framed as they might be. In this instance I support my noble friend. There is surely a
1254
difference between "have", "had been" and "are". In other words, it looks as though one could come within the meaning of the Bill if one's parents had been married but are not married any more, or have been married and still are. That they are still married is becoming increasingly rare, I appreciate. However, that should be included. It seems to me a very simple matter but it would make it much more straightforward.
The Lord Chancellor: I agree with one matter in what has taken place: that I ought to speak to both this amendment and the next, which are aiming at the same target but missing it both times. At first sight both these amendments appear absolutely reasonable. However, there is more in this than quite meets the eye at first. I should like to begin by repeating what I said in answer to the previous amendment; namely, that these words of the Bill were considered by the Law Commission more minutely than almost any others and far more minutely than usual.
It is perhaps worth pointing out that the Scottish Law Commission report—which came in time between the two reports of the English Law Commission—resulted in the Law Reform (Parent and Child) (Scotland) Act 1986. The Act begins with the following words:
"The fact that a person's parents are not or have not been married to one another shall be left out of account in establishing the legal relationship between the person and any other person".
Members of the Committee will note that these words do not appear to cover the situation of a person one or both of whose parents have died. Strictly speaking, one might have expected the subsection to read:
"The fact that a person's parents are not, have not or had not been married to one another shall be left out of account".
It is plain to see what is intended. I do not for a moment suppose that the Scottish courts will find very much difficulty in deducing, from the words they have used, the intention of Parliament.
However, there are other differences in subsection (1) of the Bill. We are considering the marital status of the father and mother, not only of one or both of the two persons whose relationship is in question but also of any person through whom that relationship is deduced, who may be some distance away. The father and mother in question may have been the young parents of an even younger baby, and that causes no trouble. They may also be a father and mother who died many years ago, leaving a number of children, some legitimate and some born out of wedlock. The question which may have arisen is the construction of a will which leaves money to be distributed between or through the children of a long-deceased father or mother or both.
What these two examples have in common is that under subsection (1) no regard is to be paid to whether the father and mother in question have or had been married to each other at any time. If instead the words read, "were married to each other at any time", the question which those words would immediately raise in the ordinary man's mind is, "At what time?". We are not here concerned with whether the father and mother were married to each other at any particular time. We are concerned—or perhaps I should say we are not concerned, since this is something to which we

1255
are not to have regard—with whether the father or mother have or had been married to each other at any time at all.
Turning briefly to the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, I appreciate his wish to cater for all eventualities and to look not only at the question of whether the father and mother of any person have been married to each other at any time but also at the question of whether they are married now. In the context of this subsection, the words the noble Lord seeks to insert are, I believe, otiose, and therefore come under the ban of my noble and learned friend Lord Simon of Glaisdale in his eloquent speech on the first amendment. On this occasion I am for brevity in that respect.
As I have said, the purpose of subsection (1) is to tell us that, in construing relationships, we are not to have regard to the question of whether the father or mother of any particular person have been married to each other—or, if one or both are dead, had been married—at any time. We are not particularly concerned with whether the father and mother are married to each other today. Nor will the courts, when they are using this subsection to construe a particular relationship, be concerned with whether the father and mother of a particular person are married to each other on the day the case happens to come to court. That would be one possible construction to be put on the amendment. They will be concerned to know whether the father and the mother have been married at any time at all, and in particular at the time when their child was born.
Members of the Committee may think that these are very fine distinctions, but it was not I who raised this matter. I should have left the matter in silence without expounding it at great length. However, it is unfortunately on such fine distinctions that the courts spend a great deal of time and public money, and also a great deal of other people's private money. As I have said, the existing words have been chosen by the Law Commission with the greatest care, and I would respectfully ask my noble and learned friend and the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, to allow the existing words to stay in the Bill.
3.45 p.m.
Lord Kilbracken: I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord, and also to other noble Lords who have taken part in the debate. The proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway, is a very good one and has the additional merit of leaving out two words. That has been found to be a very favourable course.
I should have thought that whether or not the couple in question are married at the time the case comes before the court is a relevant fact. I feel that the present wording in the Bill does not say that that matter has to be considered or brought into account. However, I do not intend to press this vital matter to a Division. I therefore beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Brightman Lord Brightman had given notice of his intention to move Amendment No. 3:
Page 1, line 8, leave out ("have or had been") and insert ("were").
The noble and learned Lord said: Amendment No. 3 was an attempt on my part to avoid what I conceived to be the inclusion in the Bill of totally unnecessary words. However, I do not wish to press the point and therefore I shall not move the amendment.
[Amendment No. 3 not moved.]
Lord Brightman Lord Brightman moved Amendment No. 4:
Page 1, leave out lines 10 to 23 and insert—
"(2) In this Act and enactments passed after the coming into force of this section, unless the contrary intention appears, a reference to a person whose father and mother were not married to each other at the time of his birth is exclusive of a person who—

(a) is treated as legitimate by virtue of section 1 of the Legitimacy Act 1976;

(b) is a legitimated person within the meaning of section 10 of that Act;

(c) is an adopted child within the meaning of Part IV of the Adoption Act 1976; or

(d) is otherwise treated in law as legitimate,

and cognate references shall be construed according.
(2A) In this Act and enactments passed after the coming into force of this section, unless the contrary intention appears, a reference to a person whose father and mother were married to each other at the time of his birth includes such a person as is mentioned in subsection (2) above, and cognate references shall be construed accordingly.").
The noble and learned Lord said: Perhaps I may speak at slightly greater length on this amendment. Amendment No. 4 has the objective of seeking to simplify subsection (2), which is a definition clause containing two definitions: first, a definition of a person whose father and mother were married at the time of his birth; and, secondly, a definition of a person whose father and mother were not married at the time of his birth.
Subsection (2) then explains the meaning of those two expressions in a single sentence containing a definition and, for want of a better expression, a reverse definition, ending with an awkward double negative. My amendment seeks to unravel subsection (2) and divide it into two subsections, one defining the positive expression and the other defining the negative expression. I submit that the result is, if I may use the jargon, a more "user-friendly" subsection than the original version.
On reflection, it has occurred to me that it may be better for the second subsection to appear before the first subsection which I seek to amend, so that the positive expression appears first and the negative second. That is purely a matter of detail. I beg to move.
Lord Denning: Each draft gives the same effect. Reading the two, I must say that I should prefer the draft submitted by my noble and learned friend Lord Brightman. It seems to me to be clearer and better than the original.
The Lord Chancellor: As no one else seems too anxious to embark on this discussion, perhaps it is my turn. This amendment suffers from one defect. It first appeared upon my desk after I had left the Cabinet at 12 o'clock today. I should have liked a little more time to consider it. There were criticisms on Second Reading of the wording of this clause as being difficult to understand. Both before and after my noble and

1257
learned friend's amendment was tabled, I sought the opinion of counsel who know more about these things than I. Counsel conceded that subsection (2) of the clause is complex and could perhaps be simplified if split into two subsections.
However, I am bound to say that, despite the support of my noble and learned friend Lord Denning, he is not happy with the attempt which has been made by my noble and learned friend Lord Brightman. His specific objections to my noble and learned friend's draft of subsection (2) is that the words in line 4:
"is exclusive of a person",
are in themselves unfortunate and the more so in contrast to the word "includes" in line 4 of subsection (2A). The words which one would have expected are:
"does not include a person".
His second objection is that in line 4 of subsection (2A) the words:
"such a person as is mentioned in subsection (2) above",
are not clear, as they might refer either to the person whose father and mother were not married to each other or to the person who is treated as legitimate under paragraphs (a) to (d).
Therefore, it is clear that in the light of that advice I cannot accept my noble and learned friend's amendment in the form in which it is drafted on the Marshalled List. One should always remember that accuracy and clarity do not always go together in legal draftsmanship.
However, quite accept that this clause might be capable of improvement. If my noble and learned friend would kindly agree to withdraw his amendment and any consequential amendments, I shall see whether the draftsman can produce a provision which is somewhat easier to understand than the one in the Bill as it now stands. I do not promise to succeed, but that is the best that I can do at short notice.
Lord Brightman: I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 5 not moved.]
Lord Kilbracken Lord Kilbracken moved Amendment No. 6:
Page 2, line 3, leave out from ("period") to end of line 5 and insert ("between his conception and birth.")
The noble Lord said: I believe that this amendment is what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning, recently called a drafting matter, although I have found in the past that when I have tabled amendments which I thought were drafting matters they have turned out not to be when the Minister in question has come to reply.
The amendment is aimed at improving the clarity, meaning and good English of the sentence comprising subsection (3) at the top of page 2, which Members of the Committee will see talks about the time of a person's birth being:
"taken to include any time during the period ending with his birth and beginning with the act of intercourse resulting in his birth or, where there was no such act, his conception".
My first point is that when talking about any period we invariably state the time at which that period began
1258
and we then give the time at which it ended. For example, we say, "Next week I shall be in London". We do not say, "I shall be in London from Friday until Tuesday of next week". We say, "I shall be there from Tuesday to Friday". Nor do we say, "I shall be there between 5 p.m. and 11 a.m. tomorrow morning". Therefore, I do not understand why this period is given as being:
"the period ending with his birth and beginning with the act of intercourse resulting in his birth",
because even the noble and learned Lord would agree that the act of intercourse has to precede the birth—at least that is normally so.
Secondly, the Bill contains a very cumbersome phrase:
"beginning with the act of intercourse resulting in his birth or, where there was no such act, his conception".
The phrase:
"where there was no such act",
is presumably intended to cover cases where artificial insemination was used. However, if in legal language conception is something that takes place whens artificial insemination is used, there is no need to include all of that phrase; we need simply to accept my words and leave the passage in question to read:
"the time of a person's birth shall be taken to include any time during the period between his conception and birth".
Earlier in the debate the leaving out of two words was found to be very admirable; this amendment will involve leaving out a dozen words. I hope that that fact may influence Members of the Committee to support the amendment. I beg to move.
Lord Renton: Subsection (3) is important because it will be used not only for construing subsection (2) but because subsection (2) in its turn will have to be construed in relation to various other provisions of the Bill. I must confess that when I first read subsection (3), as an ordinary lawyer—if there is such a person—I found myself in some difficulty in understanding it.
I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, for having tabled the amendment because, on the face of it, it seems to have the same meaning as the provision already in the Bill which he proposes to leave out. Therefore, I very much hope that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor will try to improve the words in the Bill.
One rather strange aspect about the words in the Bill is that they do not present the possible circumstances in chronological order. They present them in the reverse chronological order, which is an unusual course and one which we normally try to avoid.
The simple, succinct solution which the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, has proposed; namely, to insert the words:
"between his conception and birth",
has the advantage not only of being simple and chronological also but so far as I can tell of being complete.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I take it that the words contained in the Bill:
"Where there was no such act, [of intercourse] his conception",

1259
cover not only artificial insemination but conception in vitro. Unless they do so that seems to me to be a lacuna in both the Bill and in the amendment which results from it. If they do I cannot see why the amendment does not mean exactly the same as the phrase in the Bill. Moreover, it has the great advantage of being chronologically in order and therefore more understandable and shorter, which is always an advantage.
The Lord Chancellor: This amendment also fell upon my desk after I had left the Cabinet at 12 o'clock today. I inquired of parliamentary counsel and this time I think that he is definitely cleverer than any of the noble and noble and learned Lords who have so far participated in the debate. I am a very old man now and I learn more about the facts of life every day in connection with this Bill and in connection with other matters which I read in the newspapers. The noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, my noble friend and my noble and learned friend are guilty of a scientific error. I learned to my surprise that the period which elapses between the act of intercourse and the resultant conception can amount to 48 or even 72 hours.
It would be possible—and it is obvious once I have stated this scientific fact—that the father might die or be killed in the intervening time. It may not be likely but in law almost everything happens sooner or later. In fact, in my experience it always happens sooner or later. There was a gentleman called Murphy who told us all about this kind of thing—and rightly. He was no ordinary lawyer.
If the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, persisted in his amendment, the result would be that the child of the union would fall into the wrong class; or more probably, since the time of conception could not be accurately established, it would be impossible to tell into which class he fell. It is for that reason that the Law Commission, when dealing with what I might call the old-fashioned method of childbirth, referred specifically to the act of intercourse resulting in birth rather than to the conception.
I cannot claim any virtue for the scientific exposition that I have tried to give to the Committee. I learn more every day, and this time I did not draw it out of my own experience or knowledge. I therefore ask the Committee not to accept this amendment.
4 p.m.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: Would my noble and learned friend deal with the point that I raised as to whether "conception" is sufficient to deal with in vitro conception?
The Lord Chancellor: I should like time to consider that question.
Lord Renton: The scientific point raised by my noble and learned friend might possibly be met—I am not attempting to draft at this stage—by using the expression, "intercourse which resulted in conception", or "conception caused in any other way"—and that meets the point of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon—"and birth".
1260
That makes it chronological. The wording is still simpler than what is in the Bill. I hope that the short discussion that we have had will not be the end of the matter, and that as my noble and learned friend had so little time to consider the matter before the debate that he might be prepared to take a little more time to consider it after the debate.
Lord Elwyn-Jones: May I ask whether the silence on the episcopal Bench is relevant or not to the consideration of this matter?
The Lord Chancellor: I suppose that the right reverend Prelate is, like me, always learning. It was Solon, was it not?—the right reverend Prelate will correct me—who wrote in a poem:
"I am getting older and older, and the older I get I learn more and more.".
Lord Kilbracken: I am grateful for the powerful support that I have received from the noble Lord and the noble and learned Lord for my little amendment. The noble and learned Lord complained that he had not had much notice before answering this matter. I therefore must mention that I framed this amendment on Monday morning and sent it round to his office on Monday afternoon. That is 72 hours. Of course a journalist like myself is used to coping with a rather shorter or briefer deadline than three days; but I thought that the noble and learned Lord's reply was completely unconvincing.
Of course there is always some interval between the actual act of intercourse and the conception of the baby. I do not know how long it is. What is the shortest time it could be? It must be a few seconds, or a few minutes. Certainly I accept what the noble and learned Lord says, that it may be a couple of days or more. I do not know how one finds out. Doctors can find out these things, and presumably we know that.
The point is that nobody ever knows whether there has been this interval between intercourse and conception; and how could there be a case, as the noble and learned Lord has suggested, where a father dies and it was said that he died in the interval between intercourse and conception? It may have been a day or it may have been two days, but the question will never be raised.
In fact, whether it is conception or whether it is intercourse, the moment cannot be definitely established because we do not know which particular act has led to a particular moment of conception. Therefore the objection that the noble and learned Lord has made to putting what is extremely difficult to comprehend, or much too difficult to comprehend, into five short and simple words seems to me to be completely unreasonable.
I do not intend to press this amendment; but in view of the support that I have had from one noble and learned Lord, and from one noble Lord who is extremely learned, both on the Cross-Benches and on the other side of the Committee, with a few words from my own Front Bench, I hope that possibly the noble and learned Lord who normally sits on the Woolsack will give this matter further consideration. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
On Question, Whether Clause 1 shall stand part of the Bill?
Lord Renton: I wonder whether the Committee would bear with me if I briefly draw attention to the fact—and I welcome it—that Clause 1(1) contains a statement of general principle. On 29th October I had the temerity to point out that if more of the Government's legislation were based upon statements of principle and less of it based upon the endless pursuit of detail to cover hypothetical circumstances, the Government would get their legislation through more easily, and indeed it would be better legislation. Now that we have this welcome attempt to state the general principle, I think we should not let it pass unnoticed.
We have had reason to doubt whether it was perfectly expressed, but it is jolly nearly perfect. I only hope that it is to be regarded as an encouraging sign, indeed perhaps as a precedent which may be followed on many other occasions and not merely as, if I may use a vulgar expression, a one-off example.
The Lord Chancellor: I should like to say to my noble friend—whose expertise on the form and content of statute is, I think, unrivalled in this House and therefore what I say is not intended by way of criticism in the least—that it so happens that a number of noble and learned friends and I were listening to an appeal upstairs less than six months ago, and we had to consider an Act of Parliament of 1981 which had its conception (if I may borrow the word) in a Law Commission report.
There were significant changes made by this House, or by Parliament, between the Bill annexed to the Law Commission report and the Act of Parliament that we had to consider. The odd thing was that the change that had been made by Parliament on the parliamentary draftsman's Bill annexed led to two cases going up to the House of Lords, and it was the very change that Parliament had made which did it. The second case overruled the first.
Therefore, with the greatest respect, I ask those who think that they can really improve on parliamentary draftsmanship (although it may sometimes be defective or apparently clumsy) to pause when a poor old gentleman like me, who makes no pretence whatever at being a skilled parliamentary draftsman, stands up for the draftsman against the experts.
Lord Renton: That is splendid; but, with deep respect to my noble and learned friend—for whom I have enormous affection as well as respect—it has not answered the point that I made so hopefully: that this statement of general principle is one that might be followed on other occasions. After all, he has pointed out that this was put forward by the Law Commission and drafted by parliamentary counsel, and we are following it. I agree that we should follow such statements when they are well drafted, and we welcome them whenever they appear. I hope therefore that he will do all that he can to use his influence to encourage such statements.
Lord Elwyn-Jones: The noble Lord, Lord Renton, should not be too optimistic. When we considered the
1262
Public Order Bill, I think the introduction of general principle there was most formidably resisted and rejected not only by the Government Benches, but by the House.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I venture strongly to agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Renton, said, that we should, far more often than we do, draft in terms of general principle. Of course parliamentary counsel are immensely skilled, but there is more than one style of drafting. There is the style where one tries to cover every possible and foreseeable contingency. That causes constant difficulty when it comes to interpretation. The other is drafting in terms of general principle. That was recommended to the Renton Committee in a powerful joint memorandum by the Lord President in Scotland and the Lord Justice Clerk, and it was endorsed by the Renton Committee.
The House had an extraordinary example of the obstinacy, if I may say so, of parliamentary counsel in this regard in the Child Abduction and Custody Act 1985. That exhibited in a schedule a convention. One article of that convention was omitted although it was accepted by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor and by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Advocate that that was binding and would be applied by the courts. Nevertheless, it was absurdly omitted even from a schedule because its style of drafting—a perfectly well-known style of drafting internationally—was not the style of drafting to which parliamentary counsel's office in this country obstinately adheres in defiance of the recommendations of the Renton Committee. I therefore venture strongly to support the noble Lord, Lord Renton.
Clause 1 agreed to.
Clause 2 [Construction of enactments relating to parental rights and duties]:
4.15 p.m.
Lord Silkin of Dulwich Lord Silkin of Dulwich moved Amendment No. 7:
Page 2, line 19, at end insert—
("(h) the British Nationality Act 1981;").
The noble and learned Lord said: With this amendment we move from a fascinating area of drafting to a very important area of substance. On the subject of drafting, perhaps I may straight away reassure the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor that the amendment is not an attempt to improve on the work of the parliamentary draftsman or the Law Commission; indeed, quite the reverse. I do not expect that as it stands it will be adopted, but I hope that it will provide the opportunity for an extremely important debate.
The amendment is concerned with the only major area of discrimination against the illegitimate child that will be left when the Bill as it now stands becomes law. The present provisions of the Bill do not cover citizenship. The consequence is that the illegitimate child will continue to take the mother's nationality while his legitimate brother—or it may be halfbrother—will take the father's. That result will not depend on proof of paternity. It will be the case however clearly acknowledged paternity may be. Suppose, for example, that the mother is a foreign

1263
national and the father British. The child born within marriage will be British. The child born outside marriage will not; he may even be stateless.
Before the passage of the British Nationality Act 1981, the size of the problem was not as great as it is today; but in two ways that Act increased the problem. It ended British citizenship by birth alone and it caused British citizenship to become the most important factor, the key to the right of abode here. Thus the 1981 Act itself created the very discrimination that this Bill is designed so far as possible to remove.
It went further. It made an exception to the ending of British citizenship by birth where the father or mother is British. But, having given that easement, it then removes it from the illegitimate child by providing in Section 50(9) that for this purpose that child has no father.
British citizenship, I certainly do not need to tell your Lordships, is a very highly prized possession. Indeed, wars have been fought for it, and not only in the distant past. To the extent that the Bill fails to remove that discrimination—a discrimination not created but accentuated by the 1981 Act—it cannot be said, and here I quote the Explanatory Memorandum of the Bill,
"to remove, so far as possible, the legal disadvantages of illegitimacy so far as they affect the illegitimate child".
A very significant gap in his protection remains unfilled. That gap has been recognised not only recently; it was recognised very many years ago. The Law Commission's working party on the subject with which we are dealing not merely recognised it but actually proposed that the gap be closed. There was strong support for that view in the consultations that followed the issue of the working paper. There was strong and all-party parliamentary support for closing the gap in the debates on the British Nationality Bill. That support plainly found sympathy with the Minister of State at the Home Office (then Mr. Raison) for he said—and I quote from Standing Committee F, 17th February 1981, at col. 102:
"The Law Commissioners are looking at the problem and, when they report, we shall be very glad to consider the position of illegitimate children in relation to their fathers. If an acceptable solution could be found, the matter could be dealt with by legislation based on the Law Commission's Reports."
So the Home Office passed the nationality buck to the Law Commissioners, and they were indeed willing to receive it.
In paragraph 11.9 of the first report of the Law Commission for England and Wales, they endorsed their working paper proposal, referring in particular to the strong support for it in consultation and in Parliament. They dealt with the practical problems involved. They proposed solutions. In paragraph 11.20 they repeated their view that as a matter of policy the non-marital child should, on proof of parentage, be entitled to British citizenship on the same terms as the marital child. As I read the report the sole reason for not including clauses in the draft Bill on these lines was that at that time consultation was taking place in respect to Scottish law.
In due course the Law Commission for Scotland reported and the Law Commission for England and
1264
Wales produced its second report. That second report, for reasons which are not given in the report, did not advert to the question of citizenship. The present Bill contains no provision for dealing with this area of discrimination. That, I dare to say, is a glaring omission from a Bill which will give very great pleasure to people who are disadvantaged. It is an omission which has caused great concern to a number of bodies which otherwise greatly welcome the Bill. Their concern is the practical concern which results from the practical effects of discrimination.
For the purposes of the British Nationality Act, the illegitimate child will remain fatherless. The stigma will stay, and indeed in a form of far greater practical consequence to his life than the remote possibility of an inheritance from a paternal grandfather which the Bill rightly covers. But, even apart from those significant practical consequences, there remains the possible legal consequence that if this gap is not closed our law remains at odds with the European Convention on Human Rights and other international declarations.
I said earlier that the Home Office passed the buck to the Law Commission. The buck is now, it seems, firmly in the hands of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. I have no doubt that he is wholly competent to hold it, but whether he will be able to or whether he will be forced, as it were, to enter a curious game of passing the parcel back to the Home Office via his colleagues, I do not know.
On Second Reading the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor described the difficulties of legislating in this field as being formidable. Of course there are difficulties. Nobody suggests otherwise. It is for that very reason that my noble friends and those who have put their names down to this amendment and I have tabled an amendment which is essentially of a probing character. We believe that it is for government draftsmen to work out the details. We have to ask when these difficulties are likely to be resolved. How much urgency is being devoted to that task? After all it is now some 10 years since the issue was first under consideration. It is some five years since the first report of the Law Commission, which believed that it already had a solution. Surely the five years since then should have been adequate time to produce one. I use the Lord Chancellor's adjective, is this formidable area of discrimination considered to have low priority?
The Committee should be told very clearly where the Government stand. I very much hope that the noble and learned Lord will be able to assure us that a government amendment to fill the gap will be put down at a later stage either in this House or in another place. I am bound to say that without such an assurance I have little doubt that from all sides of the House we shall want to pursue this extremely important issue in future.
Baroness Faithfull: I rise to support the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin of Dulwich. The noble Lord, Lord Meston, regrets that he is unable to be here this afternoon, as he is in court.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, has so ably covered all the ground I shall not go over it again, save to say two things. One is that if this amendment

1265
or something like it is not accepted, that will be out of keeping with the general principle of the Bill so ably spoken about by the noble Lord, Lord Renton. The second point I should like to put to my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor is, that if it is not dealt with in this Bill, how will the problem be dealt with? Surely the Government will not be able to leave matters as they are.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, has said that this is a probing amendment. If it is not to be accepted, he and those who have put their names to it will want to know what other action the Government propose to take.
Baroness Ewart-Biggs: I too should like to support what my noble and learned friend Lord Silkin has said and to reiterate that all of us who have put our names to this amendment see it as a probing amendment. But we are quite sure that the intention of the amendment is right. We have no doubt about that. I should not like to go through the whole explanation again, but I should merely like to stress the great concern of those organisations representing the rights of children. They are delighted by this Bill. They are organisations that have not always been highly supportive of all government legislation. They are extremely supportive of this Bill except for this one area.
The National Council for One Parent Families is rightly delighted about the Bill, but it is anxious about this one area of discrimination which has been left. The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants has given several case histories which show the circumstances, which were touched on by my noble and learned friend Lord Silkin, where a child born of a mother who is not allowed to transmit citizenship will therefore be a stateless person.
It has also pointed out that the Bill shares other parental rights and duties between both parents, yet those provisions will be valueless to the child of a non-marital father, who cannot even live with him in this country if he chooses or needs to do so. It is quite unacceptable in a Bill designed to outlaw the concept of illegitimacy that such basic rights as the right to a nationality and the right of a child to have access to its parents and grandparents should be omitted.
I, too, hope very much that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will consider the intention of the amendment with favour, because I think that it will gain support from all sides of the House.
4.30 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor: We briefly adverted to this question on Second Reading, when I had the pleasure of acknowledging the extremely helpful speech given by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin of Dulwich, in support of the principles of the Bill. For reasons which he courteously explained to me, he was unable to hear my comments because he had a long-standing engagement elsewhere.
Basically speaking, one of the difficulties of getting law reform through Parliament consists in the Minister responsible—in a substantial minority of cases, it is the Lord Chancellor—not putting into a particular Bill matters which ought to be dealt with in another context. The omission from the Law
1266
Commission's report and from the draft Bill of this clause or of anything like it was not an accident; it was based on a number of perfectly sound practical considerations. This is not a Bill about nationality; it is a Bill about the position of children born out of wedlock. A Bill about nationality would have essentially to be a United Kingdom Bill and would have to be preceded by a good deal of consultation.
The Act of Parliament which corresponded with this one last year or the year before was a Scottish Bill. This Bill does not, I think, apply to Northern Ireland; it applies only to England and Wales. I should imagine it to be quite unthinkable that a Bill applying solely to England and Wales should apply to England and Wales with a different law of nationality from that which is applied in Scotland or Northern Ireland. It must be dealt with by United Kingdom legislation.
I must say frankly that I have no objection, and I think the Government have no opposition, to the general principle that a child born out of wedlock should be able to acquire citizenship through his father. But there are formidable difficulties about how the principle can be satisfactorily established in the context of our citizenship law. These difficulties arise not least from the fact that it is extremely difficult to establish paternity in cases where the child was born abroad. There is really very little difficulty—except in some cases which we may be discussing in this Committee stage—in establishing who is the mother of the child, but if a child is born, let us say, in some remote country where conditions are not quite so easily the subject of proof as in this country, the difficulty of establishing paternity is very considerable.
I think one must also consider another aspect of the matter which may have escaped the brave patriotism of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin. It is this. He said, quite rightly—and I suppose that everybody in this Chamber would agree—that British citizenship is much prized as a privilege. He went on to utter what I think was a non sequitur, that not to deal with this matter in this Bill was an act of discrimination against the child.
I do not agree with that. I would regard British citizenship as a much prized privilege, and I do so regard my own citizenship; but so is French citizenship regarded by a Frenchman; so is Canadian citizenship by a Canadian; and so is American citizenship, by a citizen of the United States. I suppose that an Indian citizen feels exactly the same about Indian citizenship.
When we get into hostile discrimination, I think that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, was probably overstating his case. One does not want to encourage without considerable consultation questions of private international law in a Bill dealing solely with the principles of English and Welsh law in relation to children born out of wedlock. If there are hard cases of the kind which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, brought to the Committee's attention, and there is (as there may be) a certain delay in introducing United Kingdom legislation of this kind pending consultation, there is a very simple way through.
He has dealt with a very reasonable case, a case where one child was a British citizen because he was born in this country while his brother or half brother might not be of British citizenship because his birth or

1267
his paternity might have taken place abroad. It is a very real case; although, as I could show from figures which I am not going to quote, a fairly rare one.
But I am quite sure that my right honourable friend the Home Secretary would use his very wide discretion in matters of naturalisation to see that such children were not disadvantaged by any delay in the law. Obviously, the case would have to be brought before him in such a matter
But I cannot agree, for the reasons I gave at Second Reading, that this Bill is a proper vehicle for something which must apply to the whole of the United Kingdom, which must follow consultation and which may require discussion as between us and countries who might quite easily be affected by what we propose to do. I am sympathetic to what has been said. I do not want to conceal my sympathy because it is real, and I know that the Government are not unsympathetic. However, I do not think that I can take the point further this afternoon, and I think that we should be doing a real disservice to this Bill by trying to force a matter into this Bill to which it is not appropriate.
Lord Silkin of Dulwich: The noble and learned Lord, in the course of his reply, courteous as I knew it would be, has put forward several points which give me at any rate some comfort. His own sympathy I had very little doubt about before he said what he said, but I am extremely glad to hear him confirm it. The sympathy of the Government and the fact that there is no opposition in the Government to the general principle of citizenship going through the father is again a very important gain which this debate has achieved.
I have no doubt that it is an important gain to know that in the kind of case I and the noble and learned Lord mentioned, where there is a disparity between one member of a family and another which you cannot justify at all, the Home Secretary would be likely to look with sympathy at the possibility of naturalisation or dealing with it by other means. Those, I think, are very tangible gains.
Of course they do not go as far as we should like the Government to go. I am not blaming the noble and learned Lord in the least, for I know the constraints that he is under. But notwithstanding what Mr. Raison said in the debates on the British Nationality Bill so long ago—that it was for the Law Commission, the very Law Commission whose report we are considering at the moment, to look at the problem and to find the solution; from which one would have thought that he meant that when a Bill came forward on illegitimacy it could include this matter—it appears from what the noble and learned Lord has said that the Government are inclined to treat it as a matter of nationality and that it will therefore find its way back to the Home Office, no doubt to take its place in the queue among other Home Office measures which from my own experience I know may cause a very considerable delay.
It is disappointing to be told that, because I think that the hopes of many were uplifted by what Mr. Raison said. Certainly when they knew that this Bill was coming forward they hoped that a place could be
1268
found for it. Of course some of us who recall the debates on (and the amendments moved by the Government to) the Public Order Bill recently found that the Home Office do not shrink from bringing into a Bill, if it is convenient, matters which are perhaps not strictly within the compass of the Bill itself. They may even have to amend the Long Title in order to do so. One would have hoped that perhaps this matter, which is partly Home Office as regards citizenship and partly the Lord Chancellor's Department as regards the consequences of illegitimacy, could still find a place in this Bill before it is finally passed.
Having said that, if further time for consultation is needed, how much time will be needed when we have already had such a long time, as has been said so forcefully by the noble Baroness opposite? Of course I am content to leave the matter as it is. I cannot guarantee that we will not bring it forward again at the next stage. My colleagues may very well feel, not having read what the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor has said, that this is a matter of such great importance that it ought not simply to be lost from our discussions on the Bill.
Equally, I have very little doubt that it will form a major part of discussion in another place, whatever happens here. Therefore I hope the noble and learned Lord will discuss it again with his colleagues. I accept that the difficulties are formidable but I cannot believe that they are insuperable. After all, the Law Commission in their first report may not have got the complete answer but they have gone a long way. Furthermore, while I appreciate that some of the difficulties to which the noble and learned Lord has referred would mean that one could not have a total acceptance of the principle because of the problems—particularly in the case of people who are born abroad and so on—it is surely preferable to have at any rate three-quarters of a loaf rather than no part of the loaf at all. In the event, even if it were difficult for some people born abroad to prove the necessary facts on which the citizenship would be founded, that ought not to militate against the citizenship being available where the child is not born abroad and the difficulties are not apparent.
I therefore hope, as I say, that with the great sympathy the noble and learned Lord has expressed, with his usual great ability and courtesy, he will seek to persuade his colleagues that something should be done before the Bill is passed into law, whether in this Chamber or in another place, With that proposal, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 2 agreed to.
Clauses 3 to 7 agreed to.
Clause 8 [Rights where child in care etc.]:
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 8:
Page 4, line 51, leave out ("guardian") and insert ("guardians").
The noble and learned Lord said: This is the first of a number of government amendments. They are all very technical, very dull, and can raise no question of principle. They correct errors of a very minor nature in the Bill. The reference here should be to "guardians" in the plural. The following line deals with the case of a single guardian. I beg to move.
Lord Renton: I wonder whether my noble and learned friend could say, in view of earlier discussions that we have had, during which the work of the draftsman was quite rightly praised, whether these amendments he is moving—this one and the ones which follow—result from mistakes made in the instructions given to the draftsman or from misunderstanding by the draftsman of those instructions, or are simply due to further thoughts by the draftsman as to how to improve his drafts.
The Lord Chancellor: I think that among these amendments examples of all three probably could be found, but I will make inquiries.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 8, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 9 to 18 agreed to.
Clause 19 [Dispositions of property]:
4.45 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 9:
Page 12, line 33, after ("of") insert ("section 1 as applied by").
The noble and learned Lord said: This amendment is necessary in order to make clear that the use of the words "heir" or "heirs" or any expression which is used to create an entailed interest does not show a contrary intention for the purposes of the new rule of construction established in Clause 1; namely, the presumption that the relationship between two people is to be construed without regard to whether either of them or any person through which the relationship is deduced is or is not born out of wedlock.
If I may answer my noble friend Lord Renton on this amendment only, it is consequential on an earlier deletion from Clause 19(1) of a misleading specific reference to a contrary intention. When counsel effected this deletion he failed to make the necessary consequential amendment. That is the answer only on this one. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 10:
Page 12, line 40, leave out second ("or").
The noble and learned Lord said: This amendment, which leaves out the second "or", does so because the word is superfluous and makes nonsense of Clause 19(4). I think this is perhaps another example of what my noble friend was referring to in his third class. I beg to move.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I am quite certain that it is my fault, but I do not understand how this is meant to read.
The Lord Chancellor: I must look at it first.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: While my noble and learned friend is going through the papers, perhaps I may say that it seems to me that if one leaves out the second "or" it reads:
"Where under any disposition of real or personal property any interest in such property is limited".
Is that what is intended?
The Lord Chancellor: Yes, I understand that it is.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 19, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 20 [No special protection for trustees and personal representatives]:
Lord Silkin of Dulwich Lord Silkin of Dulwich moved Amendment No. 11:
Leave out Clause 20 and insert the following new clause:
("Extension of protection for trustees and personal representatives.
. In section 17 of the Family Law Reform Act 1969 (which provides protection for trustees and personal representatives) in paragraph (a) after the words "the father of" there shall be inserted the words "or any person related through the father to,".").
The noble and learned Lord said: I beg to move this amendment, which stands in the names of my noble friend Lord Mishcon and myself. Perhaps I may take this opportunity to say two things. First, my noble friend much regrets his inability to be here for this debate, but he has had to go abroad. Secondly, the first word in the second line of the amendment—a rather odd word—ought of course to be "protection" and not "pretection" as appears on the Marshalled List.
This amendment would restore the wording used in draft Clause 24(3) of the Law Commission's first report (to be found on page 256 of that report) in lieu of the wording used in draft Clause 20 of the second report, which the Bill repeats. We have a conflict between the two reports. Both draft clauses amend Section 17 of the Family Law Reform Act 1969; and that section protects trustees and personal representatives who convey or distribute property without having ascertained that there is no person who is or who may be entitled to an interest via an illegitimacy. The raison d'être for Section 17, as I understand it, is that it was thought an unfair, a burdensome and, indeed, a potentially embarrassing duty to place on trustees or executors and administrators of estates to search out for illegitimate relationships.
The commission's first report accepted that view, and therefore sought to amend Section 17 only to the extent of bringing it into conformity with its recommendation that the relatives of an illegitimate child should have the same right of inheritance as the child himself. Thus the first report did no more in this context than to recommend an amendment which was consequential upon the general proposal. It did not recommend an amendment which affected the substance of Section 17 of the 1969 Act.
The draft clause in the second report goes much further and the Bill follows it. It repeals altogether Section 17 and thus removes a protection which at present exists for trustees and personal representatives. That is not merely directly contradictory to the proposals in the first report but is also far more far-reaching. This clause in the Bill makes a fundamantal change by withdrawing the protection which has existed for many years. It is hard to see how such a fundamental change can be said to arise out of the policy of this Bill. Subject to what the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor may say, it seems to me that it falls to be considered more in relation to the law of trust generally than in relation to the law of illegitimacy.
Learned and doubtless weighty explanations were given in both reports for the differences of view

1271
between the Law Commission in its first state and the Law Commission in its second state. I have studied them all. I cannot say that I am convinced by the arguments in the second report, although I certainly do not intend to seek to analyse and dissect them today. The second report relies on the right to advertise the claimants and seems, in effect, to say that this protection created by Section 17 of the 1969 Act is unnecessary because the right to advertise is itself a sufficient protection. If that were so now, it would have been the case when the section was put into that very much earlier Act. Certainly, no argument has been put forward which demonstrates why Parliament at that time was wrong.
What is quite clear is that in the case of small estates the cost of advertisement—which I am told could be about £80—would be a significant factor. I should have thought that it is not right that trustees and personal representatives should feel a compulsion to advertise against the bare possibility that there may be an illegitimate child.
However, I doubt whether it is necessary to go into those rival arguments. As I said, the amendment in the Bill is of a fundamental character, repealing as it does existing law which was part of the trustees' protection and that of personal representatives. I feel, as I said, that it is more sensible to leave the policy of that branch of the law as it stands to await consideration by the Law Commission in relation to the general policy of the protection of trustees and personal representatives. That can be accomplished by restoring the wording of the first report's draft clause, and the amendment which I move would have that effect. Perhaps I may add I am informed that the amendment is supported by the Law Society. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: The noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, adumbrated this discussion on Second Reading. The question for decision by your Lordships is a simple one. Is the Bill to incorporate a provision recommended by the Law Commission in 1982, as the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, wearing his hat, I fear, as the spokesman for the Law Society, but helped by his noble and learned friend Lord Silkin, wearing his hat as a member of the Opposition Front Bench, urges, or is it to take the form recommended by the Law Commission three months ago?
It is now clear from what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, has said that the intention is to restore the 1982 position, but in that case I must say, and on this occasion say firmly on advice, that the noble and learned Lord's amendment would not achieve its purpose, since it would restore to the statute book Section 17 of the Family Law Reform Act 1969 without also restoring Sections 14 and 15 of that Act, which are referred to in Section 17 but repealed by the Bill. That is perhaps an irrelevance, since I am now going to talk about the merits. The noble and learned Lord must realise that in its present form the amendment will not do for purely technical reasons.
The Law Commissioners very carefully considered the earlier form of their report and concluded that it was mistaken. I should have thought that they would have done so only if they had very good reasons for
1272
reaching that conclusion. Their reasons were as follows. In the first place, it may be more onerous to ascertain whether there is anyone entitled through an illegitimate person than to ascertain other matters which arise under the general duty to distribute the estate to the right beneficiaries. I think this is a very powerful reason. Let me give an example. Where a deceased lived or travelled extensively abroad in the course of his life it may be very difficult to establish that he did not somewhere contract a valid marriage of which there are issue entitled to share in his estate as legitimate issue.
I see my noble friend Lord Home of the Hirsel looking at me rather with a basilisk stare. I remember that in the 18th century there was just such a case in which his direct ancestor was notoriously involved. There may also be doubt as to whether the property should be distributed under an intestacy or whether there is an undiscovered will, or, if there is a will, whether it has been overtaken by a later will. I should have thought that this was a very powerful argument. The particular problem posed by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, is no more difficult of ascertainment than these other problems which are precisely the same kind and are raised in the ordinary course of the administration of estates. I should have thought there was no particular reason to favour this problem rather than the others.
Secondly, sufficient protection, in the view of the Law Commissioners, is already afforded to personal representatives and trustees under Section 27 of the Trustee Act 1925. Under this provision, a personal representative or trustee may advertise for claims. He is then exempt from liability to all claimants, except those of whose claim he has notice.
This was originally thought by the Law Commission, as it was by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, to be insufficient, because it was then argued that not all personal representatives do advertise, particularly since in the case of small estates, it could be argued, as the noble and learned Lord did, that the expense might be disproportionately heavy. But if the point has any validity at all, it is equally valid in respect of all the other difficulties and uncertainties against which advertising can provide protection and in respect of which there is no equivalent to Section 17 of the 1969 Act.
The noble and learned Lord is quite right in saying that the cost of an advertisement under Section 27 of the Act of 1925 is currently about £80—not a very high sum by modern inflated standards. But in the case of estates which are so small that it would prove onerous, the liability of the personal representatives would also be correspondingly small and it would be for the representatives to judge in this, as in all the other matters which may arise, whether the expenditure is disproportionate to the risk. It is understood that professional personal representatives almost invariably advertise, which renders further protection than that afforded by the Act of 1925 unnecessary.
The third point is that any question of embarrassment being caused to personal representatives and trustees was not thought sufficient justification for the present statutory protection on the ground that, where

1273
there is some reason to suspect that there might be an "illegitimate link", a conscientious personal representative or trustee would normally make inquiries, however embarrassing, if only to be sure that he would not be exposing the other beneficiaries to a later action against them. Moreover, to compromise the prospects of a person realising his rights through an illegitimate link in order to save embarrassment might seem to mark and encourage the very sense of stigma which the Bill is otherwise seeking to remove.
Fourthly, and I hope lastly, it may not be in the interests of the other beneficiaries that the personal representative's duty to establish the estate to the right beneficiaries should be qualified by Section 17. A person claiming through an "illegitimate link" would still be entitled to trace the assets into the hands of the other beneficiaries when they had got them, and they might have an understandable reason to complain if reasonable inquiries before distribution would have disclosed his existence; and, indeed, the personal representatives might find it embarrassing, too. For those reasons the Law Commissioners came to the conclusion that second thoughts were best and this is the view that I would impress upon the Committee.
5 p.m.
Lord Silkin of Dulwich: The arguments put forward by the noble and learned Lord seem to me to go to the whole principle not so much of the amendment as of Section 17 of the 1969 Act. The Law Commission's second report said—and the noble and learned Lord was repeating its arguments—that Parliament was mistaken in passing that section. I do not intend to go into the arguments at any length today, but I would say that I think they took a little lightly the cost question.
There are quite a number of small estates of £100 to £150 in which £80 of expenses would make a very large hole. Whether the trustees and personal representatives in that sort of case could honestly say to themselves, "Well, we are only dealing with a small estate, and therefore we need not give as much attention to the matter as we otherwise would", is a matter that I should not like to venture upon. I do not know what view a court would take about that. But I think that perhaps the Law Commission's arguments have not been as persuasive as one would have liked when it was setting them against a good deal of thought by the same body, the Law Commission, at the earlier stage.
Having said that, of course I shall ensure—if I may use words that come more usually from the opposite side than from this side—that what has been said in the debate is read by my noble friend Lord Mishcon and, I hope, by the Law Society, and that they will have an opportunity of coming back on it at the next stage of this Bill if they so wish. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 20 agreed to.
Clause 21 agreed to.
Clause 22 [Declarations of parentage]:
[Amendment No. 12 not moved.]
On Question, Whether Clause 22 shall stand part of the Bill?
Lord Silkin of Dulwich: Perhaps I may say a word or two on Clause 22 and particularly in relation to the amendment which my noble friend Lord Mishcon put down. I considered whether I should support him on it but I came to the conclusion that I should not. At the risk of getting a wigging from him and possibly from the Law Society as well, since I understand that it supported it, I hope that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will be able to tell me that my reason for that is a good one.
I looked at Order 80 of the Rules of the Supreme Court, and it seemed to me that it gave adequate protection and, in effect, did what my noble friend's amendment was seeking to do, his amendment being a reproduction of a provision that appeared in the draft Bill as provided by the first report of the Law Commission. He sought to restore a provision that is in the first report. I do not think that the second report has explained why it was taken out but it may be that that is the reason. I very much hope that the noble and learned Lord will be able to tell me that I am right there.
Lord Renton: Before my noble and learned friend replies, I wonder whether he would be so good as to help by clarifying a matter on this rewritten Section 56 of the Family Law Act of this year, which I must confess I do not fully understand. We find that a person may apply to the court for a declaration with respect to his parentage. That is in subsection (1). Subsection (2) then states:
"Any person may apply to the court for a declaration that he is the legitimate child of his parents",
and what follows is based upon those two limitations.
But there could be a case—and perhaps I should declare a family interest—where you have a mentally handicapped person on whose behalf there should perhaps be an application; or you may have a case where other members of the family stand to gain or to lose by the declaration of the legitimacy of another member of the family. But it would not appear that in the latter case there is any jurisdiction given to the court to hear the application. Those two practical human circumstances are ones which should perhaps engage our attention.
The Lord Chancellor: To deal first with the observations of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, yes, the court already has inherent power to deal with cases where the rights of a minor are abused, and they are considered to be adequate.
There is another point which I should like to make. It will be necessary to introduce rules of court at a later stage; I can then consider the possibility, without commitment at this stage, of ensuring that in all applications for declarations of parentage the next friend can be represented by the official solicitor who would become involved on behalf of the minor. I believe that that would deal with the point which the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, raised.
I shall have to consider the point raised by my noble friend Lord Renton and either write to him or give him some other explanation in due course. I had not thought of the point and I should like to take advice before I give him an answer.
Clause 22 agreed to.
Clause 23 [Provisions as to blood tests]:
Lord Kilbracken Lord Kilbracken moved Amendment No. 13:
Page 14, line 42, leave out ("parentage") and insert ("paternity").
The noble Lord said: Clause 23 deals with blood tests that may be ordered to be carried out where the paternity or, as it is worded in the Bill, the parentage of a child falls to be determined. Perhaps I may say that this amendment runs in harness with Amendments Nos. 18 and 19; I hope it will be convenient if I deal with those amendments together. Amendment No. 15 raises a rather different point, and I wish to move that amendment separately.
The Committee will notice that in line 42 there is a reference to,
"any civil proceedings in which the parentage of any person falls to be determined".
If the Committee will turn to page 15, line 8, the reference is to persons who are,
"excluded by the results from being the father or mother of the person".
Several lines further on, reference is made to,
"the results in determining whether that party is the father or mother of that person".
The simple point is that in all these cases the identity of the mother is never in any possible doubt. The baby has been seen to issue from her; her identity is quite definitely established. The only time when a mother's identity could be in any doubt is, for example, when babies are mixed up in hospital after birth. That is a circumstance which we do not have to consider here. We are speaking of blood tests, and they have never been used to establish the mother's identity; although, in the old-fashioned blood test of which I shall be speaking later on, it was necessary to have a sample of her blood in order to find out as much as possible about the father.
I therefore feel that it would be much more accurate to substitute the word "paternity" for "parentage" in line 42. That is the purpose of this drafting amendment. It would then be necessary to leave out the word "or mother" in lines 8 and 12 on page 15. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: With great humility, I must again put the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, right on science. The noble Lord quite candidly explained that the thinking behind his amendment was that the mother of an illegitimate child will never be in doubt except when two babies are mixed up in hospital. This is wrong although it is likely that paternity will more often be in issue. If the noble Lord will look further up the page to new subsection 56(1)(b), which is to be part of the Family Law Reform Act 1986, he will see that a declaration of parentage includes a declaration that a person named in the application is the applicant's mother. Therefore it is not a question of draftsmanship.
As an instance where such a declaration might be sought—but not the only instance—perhaps I may mention the case of a child who had originally been fostered or was adopted shortly after birth and was then led to believe that the adoptive parents were both his real parents. We all remember that this happened in the famous case of Oedipus some years ago! It led to
1276
unfortunate results and to a great play by the poet Sophocles. But the child might, as happened to the unfortunate Oedipus, eventually get an inkling as to who his true mother was. In the case of Oedipus, he found out that she was his wife, who had given birth to a child. However, in this enlightened Bill he could, if need be, establish the identity of his true mother if he wished to do so. It is therefore possible for the mother's identity to be in doubt as well as that of the father, and it is the policy of the Bill to apply the declaration procedure in such a matter.
5.15 p.m.
Lord Kilbracken: The noble and learned Lord's advisers dredged up the most extraordinary reasons for refusing to agree to my last amendment. I know that no Minister ever likes to admit that any amendment should be made to any Bill at any time, and amendments are resisted with the greatest power at the Minister's disposal. It was completely irrelevant, as regards the last amendment, to say that a period of time elapses between intercourse and conception.
Now the noble and learned Lord's advisers have managed to find objections to saying "paternity" when paternity is what is actually meant in every case which will come before the courts with which this section is designed to deal. I do not see that the case of poor Oedipus and his unfortunate wife-mother has anything to do with this sub-section, and I do not believe he would have availed himself of a DNA analysis even if that had been available at that time. However, no doubt Sophocles would have made the most of it if he had.
I rather wish that I had not withdrawn my previous amendment but had said "Content" in a moderately loud voice. In view of the reply of the noble and learned Lord, that is what I intend to do in this case.
Lord Airedale: Is the noble Lord not being a bit hard? What about the case of the mother who abandons her infant and, when it is found and she is tackled about it, denies that it is her child? What about that case?
Lord Kilbracken: I think that that kind of case can come up, and there are cases in which it may be desirable to establish maternity. However, that it not something which will come up for clarification in cases to which this subsection is destined to apply.
The Lord Chancellor: The noble Lord seems to have forgotten the case of Moses in the bullrushes.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Kilbracken Lord Kilbracken moved Amendment No. 14:
Page 14, line 43, leave out ("falls to be determined") and insert ("is relevant but in doubt").
The noble Lord said: In this case I have put down the amendment because, as the Committee will see, the subsection refers to determining,
"the parentage of any person".
It states:
"In any civil proceedings in which the parentage of any person falls to be determined".

1277
As your Lordships will know, it used to be impossible using the old-fashioned blood tests to determine the father of a child. No one ever tried to establish who was the mother of a child. If the mother's blood and the child's blood were available, with the putative father's blood it was possible in most cases to exclude someone as being the father of that child; but it was not possible to establish definitely that he was the father. Nowadays, with tissue typing and DNA analysis, that is possible.
Tissue typing and DNA analysis, I am informed, could be described as blood tests, but it is not clear whether the Government intend that these tests should be covered by the language used. With DNA analysis the father can be identified with I think, absolute certainty. For instance, these tests are now being used at Heathrow to establish the paternity of children who are being put forward as the children of a particular father for the purpose of bringing them into this country.
If tests of this kind are visualised as a means of determining paternity or maternity under this Bill, then this language is perfectly all right. But in that case I suggest that the words "or is not" in line 46 should be omitted, a proposal that would recommend itself to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale. On the other hand, paragraphs (b) and (c) of subsection (2) on the next page, especially paragraph (c), strongly imply that those tests are not going to be used. Paragraph (c) refers to,
"any party who is not so excluded, the value, if any, of the results in determining whether that party is the father or mother".
If a DNA analysis is carried out, the results are bound to be of very great value.
What has to be decided is whether or not the language of the Bill is intended to cover the tests that are available for use now. In either case appropriate amendments should be made here or in subsection (2). I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: I do not know whether it was the intention—I thought not from the noble Lord's speech—but the effect of the amendment eliminates the idea that the parentage of a person can be determined in legal proceedings. But if that were the intention—and I gather it was not—it would be wrong. Where the noble Lord is certainly wrong is in thinking that the Government are not fully aware of the relatively new techniques which enable paternity to be proved, if not quite beyond doubt, at any rate almost beyond doubt.
The noble Lord was quite right to refer in that connection to DNA fingerprinting, the result of which can be accurate almost to 100 per cent. Even in 1982 the Law Commission was already well aware of this point. I need refer the noble Lord only to paragraph 10.28 of its first report (Law Commission No. 118) in 1982. Since 1982 techniques have become even more sophisticated and it is now possible for blood tests to show with a degree approaching certainty whether or not a named person is the parent of the applicant.
There may, however, be reasons, and expense might be one of them, why in a particular case the parties may wish to use only the older type of blood testing which can prove only that a particular person is not
1278
related to another. Clause 23 has therefore been drafted to cater for the possibility that either type of blood test, or indeed any more sophisticated blood tests which may be invented in the future, may be used. The court will in all cases hear the results of the tests under subsection (2)(a) and further deductions to be drawn from those results will be placed before the court pursuant to paragraphs (b) and (c). The object of the clause as unamended is to give the applicant options, one of which, although adequate, may be cheaper than the other. But it is not due to any ignorance as to the scientific facts on the part of those who drafted the clause.
Lord Kilbracken: I wish to examine in detail what the noble and learned Lord has said but in the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Kilbracken Lord Kilbracken moved Amendment No. 15:
Page 14, line 45, leave out from ("to") to ("and") in line 47 and insert ("obtain such information about the paternity of that person as such tests may furnish;")
The noble Lord said: The noble and learned Lord spoke of DNA testing. I made it clear that the Government were aware of such tests when I said that they are being used very widely in the blood testing of immigrants. Therefore there can be no objection here to the phrase,
"a party to the proceedings is or is not the father or mother".
Nonetheless the reason for the test is much more to do with what is said in my amendment than with what is said in the Bill.
The Bill says that a direction may be given,
"for the use of blood tests to ascertain whether such tests show that a party to the proceedings is or is not the father or mother".
That is not the use that the tests are being put to; to ascertain whether or not they show who is the father. The purpose of the tests is as stated in my amendment, which is to,
"obtain such information about the paternity [or parentage] of that person as such tests may furnish".
I very much prefer my language. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: As I explained in my answer to the noble Lord on his last amendment, the clause as drafted indeed contemplates the use of blood tests which ascertain that a party to the proceedings is or is not the father or mother of the person whose parentage is being determined, and the wording of the Bill is therefore entirely appropriate as it stands.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.30 p.m.
Lord Kilbracken Lord Kilbracken moved Amendment No. 16:
Page 14, line 49, leave out from ("from") to end of line 51 and insert ("that person, his mother and any putative father;")
The noble Lord said: I beg to move Amendment No. 16 and at the same time I shall speak to Amendment No. 17. I have already spoken to Amendments Nos. 18 and 19.
Amendment No. 16 refers to the passage on page 14, line 49, which describes people from whom the court may require blood samples to be taken, who are:
"any party who is alleged to be the father or mother of that person"—

1279
which means the child, as it usually will be a child—
"and any other party to the proceedings".
I want to make the point that instead of saying "any party who is alleged to be the father" it should say "the putative father".
Of course we have to take blood from the mother, but a blood sample can also be ordered from,
"any other party to the proceedings",
which presumably includes the judges or anyone else who is giving evidence in the court—anyone who is a party. I cannot understand why this Bill should authorise the taking of blood samples from anyone other than those I have named in my amendment; namely, the child, his mother and any putative father. There will normally be only one putative father but there may be two and I suppose in the case of a promiscuous lady there may be three or four. All these people are covered by my wording, which simply substitutes at line 49:
"that person, his mother and any putative father".
Amendment No. 17 is consequential. I beg to move.
Lord Meston: I wonder whether in moving this amendment the noble Lord considered why the Bill as expressed limits the direction to parties to the proceedings. The position is that a blood test is an infringement of a liberty and when a piece of litigation ensues in which somebody's paternity is in question, it is often part of the game—and I speak as someone who has conducted affiliation and paternity proceedings of one kind or another over a number of years—to allege a number of other candidates for paternity. Sometimes there is quite a formidable list and quite an extensive inquiry has to be undertaken.
However, I suggest that it would be quite wrong that other people who are not parties to the proceedings should be at risk of having blood test orders made against them. The Bill appears to me to be drafted in this way in order to protect innocent third parties from allegations, usually made by men who are alleged to be fathers, against people who are not in the forum of the court but are outside it and not parties to the proceedings.
The Lord Chancellor: I am glad to see that the noble Lord, Lord Meston, is back in the Chamber and I hope he won his case. At any rate he has put his finger on one point. However, the amendment will allow tests to be ordered only from the person whose parentage is in issue, the mother and the putative father. Quite apart from the point that the very question at issue may be whether a particular person is the mother of the person whose parentage is at issue, it would be wrong to limit in this way the persons from whom blood tests can be ordered.
An example which was given by the Law Commission at paragraph 10.30 of report No. 118 is the mother's husband. If it can only be shown with less than certainty that the putative father is in fact likely to be the true father, it may be very relevant for the mother's husband to be tested, since his exclusion from among the ranks of putative fathers would be highly material.
1280
Additionally, when one or both of the parents is dead, a person may nevertheless desire to establish his parentage—for example, for the purposes of succession to property. In this connection, although the matter would be entirely within the discretion of the court, tests could be ordered from alleged brothers and sisters.
Of course at present scientifically these tests would not necessarily be conclusive but this branch of medical science is evolving fast and it is right that the Bill should cater for it. However, the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, has rendered a service to me at any rate, because his amendment leads me to believe that there may be a defect in the drafting of the new Section 56(1) of the Family Law Act to be inserted by Clause 22.
As I have said, it is the policy that it should be permissible to seek declarations of parentage even after the death of the parent, but Clause 56(1) is drafted in such terms that the word "is" is used in the phrase,
"a person named in the application is his father", and so on.
At first sight that may be a defect. In fact the amendment, although unacceptable, may have served a useful purpose.
Lord Silkin of Dulwich: For my benefit perhaps, I wonder whether the noble and learned Lord can say whether a brother or sister could be or would be a party to the proceedings. If not, or if there is any doubt about it, it may be that that point also needs to be looked at further.
The Lord Chancellor: I shall certainly bear that in mind but I shall need time to take advice on it.
Lord Kilbracken: I am glad that the noble and learned Lord has found it possible to say that he has found some residual value in one of my amendments. I listened with interest to the intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Meston, and I should like to say that my desire would be to limit still further rather than extend the number of people whose blood can be tested.
After all, in the Bill as it stands at present the court will be able to allow blood samples to be taken from any party who is alleged to be the father, and that cannot include anyone who is not the putative father. If it is alleged that a man is the father, that makes him a putative father, "putative" meaning "thought to be" from the Latin word puto, I think. Therefore I suggest that far from extending the measure to other categories, my amendment is limiting its application.
However, let us not get into Latin grammar. I am quite content to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: Before the Question is put, and following the point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, will my noble and learned friend consider whether,
"any other party to the proceedings",
is apt to cover a party who is cited to see proceedings, which one frequently finds in this type of case?
The Lord Chancellor: I am very sorry but I did not hear the vital word in the question of my noble and learned friend. Will he say it again?
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: Pursuant to the remarks of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, which my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor said he would investigate, I should like to ask him to seek counsel on whether or not the phrase "any other party to the proceedings" is apt to cover a party who is cited to see proceedings. I venture to point out that this is a quite frequent feature of this type of case. I do not demand an immediate answer. If my noble and learned friend would say that he will consider the point, I should be extremely flattered and gratified.
The Lord Chancellor: I will first of all read it in Hansard, then consider the point, and finally give my noble and learned friend an answer.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 17 to 19 not moved.]
Clause 23 agreed to:
Clause 24 agreed to.
Clause 27 [Artificial insemination]:
5.45 p.m.
Lord Denning Lord Denning moved Amendment No. 20:
Page 18, line 19, at end insert ("; provided that in the Register of Births and any other official or family record of the birth there shall be recorded, after the man's name, the words "By donation".").
The noble and learned Lord said: This clause is the first clause that I know of in any Bill dealing with artificial insemination—a modern and important problem. The Bill as it stands seeks to effect that when a married woman goes to a clinic and is artificially inseminated with the semen of an unknown man, and brings forth a child, then by law that child is deemed to be the lawful child of the husband and the wife and is to be registered on the birth certificate as the lawful child of the husband and wife. Is that right?
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Birmingham cannot be here today due to another important engagement. However, he has asked me to apologise but to put the case for him, and may I add, for the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London who himself on Second Reading raised the point which I am now raising.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Birmingham sent to me the official government publication—I call it "government"—which is given to married women when they go to a clinic seeking artificial insemination. The document is headed "Artificial Insemination". It is distributed by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, who, it is said.
"are grateful to the Department of Health and Social Security for funding the printing costs of the booklet".
When the married woman goes to the clinic, she is handed this document. The document states:
"AID is an alternative to adoption when the main factor leading to infertility, or the avoidance of pregnancies, is on the male side. This may be because the husband is unlikely ever to father a child due to low sperm fertility.".
The document later continues:
"Selecting AID Donors. The donors are carefully selected. They are required to be intelligent, fit and healthy and on questioning to have given no family history of hereditary disease. They must all be of very high fertility and every specimen of semen is checked before it is used to make sure that it reaches an acceptable standard.".
Then there is this important point:
"Confidentiality. The clinic is organised and your notes are kept in such a way that confidentiality is preserved. For example, the name of the donor is kept strictly confidential, so that there is no way in which you can learn his identity, and similarly, your name will not be known to the donor.
"Treatment. The treatment itself is straightforward and painless. It will be carried out by a doctor or nurse who will insert a simple instrument into your vagina to place the sperm in the mucus at the neck of the womb.".
Later, the document states:
"Legal Aspects. There are no laws against AID in this country.
"Legitimacy of the Baby. There is at present no legal guide for the registration of the AID baby. Strictly speaking, a baby conceived by AID should be registered as 'father unknown' and since it would then be illegitimate, the parents should adopt it. However, babies born within a marriage are presumed to be legitimate and provided you do not abstain from intercourse during the period in which AID was carried out there could be no certainty that any child conceived is not your husband's.".
The inference is that the woman can register the child with her husband's name as the father.
The document refers to,
"Telling your Child. Unless you decide to tell your child, there is no reason for him (or her) ever to know that he (or she) was conceived by AID. Whether or not you do so is entirely up to you'.
Then the document tells the woman how to go to the clinic. It continues:
"Content Form. For completion by husband and wife. To Dr. [Blank]. We [that is, the husband and wife] hereby request and authorise you or a suitably trained member of your staff to inseminate artifically [wife's name] by means of semen supplied by a donor selected by you. Signature of husband. Signature of wife; dated. Signature of witness. The form should be completed by the husband or wife in their own handwriting."
I have read from that document to show what is virtually an official, authorised pamphlet, issued to any married woman who goes to a clinic seeking to be artificially inseminated.
By Clause 27 it is declared that such a child born as a result of artificial insemination is by law the legitimate child of husband and wife. An earlier provision dealing with the birth registration puts in the husband as the father. Before this Bill, that could not be done. Under the registration provision as it now stands, in the case of an illegitimate child that has to appear on the birth certificate, but in future it will not.
Let us look at little further at where we are going. Is it right to tell a lie on the birth certificate? Is it fair for the child itself to be told and to be led to believe that the husband is the father when in truth some other man is the father? How does that square with the recommendation of the Warnock Committee which stated clearly at paragraph 4.21:
"We recommend that on reaching the age of eighteen the child should have access to the basic information about the donor's ethnic origin and genetic health and that legislation be enacted to provide the right of access to this."
How can legislation give a child that right when he has been told the contrary? He has never been told that he was conceived by artificial insemination rather than that he was fathered by the husband. How does the clause stand with the recommendation that on reaching the age of 18 a child should have access to the basic information about his birth? He should have that information. Every child should know his or her true ancestry. The child should know whether there is any hereditary disease and so on. It is not fair to the child.
On Second Reading, the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, said how important it was that children should be told the truth. The truth will not be told in the new birth certificate. That is not fair to the child. Is it fair to the grandparents to let them think that their son has had his own true-born child? They may provide for the child's education and will him property always believing that he is their son's true-born child. Would they do that if they knew that he was not his child but the child of some unknown donor? Is it fair to the grandparents to keep the matter quiet? In the case of a hereditary title, would it be fair to any of the Members of the Committee that this matter should be concealed from the grandparents? Your ancestry will be completely diluted if the Committee agrees to this clause.
The clause states:
"Nothing in this section shall affect … titles of honour".
That cannot be proved. It will not be possible to prove that if the artificial insemination is concealed, and is not shown on the birth certificate. It is wrong to tell an untruth on the birth certificate. It is not fair to the child, the grandparents or society. We should not sanction the telling of untruths on a birth certificate.
The Bill provides that the child will be recognised unless the husband proves that he did not consent to the artificial insemination. If he signs the document that I read out, he cannot prove that. There it is in writing. The consent has been got out of him.
Let us suppose that three months after signing that form the husband thinks better of the matter and wishes to withdraw his consent. He may have told his father and mother about the matter, and they may say, "You should not have agreed to that. You must withdraw your consent". Can he withdraw his consent? Not as I read the Bill. When the child is born—I do not go so far as to say this is possible—he may say, "The child is black. I thought that he was going to be white. They must have mixed up the sperm". Can he renounce his consent after the child is born because it is deformed? There may by then have been a separation or divorce from his wife. Is he bound by his consent for ever? Can he not tell the truth to the world and say, "That is not my child It is the child of an unknown man". It is not fair to the husband to have a clause in the Bill which provides that he shall be treated in law as the parent for all purposes. Can he not withdraw from that? Can he not say the contrary? Those are some of the questions that I ask.
The clause as it now stands was in the 1982 report of the Law Commission. That was before the subject had been investigated by the Warnock Committee. That committee went into the matter most carefully. I read out its recommendation that the child has a right to know who his father is. I do not mean his identity but his genetic origin. He should know the essentials about his paternity. That is what the Warnock Committee recommended. The whole matter should be reconsidered and fully debated now that we have the Warnock Report.
In October last year there was a second report from the Law Commission. It did not affirm its first report of 1982. It said that the matter raised many possible difficulties and questions. On the whole the committee
1284
thought it better not to legislate on it then and have to alter the legislation piecemeal later. It thought that the matter should be considered as a whole as a result of the Warnock Report.
That is the right course to take. That is what the law Commission recommended. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor says that we cannot wait for all that, because we must get ahead with the proposal now. The remedy I suggest is that, if we are to get on with the matter now, the birth certificate should be made to tell the truth so that the child knows that he was conceived "by donation" and so that the grandparents and any person down the line can know that the child is not the true and lawful child of the husband but was conceived by artificial insemination. Warnock Report at paragraph 4.26 states:
"However we are of the view that consideration should be given as a matter of urgency to making it possible for the parents in registering the birth to add 'by donation' after the man's name."
The Law Commission did not say that. It did not consider the matter. It said that the matter should be left open, and that is why the amendment has been tabled. A similar one follows it. The amendment I have tabled states:
"provided that in the Register of Births and any other official or family record of the birth there shall be recorded, after the man's name, the words "By donation".
The words should be not only on the birth certificate but on any family or official record. Surely the truth should be told. Should it be open to the wife to write to the grandparents and say, "My husband and I have had a new child. Here he is. He is your grandchild. We have had this lovely little baby boy. Do come to the christening", or whatever it may be? Is she allowed to say that? I would regard that as a family record of the birth and the truth ought to be told on that too. That is why I move this amendment. Members of the Committee will see that the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Oakridge, and the noble Earl, Lord Halsbury, have a somewhat similar amendment following.
As I indicated earlier, the right reverend Prelates the Bishop of London and the Bishop of Birmingham are of this view. I ask that the clause is not proceeded with further until this matter has been more carefully determined. The Warnock Committee and the Law Commission have considered this matter. We can put this on a proper footing. We can leave these very difficult questions for consideration in the light of the Warnock Report as a whole. I beg to move.
6 p.m.
Lord Silkin of Dulwich: I have very great respect for the noble and learned Lord, but I must say that I was saddened by the speech he made to the Committee. These are very private matters between husband and wife. The purpose of this Bill is to try to remove what is regarded as the stigma of illegitimacy. Whether it is rightly so regarded or not does not matter; it is still so regarded. The Bill goes a long way to removing the stigma.
The noble and learned Lord's proposal is that the birth certificate should disclose for all the world to see, or whoever wants so to do, that the child is not the child of the husband. Because it is the inevitable inference, it discloses that the husband was not capable

1285
of making a child with his wife and that somebody else therefore has provided the means of so doing. Nothing in my view could be more likely to create a stigma both upon the child and indeed upon the child's father. The noble and learned Lord says—perhaps in an ideal society one would agree with him—that every person ought to know what his ancestry is. In any event he will not know, even if this proposed amendment were carried. All he would know is that the person he regards as being his father could not be his father because that person could not achieve the necessary result to create a child. As a result, he will then think what he may of the person whom he has regarded as his father.
Surely in matters of this kind it is for the family—the mother and the husband—together to decide at what time if at all they should inform their child of the circumstances of his birth. Leave it to them in a matter as private as this. Do not place the matter in the situation where those who have access to a birth certificate can find such matters out, as indeed can the child himself by looking at the birth certificate, irrespective of the feelings of his true mother and the person he regards as being his father.
Many here are grandparents; I certainly am. I would not wish to have this knowledge in relation to a daughter of mine and her husband forced upon me by a birth certificate. If they wish to tell me, so be it. If they do not wish to tell me, that is a matter entirely for them in my view. Therefore, I oppose this amendment and hope that it will not be accepted.
Baroness Faithfull: Since the noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning, has mentioned my name in his speech, I should like to speak to the amendment that he has moved.
First, perhaps I may ask the noble and learned Lord whether he would reconsider the position, for instance with regard to adoption. If children are adopted, the birth certificate is named in the name of the adopters. It could be that neither the child nor anybody else would know that the child was an adopted child. On the birth certificate there is the name of the adopters. Those of us who have worked in the field of adoption believe that at some point in time it is wise to tell the child of his origins, but it is not forced on them. It is a private matter, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, has said, that the adopters, within their family, decide whether or not to tell the child, and whether or not to tell the relatives. As a person who has arranged very many adoptions, I agree with the noble and learned Lord that one has always advised the adopters to tell the children, but at a time that is suitable for the child. It varies from family to family and from child to child.
Secondly, this Bill makes all children equal. It is very unjust and unfair—and children certainly feel it—that they are labelled illegitimate. The purpose of this Bill, and the reason that we have all supported it, is that it makes all children equal. If this Bill were to be altered to include the words "By donation", let us translate that into everyday life. Let us take a small child in a class who is asked, "Johnny Jones, who is your mother?" He replies, "My mother is Mrs. Jones". He is asked, "Johnny Jones, who is your father?" The reply is, "By donation". What will the child
1286
understand by that? What will the form understand by that? What will the school understand by that? It is even more difficult when a student, for instance, wants to register at a university. He sees the bursar who says, "Fill in this form. Who is your mother?" He replies, "My mother is so-and-so". He is asked, "Who is your father?" and replies, "By donation". This amendment would be grossly unjust and unfair on the child. The purpose of this Bill is that we should treat all children as equals. If we agree this amendment, the child will not be equal either at school, university or later in life.
If the parents decide to tell the child how the child came about, that is entirely a private matter within the family of that child, those grandparents and those parents. I very strongly oppose this amendment.
Lord Robertson of Oakridge: It might be for the convenience of the Committee if I were to speak at this stage to Amendment No. 21 which stands in my name and the name of the noble Earl, Lord Halsbury. My amendment has the same aim as Amendment No. 20. I marginally prefer Amendment No. 21, but I should be more than happy to support Amendment No. 20.
Both amendments seek to remedy a defect in Clause 27 which as it stands would legalise a deliberately inaccurate statement on the records of birth. The Warnock Report, as has been mentioned, said that consideration should be given as a matter of urgency to making it possible for the parents, in registering the birth, to add "By donation" after the man's name. They further recommended, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning, said, that the child should have the right of access to the information about his parents. But if there is no indication on any document that the child was born as a result of donation, he will never know that this applies in his case.
With the greatest respect to the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, I should like to take issue with the question of adoption and the parallel situation that that brings about. I may have misheard, but I understood yesterday from the Registrar of Births office—I had this information checked by another source—that in a case of adoption the long birth certificate of the child indicates that adoption was involved. I believe that what applies to adoption applies equally to donation. If we think that it does not, that is presumably because we think AID is something slightly discreditable and we wish to sweep it under the carpet.
Finally, it may be held that this sort of detail should await comprehensive legislation on the issues discussed in the Warnock Report. However, as the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor stated at Second Reading, that may well mean putting it off for a long time. If we are to have Clause 27 as part of this Bill, we must make it as correct as we possibly can.
Lord Meston: Perhaps I may take up one point of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning; that is the position of the husband who makes the considered decision with his wife to agree to her undergoing artificial insemination by a donor and agrees with her to take on the full responsibilities of parenthood for the child which she is to bear. The husband presumably makes that decision in the knowledge of the practical and legal consequences. I suggest that it

1287
would be quite wrong to allow him restrospectively to withdraw his consent after the event and retrospectively to reject the child. As I understand the noble and learned Lord, he was suggesting that that could happen at any time during the pregnancy or after the birth of the child. That surely would be unfair to the child and unfair to the mother.
Lord Denning: Does the noble Lord say that a young man of 21 should be allowed to do that without any legal advice, without talking it over with father and mother or anything else of that kind? Should he be allowed to do that?
The Lord Chancellor: I shall not need to ask my solicitor about that!
Lord Meston: I simply suggest that when a man enters into a considered decision to take on the responsibilities of parenthood, it would be quite unfair to the child, and the mother to allow him to repudiate that agreement at some time after the event.
Lord Hylton: I would support either Amendment No. 20 or No. 21. Both will improve the Bill as it stands. I believe that it is essential that birth certificates should state the true facts. This country has led the world in many ways in public administration. I suspect that the administration of birth documents is one of the areas in which we have led the field. However, there is more to this clause than just that, and I support those who wish to delete the clause as it stands.
I am among those—and I am sure there are a number in the Committee—who sat through and took part in all stages of the Children Act 1975. One of the things written into that Act in I think, your Lordships' House was the right of an adopted child to know who its real parents were when it came of age. I think the same protection and right should be afforded to an AID child. That is not provided for, as far as I know, by this clause. That is why I think this clause is fundamentally deficient.
6.15 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor: I hestitate to intervene in these great matters, but there are one or two things I must say. First, referring briefly to what has just fallen from my noble kinsman on the Cross-Benches, I should say that neither of the amendments would achieve its purpose. I explained on Second Reading that the Bill was without prejudice to the more detailed recommendation of the Warnock Committee, to which the noble and learned Lord on the Cross-Benches referred. The one thing these amendments would not do is to tell a child its true genetic parentage. They would simply say that a particular method was used, or may have been used, to engender him. That simply will not do.
My noble and learned friend on the Cross-Benches put forward a number of reasons for his amendment, which to my mind were somewhat inconsistent. First, let it be said, as was said quite plainly by my noble friend sitting immediately behind me, that there is a profound difference between these two amendments. I quite agree that discussion of them can properly take
1288
place together, but there is a profound and ultimate difference between them.
I turn to the amendment in the name of my noble and learned friend on the Cross-Benches and the absent Bishop who thought that some other engagement was more important than an amendment to which he put his name in your Lordships' House—the right reverend and absent Prelate, Chairman of the Church of England board of social irresponsibility. The difference is that my noble and learned friend's amendment is mandatory, and that in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Oakridge, is permissive. Between those two alternatives there is a great gulf fixed which cannot be bridged. That simply will not do either.
They are not different ways of expressing the same thing. As I explained on Second Reading to the right reverend prelate the Bishop of London, the drafting of this Bill is without prejudice to the more detailed consideration which might be given to access by a person who was known to be of genetic parentage by donation. That can be dealt with, when Parliament decides to deal with it, at some future date.
When considering the content of this Bill, I was under very considerable pressure—with which I agreed—to deal with the question of illegitimate children. I thought that there would be a gross and obvious injustice if I did not say something about the children of this particular class and clarify the position. I regarded that a moral point and still do. I stand by what I did. I received advice of conflicting kinds and came to a conclusion. It is the business of Ministers to come to conclusions as to which is the better course.
If Parliament does not follow me, the Bill will go on without this clause. The situation will then be—I shall go into details in a moment—that we have dealt with the child born out of wedlock but we have not dealt with the position of a child born in wedlock, with the consent of the married couple into whose wedlock the child is born. That child will be in a different position from all other children. I think that that is a gross injustice, and I think that Parliament should face the situation.
My noble and learned friend made a thoroughly bad point. He said that if a child were registered without reference to the method by which it was engendered, the register would be inaccurate. That is as may be. However, what I must tell him in very plain language is this. He may approve or disapprove, I know not which, of the practice known as AID, which means that an infertile couple or a couple who have had difficulty in engendering children can adopt this method of donation to engender a child of their own, who they will bring up as their own. However, what is happening, and this is the fact—my noble and learned friend may not like it, but it is the fact—is that in almost every case they put the child down as the child of the marriage and nobody will ever know.
The amendment will encourage them to put something false in the register, which many of them are doing already. They are technically guilty of an offence under the Perjury Act. That is what the amendment would achieve if it were passed. That has been pointed out very plainly during the discussion of the matter. No one will ever know the position, and

1289
what is more they cannot know the position. From the painful document which I rather wish my noble and learned friend had not read out at such length because I find these details somewhat distasteful to discuss in this public forum, although it is necessary to be aware of them, it is clear that in most cases where the couple have had difficulty in engendering a natural child, they are encouraged to continue sexual intercourse within the marriage while the process of donation is going on. In the case where the husband is producing sperm, but not very much of it, it will never be known whether the child was engendered by donation or otherwise.
The amendment of my noble and learned friend Lord Denning, to which the right reverend Prelate has given his authority but not his presence, compels them, where the process is used, to state something as regards which they have no knowledge of whether or not it is true, because they will never know from what is going on who is the generic father of the child—whether the child is the child of the donation or the child of the husband. What is more, they do not want to know.
I share the view, in particular of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, that that is an intrusion into what is essentially a delicate and private matter. In the end there may very well be the Warnock Committee recommendation that there should be means available to a child by donation to be told and to find out its true parentage so far as that is possible. However, it is more likely that they will not be able to tell his true parentage because hitherto it has been considered essential that the identity of the donor be kept for ever a secret. Incidentally, as regards my noble and learned friend's suggestion, it is quite impossible that it might turn out to be black if they were white parents, or white if they were black parents. The system avoids that possibility. The identity of the donors has hitherto been kept a secret. All that would be known is that the child was engendered in this way.
I know that these are difficult problems, but they cannot be shirked. I stand by my decision to leave the clause in the Bill. Both courage and honesty demand it, as well as respect for human dignity and privacy. However, above all, I stand committed to the welfare of children. I am sure that the welfare of the child demands that there should not be a mandatory insertion on his birth certificate insisting that he was a child of this particular process.
My noble friend Baroness Faithfull said all that I thought needed to be said on the subject. Speaking for myself, this is not a matter of party politics. With due respect to the right reverend Prelate, it is not a matter of religious conviction. It is a matter of judgment about a very sensitive, and private human affair. I stand where I stood. The clause should stay as it is. If the Committee is against me, I shall not resign, but I shall do my best to persuade Members of the Committee to vote against the amendment.
Lord Denning: I should like to make one comment in view of what my noble and learned friend has said. He said that if the clause is not included, everything will go on just as it is now; and that is true. We shall have artificial insemination just the same. We shall have people filling in their birth certificates with the husband and father just the same. If everything is to
1290
continue just as it is, why on earth do we need such a clause at this moment? Why not leave it, as the Law Commission suggested, for consideration as part of a wider matter? The clause will not alter anything at present. Let us leave the whole matter for proper discussion, because everything will go on just as it is whether or not the clause is there.
The Lord Chancellor: I am rather surprised at my noble and learned friend. He is suggesting in the amendment that if a child is engendered by donation it should be mandatory to have that stated on the birth certificate. If that happens it would not go on. What my noble and learned friend has said would have been germane—and I shall deal with it on that basis—on the Motion, Whether the clause shall stand part of the Bill.
Lord Denning: I was speaking to the whole clause.
The Lord Chancellor: That may be, but we are discussing the amendment. I was saying quite frankly to my noble and learned friend that, first, it is not germane to the amendment, which would make it mandatory to insert this particular phrase. If my noble and learned freind is speaking to the Motion, That the clause stand part—albeit at an inappropriate time, but still he is entitled, with the freedom of the Committee, to do so—all I am saying is that he is encouraging perjury, and in that respect I am against him. I do not encourage perjury. If the clause is passed in its present form it will not be perjury.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: I have not been involved in this Bill until now, and I am present only because I have to speak when this business is completed, which may or may not be this evening. I have listened very carefully to the argument. I acknowledge that the matter is extremely difficult. Having heard all the debate, I have not the slightest doubt about where I come down. I come down without a moment's hesitation behind the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor and the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull. What matters—and the only thing that matters—is the child.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning, spoke about grandchildren. I have 11 grandchildren, and if any of my children had the problem which the Bill is about, I should be very surprised indeed if they did not come and tell me what they were going to do, and I should approve and support it. However if they did not tell me, I should not try to find out. I believe that it is a biological virtue in families to have children. I regard it as a biological disadvantage not to have them. We must go forward with scientific progress, monitoring it and being very careful of it. However, I wish to conclude by saying that I thought that the speech of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor was very clear and compelling and I shall certainly support him.
Baroness Phillips: I should like to speak later on the Question, Whether the clause shall stand part of the Bill. However, I suggest to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor that he is surely not correct when he says that this is not a religious matter. It depends of which denomination one is a part. I also found some slight inconsistency in his argument that by including these words we should be doing something different

1291
from what is already contained in other clauses. In other words, it is suggested that we leave it that the name given is that of the father, but surely it is not the father. That would be untrue, because they do not know who the father is. Obviously you do not want, "Father unknown". After all, it is a rather remarkable way of stating it: "By donation". It suggests that you are giving the gift of life. That cannot be something that you need to be ashamed of.
I would only say to the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, that I cannot understand the school that she has been concerned with. In my experience very few children see their birth certificate. They do not have reason to. Most people generally see their birth certificate when they are going to college or are getting married. With all due respect it is not usual for small children to bring to school their birth certificate. As for one child asking another, "Who is your mother, and who is your father?", I suggest that that is a very unusual situation and quite unlikely to occur.
6.30 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor: I must say to the noble Baroness that when I said that this was not a religious matter I meant exactly what I said. It is not compulsory on a member of any religion to indulge in this particular practice of engendering children. They can follow their own religion in this free country, and I would respect them for doing so. But what is sought to be said is that those who do should be given the rights that this clause gives them, and that is not a religious matter, it is a matter for the secular law.
Lord Robertson of Oakridge: May I take up one point that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor made? If the amendment went through and if there was doubt as to who was the father, whether it was the donor or the husband, could that not be established by a blood test? I thought I heard in a debate on an earlier clause in this Bill that the means of determining paternity by blood test was now so advanced that it would be almost certain to produce the answer.
The Lord Chancellor: I am astonished to hear that argument. The previous clause we discussed was a clause about an application by a child to ascertain its true parentage. What is the noble Lord on the Cross-Benches suggesting?—that they should be compulsory in such cases? I should like to know, because I should regard that as a gross infringement of personal liberty.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Nugent of Guildford): The Question is, That Amendment No. 20 be agreed to. As many as are of that opinion will say "Content"; to the contrary, "Not-Content". I think the "Not-Contents" have it. I think the "Not-Contents" have it.
On Question, amendment negatived.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees: Amendment No. 21?
Lord Denning: I propose to divide on this issue, it is so important.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees: The noble and learned Lord heard me collecting the voices. When I put the question a second time "Not-Content" was said, and "Content" was not said a second time.
Lord Denning: I am sorry. I submit to the Chair's authority.
Lord Robertson of Oakridge Lord Robertson of Oakridge moved Amendment No. 21:
Page 18, line 28, at end insert—
("(4) In the entry relating to a birth covered by this section, in the Register of Births maintained under the 1953 Act where, under the provisions of this section, the child is to be treated in law as the child of the parties to the marriage, after the name of the father there shall be added the words 'by donation' ").
On Question, amendment negatived.
On Question, Whether Clause 27 shall stand part of the Bill?
Lord Denning: Again the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Birmingham and I oppose this Motion. I have given the reasons already. It is premature to have Clause 27 in at this stage. It should all be left, as the Law Commission recommended, to a further consideration by all concerned of the important points whether or no the child should have a right when it is 18 to have all the particulars and whether or no the register should have against it, "By donation".
Those matters are of the first importance and ought not to be dealt with by the clause at this stage. By omitting the clause you do not alter the present factual position in the least. I suggest that the clause ought not to stand part of the Bill but, as the Law Commission said, the whole matter should be reconsidered at large in the future by the proper authorities. I oppose the Motion, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
The Lord Chancellor: My noble and learned friend has misunderstood what the Warnock Committee said. This clause embodies the main recommendation of the Warnock Report. The main recommendation was that the status of AID children, where the husband consents, should be legitimised. That is what it said, and that is where I stood.
An additional reason for leaving this clause in, which is material to what my noble and learned friend said, is that, as my honourable friend the Minister for Health announced yesterday in another place, we are publishing a consultation document about the issues on which the Warnock Committee thought legislation was desirable. About these the clause is silent, and in fact further consideration will be necessary.
What the Committee has to make up its mind about, as I indicated and therefore will not repeat except in a single sentence, is whether it would be just to children engendered in this way to leave them alone, of all the inhabitants of this island, with a separate stigma attached to them, and to deal with the question of illegitimacy alone. My answer to that is that you cannot deal with that without at least having Clause 27. What other additional amendments are necessary can be left to time, but in my submission not that.
Clause 27 agreed to.
Clauses 28 and 29 agreed to.
Clause 30 [Orders applying section 1 to other enactments]:
Lord Denning Lord Denning moved Amendment No. 22:
Page 19, line 31, at end insert ("by substituting "marital" and "non-marital" for "legitimate" and "illegitimate" respectively in such enactments").
The noble and learned Lord said: This is another point raised by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Birmingham and also by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London on Second Reading. It is a question not only of words but of upholding the sanctity, or the institution, of marriage.
Marriage is a fundamental institution in our society and for the family in society. One of the bulwarks of that institution is that the children of that marriage born during the marriage are presumed to be legitimate, whereas those who were not born during the marriage, or are of another person, are illegitimate.
There is a difference in the status of children throughout our jurisprudence between those who are legitimate and those who are illegitimate. It is not a question of words only, it is a question of status before the law; it is a status which the law draws in upholding the institution of marriage.
The Law Commission in its first report said, "We don't like the words 'legitimate' or 'illegitimate' because that casts a stigma. Let us alter the words, and instead of having 'legitimate' or 'illegitimate' have `marital' or 'non-marital' ". That is what it said in its first report. That was what was accepted in its draft and what was going through. That in a way avoids the stigma of "legitimacy" or "illegitimacy" and makes a clear-cut distinction between children born in wedlock and those born out of wedlock, which is a distinction that runs through all our jurisprudence. That distinction is maintained by the two words, marital and non-marital.
After reading the report of the Scottish Law Commission, the English Law Commission recast its view. It thought that on the whole it preferred the Scottish terms and would avoid the use of "marital" and "non-marital" because it could be done fairly well without that, although it could not be done as simply as it was in Scotland. It had to be done quite elaborately. In the commission's second report, it said at paragraph 2.6, page 3:
"We also consider that it would be desirable to apply the new rule of construction to those existing arrangements in which it is at present expressly provided that illegitimate relationships should be treated in the same way as legitimate. This would enable the term 'legitimate' to be removed from much of the statute book and we attach some importance to this. The detailed task of making the appropriate amendments to ensure that the effect of each of these widely differing provisions remains unchanged is one which we think suitable for delegated legislation. Clause 30 of the new Bill therefore confers an order making power upon the Lord Chancellor for this purpose; alternatively, however, a long list of appropriate amendments could be scheduled for the Bill in due course.".
Is it necessary to have that long list? The words "marital" and "non-marital" show that in law there is difference in status between the two. Marriage is the fundamental rock of the institution of family life. The distinction between marital and non-marital distinguishes the status of a child. A child that is marital is lawful; it is born in marriage; it is given a special status; there is a presumption of legitimacy.
The Scottish report on this point said that it was very important to keep the distinction between the two. Therefore, it said, there should be a special provision. The Scottish report put in a presumption. The Scottish Law Commission report, at page 36, said:
"It is highly desirable that there shall be some legal presumption relating to the paternity of a child since paternity, unlike maternity, is not a self-evident fact. Our view is that the present presumptions based on marriage accord with normal human behaviour, are highly desirable in the interests of the stability of family life, and should be retained."
In order to do that, it expressly put in the Scottish Act a presumption of legitimacy.
The way to retain this distinction and to make it effective throughout, as the right reverend Prelate said, is to keep the words "marital" and "non-marital". This shows the importance that we still attach to marriage and the children of a marriage. That is why I have tabled the amendment.
6.45 p.m.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: Although the amendment has been moved by my noble and learned friend, I hope that the Committee will not accept it. I think that I can put the objections quite shortly. First, it will introduce an inconsistency in this Bill, which will become an Act. This is an amendment to a provision that refers to Section 1; in other words, Clause 1. If one looks back at Clause 1, one sees that that clause itself uses the word "legitimate". Secondly, it will throw a whole number of English statutes into hopeless confusion with the Scottish ones, not only the Scottish counterpart of this Bill but a whole number of other counterparts to the English statutes with which this clause deals.
In a sphere of private law such as this where there is constant intercourse across the Border, nothing could be more confusing or likely to lead to litigation and legal trouble than to have different terminology in the English statute counterpart and Scottish statute.
Thirdly, with all due respect to my noble and learned friend, I cannot see how using "marital" for "legitimate" and "non-marital" for "illegitimate" in any way upholds the sanctity of marriage. As for the stigma, my noble and learned friend referred to maintaining the status of marriage, the status of legitimacy, the status that he said would be preserved by using the words "marital" and "non-marital". As I pointed out on Second Reading, a status depends on capacities. Once one removes all the incapacities on illegitimacy—and the bulk is removed by the Bill—all the stigmas disappear because there is no separate status left for them to attach to. It matters not in the slightest whether one calls the status legitimacy and illegitimacy or marital and non-marital. If the incapacities go, the stigma goes.
In any case, with respect, it seemed to me that there was a fundamental confusion on Second Reading with popular terminology in this field. People do not use the word "illegitimate" or the words "conceived out of wedlock". They use a word of Norman-French origin—it seems to be one of our cultural exports to Australia—which links with the word "pommie", so far as I can see. I hope, therefore, that the Committee will have nothing to do with the amendment.
Lord Kilbracken: I should like to express my disagreement with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, on several points. The first concerns his remarks on the word "bastard", which I shall spell out in all its seven letters. About the only way in which the word is not used is to mean an illegitimate child. When we talk about someone being a bastard or a proper bastard, about the last thing we are likely to mean is that he was born out of wedlock. The word that is normally used is "illegitimate".
I cannot agree with him either in the reasons that he gave regarding the proposals of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning, for wanting to insert these words into the section. In fact, they enable the Lord Chancellor to make changes in existing enactments to make them consistent. If it is wrong that the word "legitimate" should occur in Section 1, that can be changed at a future stage.
I ask noble Lords to consider very carefully the amendment proposed by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning. I have always held that it is most wrong to refer to any child as being illegitimate. "Illegitimate" means against the law. There is no way that any child is against the law. We often hear it said that it is the father, the mother or both who are illegitimate, but that is not the case either. When a child is born out of wedlock neither of the parents has committed any act contrary to any law in this country. Therefore I strongly support the noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning, in his proposal.
Lord Meston: I oppose this amendment. One of the great advantages of the second thoughts that the Law Commission had in its second report was that it withdrew the awful expressions "marital" and "non-marital", which seem to me to have little more to commend them than the expression "love child" used by the Sunday newspapers.
The context may require the child to be described in a legal document or something of the sort as having been born in wedlock or out of wedlock, otherwise can we refer to them simply as "children"?
Lord Silkin of Dulwich: I only want to add one word and that is to express my approval of what the Scottish Law Commission said when it argued that
"labels of any kind applied to the child are unnecessary … and also undesirable, because they would 'rapidly take on old connotations'.".
That is precisely what would happen, whatever word we used.
Lord Hylton: I speak with great trepidation as a non-lawyer. It seems to me that, if this amendment has merit in its own right, the legal consequences for other statutes and other jurisdictions can be sorted out either by order or by amendments to the schedules to this Bill.
The Lord Chancellor: I cannot let it be said that I am against the status of marriage or that others who oppose this amendment are against the status of marriage. Let me state plainly. If anybody thinks I am a prude I am willing to be called a prude, but I am not prepared for it to be said that I am against the status of
1296
marriage, or seeking to demean it, whether it is said by my noble and learned friend or whether it is the right reverend and absent Prelate.
I am against sexual intercourse outside marriage. I am against fornication. I am against adultery, I am against concubinage and I am against sodomy. Can I say it more plainly than that? On the other hand I cannot see that this has anything whatever to do with the amendment we are now discussing. It is, let us say frankly, a nonsense amendment for purely technical reasons. One of them was pointed out by the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, in the second of his three points.
If the Committee looks at what we are discussing, it is an amendment to Section 30 of the Bill. It states:
"The Lord Chancellor may by order make provision for the construction in accordance with section 1 above of such enactments passed before the coming into force of that section as may be specified in the order".
It is solemnly proposed to add,
"by substituting "marital" and "non-marital" for "legitimate" and "illegitimate" respectively in such enactments".
The words in the original draft of the Bill as it stands printed enable the Lord Chancellor by order to provide for the construction of enactments in accordance with Section 1 and only in accordance with Section 1. That section is framed specifically in terms of the marital status of the child's parents rather than the status of the child itself. I could not comply with my existing powers under Clause 30 if in addition I had to use the words which my noble and learned friend and the right reverend Prelate would have me use. It is a nonsense amendment quite apart from any other virtues it may not possess.
I must add that the Bill as drafted is interested in the welfare of children. The view of the two Law Commissions—the Scottish Law Commission by origin and the English Law Commission on second thoughts—was that one should not put a label on a child born out of wedlock. That was to punish the child for the sins of the parents. God may do that, see Exodus 20, but the right reverend the Bishop of Birmingham cannot—he is not God—and nor can my noble and learned friend. This is an injustice to the child. It is one of the typical examples whereby one invents a phrase like "marital" and "non marital" instead of "legitimate" and "illegitimate" and in five years' time those words will come to have exactly the same meaning as "legitimate" or "illegitimate". It is a nonsense amendment and I ask the House to reject it.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: I should like to ask a question. Lawyers call it "mar-eye-tal" and ordinary citizens call it "marital". Why?
The Lord Chancellor: Lawyers are not agreed about this. Ordinary citizens are not agreed about it. I was brought up to study Latin and the "i" in maritus is long.
On Question, amendment negatived.
Clause 30 agreed to.
Clauses 31 to 33 agreed to.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale Lord Simon of Glaisdale moved Amendment No. 23:
After Clause 33, insert the following new clause:
("Law Commission Reports
. In the interpretation of this Act any Court may refer to the following Reports of the Law Commission, namely, Law Com. No. 118 of 1982 and Law Com. No. 157 (Cmnd. 9913) of 1986; including the explanatory notes to the draft Bill contained in the former Report.").
The noble and learned Lord said: This raises—I confess not the case I should have chosen myself—the question of what material the court may have regard to in interpreting a statute and in particular this statute. It falls into two parts. The first part, or limb, states that the courts may refer to the Law Commission reports and the second part says that they may have regard to the explanatory notes to the draft Bill in the first report.
On the first limb, I do not think that there is now any problem. There has been in the past. When I first came as a judicial member to your Lordships' House the Appellate Committee would not look at any report of a Royal Commission, a departmental committee or the Law Commission. That was a deference to the strong view of the late Lord Reid, that it was desirable to limit the amount of material that a court might have regard to in interpretation. I deferred to that myself, although it had been my custom, when sitting in the High Court, whenever I thought it would help, to have regard to the report of a Royal Commission or similar body preceding a measure. But the practice has now changed—and my noble and learned friend will correct me if I am wrong because I have not been sitting lately—and I think it is now clearly established that a court may have regard in interpretation to the report of a Royal Commission or similar body preceding a statute.
Therefore, I would not have thought that it is really in question that the Law Commission reports may be resorted to on this Bill. How useful they would be may be measured by the frequency with which my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor has cited them today. I included them as a matter of drafting because it seemed to me that that was the most convenient way to raise the point that I should like considered by your Lordships; namely, whether the explanatory notes can be considered.
The question arose before your Lordships' Appellate Committee in a case called Black-Clawson v Papierwerke. That case turned on the Foreign Judgments (Reciprocal Enforcement) Act 1933. That Act had been preceded by a high-powered legal committee presided over by Lord Justice Greer in which they drafted the Bill, which was followed by the 1933 Act, and gave a most valuable commentary upon it. In fact, when your Lordships came to interpret the relevant provision it was not necessary to refer to the commentary, so that anything said on it was obiter (in other words, unnecessary for the decision).
But I might just point out that when that case came before the Court of Appeal, presided over by my noble and learned friend Lord Denning, they were not even shown the report. If they had been, I do not doubt for a moment that they would have come to a different conclusion.
Without, I hope, being accused of egotism, I am going to quote a short passage from my own judgment in that case because they were my considered words and I think that that would be preferable to my trying to paraphrase them extemporarily. I shall quote the words first and then tell the Committee how the opinions fell out.
The passage which embodies my view is in page 651 of the report. It reads:
"The commentary on a draft Bill in a report to Parliament is not merely an expression of opinion—even if it were only that, it would be an expression of expert opinion, and I can see no more reason for excluding it than any other relevant matter of expert opinion. But actually it is more: that experts publicly expressed the view that a certain draft would have such-and-such an effect is one of the facts within the shared knowledge of Parliament and the citizenry. To refuse to consider such a commentary, when Parliament has legislated on the basis and faith of it, is for the interpreter to fail to put himself in the real position of the promulgator of the instrument before essaying its interpretation. It is refusing to follow what is perhaps the most important clue to meaning. It is perversely neglecting the reality, while chasing shadows. As Aneurin Bevan said: "Why read the crystal when you can read the book?" Here the book [that is, the report] is already open: it is merely a matter of reading on.".
The late Lord Denning—I am sorry, I am delighted to correct that. I should say that the late Lord Dilhorne agreed with me when the draft Bill prepared is in identical terms with the subsequent statute. I confess that that does not cover this case entirely because here we have, I think, a valuable change of mind by the Law Commission. The Law Commission have commented on their original draft and not on the second draft which this Bill followed.
Nevertheless, it seems to me that it would be very useful if courts could look at the original commentary. For example, Clause 1 of the draft Bill reflects almost entirely Clause 17 of the original Bill as drafted by the Law Commission in their first report. Any court essaying interpretation in the light of a commentary would be able to distinguish perfectly easily what has been followed and what has not.
I mentioned the late Lord Dilhorne's view, virtually, I think, agreeing with mine. It is only right to say that the other three members of the committee—great judges all—took the contrary view, although one of them dissented on the main issue. But it seems to me, for the reason I gave, that it would be quite wrong for a court to shut its eyes to any relevant material when they have the report already before them and can have recourse to it. Therefore, I beg to move.
Lord Denning: Perhaps I may say that if this be necessary, I would support the amendment altogether. But we have gone a long way from those early days when you could not even refer to the author of a textbook unless he were dead. I must say that when I have been sitting in the Court of Appeal, I would look at all these sorts of things without any trouble and get all the guidance I could from them. I would not feel inhibited in any way from looking at any material that would be helpful.
The Lord Chancellor: I hope that it will not be thought that I am in any way unsympathetic to anything that fell from my noble and learned friend on the Cross-Benches if I say that I hope that he will not pursue this amendment in connection with illegitimacy. A general rule of the interpretation of statutes

1299
may be desirable. Indeed, there was a Law Commission report which recommended it, and we have debated it more than once in this House. I, myself, gave it a fair wind; but it did not get any further than this House and a lot of lawyers took a different view. What must be wrong is to put it into this statute about illegitimacy when the Law Commission arrived at two quite widely varying reports more than 450 pages in length. Although this Bill is somewhat longer than I should have liked, it contains only 44 clauses (or thereabouts) and one or two schedules, one of which is a Keeling schedule, and so I hope that my noble and learned friend will not think it remiss of me or that I am going back on anything I may have said in the past if I say now that I hope he will not pursue it in connection with this Bill.
I was glad to hear that "the late Lord Denning" was still alive! If he will again forgive me for saying so, everybody knows that he even reads Hansard before he writes his judgments. He did not always admit it but I think he sometimes has. I take an intermediate view, which is that we have gone a long way from the days when we were not supposed to look at anything. I heard an appeal upstairs, I think about 10 years ago, which concerned what I believe was called "the missing football" competition in some newspaper. Sitting in front of me were two counsel, both of whom were authors of the Blue Book, whose Act we were discussing; and at least two members of the Appellate Committee had been on it too. My view was that it was absolutely unrealistic to say that we should not read it. I am in fact the author of a judgment which has not yet been delivered, in which I refer to the findings of a Law Commission, in terms. In the case of Shivpuri, on which my judgment is on record, I certainly said that it was a great pity Parliament had not enacted the Bill in the form which was recommended by the Law Commission. So really I think the point has been made, but let us leave it out of illegitimacy, if we may. I hope that my noble and learned friend will not pursue this.
Lord Airedale: I believe the competition was called "Spot the Ball", was it not?
Lord Silkin of Dulwich: I need say only one word, in agreement with the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. I agree with both parts of his speech in supporting the view of the Law Commission in the past, and I hope that some day effect will be given to its report.
If I may take just a minute or two at this hour, I remember appearing in the well-known case of Rookes v. Barnard in the House of Lords, where we had to consider the meaning of Section 3 of the Trades Disputes Act 1906—a matter which the House found so difficult that it invited counsel to re-argue it a second time. That is understandable, because there was no obvious reason why the second part of Section 3 should have been put in at all. It did not seem to have any significance—until one looked at the report of the Royal Commission of 1905 which preceded it, and one read the opinions expressed to that Royal Commission by counsel at the time. One realised then the reason why it was drafted in that way was simply because they misunderstood the law in 1905! But
1300
without that one could not have told the mischief which that section was apparently designed to remove. And it is that evidence of the mischief, it seems to me, upon which the works of reference referred to by the noble and learned Lords in this debate can throw a great deal of light.
For a reason other than that given by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, I hope that we shall not introduce that section into this Bill. If we were to do so, it seems to me it might at least throw some doubt on the practice which has been obtaining and growing up to now and it will make people think (as lawyers will, if they try to seize on any point in their favour) that Parliament put this provision into this Bill because it thought it was necessary to do so and that therefore what is said here was not intended by Parliament to apply to other legislation.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I should like to say two things in reply. I was sitting with my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor on the "Spot the Ball" case. Unfortunately, we took different views and, still more unfortunately, all my other colleagues agreed with my noble and learned friend! The other point I would make is this. I cannot agree that it is out of place to put this provision in a Bill relating to legitimacy and illegitimacy, because what the amendment seeks to do is to say what reference may be made to the reports of the Law Commission which led to this Bill.
However, I take the point of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Silkin, that it would be a very great pity if the first limb of this amendment were to cast any doubt on the more liberal policy of the courts in scrutinising material which my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor described. In view of that, and in the hope of raising the matter in a clearer case, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn
Clause 34 agreed to.
Schedule 2 [Minor and consequential amendments]:
7.15 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 24:
Page 37, line 23, leave out ("4") and insert ("64").
The noble and learned Lord said: The appropriate reference is to Section 64 of the Child Care Act 1980, which deals with transfers of rights and duties in relation to children in the care of voluntary organisations. It is purely technical, to correct an error. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 25:
Page 44, line 45, after ("before") insert ("the time of").
The noble and learned Lord said: I rise to move Amendment No. 25 but I will speak to No. 26 as well, with the leave of the Committee. These amendments ensure that the mother of a child conceived as a result of AID will be able to claim a widowed mother's allowance only in respect of pregnancies which occurred before the time of her husband's death. This provision, as amended, is in line with Clause 27, which

1301
deals with the legal status of children born as the result of artificial insemination. I think it corrects an obvious error, and I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 26:
Page 44, line 46, after ("inseminated") insert ("before that time").
The noble and learned Lord said: I beg to move Amendment No. 26 formally.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 27:
Page 49, line 37, leave out ("(5)") and insert ("2(5)").
The noble and learned Lord said: This amendment does not change the effect of the provision; but it is a matter of record that Section 1(1) (a) (i) of the Family Law Act 1986 refers to "Section 2(4) (b) or 2(5)" of the Guardianship Act 1973, and not to "Section 2(4) (b) or (5)". I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 28:
Page 49, line 38, leave out ("(5)(b)") and insert ("(5)(a)").
The noble and learned Lord said: Paragraph 49 of Schedule 2 amends Section 2 of the Guardianship Act 1973. The correct reference is to the new Section 2(5) (a) of the 1973 Act (page 43, line 18 of the Bill) which refers back to the new Section 2(4) (page 43, line 1). I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Schedule 2, as amended, agreed to.
Schedule 1 [Text of 1971 Act as amended]:
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 19:
Page 23, line 35, leave out ("4") and insert ("64").
The noble and learned Lord said: Schedule 1 is the Keeling schedule with the Guardianship of Minors Act 1971 and this amendment is consequential upon Amendment No. 24. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
On Question, whether Schedule 1, as amended, shall be agreed to?
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I merely wanted to congratulate my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor and his draftsman on the success of managing such an extensive Keeling schedule. I cannot remember one of this extent. But it shows what a very useful approach it is to, and indeed I think in this case, substitute for, consolidation.
Schedule 1, as amended, agreed to.
Schedule 3 [Transitional provisions and savings]:
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 30:
Page 50, line 34, leave out ("8") and insert ("7").
The noble and learned Lord said: It is paragraph 7(b) of Schedule 3 and not paragraph 8 which refers to an affiliation order made under the Affiliation Proceedings Act 1957. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Schedule 3, as amended, agreed to.
Schedule 4 [Repeals]:
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 31:
Page 53, line 57, column 3, leave out ("7,9").
The noble and learned Lord said: There is no need to repeal paragraphs 7 and 9 of Schedule 3 to the Children Act 1975, which made amendments to the Marriage Act 1949. Neither of these paragraphs is in the 1982 Act, and it is unclear how they came to be included in the Bill before the House. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Schedule 4, as amended, agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported with amendments.

Teachers' Pay and Conditions Bill
Brought from the Commons: read a first time, and to be printed.

Health and Personal Social Services and Public Health (Northern Ireland) Order 1986
7.25 p.m.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Northern Ireland Office (Lord Lyell): My Lords, I beg to move that the Health and Personal Social Services and Public Health (Northern Ireland) Order 1986, a draft of which was laid before your Lordships on 5th November of this year, be approved.
Your Lordships will appreciate that the order before us this evening contains a wide range of miscellaneous amendments to legislation which concern health, and the personal social services and public health. Article 3 to 14 of the order make amendments to the Health and Personal Social Services (Northern Ireland) Order 1972. I think your Lordships would bear with me if I did not propose to describe these amendments individually in any remarks that I might make at the outset because I think the scope of these articles, and the purpose, will be apparent from the draft order itself, and I hope from the explanatory note which accompanies the order. I shall certainly try to answer any queries or points which your Lordships wish to raise on the article. If I could concentrate my remarks on two remaining aspects of the draft order. The first aspect concerns the tighter controls which we propose to introduce over the sale of tobacco products to children and we find that in Article 15.
The second aspect of the order before us this evening concerns the provisions which we are introducing in Articles 16 17 and 18 to control the spread of infectious diseases in the province and also to bring our legislation for that purpose into line with that applicable in Great Britain.
Article 15 amends the Health and Personal Social Services (Northern Ireland) Order 1978 and it further restricts the sale of tobacco to young people. Many individuals and organisations have expressed concern at the amount of cigarette smoking by children in Northern Ireland. Your Lordships will be interested to note a survey sponsored by the Department of Health and Social Services in conjunction with the Ulster Cancer Foundation carried out in 1983. This survey

1303
showed that the children in the Province aged 11 and 15 years smoked approximately £2,340,000-worth of cigarettes each year. That is well over £2.25 million-worth every year. Twenty-four per cent.—that is, about a quarter—of the fifth-year pupils at secondary schools smoked regularly. I do not know whether that is once a week or once a day, but they were in the habit of regular smoking.
Further concern has been aroused by the manufacture as well as the sale of new tobacco products such as the things which are called Skoal Bandits. I must say to your Lordships that I am unfamiliar with them. Perhaps your Lordships have tried them or know them, but these Skoal Bandits are likely to be attractive to children and they constitute a considerable health hazard.
Article 15 strengthens controls on the sale of tobacco to young people in three important ways. First of all, it makes the sale of tobacco to children an offence of strict liability. At the moment, except for the sale of cigarettes, the vendor has a legal defence that he did not know the tobacco was for the young purchaser's use. As from today this defence will be removed. Secondly, Article 15 will deal with the definition of tobacco, and it will extend this definition to include products for oral or nasal use. This definition will cover products like Skoal Bandits which are sucked rather than chewed. The third control which Article 15 will place on the sale of tobacco to young people will increase the control of automatic vending machines because in future the court will be required to take action if it can be proved conclusively that a vending machine selling tobacco is being extensively used by children.
These amendments match the provisions in the Protection of Children (Tobacco) Act which was recently sponsored in another place by the honourable Member for East Lothian. I shall ensure that these amendments are brought to the attention of the police.
The remaining three articles in the order before us this evening amend the Public Health Act (Northern Ireland) 1967 and they are intended to strengthen controls available in Northern Ireland to reduce the spread of infectious disease.
Article 16 enables the department to determine the fee to be paid for a notifiable disease certificate, instead of prescribing the fee by regulations. The amendments in Articles 17 and 18 include provision for making regulations to deal with certain diseases, to prevent danger to public health from vessels or aircraft arriving at any place and to provide for removal to or detention in hospital of persons with notifiable diseases. The amendments match many of the provisions carried in the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984 and will thus facilitate a common policy within the United Kingdom for the control of certain diseases, and, in particular, acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).
Suspected cases of notifiable diseases must be notified to the chief administrative medical officer of a health and social services board. These diseases are specified in the schedule to the Public Health Act (Northern Ireland) 1967 and are all infectious diseases, such as infective hepatitis, typhoid fever, dysentery,
1304
whooping cough and measles. Various provisions in the 1967 Act enable controls to be applied for the purpose of restricting the spread of notifiable diseases.
It is at times desirable that some of these controls should be applied to other infectious diseases, and under the new provisions in Article 17 regulations may be made to enable appropriate controls to be applied to any disease which may be specified. It is the intention to use these powers to make regulations which will apply to AIDS some of the controls in respect of notifiable diseases. I hasten to stress to your Lordships that these controls already apply in Great Britain. I want to make it clear that AIDS is not a notifiable disease and it is not the intention to make it one. There is a risk that some people suffering from AIDS might be reluctant to seek medical help if the disease were notifiable.
In Article 17, the opportunity has also been taken to introduce the necessary regulatory powers to Northern Ireland public health legislation in respect of public health risks from the arrival of ships or aircraft. Similar powers were originally contained in United Kingdom legislation, but certain provisions have now become transferred or reserved matters and new powers must be provided in Northern Ireland legislation. The provisions for public health control of arrivals of ships and aircraft correspond to similar provisions in the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984, which replaced the provisions in Section 143(1) to (7) of the Public Health Act 1936.
Article 18 makes provision for the compulsory removal to or detention in hospital of people suffering from notifiable diseases. There are no existing powers, but there may be rare and very exceptional circumstances where the clinical condition of a patient who is suffering from a notifiable disease places him in a dangerously infectious state and yet he refuses medical care and admission to hospital, or refuses to remain in hospital. In those circumstances, the new provisions in Article 8 of the order empower health and social services boards to apply to a resident magistrate to make an order for the removal to or detention in hospital of a person with a notifiable disease. A resident magistrate will decide whether the person presents a serious risk of infection to other people and if satisfied he will then make the necessary order.
The new provisions are among those which will in due course be applied to AIDS. They will not be applied to other diseases. Although one would naturally not wish to use such powers, they are a necessary safeguard and are appropriate given the concern which exists about AIDS. I should add that under the Magistrates Courts (Northern Ireland) Order 1981 there is a general right of appeal against the decision of a magistrates court.
If I may wind up, the draft order represents an important contribution to public health in Northern Ireland, not only in terms of safeguarding against disease but also in terms of the risk to children from tobacco. I commend the order to your Lordships. I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 5th November be approved.—(Lord Lyell.)
Lord Prys-Davies: My Lords, as the Minister has explained, this order contains a wide range of miscellaneous amendments bringing the health legislation of Northern Ireland into line with the health legislation of Great Britain. We warmly welcome Article 15, which makes it an absolute offence to sell tobacco products, including new tobacco products such as Skoal Bandits, to young people under the age of 16 years. We are sure that this article will be endorsed by the organisations and parents in the Province who are concerned about the prevention of cigarette smoking by children. Similarly, we welcome Articles 17 and 18, which strengthen the controls available to reduce the spread of those diseases which can be a danger to public health.
However, having regard to the comments made elsewhere and in another place, perhaps the Minister will again confirm that the individual has the right of appeal when he considers that he is being unjustifiably admitted to or detained in hospital. Moreover, is the individual patient told that he has this right of appeal or is this something that he may or may not stumble across?
We note that Article 5 provides for the registration of common lodging-houses, and Article 9 provides for the short-term assessment of persons for admission to old people's homes. I should like to trespass for a minute or two and to put a few points to the Minister about the problem of homelessness among single people in the Province who are in need of help.
There is mounting evidence that the position of homeless single people is, or at least should be, a cause of great concern. This concern was voiced by a deputation which came to Parliament a few weeks ago and it has been voiced, in particular, by the Simon community for Northern Ireland. I understand that half of those who approached the homeless advice unit in Belfast are single people, yet there is only one statutory hostel for single people maintained by the Eastern Health and Social Services Board and it is unable to meet the demand. I am told also that single people are the largest group on the Housing Executive's waiting list of 24,000. So there are many homeless young people languishing on waiting lists.
Can the Minister tell us how the department views the position? Does it consider that the eastern board and the Housing Executive are coping adequately with the position? Is the department satisfied that those two bodies have identified the genuine cases of need, and can more be done for the genuine cases of need? Looking to the future, is the department satisfied that both bodies have adequate plans for the provision of additional accommodation for single people in need of help in the period 1987–92? One is bound to ask whether in these circumstances there is any agency in Northern Ireland which is monitoring what becomes of homeless single people who cannot find accommodation.
The year 1987 has been designated as the International Year of the Homeless and I understand that the Government will be introducing next year a homeless persons order for Northern Ireland. It would be helpful if the Minister could tell us something about the timetable for the proposed legislation. Also, will the department be publishing a list of bodies with
1306
whom it will consult before finalising the term of the draft order? Will those bodies have ample opportunity to feed their proposals into the department? I have been specifically asked to raise that particular question with the Minister.
Article 10 gives authority to the department to recover the cost of provisional residential accommodation in the circumstances described therein. I should be grateful if the Minister would confirm to the House whether or not this article will have retrospective effect. It is not clear to me from reading this article whether or not it will have such effect.
Finally, perhaps I may say something about the dissolution of the Northern Ireland Social Services Council. Some of us have some reservations about the wisdom of dissolving the council. The National Health Service is a large enterprise serving a huge public. It could be argued that what is required at the Northern Ireland level is not only specialist advisory committees—and certainly one requires such committees—but also an organisation outside the department with its own research and intelligence unit on which members of the general public will serve. This kind of organisation should be able to range freely over the whole range of health policies at work in the province and question the assumptions. But in any event, I am not convinced that the case has been made out for abolishing this council, at least until an elected assembly has been reconstituted and is functioning effectively.
With those few comments, we on these Benches are pleased to support the draft order which is now before the House.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: My Lords, perhaps I may begin by saying that it is a remarkable fact that the number of people sitting on the Government Benches has actually doubled in the past five minutes.
As I thought, the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, has dealt with this matter fairly fully, and I shall therefore not deal with it very fully because I wish to say a few things on the next order. I should like to say that we support the order throughout. In particular, we are interested in the tobacco problem as regards children and in the new risks which the modern trend of sucking and sniffing have brought. We shall do everything we can to support the Government in their efforts to fight these trends. The same applies to the disease regulations and particularly to the new and frightening rise of AIDS in this country. I do not know to what extent that disease has yet occurred in Northern Ireland; I hope it has not occurred.
As regards homelessness, this is a point which is not really covered by the order but it is a very interesting point. I am glad that the noble Lord mentioned the Simon Community. This community was founded by a man called Wally Clifford, who had been a probation officer and whom I first met in 1952 or 1953. He founded the Simon Community, which was interested only in people who were below the bottom line. It has done a wonderful job and I am glad that it was mentioned.
I shall say no more, other than that we support this order fully. As time goes on, if matters arise under it we shall do what we can to support the Government.
7.45 p.m.
Lord Lyell: My Lords, I am sure your Lordships will agree with me in being grateful for the close attention that has been paid to this order, particularly by the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, and the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, both of whom have spoken this evening. I was not necessarily aware of the ebb and flow of my noble friends behind me, since I was paying close attention to the reasoned arguments of noble Lords who were speaking. However, I am particularly grateful that the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, pointed out that the number of my noble friends had doubled. This must be some indication of increasing interest in the order before us this evening.
The noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, raised a number of points, some of which I hope I shall be able to answer fairly easily. I think I may have to write to him on one of those points, but I shall have a stab at answering it this evening. The noble Lord raised the question of the dissolution of the Health and Social Services Council. We regret one side aspect of this particular question, which is that the existence of the Health and Social Services Committee of the Assembly (which your Lordships will be aware is not functioning) was only one of a number of factors contributing to the department's decision to dissolve the council.
I have to tell your Lordships that the primary reason was that the council had not made the contribution which possibly they had hoped and certainly we had hoped they would make towards the development of policy. We believe that advice and contributions to policy development come adequately from other channels and we are definitely satisfied that we receive the advice that we ought to be receiving. I stress to the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, that the order before us this evening in no way affects the five central advisory committees. The noble Lord will be aware that there is one committee for each major professional discipline. Those committees will continue to advise the department. They, with a number of other bodies, will give us all the advice we seek and we are very grateful for it.
The noble Lord wondered whether there would be any retrospective effect of Article 10. I am able to tell him that Article 10 is certainly not retrospective. However, as soon as provisions come into effect by the appointed day order we will take action immediately where people have disposed of assets within the past six months. The provisions will not be brought into effect in Northern Ireland until similar action is taken in Great Britain, and no decision has yet been taken as to when the provisions will be implemented in Great Britain.
Perhaps I may also point out at this stage that under the present arrangements for determining the level of charges we may take account of any assets which are deliberately disposed of and the resident may be charged accordingly. I stress the word "may" and I hope we shall not take a draconian view. I suggest to your Lordships that in practice assets disposed of more than 12 months previously will not be taken into account. Finally, I stress that people in Northern Ireland will have had lengthy notice of the intention to recover assets.
1308
The noble Lord also had a query about appeals by an individual against a decision of a magistrate sending him to or detaining him in hospital. I do have a note, but this is a little complicated and perhaps the noble Lord will bear with me if I write to him. A brief search of company legislation indicates that there is relevant material in Section 67 of the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984. The noble Lord will see that that covers part of the point. However, I think it better not to get into Section 67 of the 1984 Act this evening.
I hope that I have covered most of the problems which the noble Lord raised. If there is anything not covered in Section 67, I shall clear it up in writing. However, I would stress to your Lordships that there is a general right of appeal against the decision of a magistrates court. This is contained in Article 143 of the Magistrates Courts (Northern Ireland) Order 1981. I understand that this means that Northern Ireland does not require a specific right of appeal. That specific right in Great Britain is contained within the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984. That probably cuts down my own dabblings in the law and I shall not go further tonight. However, I shall write to the noble Lord on that aspect of the matter.
The noble Lord asked me about homelessness. I understand that the Shelter Organisation monitors the number of homeless persons of all ages, the young and senior citizens as well. It makes available the results of its monitoring survey to the department. He will be aware that it is a voluntary organisation.
Perhaps I may deal with the noble Lord's main concerns. In regard to permanent accommodation, the Northern Ireland Housing Executive allocates available dwellings in accordance with its housing selection scheme. The scheme has been approved by the Department of the Environment. Under it dwellings are allocated to those applicants in greatest need. Normally we will find that families with children are regarded as having a need greater than single persons, but where there are special health or social needs a single person may be awarded greater priority. The health and social services boards already co-operate closely with the Northern Ireland Housing Executive in providing professional assessment of the medical and social needs of applicants. I stress at this stage that social security benefits would be payable to any homeless person who made a claim and who also satisfied the relevant prescribed conditions. The amount payable would vary according to the circumstances of the individual claimant.
The noble Lord asked me specifically about the Eastern Health and Social Services Board. I assure him that the board co-operates closely with the housing executive and with voluntary organisations in seeking to ensure that all those in genuine need receive the assistance, and above all the support, that they require. But with regard to the provision of permanent accommodation in the eastern board area, the Northern Ireland Housing Executive has modified its new-build programme to reflect the changing composition of its waiting list. I am able to tell the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, that a greater proportion of dwellings suitable for single people is now being provided.

1309
Finally, in winding up this topic of homelessness, perhaps I may say that we hope to publish next year a proposal for a draft order dealing mainly with homelessness. I hope that I may be able to fine that down next year in writing. I do not know whether it will be sooner or later. Perhaps I may have a first shot this evening and say "next year", and complete, so far as we are able to, the more precise timing for 1987 to the noble Lord in writing. I am able to conclude on this point by saying that interested voluntary organisations have already put their ideas to the Department of the Environment and they will be invited to comment following the publication of the proposal for the draft order.
I think I have dealt with the queries that were raised. If I have missed any, I shall study the Official Report closely and I shall certainly be in touch by letter with both noble Lords who have spoken. I beg to move.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Appropriation (No. 3) (Northern Ireland) Order 1986
7.54 p.m.
Lord Lyell Lord Lyell rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 13th November be approved.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the draft order is being made under paragraph 1 of Schedule 1 to the Northern Ireland Act 1974 and relates to only one Vote—Class II, Vote 3. This Department of Economic Development Vote covers expenditure on local enterprise, aircraft and shipbuilding, energy efficiency, mineral exploration, other support services, capital grants and the new Technology Board for Northern Ireland. Notwithstanding that rather lengthy list of services, extra funds are being sought for only some of them. For that reason my opening thoughts will be fairly brief. Full details are provided in he Autumn Supplementary Estimates booklet which is available in this interesting cream cover from the Printed Paper Office. I hope that it is fairly clear. I found it illuminating, interesting and reasonably easy to understand.
Your Lordships will see from the booklet that we are seeking an additional £50·5 million. This amount, when added to the 1986–87 Main Estimates approved by your Lordships on 30th June this year, brings the total provision for services under this Vote to £127.8 million.
Turning now to the Supplementary Estimate, at Section A on page 2 of the booklet, which covers the activities of the Local Enterprise Development Unit (commonly called LEDU in Northern Ireland) an increased provision of £3 million is required. The figures in the right-hand column of Section A of £1·775 million and £1·225 million come to precisely £3 million for LEDU. In previous debates I have been able to praise the work of LEDU and I want to do so again this evening. Since its creation in 1971 it is a matter for no small pride that the small business agency of the Province has promoted approximately 27,000 jobs in a highly cost-effective manner. In recognition of the valuable work being carried on by LEDU, and to make it even more effective, the
1310
Government recently approved an increase of approximately 30 per cent. in its staffing.
Section B of the supplementary estimates relates to the aircraft and shipbuilding industry. In Section B1 an additional £2 million is required for Shorts Brothers. The Government are naturally disappointed at the recently announced downturn in the company's financial performance in 1985–86, but I hope that the commitment and ability of both the management and the workforce will ensure an early return to profitability. Before we leave Section B your Lordships may wish to note the increase in the provision for the Belfast shipbuilders, Harland and Wolff, from £37 million to £68 million. Part of this increase is to meet the cost of 800 redundancies announced by the company on 25th November of this year.
While any redundancies are to be regretted, Harland and Wolff, like other yards throughout the world, has had to face up to the severe decline in the availability of new orders. The Government are doing what they can to help those made redundant by earmarking £2 million out of the increased provision to fund the setting up of Harland and Wolff Enterprises. This will operate in a way similar to British Shipbuilders Enterprises and will provide redundant work people and operatives with practical advice and assistance towards retraining and, above all, re-employment.
At the top of page 3 we find Section C. In this section we find energy efficiency and other support services. Extra funds are required at Section C3—the energy enterprise scheme—and also at Section C5. Those two are on page 2 (C5, consultancy studies on energy matters), whereas on page 3 we find savings at C4, energy conservation scheme, and at C6, mineral exploration. If we look at the additional expenditure, an extra £100,000 is required for the energy enterprise scheme known as the Monergy Campaign. This has proved to be very successful with Northern Ireland industry and commerce, achieving energy savings of almost £4 million a year.
The year 1986 has been designated as Energy Efficiency Year in the United Kingdom. If we look down also in Section C on page 2, we see an extra £474,000 being required for consultancy studies on energy matters in relation to the mining of lignite, and let us not forget its prospective uses. The original esimate was a token £1,000 and firm costings are now available.
If we move on to Section D, we find that an extra £12 million is required for this financial year for capital investment grants for industrial development, bringing the total financial provision in this financial year to £30 million.
Finally, perhaps I may take your Lordships to Section E and the token estimate of £1,000, the purpose of which is to draw the attention of your Lordships to the setting up of the Technology Board for Northern Ireland. This is an important step in the industrial development of the Province. The responsibilities of the board include that of advising government on the application of science and technology to economic needs in Northern Ireland and particularly on the contribution that technology can make to the growth and development of the manufacturing and service sectors of industry.

1311
The board has members drawn from industry, commerce and the universities and it also has links with the Department of Trade and Industry and, above all, all the Northern Ireland departments. We believe that bringing together the varied experience and expertise of industry and the universities in this forum will give a further impetus to the technological development of the Province. It will keep the need for the exploitation of science and technology to the forefront of the thinking of industry and government, because, as I am sure your Lordships will be aware, the Province faces a major challenge in improving its industrial competitiveness and, above all, in increasing its share of world markets.
We believe that the new board has a crucial role to play in providing advice and generating ideas for new ways of using technology to the best advantage. To that end we believe that we have been fortunate in securing the services of Dr. Daniel McCaughan, who is a native of Northern Ireland and currently the technical director of Marconi Engineering Devices Limited, and we have obtained his services as the first chairman of the board. The board has already met on two occasions and is actively pursuing a number of key issues. It will not only report on an annual basis to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State but will also make appropriate recommendations to Ministers and departments when necessary. It is operating on an extra-statutory basis in the same way as the similar Department of Trade and Industry Requirements Board operates, and that permits a certain flexibility in approaching its task. I am confident that the new Technology Board represents a valuable investment in the future industrial well-being of the Province.
I think that is all that I want to say at the outset. I shall certainly listen to everything that is said by your Lordships and I hope that I can answer most of the points that are raised. I shall of course write to your Lordships about any points that I may miss. With that, I commend the order to your Lordships, and I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 13th November be approved.—(Lord Lyell.)
Lord Prys-Davies: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, for taking us through the main provisions of the draft order and for explaining their significance. I hasten to say that we support the order and I am sure that it will be welcomed from all sides of the House.
When my noble friend Lord Graham of Edmonton and I were in the province in September—and I should say that as spokesmen for Northern Ireland we wish that we could be in the Province more often—we did not come across any person in a responsible position who seriously believed that the Government's policies would produce jobs on the scale that is required. Such was our finding. We believe that the economic outlook for Northern Ireland remains bleak. Indeed, this order acknowledges that the Province is faced with another heavy instalment of redundancies at Harland and Wolff. Over one-fifth of the working population of the Province remains unemployed. Competition for inward investment is intense, and obviously Northern Ireland is not helped by its geographical location, let
1312
alone by its image of being a divided society. On the other hand, Northern Ireland is fortunate in having a machinery of state to guide its development.
I was heartened, if somewhat surprised, by a speech made by the Secretary of State to the Regional Studies Association conference held here in London on 14th November, when he announced that he was encouraged by recent developments on the economic front which suggested to him that Northern Ireland—and I quote his words—"was again on the move". Time will tell whether his optimism was well founded. Our hope must be that the provisions of the draft order when implemented will be a small contribution toward the well-being of families, enterprises and the Province.
As the noble Lord has explained, this order seeks approval for the expenditure of an additional £50·5 million by the Department of Economic Development on about six or seven different topics which the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, has explained. However, we are reminded that over half —just about 60 per cent.—is for the cost of 800 redundancies announced by Harland and Wolff. We deeply regret the further redundancies, as we regret the redundancies which have been announced by Van Heusen, National Supply, Gallaghers and others. Can the Minister help the House by telling us what part of this additional sum of £31 million will be disbursed in redundancy payments and what part will be paid to Harland and Wolff enterprises? I understand that it will provide practical advice and assistance towards retraining and re-employment. Will the Minister also tell the House whether these redundancies will also mean that next year Harland and Wolff will have to reduce its apprentice intake, and if so by how much!
We welcome the increase of £12 million for capital investment grants and we were particularly glad to learn from the Secretary of State that the IDB is considering a large number of potential investment cases. We also endorse the smaller increase of £3 million in LEDU's budget, because as the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, has indicated—and we agree with him—there is an increasing role for small enterprises, whether they be in manufacturing, craft or services. We join with the noble Lord in paying our tribute to the men and women of LEDU and the leadership which they have demonstrated. However, can the Minister tell the house what encouragement is being given by LEDU or the Department of Economic Development to producer and consumer cooperatives in Northern Ireland?
The smallest sum bespoken in the order is a token £1,000 for the Technology Board for Northern Ireland, but we believe that this is full of potential. From little acorns great oak trees grow. I am sure that the setting up of the Technology Board will be supported by all your Lordships. The Minister has been quite helpful and has referred to the tasks which the board will discharge. Can the Minister tell us whether it will also have a direct impact on educational policies so that more young people are equipped for a career in the technological field in the new industries?
Can the Minister also tell us when this board was established? What is its registered address? Where is it

1313
located and to whom is it accountable? If this information has already been given to the general public I regret to say that I failed to pick it up. We give our blessing to this new Technology Board.
When the noble Lord, Lord Graham, and I were over in Northern Ireland in September, I spent a little time at the Belfast office of the Northern Ireland Association of Citizens' Advice Bureaux. This association has undertaken much hard work almost throughout the Province. I should like to pay tribute to the way in which its staff have served their fellow citizens in very difficult circumstances.
This association employs no more than 30 organisers, and all but one are paid less than £3,000 per year. The organisers call on the services of about 330 unpaid voluntary workers. I was told that during the year ending in March 1986 they had handled 120,000 inquiries. This represents an increase of about 5·6 per cent. on the number of inquiries handled in the year ending March 1985.
I was impressed by the achievements of this small band of people with a small staff of about nine at the headquarters. I was also impressed with the magnitude of their problems. Yet those problems, including the lack of enough trained staff, are, at root, financial. Therefore they are capable of resolution if the Government can find the money. This would be a very small sum of money compared with the sums that the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, has mentioned this evening—apart from the £1,000.
There are three specific questions that I should like to put to the Minister in relation to the Northern Ireland Association of Citizens' Advice Bureaux. First, will his right honourable friend the Secretary of State now exercise his powers to ensure that central government funds which have been allocated to local bureaux are released to the bureau where the appropriate district council through which the funding is channelled has adjourned its meetings in protest against the Anglo-Irish Agreement, thus effectively preventing funds from reaching the bureaux?
I should remind your Lordships that the association in Northern Ireland has now to consider the closure and abandonment of at least five if its bureaux due to non-release of funds from the relevant district council.
Secondly, will the department consider with sympathy, and urgency, the CAB's very strong case for additional funding to be made available to the Northern Ireland Association to enable it to develop its role as a regional office, even if this is at the expense of another spending unit?
Thirdly, is the Citizens' Advice Bureaux organisation in Northern Ireland an eligible candidate for funding from the International Fund for Ireland, bearing in mind the need for important CAB services both north and south of the Border? I was a little surprised to learn that it is being said that the American contribution to the International Fund cannot be so applied as it is earmarked for—I quote—"private sector investment". Can the Minister tell your Lordships' House whether or not that interpretation is correct? The Minister and the House will know the objects of the fund as set out in Article 4 of the agreement are very much wider than private sector investment. It is very much to be hoped that the
1314
board of the International Fund will pay due regard to all the objectives of Article 4 when it comes to disbursing the money.
It is our impression that foreign governments and foreign companies, when considering investment in Northern Ireland, will need to be satisfied that industry and business in the Province are attacking seriously the problems of discrimination in employment. Only the people of Northern Ireland can tackle this problem, and they owe it to themselves to do so with determination. Is the Minister able to assure your Lordships' House that the Government for their part are satisfied that the policies for promoting equality of opportunity in employment are being effectively implemented and monitored?
I have a few additional questions to pose to the Minister, although they do not arise out of the matters covered by the draft order. I will be as brief as I can. A number of your Lordships recently met a deputation from a Unionist background, some of the members being related to life sentence prisoners. They told us that they were worried about a number of aspects of the life sentence prisoners review procedure. I believe that it is my duty to raise one or two questions. Is it the case that the membership of the Life Sentence Review Board, when compared with that of the Parole Board in Great Britain is too dominated by senior departmental officers? Should its membership not contain outside people such as a trade union official? When a life sentence prisoner is being considered for release by the board, is there not a case for informing him of the main features of the case against his release so that he may meet that objection?
Turning to another subject, I should like to draw the Minister's attention to the possible closure in February next of the Short Strand Irish Language Nursery School in Belfast. A letter setting out the circumstances of this school and questioning certain assumptions made by the department was posted to me in Belfast over a week ago, but has not yet reached me. Therefore, I accept that I am inadequately briefed to do justice to this nursery school, which, as I understand the position, will have to be closed down next February because the department is withdrawing funding from the St. Matthew's Trust Association, from which the school draws its income.
I am not fully briefed as to why the department should be withdrawing funding from the association. However, it is my duty to put two questions to the Minister. If for good reasons the department ceases to support the St. Matthew's Trust Association, will it take steps to ensure that the Short Strand Irish Language Nursery School continues to receive government funding so that it remains in being after February next year, in order to seek to transfer the Irish heritage to the children of that area? In any event, if the department has a positive policy of encouraging the reflowering of the Irish language in Northern Ireland, should the Irish Language nursery schools not be in receipt of a direct grant from the department? That is the issue to which I may return on receipt of a more adequate briefing.
Finally, I should like to pay a handsome tribute to the work undertaken by Co-operation North, a non-political, non-denominational reconciliation body, which since it was founded in 1979 has been reaching

1315
out into every aspect of community life in Ireland, both North and South. I was sorry that I was unable to be at a meeting last week convened by the study group when the chairman of Co-operation North came to the House to explain its work programme.
In the work of Co-operation North among young people, business people and communities one sees a powerful ray of hope. Both governments have given financial support to that organisation. That support needs to be continued, but on an even bigger scale. This year it is spending about 850,000 Irish punts. It intends to double that expenditure next year and to increase it progressively thereafter until it reaches about 5 million Irish punts in the early 1990s.
On all the evidence known to us, Co-operation North is playing its part within the framework for progress which both governments have been constructing, and in our view it is worthy of the increased financial support which it requires and has requested. I should be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, if he would convey that message to his right honourable friend the Secretary of State. With those comments and that question, we give our support to the order.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, for taking us through the appropriation order so thoroughly. I am grateful also to the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, for discussing various parts of it. I shall say no more than that the picture is sombre because so much of what is being spent, as the noble Lord pointed out, is for redundancies. It is a great tragedy that there has been a big change in Harland and Wolff. It is not useful at this stage to comment on it because we all know about it. Nobody knows what to do about it. I believe that the Government are genuinely trying to do something.
I want to exercise the licence which we traditionally grant ourselves in this House on the three appropriation orders each year to deal with certain topics which do not arise directly from the order. My noble friend did that also, and good luck to him!
I should like to begin by congratulating Ulster on the fact that the Giant's Causeway has been accepted by the World Heritage Convention as an area of outstanding world value. I have walked down it over two days and two nights, and it is a place of great beauty. Everyone in Northern Ireland loves it. That world honour is satisfactory, but does it involve financial assistance from anybody if there is such applause from the World Heritage Convention? Will it help Northern Ireland to keep it in order? I do not know whether the noble Lord knows the answer to that, but if not perhaps he will write to me, because it is an interesting point.
Secondly, I see from the report of the Arts Council that it was disappointed when in the closing weeks of the year it was informed that the uplift in its grant, far from contributing to its increased functions, was to be so modest that in real terms it amounted to a cut. We have talked about that several times in this House. There is no question but that anyone who reads the letter of the noble Lord, Lord Donoughue, in The Times today will be clear that we in this country are not doing frightfully well.
1316
The case for supporting the arts is even stronger in Northern Ireland because it is one of the matters which brings people of all denominations together. It brings them into communication and assembly with good, and not bad results. The arts have been an important and successful venture in Northern Ireland. I note that the Belfast Festival at Queen's University ran 200 performances at 70 per cent. capacity. The Ulster Orchestra is respected in all musical circles, and its broadcast programmes are always interesting and well presented. The university managed to find 1,000 people who wanted to hear Jonathan Miller lecture on producing Mozart's operas. I doubt whether Oxford or Cambridge could have done half that.
The Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra gave two concerts. The Abbey, the RSC and the National Theatre companies appeared, and so did Andrew Lloyd-Webber's Requiem. That is a living example of how the arts can bring people with opposing political views together in harmony. Surely the Government should try to extend that. There is a strong case for giving more money to the arts on the mainland; it is unanswerable in Northern Ireland, where so few things lead to harmony.
The appropriation order is about money. This is one of the few occasions when we are allowed to talk about it. I suggest that if it is right to spend £127 million on the various economic and other necessities which are concerned largely with jobs and unemployment—and of course we are happy to agree with that—it is right and even more necessary to spend a few thousand extra on the arts and other things which have an influence on the tolerance and good temper of the community.
Now I turn to the other things. The main one I want to mention has been fully dealt with by my noble friend from the Labour Front Bench. That is because we do not collude in what we are going to say. I prepared most of my remarks about Co-operation North, by which I was enormously impressed. It aims to bring together Irish people from North and South and to destroy the ignorance which breeds fear, hatred and violence. As the noble Lord said, it receives £50,000 from the Government of the South but only £35,000 from the Government of the North. It is doing sterling work and I propose to take a minute or two to add some details which I obtained when the organisation came here last week and which the noble Lord was unable to give.
Co-operation North has several groups of projects. The first, and I think the easiest to understand, is school exchanges. Groups of pupils from the South go to the North, and in reverse. They are exchanged for a month at a time in 200 schools—20 per cent. of the secondary schools of the whole of Ireland and 50 per cent. of those in Northern Ireland. They have various youth-link projects. Groups working on cross-Border projects are exchanged. A group from the North goes South to work with a group from the South, and vice versa. Many members of those groups are unemployed. Last year 10,000 youngsters crossed the Border in school exchanges and youth-link projects. It is not a negligible project when it involves 10,000 young people.
Co-operation North also has a business and a community programme. I cannot go into all these

1317
matters. I have its annual report and programmes. I can put them in the Printed Paper Office if any of the many noble Lords here would like to see them. They are interesting.
However, the matter about which the organisation convinces me is that it has raised its income—apart from the Government's £35,000 from the EC—largely from Irish banks, and in one way or another. It was distributing over £800,000 this year. It has plans to go well over the million mark, but it does not have all the money. It wants to do more; it has the demand to do more. It has demonstrated that what it is doing is effective, and it should be helped to expand.
I must tell your Lordships about this organisation. It consists of a joint board of eminent men and women from the professions, business, academic life, the trade unions and the voluntary bodies. The chairman serves for one year and comes alternately from Northern Ireland and the Republic. The current vice-chairmen are the chairman of Ulster Television from the North and the chief executive of Aer Lingus from the South. The chairman elect is Dr. Louden Ryan, Governor of the Bank of Ireland. It is a mixture of business people and people of eminence who are not taking the line that until political issues are settled it is impossible to live properly together. They are doing something about it.
This is a topic where we are agreeing to extra money. We are agreeing to £50 million odd, adding up to £127 million. Of this I think that the Arts Council gets about £3 million and wants probably £100,000 more immediately. These people receive £35,000. The work they are doing is important. Until that kind of work prospers Northern Ireland has no hope of doing better.
I should like formally to ask the Government through the Minister to recognise the long-term importance of this kind of work and to help the organisation meet its great demand for growth by doubling its annual grant this year and again next year. I do not see how money could be better spent. I do not think it right that we should always agree easily to every extension to the main expenditure which the noble Lord asks us for on economic and other affairs without paying some attention to the enormously important social work that this organisation is doing. On those grounds we support the appropriation order.
8.30 p.m.
Lord Hylton: My Lords, I should like to support everything said by the two noble Lords speaking from the Opposition Benches about Co-operation North. I have know this organisation more or less since it started. It is something that I have mentioned in your Lordships' House before. I am grateful also to the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, for what he has said about the Life Sentence Review Board. I am pleased that he reinforced the plea that I have already made to Mr. Nicholas Scott in correspondence about putting some independent members on that board, which at the moment is comprised 100 per cent. of officials and civil servants and members of the probation service. There is clearly plenty of scope for many improvements in the procedures of the board, but I shall not go into that in detail now.
1318
The noble Lord, Lord Lyell, will be well aware that agriculture and its products play an important part in the economy of Northern Ireland. I should like to ask him about a traditional crop which appears to have a bright future. I refer to flax. How many acres of flax were grown this year? Will there be substantially more next year? The main brake on increasing the acreage of this crop has been the limited amount of machinery for extracting the fibres from the harvested plant. Can the noble Lord tell us what is being done to remove this bottleneck? For instance, can the available machinery be used over a longer working season? In the past much of Ulster's flax was grown in Donegal and the nearby counties of the Republic. Does the noble Lord see any scope for reviving this type of cross-Border traffic?
For some years now it has been common ground that security, politics and the economy are three linked areas where progress is needed in Northern Ireland. Perhaps I may quote from the Minority Rights Group's recent report on Co-existence in Some Plural European Societies, a document that I hope we may be able to debate next year. In the introduction to this report, Professor Claire Palley has written:
"Another crucial factor is the state of the economy: economic growth softens inter-group competitiveness, while economic decline worsens it".
This was indeed seen to be so in Northern Ireland during the 'sixties. Now, alas, the situation is much less good, as has been pointed out already. In October of this year there were nearly 135,000 unemployed claimants, a figure quite posibly smaller than the total number of unemployed or under-employed people. These claimants represented 23.1 per cent. of the workforce, and for men a still higher percentage. The total had risen by 11,500 over the previous year.
I wish to argue from these figures that the time has come for Her Majesty's Government to recognise that Northern Ireland cannot afford any further job losses in the public sector. There may have to be some switching of resources within public expenditure programmes, for example, when schools have to close for lack of pupils. There may be other reasons for flexibility and the redeployment of personnel. Nevertheless, the total of public sector employment needs to be maintained or even increased until such time as the private sector is able to generate many more jobs than it can at present. I submit that it is no good trying to economise on desperately needed services such as home helps and the nursery schools, which have been mentioned already, because such attempts will be counter productive both economically and politically. Can the noble Lord the Minister confirm that Her Majesty's Government accept that broad view?
I should like to go on to argue that economic and social policy and development should not be separately considered. On the contrary, they should march hand in hand. This should be reasonably easy in Northern Ireland with its six counties and total population of only 1½ million, linked, incidentally, by a rather good communication system.
What is needed is a five-year programme. This should bring together both statutory agencies and voluntary bodies. It should embrace the cities, market towns and rural areas. It will be concerned not only

1319
with community development within localities that are often segregated or polarised but also with inter-community reconciliation. This is why the present local authorities are not the most suitable instrument for this purpose. There are already a number of places that provide neutral meeting grounds with reasonable security and access. These will have to be multiplied very considerably if a majority of the people are to be enabled to work towards the common good in the widest sense.
Your Lordships will be aware that there are a variety of activities in Northern Ireland that bring people together across the traditional divides. These include such things as public sector works, trade unionism, and, in leisure and sport, pigeons, snooker, football, rugger, Save the Children Fund, and indeed the arts, as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson. Nevertheless, there is still a lack of common ground in regular use by both traditions. Conscious government policy has a part to play in building up the common ground and in developing existing and new shared institutions. For many years grants for children's holidays have been confined to organisations that enable both traditions to mix and meet. This is the kind of precedent that needs to be developed.
The next question is how to ensure that economic and social policies are in harmony, and that there is co-ordination between the public, private and voluntary sectors. I suggest that nothing less will do than a special unit within the office of the Secretary of State. Its task would be to make policy recommendations and to assess the impact of the plans of individual departments. It might well need to be supplemented by a council bringing together representatives of the public, private and voluntary sectors. This would function in a way somewhat similar to a regional Neddy, with the added task of promoting social development and assisting the coming together of two very divided traditions within the wider community. If anyone asks how this essential work is to be financed, perhaps I may urge Her Majesty's Government to use the windfall of the American Government money for this purpose.
I realise that the proposals I have made this evening lie somewhat outside the departmental brief of the noble Lord the Minister. Nevertheless, we would be most grateful if he could comment on it when he replies and perhaps undertake to discuss it with his honourable and right honourable friends.
8.45 p.m.
Lord Lyell: My Lords, we are all immensely grateful for the close attention paid to the regular question of the Appropriation Order. We know that debates on these orders give rise to very wide debate. I think it is known by custom that your Lordships will take an opportunity of raising many very important points. I certainly do not begrudge one second of the time taken by the three noble Lords who have spoken in reply to my opening comments. I shall attempt to cover the many points raised, but I suspect that one or two of the questions will have to be covered by written reply.
My right honourable and honourable friends in another place were pleased to welcome the noble Lord,
1320
Lord Prys-Davies, and his noble colleague the noble Lord, Lord Graham, on their visit to Northern Ireland earlier this year. I am glad that they both obeyed the three-word command given to any visitor to the Province and that is: "Watch your weight". The hospitality there is known for the great damage that it does to the waistlines of visitors. I am pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, is back to his svelte shape. We appreciated the interest that he took in all aspects of life in the Province.
The noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, raised the question of the general economic outlook in the Province, which, I am sure he would agree, is coupled to that in the United Kingdom as well as in the Western world. He referred particularly to unemployment levels in Northern Ireland. The Government share the concern of the noble Lord, and of all those who have spoken this evening: I would assure your Lordships of that.
Of course it has been said by my noble friend many times before that unemployment cannot be countered by government alone. It requires great commitment by employers to be efficient, competitive and innovative. I shall be referring to this later when speaking about the Technology Board. The countering of unemployment also requires the sustained efforts of employees, and ultimately the understanding and support of the whole community in Northern Ireland.
The priority of government is to create a climate in which enterprise can flourish. Jobs are created by successful businessmen who produce quality goods at the right price. Our aim is to encourage more people to set up in business, to facilitate the growth of existing small businesses, to support LEDU—I would reiterate the Government's commitment to LEDU in Northern Ireland—and to stimulate economic activity in communities through the various local enterprise programmes. However, I must stress that for the immediate future the Government recognise that there is a need to help the unemployed, and they provide a wide range of measures for this purpose. Over 5,000 people in Northern Ireland have started their own business under the Enterprise Allowance Scheme. The Action for Community Employment Scheme has provided a wide variety of constructive and practical work for the long-term unemployed in their local communities. I do not think there is anything there that is not also carried on this side of the water in England, Scotland and Wales.
The booklet, Action for Jobs, and counselling for long-term unemployed under the Restart Programme are recent measures to ensure that those out of work are aware of the enterprise, employment and above all training opportunities available. On their own these measures will not cure unemployment, but we hope that by supporting the longer term strategy for self-sustaining jobs they will help and be of lasting value to many of those worst hit by unemployment. Above all, we hope that they will improve the chances of those who are temporarily without work of getting back into work in lasting jobs.
The noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, also raised the question of Harland and Wolff, and especially of

1321
Harland and Wolff Enterprises, which I mentioned and which is before us in the order this evening. The £2 million of increased allocation for Harland and Wolff in the present financial year has been earmarked to fund the setting up by the company of the separate subsidiary company. This will provide those who are declared redundant with potential advice and assistance towards retraining and re-employment. I believe these schemes have a good record and I am sure your Lordships will agree. I am thinking particularly of a scheme in Consett, and I remember reading of the considerable success of that scheme. I am sure that Harland and Wolff Enterprises will have similar success, and we look forward to looking at the results in due course.
The new company will operate in a way similar to British Shipbuilders Enterprises. We hope that it will be established and operational in the very near future. I do not want to fine down the timing, but "the very near future" will give an indication to those of your Lordships who have spoken. The balance of the increased allocation for Harland and Wolff will be spread. It will cover the costs of the redundancies recently announced as well as meeting capital requirements and trading losses—a mixture of all these elements.
The noble Lord raised the question of the intake of apprentices next year. It is a matter for the company to decide in the light of the circumstances prevailing how many apprentices to take on and train. I am sure the company will note the concern of both the Government and your Lordships as expressed this evening.
The noble Lord also asked when the Technology Board was constituted and what it has been doing so far. It was constituted during the summer of 1986. The board will report on an annual basis to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State. Most of its work and recommendations will normally be considered on a day-to-day basis by the departmental Ministers. I have not yet had anything from the board crossing my desk but I certainly look forward to receiving any advice.
The board has met twice, and the topics it has considered include research in the two universities in Northern Ireland and its relevance to local industry. Secondly, the board considered the training needs of technologists which included non-technical skills such as language proficiency. I am sure your Lordships will agree to that. I had cause the other night to attempt to address a group of German supermarket owners on the benefits of Ulster beef, with apparently some success, but certainly we should be improving. The board is located in, and operates under the aegis of, the Department of Economic Development. It operates within their precincts and in their premises.
The noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, also raised the question of equal opportunities. We agree with the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies. We are fully committed to equal employment opportunities in both the public and the private sectors; that is, equal opportunities for everybody. So far as the Civil Service is concerned we have produced
1322
a major report on the issue. We have put in place specific and detailed arrangements for monitoring employment, and monitoring this particular aspect.
The noble Lord was kind enough to give me some notice of his question regarding the Citizens' Advice Bureaux. On the question of funding the bureaux during the current protest action and shenanigans (if I may call them that—and your Lordships will understand what I mean) of the district councils in this particular period of disturbance in their activities, the Government are prepared to intervene only where essential district council jobs and services are at stake.
I have to stress to your Lordships, and above all the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies—although it will not be news to him—that the funding of the local bureaux is at the discretion of the district councils. The noble Lord will be aware that some district councils continue to function. There are increasing signs of life in the district councils, but of course mainly we read about resignations, or the non-attendance of members. In the vast majority of the district councils the councils meet, but I could not necessarily tell the noble Lord whether the funding and activities of the citizens' advice brueaux come into the agenda of the particular meetings. If I can glean anything further I shall let the noble Lord know on that point. I would point out to him that because the funding of the CABs is at the discretion of the district councils we are not prepared to make funds available direct to the local bureaux.
The noble Lord also asked in this respect about the support of the central Government for the Northern Ireland Association. This has risen in real terms by over 130 per cent. since the financial year 1978–79, and the association is shortly to meet the Minister responsible, who is my honourable friend Dr. Mawhinney, the Member for Peterborough, and they will discuss a number of topics, of course including funding. We shall give further consideration to the needs of the association in the light of the competing priorities and the Government's wish to ensure that the association can properly fulfil its role, and perhaps, one might suggest, as a result of the interest shown by your Lordships this evening.
Thirdly the noble Lord asked—and this was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, and touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson—about the International Fund for Ireland. This will be administered, as the noble Lord will be aware, by a board which will decide which projects or bodies deserve financial support. So far as citizens advice bureaux are concerned I understand that they could apply, but I would not be able to say whether or not the CABs would have any success, or would find any success in any application. Of course the board are the ultimate arbiters upon the presentations made to them.
The noble Lord also raised the question of life sentences, and this interested the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, as well. The Life Sentence Review Board was established in 1983. It operates under the chairmanship of the Permanent Under-Secretary to the Northern Ireland Office. It includes among its members senior Northern Ireland Office officials, a principal medical officer in the Department of Health and Social Services, a consultant psychiatrist, and the

1323
Chief Probation Officer. While we do not at any time rule out the possibility of widening the membership to include people from the outside community who are suitably qualified by experience for this particular work, I think your Lordships would agree that it would be a little difficult in the present climate in Northern Ireland to appoint outside people who would not be seen as representing the interests of one side of the community or the other.
I ask your Lordships to consider a further possibility were there to be such outside—if I may call them that—members. They might well come under pressures from varying groups or sections of the communities. I do not necessarily say extremist groups, but your Lordships will be aware that in the climate of Northern Ireland these groups are always lurking in the background.
So far as concerns giving reasons for the decisions of the board, this question came up from time to time in relation to the deliberations of the Parole Board for England and for Wales. Some of the difficulties which arise in relation to the giving of reasons—which would include the situation where, although the decision might be unanimous, members of the board might have different reasons for reaching it—were explained by my noble friend Lord Beaverbrook in his reply to a Question by the noble Earl, Lord Longford, earlier this year. We think that the giving of reasons would be likely to lead to their being challenged in the courts, followed by pressure to allow appeals. These factors would apply with equal force in Northern Ireland. I hope your Lordships will bear with me if we say that we do not feel able to go down that particular road.
The noble Lord also raised the question of the Short Strand Nursery School. I understand that this is an Irish language school. I am told that it is called Macairt Naiscoil. I do not speak Irish, but I occasionally hear something on Radio Eireann, and I understand that is what it is called. The school is run by two cultural officers who are funded from a government grant to the St. Matthew's Tenants' Association under the Action For Community Employment Scheme. Your Lordships will be aware that the scheme is generally referred to as ACE. The Government have informed the association that ACE funding will no longer be available to this association because our policy is to ensure that Government financial support for community activities does not give rise to a grave risk—and I stress those two words—of improving the standing and furthering of the aims of a para-military organisation, whether directly or indirectly. I think your Lordships will bear with me if I mention what we believe to be a grave risk. This may explain to your Lordships the actions that we have taken.
The policy of the Government was stated in a written parliamentary reply by the then Secretary of State, my right honourable friend Mr. Hurd, on 27th June last year. I shall not weary your Lordships by going on on that particular Written Answer. I can convey this Answer to the noble Lord, if he wishes, and let him have a copy. It is open to the association to submit an acceptable application for ACE funding, and indeed for the nursery school to relocate its activities and submit a separate ACE application.
1324
There is also the other school, which is called Naiscoil Breandain. The financial resources available for the development of additional nursery provision have of necessity been limited. As a result we have not found it possible for over 100 proposals for new nursery provisions to be accommodated. In these circumstances the department was not prepared to approve the recognition of Naiscoil Breandain, which is a pre-school play group in West Belfast. We could not take this as a grant-aided school.
The noble Lord, and the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, praised Co-operation North. I welcome the remarks made by the two noble Lords about this, and also those by the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson. We believe that Co-operation North is a valuable organisation whose efforts deserve support. We have already given a grant of £35,000. This year we shall soon give a further £5,000 and we are prepared to continue the grant next year. We shall consider the case for an increase.
We believe that it is valuable that Co-operation North should seek private finance as well as public finance. It will of course be open to Co-operation North once again to seek money from the International Fund, and I shall convey the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State.
The noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, had a query on co-operatives. In the order, there is provision for assistance to other local enterprise initiatives, for which an increase of £30,000 is sought. This brings the total provision for the current year to £105,000. The purpose is to assist such initiatives as co-operatives. There has already been expenditure this year on the Northern Ireland Co-operative Developers Association. I hope that the noble Lord will see that we attach considerable importance to these aspects.
The noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, was kind enough to refer to the Giant's Causeway, which, as we all know, is one of the most beautiful and important tourist attractions in the Province. I understand that the new visitors centre at the Giant's Causeway was built with the assistance of the European Regional Development Fund and other funds. I am sure that your Lordships will be glad to know that the European Regional Development Fund put a considerable amount of money into this project. As to the current funding, perhaps I may make inquiries and write briefly to the noble Lord.
The noble Lord also raised the question of grants to the Arts Council. He rightly argued for an increase in government grant to the Arts Council. Government aid to the arts in Northern Ireland will exceed £3 million this year. While I do not question that the noble Lord regards this as a cut, perhaps he will accept that the Government do not regard it as a cut. He will surely agree that we can spend more on this or in many other areas.
The arts is one area—the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, brought this up—that unites the community across all sections. Indeed, your Lordships have pointed to the great success of the Belfast Festival. In the end, however, I am afraid that funding of the arts and every

1325
kind of co-operative venture comes down to a matter of expenditure. I will draw the attention of my honourable friend the relevant Minister to the remarks made in the House this evening.
The noble Lord, Lord Hylton, was kind enough to refer to agriculture. He referred to the crop that used to grow extensively in Northern Ireland—indeed, it was famous in Northern Ireland—flax. I am advised that 250 acres—what I like to call the British measurement—or 100 hectares of flax was grown in Northern Ireland this year. Any of your Lordships who dared to go across to Northern Ireland in 1985 will have appreciated exactly why: the weather made the retting and other processing of flax virtually impossible. This very much depressed any farmers who were likely to plant flax. A total of 250 acres was grown.
Retting, which is of course an important process in the production of flax, is now carried out with enzymes and other chemical and biological agents in tanks. It is no longer done in the traditional Ulster style of retting dams. In the past, when the flax was suitably treated and retted, the dams were opened up and this gave rise to massive environmental pollution in the rivers, of which we do not approve and which is totally banned these days. Retting is the main problem. I understand that the forces of the Department of Agriculture and the technology board may look to further progress in the future.
As to the other points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, he was generous enough to suggest that I might not have them in the brief. As they covered a fairly wide area, perhaps I may write to the noble Lord.
In conclusion, I am grateful for the welcome given to the considerable efforts made by the Government to assist in the economic and social life of Northern Ireland. I am particularly grateful for the support given to LEDU by those noble Lords who have spoken. If I have missed any points, I shall be in touch in writing.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Copehill Down: MoD Training Facilities
9.5 p.m.
Lord Harris of Greenwich Lord Harris of Greenwich rose to ask her Majesty's Government whether the Secretary of State for the Environment will hold a public inquiry into the proposal by the Ministry of Defence to construct FIBUA (Fighting in built-up areas) training facilities at Copehill Down, Wiltshire.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the issue I am raising this evening concerns the proposal of the Ministry of Defence to construct a mock German village—or FIBUA—on Salisbury Plain for military training purposes. This proposal, as the Minister will be aware, is being fiercely opposed by the communities in the immediate vicinity, by Wiltshire County Council and by Salisbury District Council.
I propose to go into some detail about the background because I think that it is right to analyse the past carefully in order to come to a conclusion on why there is such bitter indignation in the area concerned about the conduct of the Ministry of Defence in this matter.
In September 1984, the then Secretary of State for Defence, Mr. Heseltine, announced plans to build the mock village. On 24th September, a representative of the Ministry of Defence entered into preliminary discussions in private with a number of councillors at the offices of Salisbury District Council. Following that meeting, an army presentation of the proposed plans was arranged for district councillors and parish councillors from the villages in the immediate area of the German village. The villages concerned were Chitterne, Orcheston, Shrewton and Tilshead. That presentation took place on 24th November.
The party met at Bulford camp and was briefed with the help of a specially produced brochure from the Property Services Agency which sought to explain where the village was to be built, how it was to be used and the extent to which it was to be employed for military exercises. After the briefing, the party was taken to see the proposed site, which was indicated by a red light on a Land-Rover. On return to Bulford camp, there was an agreeable social ceremony—cups of tea and so on—but unhappily no opportunity was provided for a proper question and answer session. Shortly afterwards, the local parish councils decided on an individual basis to oppose the siting of the German village on Copehill Down and communicated their views on the matter to the district councils.
The reasons for the villagers' objections I think can be summarised fairly succinctly. First, there was the close proximity of the site to all four villages, somewhere between one and a half and three miles. Secondly, there was the risk of excessive noise from tanks and other vehicles, aircraft and simulated gunfire when exercises took place at battalion strength. An army publication, I do not know with what degree of accuracy, said that they could take place virtually every day of the year. Thirdly, there was the drastically reduced access to the area of the plain in and around Copehill Down. Fourthly, there would, they believed, be greatly increased local military traffic with the risk of local road closures; and, fifthly, there was the obvious problem of generally damaging consequences on the environment. At that time Wiltshire County Council decided that it would not object in principle to the siting of the village, but passed the matter on to the Salisbury District council for its consideration.
On 2nd January last year Salisbury District Council convened a meeting of the north western planning committee, which resolved to oppose the plan. Later the West Wiltshire District Council, the other local authority involved, met, decided and voted to raise no objection, save for some clarification on access. It is only fair to say that the vote was a pretty close one. It was eight to seven, with 10 abstentions.
In June 1985 one of the local Members of Parliament involved in this matter led a delegation of villagers to meet the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, and

1327
to press the case for a public inquiry before the matter was proceded with. But the noble Lord made it quite clear that he was opposed to such action. On 9th July the Association of Local Councils wrote to the Secretary of State for the Environment asking for a public inquiry, and on 4th August the Minister said no.
On 8th August the Association wrote to the Secretary of State for Defence also pressing the case for a public inquiry, and the answer was the same, no. The chairman of the Tilshead Parish Council, Mr. Druce, then made contact with his local Member of the European Parliament to ask for assistance. This led to a rather interesting discovery—that a precisely similar proposal for such a facility had been considered and it had been decided provisionally to construct this at Sennelager in West Germany. But there were strong local and Federal objections that resulted in the postponement of the proposal. It is interesting to note at this stage that fierce local opposition in Germany leads to proposals being dropped but in this country we are not even apparently prepared to have a public inquiry.
We then come to the far more up-to-date situation. On 10th October this year the villages concerned decided to launch a public campaign of opposition to what was being proposed and to press again vigorously for a public inquiry. Under the name the Wiltshire Villages Environment Protection Association there was a new concerted attempt to have the matter reopened by the local authorities and by the two government departments concerned.
Wiltshire County Council met on 21st October and passed a motion calling on the Secretary of State for the Environment to hold a public inquiry before the proposals proceeded. That is the situation up to the present moment, except that there has been a further meeting between Ministers and some of the local Members of Parliament. No one in the villages concerned doubts the need for proper military training facilities, and neither do I.
Many of the councillors involved are themselves former military officers. One is a retired major in the Royal Artillery, another formerly commanded the King's Troop, Royal Horse Artillery. But all believe that they are being railroaded by the Ministry of Defence. They believe that there has been behaviour by the Ministry of Defence that is both arrogant and dictatorial. If one wanted evidence of that one has only to study a most extraordinary press report today about the pressure being applied by officials of the Ministry of Defence on some of their own employees who are living in the area.
Apparently a number of them were called to a meeting at Bulford Camp when they were addressed by an army officer and by a local and senior civil servant who is the district secretary for the region. They believed that they were to have some process of consultation. I understand that it was made clear to them at that meeting that they would have the opportunity of visiting some of the exhibitions which were being put on the road by the army to explain
1328
what was in their minds. But there was then some very strange language used. There are two versions of what happened. The villagers—and I am talking now specifically about those who themselves were Ministry of Defence employees—apparently believed that they were being threatened directly or indirectly by those who were addressing them.
The army's chief spokesman for the area, Mr. John Turner, who is quoted in the press today, denied those allegations. He said that the briefing took place because,
"some of our staff came and said they were concerned".
They were a bit worried about their position both as villagers and as Ministry of Defence employees. There was no suggestion, he said, that they were threatened or told to back off. They were simply reminded of their service contracts and that they might possibly face a conflict of interest. I suppose it is possible to construct without a great deal of difficulty what was said at that meeting. There appears to be a fair amount of common ground, I should have thought.
What is even more extraordinary is what happened in relation to Lt. Col. Peter Heaton-Ellis, chairman of Chitterne Parish Council. I quote the words of the local Conservative Member of Parliament, Mr. Robert Key, who has sent a complaint to the Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Ministry of Defence on the grounds that the colonel had been threatened with dismissal as a result of his part in the villagers' campaign. The colonel apparently, although stressing very properly his total loyalty to the army, had committed the unforgivable sin of describing the FIBUA project as "this horrible thing".
I quote again Mr. Key, who said:
"Col. Heaton-Ellis is now convinced he is going to lose his job. I don't know the truth of that but it does raise a very important issue. If the MoD believes its staff should not stand for election in the local community then it should say so in its conditions of employment. They should not wait until people have been elected and then tell them they mustn't do their job".
I think that this is a most disturbing series of allegations made by responsible people in the local community. All the people living in this area, or the overwhelming majority of them, have a longstanding relationship with the army and in the overwhelming majority of cases an excellent relationship. They recognise the need for proper military training facilities. But it will not be the people who have been applying pressure to them who will be suffering the consequences of this plan if it goes ahead without a public inquiry. It will be the local villagers. They claim that they have been pressurised wholly unreasonably by the military authorities who have attempted to prevent them expressing their views on this proposal. I think that this series of allegations deserves an answer from the Government.
I must make this quite clear. The overwhelming majority of the local community believe that they are entitled to a public inquiry, but I think—and I come back to this point—that the whole thing has been handled quite atrociously by the Ministry of Defence. Let me give another illustration. We had a statement made by another public relations officer who set out his position very clearly when he said about the

1329
villagers that there were not many of them but they made a great deal of noise. That is really the authentic voice (is it not?) of the gentleman in Whitehall who really does know best.
I hope that the Minister, as he represents the Department of the Environment, will indicate tonight that the public interest really would be best served by having a proper public inquiry into this proposal. He must realise the depth of all-party opposition in the area concerned, which has been joined by three Conservative Members of the House of Commons, by my own political colleagues in Wiltshire and by many others who have no fixed political position at all. I believe the Government will make a serious mistake if once again they try to brush off this local campaign as though it was a matter of no account. The local community want a public inquiry and I believe they deserve to have one.
9.21 p.m.
Earl Cathcart: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for raising this question of constructing a village complex of 90 buildings at Copehill Down on Salisbury Plain to enable the army to carry out training for fighting in built-up areas.
Before I say anything else, I must declare a slight interest since I live eight miles from Copehill Down. But anybody who lives on the edge of Salisbury Plain soon becomes accustomed to low-flying aircraft from Boscombe Down or, worse still, low-flying helicopters. We are also used to the distant thump of artillery firing on the Larkhill ranges, so that I do not think this new activity on Copehill Down eight miles away will, for me, add much to the general clatter of the area which I experience already. However, for the inhabitants of the five villages—I make it five, because Orcheston is in two parts—who live very much closer to this newly proposed training area the effect will be very considerable indeed.
There are 2,500 people living in these five villages, and Chitterne village, which is the nearest to Copehill Down, is only two miles or 3,000 yards away. I must stress, as indeed the noble Lord, Lord Harris, stressed, that I realise the importance of providing proper ranges and facilities to enable the army to do this type of training. If our conventional forces allocated to NATO are to be properly trained to play their full part in Central Europe, where there are very many small villages and farmsteads, this type of training is essential.
I understand that the noise aspect of this training will be confined to blank ammunition, thunder-flashes and other pyrotechnics. The training exercises, I understand also, will continue by day and by night; and because Copehill will be used by both regular and territorial army units the training area is likely to be in almost continual use. Also, because the territorial army are included this implies that such use will be at weekends as well as during the week. I understand that tanks will naturally form part of these exercises and they, too, by the noise of their engines will add to the general noise.
1330
Will my noble friend the Minister who is to reply to this Question say whether or not these tanks will be permitted to fire blank ammunition? If that is to be so, this will add very considerably to the noise factor as well. Furthermore, will my noble friend say whether other forms of explosion, such as demolitions, will be included in the training on Copehill Down?
I must say that in view of the size of the military training area already availale on Salisbury Plain, I am surprised that this Copehill site has been selected. Was it the only site considered? Why were alternative sites discarded and what advantages does Copehill have that could not be found elsewhere? For example, why could not this training village be sited near the now unoccupied village of Imber, which is right in the middle of Salisbury Plain?
I therefore most certainly support the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, in asking the Secretary of State to hold a public inquiry so that the views not only of the people who live nearby but of all other interested organisations and local authorities can be heard.
9.25 p.m.
Lord Graham of Edmonton: My Lords, in view of the excellent presentation of the facts and the feelings which the House has already heard, I do not intend to delay your Lordships for very long. I want to say to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, how grateful I am to him. I may add that he may be assured I shall not say that very often on many other issues! However, I am grateful to him for seizing the opportunity that we have tonight.
The noble Lord spoke with feeling, and certainly he has done his research extremely well. I was absolutely appalled, having read what I read at very short notice. My noble friend Lady David would have dealt with this matter but there has been a problem. Nevertheless, it shows the juxtaposition of the two issues. My noble friend speaks on the environment and I speak on defence matters. I think it is quite right that the Minister who is to reply will speak from the environment brief.
I cannot believe that he will not be the first to be absolutely appalled if what we have heard is true. We rely upon being told, but if what we have been told is true, it is a scandal and a disgrace that innocent men and women who are desperately worried appear to have been treated so arrogantly and in such a cavalier fashion. The issue has been very well put, but I just want the Minister to take this on board.
An individual was quoted as saying, "They have been talking nonsense about artillery firing at night. I do not understand what they are getting at. There are few of them and they make a lot of noise". But I am not certain whether he lives in the middle of the area. I imagine that he lives somewhere else. It is like the architect who told us that tower blocks were good, but was very careful to live somewhere else.

1331
The Minister ought to take on board the cynicism about this Government which people will feel if they do not recognise that little people, and handfuls of people, are as entitled as big corporations and big aggregations of power to a fair deal. The Minister knows how caustic I was about the way that people who live in the area of Canary Wharf feel at being deprived of the opportunity of having all the facts examined in the cold light of day by an independent person.
As the noble Lord, Lord Harris, and the noble Earl, Lord Cathcart, said, it is not a question of being anti-army; it is not a question of not recognising that something needs to be done. At the end of the day, these people may very well have to be satisfied that this is the best solution, but I think that the Minister has to take on board what has been said.
Let me quote the words of Mr. Frank Druce, who is the chairman of the protest campaign. According to a paper he said:
"The German village is all part of the process. There was no real liaison with the Army about it".
The army might think there was, the Minister might think there was, but the people affected say that there was no real liaison. They say, "We weren't consulted". They needed to be advised. Somewhere, someone says that they were kept in the picture. To be kept in the picture does not mean to be consulted. To be told what is to happen does not allow them to question and to challenge. More importantly, when there are two arguments, one needs to see what one can do to take the people with you. I think the Minister will understand that if this plan is railroaded through against the wishes of the local people, we shall get a situation of the army doing its best for all of us in an atmosphere which will poison the relationship between the local people and the army for a very long time.
I think it is rich that we are debating here today the expenditure of £7 million on creating a village and putting in electricity, light and all the rest of it, when yesterday we were talking about the need to find billions of pounds to put right our housing stock in other places. I think the Government have a great deal to answer for. They seem to me to run away from the opportunities of justifying their actions whenever they are challenged. Of course it is not right that any group of people who demand a public inquiry should automatically get one. But here you have a place of historic interest, Salisbury Plain, here you have something that has grown up and you also have the charge of deception.
Somehow or other the people in the area feel that they have been "conned"; and although it might take time and money, if at the end of the day by holding a public inquiry the public at large, even though those individuals affected may not accept the decision, feel that the ministry has done its best to try to demonstrate why it is the only solution, I think it will have served a good purpose.
1332
I promised myself that I would not speak for more than five minutes and I intend to sit down now. I simply say to this Minister, who in my eyes has a good record that there is no argument about the sites of special scientific interest or conservation. That is not the case I make. I believe that the convervation officers of the Ministry of Defence are very very good indeed in listening to what people want to say. They have a first-class record. I believe that the solution for the Minister and for the Government is perfectly simple. Listen to the local people, give them an opportunity of putting their point of view, hear what an independent person has to say and act upon it.
9.32 p.m.
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, I agree straight away that this matter is about people. It is an important matter and it is people's concerns which count. I think it would be helpful, therefore, if I gave some background to the House. I do not want to quibble with the noble Lord, Lord Harris, but in September 1984 the Property Services Agency, on behalf of my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence, proposed the construction of a training complex comprising about 90 buildings on Salisbury Plain, suitable for fighting in built-up areas—the so-called FIBUA complex.
This includes mock houses, farms, shops, and a church in a style typical of that found in the North German plain. It will be used to practise the sort of fighting it is envisaged will take place in conventional war, and the training will include such skills as street and house clearing and preparing buildings to resist a major attack. There is also a requirement for sufficient space around the facility to enable troops, tanks and armoured personnel carriers to carry out realistic manoeuvres. No—and I repeat "no"—live firing will take place; the soldiers under training will, as my noble friend Lord Cathcart said, use pyrotechnics.
My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence attached high priority to the provision of such a purpose-built complex to provide essential peace-time training for one of the Army's most important wartime roles. Other smaller facilities are being built elsewhere in England and Wales, but I understand that the only area in the United Kingdom where FIBUA exercises on this scale can take place is Salisbury Plain.
Prospective sites had to be considered against a number of criteria, namely, the suitability for the military training requirements that I have just described (an unsuitable site would restrict training too much for it to be realistic); the need to minimise the environmental impact on local residents; the need to avoid existing live firing areas because mutual interference would reduce essential training; the need for easy access and to be in close proximity to the main military users; the need for a wide radius around the area to be available for manoeuvre; the need to cause the minimum interference to known archaeological sites and to avoid existing rights of way; and the need to build the facility without excessive cost.

1333
My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence concluded that the site would have to be in the area bounded by Tilshead, Chitterne and Orcheston. Copehill Down was the most suitable location in that area.
So far as usage is concerned, I understand that the training facility will be used by our own soldiers who will practise defending the buildings. Most of the exercises will be taken up by planning and preparation and not by staged battles. Normally during a five-day exercise staged battles will last less than one day, and, in shorter exercises of one or two days, fighting will be practised for only a few hours so noise from the exercise will be limited. The planting of hardwood trees round part of the site, as well as providing a visual screen, may also serve to alleviate noise.
There will thus be no increase in disturbance from training in and around Copehill Down. The area is already used for military activities on 350 days of the year. The use of the complex will not entail any live firing, including use of tanks, as I understand it, and there will be no increase whatever in the use of tanks and other tracked vehicles or in the use of helicopters or other aircraft. There will be no extra camps or accommodation built. In other words, army activity and noise around Copehill Down will not increase above what it is today.
As the facility is a development by the Crown, planning permission is not required. However, there is an arrangement under which Government departments consult local planning authorities before proceeding with development which normally would require planning permission. Local planning authorities treat such consultations in the same way as formal applications for planning permission. If they do not intend to object, but consider a proposal to constitute a material departure from the development plan for the area, they notify my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment who decides whether to call in the proposal and hold a non-statutory public local inquiry. If the proposal is not such a departure, or my right honourable friend decides not to intervene, the local planning authority is free to deal with the proposal as they see fit. If they decide not to object, the developing department may proceed. If the local planning authority objects to the proposal, it is for the developing department to notify my right honourable friend of the disagreement—in other words, under normal circumstances, to appeal.
This proposal was carefully examined, together with the objections to it from local councils and members of the public. The objections centred around the effect the proposal would have on the environment, the capacity of the local road system to cope with the construction traffic and additional military traffic, and the level of noise and disturbance that might be caused to nearby villages.
In March 1985 my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment decided not to intervene in this matter. This was neither arrogant nor dictatorial; and nor was it cavalier. West Wiltshire
1334
District Council subsequently resolved that the project could proceed, subject to further consideration on the details of the buildings, landscaping of the site, access arrangements and traffic management.
However, as we have heard this evening, objections to the development were renewed this year by local residents, individual parish and district councillors, Salisbury District Council, the Wiltshire Association of Local Councils, and three honourable Members of another place. My noble friend Lord Elton, as the then responsible Minister, wrote to the honourable Member for Devizes saying that the decision not to intervene could not be reversed owing to no new evidence being adduced. I understand that the honourable Members for Westbury and Salisbury led delegations to my honourable friend and received assurances that every effort would be made to minimise any inconvenience that would result from the complex, and to protect the local environment. My honourable friend the Under-Secretary of State for the Armed Forces has also seen the three honourable Members individually.
On 29th October 1986, Wiltshire County Council informed my right honourable friends the Secretaries of State for the Environment and Defence that the county council had changed their view on the proposal, and had formally resolved in favour of a public local inquiry.
On 8th December, I, together with my honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department of the Environment, met the honourable Members for Salisbury, Devizes and Westbury to discuss the matter, but I could not agree to their request for an inquiry. In this case, in the light of representations made at the time, the local planning authority decided not to object to the proposed development. All the appropriate procedures were followed between October 1984 and March 1985, and it is notable that, when consulted, neither of the planning authorities in whose area the development is to take place objected. The county council have since changed their views, but essentially the position has not changed.
Since the area is already used extensively for military training for most of the year my honourable friend and I recognise that the concerns expressed in the meeting that I have referred to were environmental. I accept, in the words of noble Lords opposite, that they must be explained properly locally. The concerns are those of noise, timings of operational use and vehicle movements in the construction phase. My noble friend Lord Cathcart is quite right—people's concern is for the environment.
On further investigation I understand that this development will not be seen from any of the villages in the area; and I am satisfied that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence will ensure that steps are taken to minimise any inconvenience to nearby communities and to protect the environment. My right honourable friend is seeking to allay the very

1335
understandable fears of local residents by explaining fully what is proposed, and public presentational meetings are to be held in the area next week. I have in front of me an advertisement for these meetings. It says:
"The purpose is that everyone who is interested has the fullest possible opportunity to see for themselves precisely what the training complex amounts to. The display will open to the public in two sessions—on Tuesday 16th December from 2 p.m. until 7 p.m., and again on Friday 19th December from 2 p.m. until 7 p.m.".
I can give this assurance to the House: questions will be welcomed.
The concerns that have been expressed today seem to me to relate to two distinct phases of this project: the construction stage and the actual use of the facility once it has been built. During the construction period, there will be no noticeable increase in heavy vehicle traffic through the local villages. The Ministry of Defence undertook a census of traffic movements on the B.390 (which, as my noble friend will know, is the Chitterne-Shrewton road) from Monday to Friday one week last month. This showed that the average of seven heavy vehicle loads a day that will result from construction will amount to less than 1 per cent. of the normal civilian heavy goods vehicle traffic that occurs already. I do not believe that such an increase could be regarded as significant.
Once the training facility has been built, there will be no increase in disturbance from training in the area. Indeed, this type of military training will often displace training that is currently carried out there. The training complex cannot be used for more than a single exercise at any one time. There will be no live firing as part of FIBUA training, and no increase whatever in night firing. In a real-life situation troops would rarely choose to fight in an urban area at night, so the battle phase would take place in daylight. The whole object of training is to simulate operational conditions.
Neither will there be any increase above what already happens in the area today in the use of tanks and other tracked vehicles, or in the use of helicopters or any other aircraft. On rare occasions, there might be as many as 30 tanks involved in the training, but for most of the time there will be fewer than that or indeed none at all. Tanks are already forbidden to pass through the neighbouring villages, and that restriction will continue. From time to time there will be varying numbers of light-tracked vehicles taking part in this training, and I understand that overall the Ministry of Defence expects to use tracked vehicles in the area in connection with FIBUA training on about 120 days per year and for about 30 days per year for other training. The existing use of the area for artillery firing should actually reduce as a result of the complex being built in it. In summary therefore—and I cannot stress this strongly enough—the building of the FIBUA training complex will not increase noise levels or general disturbance to those living in surrounding villages.
In asking this Unstarred Question, the noble Lord, Lord Harris, was concerned about public access to
1336
Copehill Down. I am advised that there will be no changes to the Salisbury Plain military lands by-laws. The public will continue to have access along existing rights of way, though they will of course be excluded from the village and its immediate area. As there will be no live firing there will be no danger to the public from unexploded ordnance, which can happen in other circumstances.
Both noble Lords opposite mentioned an officer in the armed forces. I can tell them that Civil Service rules allow for civil servants to participate in political activities at parish level. However, those regulations are quite clear that a civil servant is bound to maintain a proper reticence in discussing public affairs and more particularly those with which his own department is concerned. In other words, they are confined by much the same conflict of interest rules as I am or as are any of my noble friends on this Bench.
Referring to that particular member of the armed forces, there have been no threats of dismissal, and I cannot underline that strongly enough. In the circumstances that I have outlined—
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, is the noble Lord going to deal with the other question, which is this strange meeting with Ministry of Defence employees? Does he realise that if people think that the whole quality of their lives will be damaged and the value of their houses will be slashed, they believe they have a right of free speech? Does he agree with that?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, with the greatest respect, I think that the noble Lord is confusing two different things. I have already alluded to the two meetings for local people which are to be held on Tuesday and Friday next week, 16th and 19th December.
The other matter with which he was concerned was the employment of Ministry of Defence staff. Meetings held between them and senior officers are something on which I cannot comment in this House or indeed anywhere else. However, I can say that I have no doubt that it was what perhaps I may call a cards-on-the-table meeting, and that positions on both sides were explained and explored.
Lord Graham of Edmonton: My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for allowing me to make this intervention. An impression was gained by the employees who attended the meeting that when the cards were put on the table they were invited to play them in the proper order or else. That was the impression with which they left the room, and we believe that that is a very serious allegation. I hope that the Minister will take note of what has been said and what we believe took place, and that when the meetings take place next week a categorical rebuttal can be given to the people who have made the charges to the newspapers.
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, if—as was suggested, I think, by the noble Lord, Lord Harris—the people in question live in the village or indeed have what one might call a civilian interest in this matter, of course they will be fully entitled to attend those meetings and to ask questions and receive such replies as appear to be appropriate to the various individuals at that time. The noble Baroness looks restless.
Baroness Seear: My Lords, I had not intended to speak but, as there is an invitation to do so, I shall take it up. The people may receive answers but if they are deeply dissatisfied with those answers what will the department do then? To be given answers which simply are totally unacceptable does not really get one very far. That is not consultation. People are asking for the opportunity to have a proper inquiry. That is not in the least met by being told that there will be a meeting at which they can ask questions, be given answers and then be sent home.
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, as I sought to explain earlier, there are proper procedures for public inquiries or for the consideration of public inquiries in a matter such as this. I have assured the House and given your Lordships my own assurance that these procedures have been conducted fairly. I have said that public relations need to continue and, through the meetings to which I have referred, they will continue.
In the circumstances that I have outlined and after all the procedures, which themselves took some time, have been properly followed, and having been satisfied that there will be no significant extra damaging environmental effect, I cannot recommend my right honourable friend to go back on the decision made some 21 months ago not to hold a public inquiry.
House adjourned at ten minutes before ten o'clock.