Lords Sitting of 26 May 1993

Preamble
The House met at half-past two of the clock (Prayers having been read earlier at the Judicial Sitting by the Lord Bishop of Chichester.): The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
The Earl of Woolton—Took the Oath.
Lord Wrottesley —Sat first in Parliament after the death of his grandfather.
The Earl of Albemarle—Took the Oath.

Sub-Saharan Africa: Aid Policies
Lord Judd Lord Judd asked Her Majesty's Government:
What steps they are taking to co-ordinate their bilateral and multilateral aid policies and their policies at the International Monetary Fund and World Bank to ensure an effective strategic campaign to eliminate poverty in sub-Saharan Africa.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Chalker of Wallasey): My Lords, poverty reduction through sustainable economic and social development is a priority for all multilateral and bilateral donors to sub-Saharan Africa. We co-ordinate our policies closely with other bilateral donors, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the European Commission.
Lord Judd: My Lords, while thanking the Minister for that reply, does she not agree that sub-Saharan Africa is balanced on a knife edge? If effective action is not taken, there could be 300 million people in absolute poverty by the end of the decade. What do the Government intend to do bilaterally and multilaterally: first, about the crushing annual debt burden of 10 billion US dollars; secondly, about the devastating impact of falling commodity prices; and, thirdly, about the World Bank and IMF structural adjustment programmes which have failed totally to produce a framework for sustained economic recovery in the region?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, to answer all the questions asked by the noble Lord, Lord Judd, would take me longer than time permits this afternoon. However, I agree with him that many of the countries, although not all, are in a very precarious position. That is why I suggested at the ACP/EC meeting a week ago that we should consider further the application of Trinidad terms and the writing down of the stock of outstanding debts after three or four years of following sensible structural adjustment policies and proper economic reforms. We are well aware also of the plight which the fall in world commodity prices has meant for many of those countries. I assure the noble Lord that in my discussions next week with the World Bank and the IMF, I shall take those matters further.
Lord Judd: My Lords, again, I thank the Minister for her commitment on this issue. Does she not agree that the crisis for a number of countries in that region is one of bankruptcy rather than temporary balance of payments difficulties and that, for example, the slide in commodity prices between 1986 and 1990 cost Africa 50 billion US dollars in lost earnings? Does that not indicate that the IMF is addressing the wrong issues in the area? What is the Government's policy towards the IMF to insist that it gets its policies right?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I shall discuss those matters in great detail next week. The noble Lord, Lord Judd, will be well aware that the UK is the largest contributor to the Enhanced Structural Adjustment Facility (ESAF) interest subsidy account. We are seeking to help those countries not only through our own bilateral programme of aid but also through the international institutions. However, it would be a good deal easier for us to help them if other nations were to sign up to the Trinidad terms and also tackle the issue of commodity prices as we are seeking to do.
Lord Callaghan of Cardiff: My Lords, while the Government certainly deserve credit for putting forward the Trinidad terms, I am sure that the Minister will agree that they are by no means sufficient and that there is a great deal more to be done. Has the noble Baroness heard the story that Japan—the chairman of this year's Group of Seven meetings—is anxious that there should be on the agenda next month a discussion on aid and in particular on the way in which the sub-Saharan countries can be helped, but it is said that some countries are rather against that proposal? Will the noble Baroness assure me that that would certainly not be true of Britain and that we should support any proposal by Mr. Miyazawa to put that matter on the agenda?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, as far as I know, the agenda is far from being decided although the meeting is only a month away. I assure the noble Lord that the Prime Minister certainly intends to take up the issue of debt for those countries on each and every possible occasion. I do not know whether or not it will form a substantive part of the G7 agenda. However, I know that the Japanese have looked again at the amounts which they can give in the third world and are looking to increase their budgets substantially. It is critical that many of those countries begin to spend within their limits and that they follow a sound economic programme. We must help them to do that.

North Sea: Illegal Oil Discharges
2.38 p.m.
Lord Campbell of Croy Lord Campbell of Croy asked Her Majesty's Government:
What is their estimate of the quantity of waste oil discharged in the North Sea by vessels flushing or emptying tanks or bilges in 1992.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, it is generally agreed that the quantity of oil legally discharged each year is

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from 1,000 to 2,000 tonnes. For illegal discharges the only measure is the number observed and reported spills and there is no technique which will accurately determine the total quantity of oil in a slick of known area. In 1992 the aerial surveillance programme of the Bonn Agreement reported 723 slicks in the North Sea.
Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for his reply even though he indicates that accuracy is not possible. Do the figures indicate any improvement upon recent years? Also, if deliberate discharges are internationally regarded as offences, what measures are available now against offenders?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, there is a general consensus that oil discharged illegally from shipping has remained fairly constant over the past five years at between 1,000 and 2,000 tonnes per year, although that will be reduced under the new regulations. The detection and prosecution of perpetrators of illegal discharges is extremely difficult. If an illegal discharge is identified and the vessel is in UK territorial waters, it can be prosecuted and, if appropriate, the vessel detained.
Baroness Hilton of Eggardon: My Lords, will the Government support the provision of recycling facilities at ports to prevent ships flushing their tanks at sea?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, the Department of Transport recently conducted a survey on reception facilities for oil and, indeed, garbage from ships. The results show that the facilities available in UK ports range from acceptable to good. The same is true of European ports. The department has arrangements in place which will enable ship masters to report on the lack of adequate reception facilities for oil and garbage.
Earl Grey: My Lords, is the Minister aware that the port of Rotterdam operates a green-star system for ships that have a good record in handling and disposing of waste at sea and that this can save thousands of pounds on each visit? Have the Government any similar, comparable system in mind that they think is worth operating?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I have already given details of the Government's and the department's attitude and policy as regards reception facilities for oil at ports in the United Kingdom. The Government are most concerned about the other issue; namely, illegal discharges from ships that continue to contribute to the pollution of the North Sea and other waters.
Lord Monkswell: My Lords, can the noble Viscount confirm that defence-related surveillance facilities enable the vessels discharging oil into the North Sea to be identified and tracked? Further, will the Government undertake to ensure that the information obtained by such surveillance facilities is placed in the public domain?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, aerial surveillance techniques continue to improve. The subject is being discussed this week at a meeting of experts from contracting parties to the Bonn Agreement. Among other things, they will be considering whether a methodology for estimating a quantity from all remote sensing flights can be agreed.
Lord Clinton-Davis: My Lords, does the Minister agree that, deplorable though acts of deliberate pollution are—and despite the fact that it is extremely difficult to trace the masters who are responsible for them—something like 85 per cent. to 90 per cent. of maritime pollution comes from land-based sources? Does he further agree that a significant proportion of that pollution comes from used car sump oil which a number of people unwittingly pour down the drain and which eventually flows into the sea? Can the Minister indicate whether the Government are taking any steps to encourage the safe disposal of oily wastes in order to help solve the problem?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Clinton-Davis, that ships are not the only source of oil pollution. Indeed, oil can come from rivers, from off-shore oil installations and from natural seeps. One estimate of the annual input into the North Sea is from between 71,000 tonnes to 150,000 tonnes.

National Parks Administration: Legislation
2.43 p.m.
Baroness Nicol Baroness Nicol asked Her Majesty's Government:
When they intend to bring forward the legislation which they have promised to provide for all national parks to be administered by independent boards.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I cannot pre-empt the contents of the next Session's legislative programme. We are continuing to work on all aspects of legislation to which we are committed. I can reassure your Lordships that our resolve to create independent national parks has not weakened.
Baroness Nicol: My Lords, I thank the noble Viscount for that helpful answer. However, is he aware that there is considerable and increasing pressure on national parks, and that the need for legislation is becoming quite urgent? Therefore, can he take some action to ensure that it is treated as a matter of urgency? Is the noble Viscount also aware that we were hoping that the legislation would be part of an environmental protection Bill which I now understand has been dropped? Is he further aware that during the passage of the Local Government Bill, his noble friend Lady Blatch gave very firm undertakings about legislation for national parks? Therefore, I am sure he will understand that his Answer has caused some disappointment.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I can reassure the noble Baroness, Lady Nicol, that the Government

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remain committed to the care and protection of the parks. Legislation to establish independent national park authorities for all parks remains a priority to be introduced when parliamentary time permits.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that such legislation would be largely regarded as uncontroversial, and that it would therefore take little parliamentary time? Is that not an argument for bringing forward the measure promptly?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, the Government fully understand the anxieties expressed about national parks. However, I can only restate that such legislation remains a priority for the Government and will be brought forward as soon as possible.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, is the Minister aware that the largest provider of countryside recreation is the Forestry Commission which has 50 million day visitors per annum? Is he also aware that those facilities are well and sensitively managed? Therefore, can I have an assurance from the Minister that there will be no interference with that pattern of management by any new institutions that may be created?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord about the importance of the Forestry Commission. However, what we are discussing here is the potential for the forthcoming legislation on national parks.
Lord Grimond: My Lords, can the noble Viscount say whether the Government read the very pertinent remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos, during a recent debate when he spoke about the growth of unappointed quangos in the country? If we are to have boards appointed for national parks, can the noble Viscount say how those concerned will be appointed or elected? Further, can he give the House an assurance that the public will have some say in how they are appointed?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I cannot anticipate in detail the content of any legislation. However, I can say that two-thirds of the members of the boards and committees of existing national park authorities are appointed by county and district councils.
Lord Norrie: My Lords, is the Minister aware that four national parks—namely, the Yorkshire Dales, the North York Moors, the Peak District and Exmoor—will be involved in the first tranche of local government reform or reorganisation? However, the work of the local government commission does not include national parks because, as we know, the Government have promised independent authorities. Therefore, are those national parks to be administered under what the Government term "transitional arrangements"? If so, what does that term actually mean? Perhaps the Minister can enlighten the House.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, transitional arrangements will be put in place to ensure that the national parks committees will be able to carry out their
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statutory functions to receive funding from government and local authorities and ensure that there are local authority and Secretary of State-appointees on the committees.
Baroness White: My Lords, we have been told that we are to expect a local government Bill for Wales in the next Session of Parliament. Leaving aside whether or not one approves of its main provisions, can the noble Viscount confirm that it will be possible to include appropriate proposals for the independent administration of our three Welsh national parks in the legislation? Is he aware that the option has been under consideration by the Welsh Office at least since last September when it was publicly discussed by the Minister of State, Sir Wyn Roberts? If there is to be no guarantee of early general legislation for England and Wales—which would be the more desirable—does the noble Viscount acknowledge that there can be no excuse for not giving Wales its necessary national parks readjustment to coincide with changes in local government organisation in Wales?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I must restate that I cannot pre-empt the contents of the next Queen's Speech. However, the Secretary of State for the Environment already has powers under the Local Government Act 1992 to enable him to put transitional arrangements in place if needed. The Secretary of State for Wales plans to establish new authorities in Wales by 1st April 1995. He will no doubt be taking powers to ensure that transitional arrangements can be put in place for the Welsh parks, if needed.
Baroness White: My Lords, why should we have to put up with transitional arrangements if there is appropriate legislation for including Welsh parks in the Welsh local government Bill?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, again, I can only restate the fact that I cannot pre-empt what will be in the Queen's Speech.
Lord Marlesford: My Lords, I noted what my noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter rightly said about such legislation being uncontroversial. Does my noble friend recognise that if the Government do not bring forward legislation this will cause widespread disappointment among the people who are deeply concerned about the future of national parks, among whom are many of the Government's own supporters? If the Government cannot introduce this legislation, will they perhaps at least facilitate such legislation by other routes?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, we are continuing to work on legislation to which we are committed but there is immense pressure on the parliamentary timetable. There are many pressing matters which need to be dealt with urgently. I am afraid the answer to my noble friend Lord Marlesford is still that I cannot pre-empt the Queen's Speech.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, in view of the fact that these are supposed to be transitional arrangements, and in the light of the Government's

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own ideological obsessions, as well as their shortage of money, will the noble Viscount give the House a complete and unequivocal undertaking that these steps that are to be taken are not the prelude to privatisation?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I have said on a number of occasions in answer to this Question that I cannot say what will or will not be in the legislation and whether it will or will not appear in the next Session.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, is there not a strong case for giving this Bill priority as it would be far more popular than anything else the Government have in mind?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, the legislation has priority but I still cannot say whether it will be found a place in the next Session.
Lord Morris of Castle Morris: My Lords, is it not nice to find so much agreement on a subject like this on all sides of the House? In the light of that agreement, will the noble Viscount undertake at least to discuss seriously and soon with his right honourable friend in another place the possibility of introducing a brief government Bill on this issue, and this issue alone, in your Lordships' House as I can assure him that it would command wide cross-party support and could provide the national parks with a happy end to all their afflictions?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I am appreciative of the cross-House support for national park authorities and for the benefits of independence on this issue. However, I must repeat that I cannot pre-empt the contents of the next Queen's Speech.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, will the Minister elaborate on his reply to the important question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gryfe? If Forestry Commission property falls within the national parks, would the Forestry Commission's general policy on its woods come under the auspices of the independent boards administering the national parks?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, the noble Lord asks a specific question about the relationship between the national parks authorities and the Forestry Commission. I cannot say whether that will be changed under any forthcoming legislation.
Lord Williams of Elvel: My Lords, the noble Viscount has spoken a good deal about priority. Has he had the opportunity to read the 1987 manifesto of the Conservative Party in which that party promised to legislate to protect national parks? The manifesto was published in 1987, not 1992. In view of the high priority that the Government obviously place on this matter—it has only been six years since they gave that commitment—and given the feeling expressed by Members all round the House that legislation on the national parks is a matter of extreme urgency, will the noble Viscount talk to his noble friend, who I
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understand is in charge in some measure of the legislation that might be in the Queen's Speech, to see whether your Lordships' convenience can be met?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, the Government consider the national parks to be the jewel in the countryside's crown and will continue to give their protection the highest priority. We have already acted to introduce a test against which any proposal for major development in the parks should be set. In any case such development would only take place in exceptional circumstances.

Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
2.54 p.m
Lord Jenkins of Putney Lord Jenkins of Putney asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether proposals for the discussion of (a) a comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty, (b) halting the separation by reprocessing of nuclear weapon usable fissile plutonium and (c) a timetable for global nuclear disarmament were put forward by the United Kingdom delegation to the first preparatory committee meeting for the fifth Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty held in New York on 10th to 14th May; and what was the outcome of the meeting.
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, the first meeting of the preparatory committee for the 1995 Non-Proliferation Treaty Extension and Review Conference was concerned with organisational issues and the committee made a satisfactory start to its task of preparing for the conference. The UK delegation leader delivered a statement reaffirming our aim to secure the treaty's unconditional, indefinite extension in 1995 and our commitment to support continuing progress towards nuclear disarmament.
Lord Jenkins of Putney: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for that Answer. I hope that she will permit me, for the sake of accuracy, to quote from an article in the Washington Post which states:
"If America resumes testing, Russia and France will probably follow, and perhaps China. That would greatly reduce U.S. leverage to persuade North Korea and others not to go nuclear. The have-nots have always said that a universal test ban is a necessary preliminary to meaningful agreement on nonproliferation".
Does the noble Baroness agree with that article?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I have read an article in the Guardian which was written by three of the newspaper's journalists. The United States policy review is still in progress. No final decision has yet been taken. The article I read queried whether the UK had lobbied for resumption. I can tell the noble Lord that we have told the US of the importance that we attach to the three tests allowed to us under the current legislation. I believe that the noble Lord asked my noble friend Lord Cranborne about this matter yesterday at Question Time. Indeed, the noble Lord has raised it with me on many other occasions. It is important that we obtain an extension of the non-proliferation treaty but we should not use that as

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a means of achieving other measures. If a ban is to be effective, we shall have to engage in some time-consuming negotiations to go further down the route that the noble Lord favours. Regardless of what progress is made towards a comprehensive test ban, we still need to secure the NPT extension. We must work for that now.
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, I wish to pursue the question that my noble friend has just put, as I do not believe that the noble Baroness entirely answered it. Is the Minister aware that nuclear threshold states such as Korea and Iran would be far more likely to stop developing nuclear weapons if the Western states, including the UK, were to sign a comprehensive test ban treaty?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I do not believe that that is necessarily true. As I have explained in this House on many occasions, the most important matter we must tackle is to work for an extension of the NPT. If it is decided that work can continue towards a comprehensive test ban, that should also be pursued. However, one should not give up working towards the NPT, which needs to be extended in 1995, simply because there are people who fail to agree with it, who seek to withdraw from it or who are being awkward about it at the present time.
The Earl of Halsbury: My Lords, will the noble Baroness confirm that, with regard to heading (b) of this wearisomely repetitious Question, reprocessed plutonium from commercially operated power stations is not suitable for weapons manufacture?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, that is so to the best of my knowledge. We are extremely careful as regards reprocessing, whether of plutonium or of any other dangerous substance.
Lord Mayhew: My Lords, will the noble Baroness say whether she feels we are likely to find many allies among the 156 signatories to the treaty for our policy of go-slow on a test ban treaty and our apparent intention to increase our strategic nuclear capability?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I assure the House that there is no go-slow. We have always supported a comprehensive test ban as a long-term goal. We are consulting with others on how we might move towards that end, but we also need to take into account the implications of an end to testing as regards our ability to maintain the safety of our nuclear weapons over time. We must also bear in mind the importance of ensuring that any ban on testing contributes as effectively as possible to nonproliferation. One cannot separate the issues and one must keep working towards an extension to the non-proliferation treaty.
Lord Jenkins of Putney: My Lords, the American Defense Secretary, Les Aspin, recently made a remark which seemed to me to be directly relevant to what the Minister said. Again for the sake of greater accuracy perhaps I may quote him. Mr. Aspin said:
"International co-operation is at the core of nonproliferation efforts … Co-operation is going to be difficult if the United States continues insisting on nuclear testing".
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Is that not exactly what my noble friend on the Front Bench said today?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I am not responsible for what is said by the United States Defense Secretary or, for that matter, any Secretary of State for Defence other than our own. It is very important that we do not give up the pressure that we have been maintaining on others to sign the non-proliferation treaty. It is also important that we move forward as quickly as we can down the path of getting rid of nuclear weapons. However, we should do so only when it is safe to do so. In the meantime it is the Government's responsibility, as it has been of previous governments, to ensure that we have viable defence in this country.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, do the Minister and the Government draw a distinction between testing for safety and testing for development?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, the logical answer must be yes. I do not believe that my right honourable friends in another place are anything but logical in deciding an issue of such importance.
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, as the Minister said that to some extent she is responsible for what our Secretary of State for Defence intends to do, will she say whether the Government intend to resume testing in July?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I need to make a correction in your Lordships' House. I am certainly not responsible for the Secretary of State for Defence. Obviously, in working with him on these important matters we talk together and have a common policy. While under the current legislation there is the opportunity for the UK to conduct three tests between July 1993 and September 1996, which will allow us to complete important safety-related work—and it is safety-related work—I do not necessarily know whether we will or will not take up the opportunity.

Business
3.3 p.m.
The Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne: My Lords, at a convenient moment after 3.30 p.m. my noble friend Lady Blatch will, with the leave of the House, repeat a Statement that is to be made in another place on the White Paper on science, engineering and technology.

Citibank International Bill [H.L.] (formerly Citibank Europe Bill [H.L.])
Read a third time, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

The Police Service
3.4 p.m.
Lord Harris of Greenwich Lord Harris of Greenwich rose to call attention to the Home Secretary's Statement of 23rd March 1993 on the management and structure of the police service, and in particular to the proposal that the Government should appoint the chairman and some other members of police authorities; and to move for Papers.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper. Perhaps I may say at the outset how pleased I am that the noble Lord, Lord Trevor, has chosen to make his maiden speech today. It is particularly appropriate that he should do so given the fact that he is a member of the North Wales Police Authority.
When the Home Secretary made his Statement on the future of the police service on 23rd March it was described as the most important for 30 years. I certainly agree with that view. Indeed, I should go a great deal further. I believe that Mr. Clarke's Statement represented a more dramatic change of policy than anything contained in the report of the Willink Royal Commission or the Police Act 1964, which put in statutory form many of the commission's principal recommendations.
I shall deal first with the policy changes which have received a general and I believe well-deserved welcome. First, I welcome the end of the detailed Home Office controls on police manpower. That is clearly right. I remember spending a substantial amount of time attempting to work out which forces deserved an increase of establishment and those which did not. Such was the degree of fine tuning that I recall a discussion as to whether one particular force, led by a particularly able chief officer, should be allowed to have a Detective Superintendent in charge of its fraud squad. It does not seem to me to be at all sensible that the Home Office should become involved in detailed questions of that kind and, therefore, I welcome what Mr. Clarke said. Similarly, I welcome the proposed easing of the controls on capital expenditure.
I now turn to London. On 23rd March Mr. Clarke announced the creation of:
"a new police authority for the Metropolitan Police in line with the new national pattern, thereby strengthening local accountability in the capital".—[Official Report, Commons, 23/3/93; col. 765.]
When the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, repeated that Statement in this House I welcomed what he said.
Then last night we read in the columns of the Evening Standard, under the headline "New U-turn on Yard Shake-up", that the Home Secretary had gone into reverse. No longer was London to have a police authority like the rest of Great Britain; instead, it was to have what was described as an "advisory board". Apparently all its members would be appointed by Ministers. The question for the noble Earl is, I hope,
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fairly simple: is this true? If it is true, the brave new world announced on 23rd March is in the process of being abandoned. In just eight weeks Mr. Clarke would have capitulated to the pressure of a handful of colleagues in the House of Commons. That would be an extraordinary way in which to make a critical decision affecting the future of policing in London. We look forward to hearing from the noble Earl on that particular matter when he comes to reply.
I now turn to the three issues about which, as I indicated on 23rd March, we have substantial reservations. They are the manner in which decisions on force amalgamations will be determined; the issue of performance indicators; and the character of the proposed new police authorities. I deal first with the issue of amalgamations. I am by no means opposed in principle to force amalgamations. Indeed, it would be foolish of me to say anything of the kind because I was at the Home Office in 1966–67 when my noble friend Lord Jenkins of Hillhead carried out one of the biggest programmes of force amalgamations in the history of the police service. At the time of the Willink Royal Commission there were, excluding the Metropolitan Police, 155 police forces in Great Britain. They ranged from a force of 18 officers in the Shetlands to one of more than 3,000 in Lancashire. Now there are 43 forces in England and Wales and a further eight in Scotland.
Since those changes there have been other important developments. Regional crime squads containing officers from different forces, often acting against target criminals, have had their areas as well as their size increased. There has also been the creation of the National Criminal Intelligence Service. Any further force amalgamation would take place in a situation very different to that which existed in 1966–67. Nevertheless, some further amalgamations could possibly be justified.
But the issue raised in the Home Secretary's Statement is an altogether different one. It is whether he should be compelled to justify his proposals at an independent inquiry. The procedure recommended by the Willink Royal Commission, and accepted by the then Conservative Government, is as laid down in Schedule 3 to the Police Act 1964. That requires the Home Secretary to publish any amalgamation scheme. If any police authority or council objects, there has to be a local inquiry. The report of the inspector has to be laid before Parliament, together with the draft of the statutory instrument comprising the final scheme, which may of course include modifications made to the original proposal as a result of that local inquiry.
I know of no one who was at that time involved in amalgamations who believed that that system was other than desirable. It requires the Executive to justify its proposals before an independent tribunal; and it gives representatives of the local community the opportunity to challenge it.
But now the Home Secretary proposes to sweep the procedure aside. According to Mr. Clarke—he is reported in Hansard at col. 767 it is "unduly cumbersome". It should be "simplified". Why, my Lords? What is the justification for that? What is the

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case for that so-called simplification? According to the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, when he repeated the Home Secretary's Statement in the House on 23rd March—it is reported at col. 190 of the Official Report—the procedure,
"can carry on for 18 months before any decision is taken".
I have only one thing to say about that. What will be the new procedure? Unless the Home Secretary proposes merely to impose his amalgamations without any period of consultation, there will presumably be a period of some months before the announced change and the imposition of the new arrangements. I assume that Mr. Clarke is not suggesting that there will not be even a period of consultation, or that a police force could simply be wiped out and amalgamated without local authorities and local communities being given the opportunity to make representations to their local Members of Parliament and to the Home Secretary. I assume that he is not suggesting that, for instance, the City of London Police, a force very much under threat in any new amalgamation process, could simply be wiped out by a ministerial decision.
Assuming that there will be a period in which representations will be permitted, we are talking about a difference of only a few months between one system and the other, but there is of course one very substantial difference. It is that the right of local communities to make an appeal to an independent inspector is to be abolished. Under this system the Home Secretary will be allowed to impose his own view without his judgment ever being exposed to independent analysis. I believe that that is wholly wrong. It is yet another example of the Executive running roughshod over the interests of local communities.
I turn now to performance indicators. Mr. Clarke stated that the results will be published so that comparisons can be made between different police forces. We are apparently to have league tables—and this at a time when they have not exactly been a triumphant success when applied to education. One of the key tests—it is not the only one but it is one of the principal tests—will apparently be how much crime an individual force solves. No doubt many people will say that that is a most reasonable test. But is it? Let me quote the view of one distinguished senior officer, Sir Roger Birch, who is the Chief Constable of Sussex. He said:
"Consider the amount of police time and effort, and therefore money, needed to support the investigation of, say, one major murder or terrorist incident. This will, in cold statistical terms, be merely the equal of a shoplifter caught red handed".
How can any serious person suggest that a shoplifting offence can be measured in the new league table in precisely the same way as a murder or a terrorist incident which may occupy the time of scores of police officers and need thousands of hours of investigation?
What about the many issues which cannot be measured in the league table? I refer to the hours of police time spent in sorting out people's domestic disputes, or in dealing with missing persons, lost children or the elderly or infirm, who call on the police for help; or in policing sporting meetings and major events. I refer too to sending police officers on visits to
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schools or on foot through small rural communities to give reassurance to the public that their concerns are being addressed by the local police force.
None of those vital responsibilities will be measured in determining where a police force appears in the new league table. The more socially responsible a chief officer is, the greater will be the likelihood that his force will appear toward the bottom of the league table. I can understand at least the logic of the schools league table. However doubtful one may be about the system, parents can decide, I suppose, to move from one area to another so that their child can go to a school which appears at the top of the schools league table. But does anyone seriously suggest that on the basis of the police league table, people will move from the Metropolitan Police District, or that of the West Midlands Force—two forces which have an immense series of inner city policing problems—to that of Dyfed Powys, which polices a rural community with a settled population. On the basis of the Home Secretary's league table, Dyfed Powys, which has a high clear-up rate, will be right up to the top of the league whereas the others certainly will not be.
One has to ask the noble Earl this: what on earth is the point of the new system? All that it will achieve is a futile, ill-informed debate based on league tables which have no conceivable relationship to the real world in which police forces operate.
Finally, I come to the Home Secretary's proposed changes in the constitution of police authorities. Ever since the passing of the Municipal Corporations Act 1835, which required boroughs to appoint watch committees, the Local Government Act 1888, which allowed for the appointment of standing joint committees made up of county councillors and local justices, and the Police Act 1964, our policing has been based on a tripartite system between chief officers, local police authorities and the Home Secretary.
Of course, there have been periodic disputes between them. But they have been resolved. We now have, I believe, a system of accountability which is the envy of many countries outside our shores. Through his inspectors of constabulary, the Home Secretary is accountable to Parliament for the efficiency of the service and its overall level of resources. The chief officer is accountable to his police authority, containing two-thirds elected members and one-third justices of the peace, and to the courts of law. The police authority has to justify itself to the local community.
I believe that we have avoided the over-centralisation of power that we have seen in some Continental countries in which the police are responsible to an all-powerful Minister of the Interior. I believe that that is one of the reasons why the police service in this country, despite all the hideous problems it has faced in the last few years, continues to have such a high reputation in this country. It is seen not as the servant of central government hut, in the words of one former chief officer of police, as the people's police. That is why I so deplore the changes announced by Mr. Clarke on 23rd March. Instead of all members of our police authorities being either elected members or justices of the peace, the

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Government propose to appoint a group of Home Office nominees to every police authority in the country. According to Mr. Clarke's briefing of the press, police authorities will have eight elected members out of 16. There will be three JPs and five government nominees. In addition the Government will appoint the chairman of every police authority from among the group.
There is another factor. We, or the local authority associations, have been told Parliament has not been told—that the chairman will be paid. In other words, there will be a paid representative of the Home Secretary presumably sitting in an office in every police headquarters in this country. The justification for the appointment of government nominees, according to Mr. Clarke, is that it would secure:
"local people with relevant management experience".— [Official Report, Commons, 23/3/93; col. 766.]
I say only this about the establishment of the new set of semi-quangos. First, many police authorities already include people with business experience, as was pointed out on 23rd March by my noble friend Lord Ross of Newport, who is unhappily no longer with us. In the case of one local police authority, 35 per cent. of the current members, or of the members prior to the recent county council elections, had business experience; in another authority, 38 per cent. had business experience. So that does not seem a terribly powerful argument.
Secondly, although I recognise, as we all do, that people with business experience can bring great value to a local police authority, it seems a little odd for the Government to imply that the record of the business community is so astonishingly and uniquely good that businessmen will always improve the quality of decision-making of police authorities. The record does not seem to me to justify that view. Two years ago, most people would have rated British Airways as certainly one of the country's most impressive public companies. Now, it is engulfed in what appears to be never-ending litigation over a so-called "dirty tricks" campaign against Virgin Atlantic. In the past few days, still further allegations have been made against British Airways as a result of, allegedly, a similar campaign against Air Europe.
Then there has been the case of Taurus, the Stock Exchange's planned paperless settlement system. That project, planned for 12 years, collapsed after the expenditure of over £200 million. It was a damaging blow to the City of London.
Then there have been the remarkable cases of two of the Government's favourite quangos: the Wessex and the West Midlands Health Authorities. Huge sums of public money have been wasted on computer systems and consultants under the leadership of businessmen who have had close associations with Ministers—just the kind of people, one suspects, they would appoint as chairmen of police authorities. In both cases, major police investigations are continuing and the Public Accounts Committee of the House of Commons is leading an investigation.
Finally, there is the tragi-comedy of Group 4, a company whose record in the past few weeks has given
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new meaning to the proclaimed policy of the Government that they are continuing to develop new alternatives to imprisonment.
Of course, there are many admirable businessmen and women in the country, but it is simply silly for politicians to pretend that the record of the private sector is so immaculate that it is to be preferred to the elected representatives of the public. That is just doctrinaire foolishness.
I have found that many of our most intelligent business leaders are deeply sceptical about the suggestion that some of them should accept appointment to the new police authorities. As one chairman of a large and successful public company said to me the other day: "What exactly would be their role? They might live in the area of the police force, but they would not represent the people living in that area in any way at all". It seemed to him that all they would be doing would be representing a politician in London. Inevitably, they will be appointed, not just because of their supposed business experience, but because of their political background. Anyone who read the Financial Times report of 14th January this year on the subject of quangos knows how the appointments are made. The supreme test is not business experience, it is political loyalty.
Do we really want to travel down that road? What has it to do with creating greater accountability for the police service, which Mr. Clarke tells us is one of the central features of his reform? How can he possibly pretend that this is so? What he has announced has been the greatest act of centralisation of power in the history of the British police service. We must recognise that too. The government nominees will, of course, change as and when there is a change of government. Out will go one crowd of chairmen and members of police authorities and in will come another crowd. The reason that is so inevitable is that the nominees will be responding not to the agenda of the local community but to the views of the person who may temporarily be Home Secretary in London.
However, in the meantime, what will be their powers? The new police authorities will, according to Mr. Clarke, be free standing, precepting bodies. That means that they will be enabled to pass on what they regard as an acceptable charge to each of the local authorities in their area. Are the government nominees to be allowed to vote on that question? If they are, the possibilities of conflict between them and the elected members will be immense. For they will be doing that at a time when the Government are charge-capping local authorities. The decision on police authority expenditure could have a significant effect on whether the Government cap the council tax levels of the constituent local authorities. I can think of nothing more likely to damage relations between members of the new police authorities.
There is yet another risk. If serious problems arise, what is more natural than that a successor to Mr. Clarke will decide to reduce still further the number of locally elected members on the authorities and bring them under even greater ministerial control?
What we are debating this afternoon is, I believe, an issue of overwhelming importance to the future of

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policing in the country. We are not being asked to sanction the creation of a national police force, but we are discussing something even more insidious—a major step towards transferring effective power over local policing from democratically accountable members of local authorities and local justices to representatives of a politician in London. That is being done, not on the basis of the report of a Royal Commission or a departmental inquiry which has listened to all the evidence, but on the basis of the whims of a single man, a Home Secretary in office for a year, who may, of course, be in charge of a different department of state long before the Police Bill, due next Session, is on the statute book.
I know that the responsible leaders of the police service are deeply disturbed by these proposals, as are many leading members of police authorities, many of them loyal members of the noble Earl's party. If Ministers want to have their protestations about becoming a listening government taken seriously, they should draw back. Unless they do so, I fear that we shall have a fierce dispute on this issue for the next year or more. How can this be desirable at a time when every sensible person in this country wants to do everything possible to assist the police in their struggle against the rising level of crime?
3.31 p.m.
Lord Merlyn-Rees: My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord on the Liberal Democrat Benches on introducing this subject. He knows a great deal about policing. He worked with two Home Secretaries and subsequently (and I believe he still does) with the Police Foundation; and—I tremble to say it because of his words about quangos—I appointed him to the Parole Board. He has raised many issues. I promise not to repeat his words, but I should like to emphasise at the beginning that his powerful words about the loss of local accountability are very important. When I visited European police forces and found the powers of the Minister of the Interior right down to the interstices of the police forces in different parts of the country, I much preferred the system for which I had some responsibility in this country.
I have a slight doubt about the value of this debate. It cannot be long before the White Paper is published. (We are nearly in June.) I grant that after the White Paper has been published there will be more time for discussion, but I wish that there had been more discussion before the White Paper was published. My only hope is, who knows what will happen in the next two or three years. Political predictions sometimes go out of the window, and we may have more time to consider this matter than we think because the police Bill, when it comes, will be a long one. I first entered the other place just after the Willink Report, and I took part in debates on the police Bill which went on and on. It was given a great deal of cover by the other place, and a very valuable piece of legislation it was. The same thing will happen again. So we may have more time than we think to influence the Government after the White Paper is published.
I should like to raise one issue in particular which underlies management and the structure of the police.
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In this country under all governments the crime rate continues to rise. It has increased five times since 1979. It would be very easy, in the silly politics that we all engage in from time to time, for me to argue that it is all due to the change of Home Secretary in April 1979. But it is not. Whatever government are in power the crime rate will go on rising. There are real problems that the police have to deal with.
Where I live in London, a few months ago an old friend of mine nearby—I cannot say "an old man" any more, but he was an old man—was badly beaten up. A friend of mine was recently held up by two gunmen outside my front-door. His house was broken into just a week or two later. It is not the fault of the police. It is not even a matter of extra policemen on the beat. I learnt that when I was in Northern Ireland. There is something intrinsically wrong. And, of course, even though extra policemen and better policing will not solve the problem, they are a necessary part of the equation.
Perhaps it would be a very good thing if all of us who are in politics stopped making foolish claims about the crime rate. "We are the party of law and order". The general public knows that that is rubbish. If we are to get this right it needs sober analysis, looking back to the past, looking at other countries and looking to the future. I wish that there had been a Royal Commission. All parties tend to shy away from Royal Commissions, largely because often when they report we do nothing about it. But the Royal Commission on miscarriages of justice, to which a number of us gave evidence the other day, gave me a great deal of confidence in the quality of the people who sat round the table. I wish that we had had a Royal Commission on the police. From the Willink Commission, which reviewed the constitutional position of the police—which is still a matter of great concern as change takes place—and the arrangements for control and administration, came a very good police Act that has stood us in good stead.
What should be investigated? What should we begin, particularly in this House, as I have learnt in just about a year, to look at? I should like to put a few ideas forward, and only tangentially cover the points that the noble Lord has looked at.
The first point I come back to is the role of the police committees. They must be local. Once at Question Time in the House I reminded noble Lords about the miners' strike in the last decade. I had no responsibility but I took an interest in West Yorkshire. The fact that the chairman of the police committee knew the area and knew the pit villages and that the assistant chief constable had been a coal-miner in the past meant that they knew what to do in the pit villages—unlike in a nearby area, where young men from the Metropolitan Police came north, went into the pit villages and in my view behaved indefensibly. They did not know the nature of the chairman of the lodge and that he would be an important man. In the old days, though not so much now because times have changed, he would have been an important person in the local Nonconformist chapel—that may even now be the case. The fact that someone knows the local areas is important. I say to

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the noble Lord who raised the topic under debate that the question of reinforcing police forces elsewhere needs to be looked at. It is not just a matter of having good administration; it is a question of who is in control of them and who will inform them of the nature of the areas into which they have moved. Local accountability is of the greatest importance.
I also know the man I referred to as the chairman of the police authority and the chief constable. As Home Secretary one has a police department which provides information. It may be valuable for local police forces to have their own small police department, with their own research facilities, so that they can provide information for their own force and not be so dependent on the national organisation. But as for having political appointees on police authorities—I do not want to repeat what the noble Lord has said; he said it powerfully enough—it would be fundamentally wrong for that to happen given the nature of policing in this country.
So far as the Metropolitan Police is concerned I had intended to say a word about the Statement in the House in March. Apparently that is all over. Perhaps I should have acted in the 1970s over the question of a police authority for London. But I was not moved to do so. I accept that it is not easy. But under the new arrangement—as forecast in the Evening Standard last night and in some of the other newspapers today—which comes, I understand, as the result of a briefing from the Home Office, if there is to be some sort of a police authority for London, however appointed, what will happen to the Special Branch? One would not put the Special Branch under a local police committee. One would not put the diplomatic protection group under a local police committee, or the national drugs organisation or the anti-terrorist squad. What needs to be considered is that they should be made responsible directly to the Home Secretary, as they are now because of London, and then the Home Secretary could be responsible to the House of Commons for these national responsibilities which are based in London.
With regard to the Special Branch, MI5 now has a far bigger role than before. Its role is in providing information and analysis of information that comes forward, leaving the police with their operational responsibilities. MI5 cannot do that. It may be that there is room for a different role for the inspectorate. I was talking recently to a chief constable in preparation for this debate. He said that when the inspections first started they simply added up to the few policemen in the small borough force lining up at the station and the chief inspector getting out of the train, inspecting them and looking at their medals and buttons. That added up to the inspection of the force by the inspector. It is not like that now.
It may well be that the role of the inspectorate ought to be greatly increased. That would not be very well received by chief constables. But at least it ought to be looked at. It is part of the growth in the powers of the Home Secretary with regard to these matters
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and it ought to be looked at very carefully because those powers are increasing without legislative change.
For my part—it would not be universally approved even within the police—I would also have a look at the role of the Association of Chief Police Officers. That is not because they are bad people or do the wrong thing but because we are using ACPO as a sort of inspectorate. We are using ACPO to do a job that in other countries the inspectorate does. Maybe that is good, but let us have a look at it. For my money too I would look at the Police Superintendents Association and the Police Federation. That is not because they are bad or evil; but if it is good enough for this House over the past few weeks to have looked at trade unions and had so many pieces of trade union legislation, why should it not have a look at the bodies that organise the police?
With regard to the size of forces, the noble Lord has already dealt with one aspect in which I was interested. In the days of Labour as well as other governments, there was a great diminishment in the number of police forces—the old borough forces and the small county forces. The other day I visited Gwent, where the police feel that they will be amalgamated into the South Wales police and maybe the Dyfed-Powys police as well. It is a small force and a very good one. The point was put to me by the chief constable, Mr. Over. He contended that forces below about 2,000 in strength, which make up 23 of the present 43 forces, are not only viable but provide the highest quality of service at the lowest cost. He argued that a reduction by some 23 forces would obviously reduce the chief constable posts by the same number. The loss of those posts, together with some supporting staff, might provide a notional saving of about £2 million. Using Audit Commission figures, he argued that it could provide only six additional motorway patrol constables. If there is an argument, it is not a financial argument. The matter needs to be looked at very carefully.
In my days as a service Minister, when around us the service commands were being made bigger as the services became smaller in numbers of men and women, my worries were different. In the olden days a general of lower rank could be given a command so that he could show how good he was. The smaller police forces give the Home Office and Home Secretaries a chance to see how a young man can run a police force before he is put in charge of a bigger force. There are all sorts of advantages to the smaller forces. In any case, there are the regional crime squads and so on.
I rather liked what the Government said about finance, perhaps not in detail, but they are looking at finance because of the devastating statement of the Audit Commission to the effect that the tripartite relationship between chief constables, public authorities and the Home Office had broken down. That was a damning statement to make. Therefore the financing of police forces certainly needs to be examined.
There is one matter that I do not think has been considered. The other day I looked at my papers. In 1978 I was very concerned about a problem with the

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Chief Constable of Lancashire. The noble Lord will remember it well. When we looked at the procedures laid down in the police Act, they did not appear very easy. Perhaps the noble Lord will remember that I asked the legal advisers whether it would be possible for him to handle the matter because I was also the appellate authority. How could I both look at the matter and be the appellate authority? I was advised that that could not be done because the Minister of State has powers only from the Home Secretary. It could not be done. In any event, I made a statement on 19th April 1978 in the other place (I have not checked as to whether it was made in this House also) saying that the present position on discipline for senior officers was unsatisfactory and that a document was being prepared. That document has never seen the light of day, though I saw it before I left office. It disappeared somewhere.
I was concerned about the disciplinary arrangements for chief constables and senior officers. I was also very worried about the minor but important cases concerning police constables in all parts of the country which came on one's desk to be adjudicated upon. There has to be an appellate authority. I understand that. However, there were so many appeals that I could not believe that that was the right way to deal with the matter. The whole thing had to be looked at. I hope that the disciplinary arrangements, which are still a problem, will be examined.
I hope that the White Paper lives up to expectations. I hope that it gives us a chance to think hard about the problem of the structure of the police. We depend upon the police. I learnt that not only as Home Secretary but also in Northern Ireland. The noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, has greater experience than I in that respect. At that time one of the problems with law and order in Northern Ireland was the weakness of the police. It has greatly strengthened, but perhaps too late.
A good police force, responsible to the community, so that people are not afraid to go to the police station or speak to the constable on the beat, is one of the important glories of this country. I hope that the Government will not throw that away in the search for greater management techniques. Accountability finance-wise, important as that is to central government, needs to be looked at. I hope that we will not throw out the baby with the bath water. The police force in this country stands to the credit of this nation and has done so for many centuries. I hope that it will be able to continue.
3.48 p.m.
Lord Trevor: My Lords, I am pleased to be able to make my somewhat overdue maiden speech during a debate which affects my locality most considerably. I have been a magistrate for 33 years and a member of the North Wales Police Authority for 10 years. That force was formed by the amalgamation of the old Denbighshire, Flintshire and Caernarvonshire constabulary. It is one of the oldest and largest forces in the country. Therefore I fully support the views and
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opinions contained in the consultative documents prepared by the Association of County Councils and the Association of Metropolitan Authorities.
The proposals put forward by the Home Secretary are drastic and many forces and authorities are extremely disturbed by them. They are considerably affecting the morale of those involved. Police authority membership is composed of democratically elected councillors and some magistrates, all of whom know their areas intimately, are experienced in many different spheres and are readily accessible to members of the general public whom they represent. The chairman of the authority is elected by the members for a two-year period of office. The office alternates between councillors and magistrates. The chairmen are accountable to the members. That system has worked most satisfactorily in the past and there is no reason at all why it should not continue to do so.
The Home Secretary proposes to appoint directly a proportion of the members, appoint and pay the chairman and decide on the total number of the membership of the authority. We believe that that will result in persons with a lack of knowledge and experience being appointed. It will reduce the mandate from local communities and transfer power and control from the authorities to central government.
Furthermore, the Home Secretary indicated that he proposes to initiate a programme of amalgamation of police forces. We believe that our force area, with a population of 643,097, with a large holiday seasonal increase and covering 629,349 hectares, and with a road system of 9,593 kilometres, is large enough in view of the terrain and the inherent communications difficulty. It would be detrimental to all concerned if it were to be expanded. I believe that that view is held by many other forces and authorities.
It is fair to say that we welcome the suggested financial freedom, local delegation of budgets and operational independence of the chief constable. But we feel that the rest of the proposals are too far reaching and that a need to make such radical changes has not been established.
3.51 p.m.
Lord Allen of Abbeydale: My Lords, it is my great privilege to offer the congratulations of the House on what was a notable maiden speech by the noble Lord, Lord Trevor. It is perhaps a shade unusual to wait for 43 years before making a maiden speech. Apart from experience in forestry and fishing problems, the noble Lord has had great experience as a magistrate, as he explained, and as a member of a police authority. He demonstrated beyond any doubt that he is well able to make a notable contribution to our deliberations. Now that he has broken the ice, I hope that it will not be too long before we hear him again.
Turning to the Motion, it is only one of the Home Secretary's three approaches to the reshaping of the police service, but it certainly raises enough problems to justify a debate on its own—whatever the timing might be. I am extremely grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for giving us this opportunity to discuss the Home Secretary's recent Statement.

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I first became involved with the police in the 1930s. It strikes me that, although traditionally the police service is looked upon as a local government service, it has always stood a little aside. When I started there were over 180 forces in England and Wales. Since then, by direct legislation or by amalgamations, that total has come down to 43. I would say that when we got rid of non-county borough forces we achieved, numerically, a greater number of amalgamations than even in the days of the noble Lord, Lord Jenkins of Hillhead.
In relation to police areas, that realignment has never quite kept in step with what was going on in local government. Given the attitude of the present administration to local government, they are hardly likely to go out of their way to bring the areas covered by individual forces into line with local government areas. Indeed, the tendency is the other way. When the local government Act of 1992 was going through Parliament, setting up the boundary commission and making provision for police amalgamation, it was made plain that whatever happened to local government there was no intention on the part of central government to go ahead with smaller police forces. To take a current example, I gather that the small print of the suggestion that Derbyshire may be split into two unitary authorities takes it for granted that a single force would remain covering both areas.
As previous speakers have said, the Home Secretary spoke of simplifying the amalgamation procedure. Although he says that he has no specific plans in mind, no one will be surprised to find the total of 43 being further reduced, whether under a new streamlining procedure or the procedure explained by the noble Lord, Lord Harris. To my mind, developments of that kind inevitably mean that the structure of the police service is likely to become even more detached from local government.
Turning to management, it is fair to say that the police authorities of the 1930s—the watch committees and the standing joint committees—were the weakest part of the tripartite system, squeezed as they were, on the one hand, by the Home Office with all the big guns and ammunition and, on the other, by the chief constable who resisted any encroachment on all the more interesting matters on the ground that they were his operational responsibility.
Things have changed since then, but perhaps not that much. It is not to be wondered at that, some time ago, the Audit Commission came to the conclusion that the present responsibilities of the police authorities are somewhat blurred. Therefore, it is not surprising that the Home Secretary should want to sharpen up those responsibilities. The question is whether the solution which he suddenly pronounces to the world is on the right lines.
It is perfectly plain that whatever else might be the case, it is not local government in any ordinary sense of the term. The police authority will be free standing. There will not be a majority of local authority members. As I understand it, there will be a paid chairman, although I have not been a party to the briefing which seems to have given to others a good
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deal of information that was not made available to Parliament. He will be appointed by the Home Secretary, who is bound to look to the appointing authority. There will be other members appointed by the Home Secretary and special financial arrangements peculiar to the police authority on which I propose to say a few words in a moment.
The Home Secretary rightly stressed the importance of the police responding to the needs of the local community. Perhaps one can be permitted a tinge of doubt whether the composition of the authority will be such as to make the meeting of that expectation its outstanding characteristic. Nor is it entirely clear how the Home Secretary's nominees are to be identified. Being politically innocent, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Harris, I naturally accept the Home Secretary's indication that he will not be obsessed by their political complexion. But while I yield to no one in my regard for the sagacity of the Home Office, there are limits even to its knowledge of individuals and I am not sure how they will set about identifying and assessing likely local candidates. It is a much worse problem than the one I had when I was trying to find members of the visiting committees of prisons dotted throughout the country.
The Home Secretary said that although there would be greater local autonomy, national objectives would be set. I can think of some rather platitudinous objectives. However, I confess in my ignorance that I do not really know what the Home Secretary had in mind. Perhaps when the noble Earl replies he will give one or two examples. Surely there will be a host of questions which can hardly be described as national objectives but which can hardly be left entirely to local initiative; such as the scale on which police officers might be armed or the need for career planning for higher appointments.
I must come for a moment to the financial arrangements on which I touched a moment ago. I know that they are not a very enlivening subject for discussion but they are rather important. As I understand it, although I may have got it wrong, something over 90 per cent. of the money will come to the police authority from central government, either by way of specific grant up to a cash limited amount or by way of revenue support grant and non-domestic rates. Then the police authority will be able to precept on its constituent authorities for the small balance. Each police authority would have its very own standard spending assessment, subject to capping, but the Home Secretary could also intervene if he thought that a local budget had been fixed too low. This all seems to be just a little rigid. I do not quite know what would happen if a police authority were suddenly met by an item involving a great deal of unexpected expenditure, as happened, for example, over the bomb at Warrington. But more importantly, I wonder how it is proposed to calculate the amount payable to each authority at the level necessary, as the Home Secretary put it, to secure an effective police service.
When on a previous occasion (reported at col. 934 of the Official Report on 20th November 1991) we were discussing the byzantine complications of standard spending assessments, the noble Earl, Lord

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Ferrers, explained that that part of the police expenditure not covered by specific grant was calculated by reference to the authorised establishment approved by the Home Secretary. But now there is not going to be an authorised establishment approved by the Home Secretary. One wonders what the criteria will be. When there is talk of 51 per cent. specific grant or 40 per cent. revenue support grant, the question is: 51 per cent. or 40 per cent. of what?
Like the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, I wonder a little about the role of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Constabulary. Will they be less important, given the greater local autonomy, or will they be more important, as the Home Secretary's principal agents when he comes to hold a police authority accountable for the performance of its force? Will this opportunity be taken to end the bickering about the financing of the common services such as the police college?
Finally, I should like to say a few words about London. It is a little difficult to know what to say when we are still uninformed about what is now in contemplation. All we know is that it is not what was in the Home Secretary's statement, assuming that there is validity in what appeared in the Evening Standard, which had every impression of having some authentic official background. I was anyway, I confess, a little surprised that the momentous change of handing over the Home Secretary's responsibilities as police authority was announced in such a casual way. But, evidently, that is not now to happen. The composition and role of this proposed advisory body is not clear, but the noble Earl will no doubt be taking the opportunity of giving us a further parliamentary statement about what is now proposed.
At any rate, this change of plan should cover one aspect which had been giving me some concern; namely, the future of the receiver's office, the supplies and services side of the Metropolitan Police. This has been integrated with the police set-up in London in a way which has simply not been possible elsewhere. The force has been particularly well-served by those who have held the post of receiver. I hope that there is no risk now of this efficient and unique partnership between police and civilians being abandoned simply in order that London should he brought into line with the provinces.
Speaking of London, it is, after all, a great metropolis and the nation's capital. Somehow I was never quite able to envisage the position in which the Home Secretary would stand on the sidelines if there were a major catastrophe, perhaps involving calling in the military to help, or large-scale violence—a problem with which the present Home Secretary has, happily, not been confronted—or even a hostage-taking, as recently happened in France.
We are discussing a great service with a great tradition crucial to the well-being of the community which it serves. There have been causes for disquiet and no one would dispute that there is a case for change and for improving the capacity of the service to cope with rising crime and other ills of our society. But enough has been said in this debate—and I suspect that a good deal more will be said as time goes
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on—to demonstrate to Ministers that the package of reforms, when we have the whole package, will be carefully watched to see that what is proposed is likely to achieve the efficient servicepolicing, as it does, by consent—that we all want to see.

Science, Engineering and Technology
4.7 p.m.
The Minister of State, Department for Education (Baroness Blatch): My Lords, with the leave of the House, I shall repeat a Statement on government policy on science, engineering and technology which has just been made in another place by my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. The Statement is as follows:
"Following the debate in this House last June, I launched a consultation exercise about the future of science and technology in this country. This produced more than 800 responses. Many were of high quality, not least those submitted by the Science and Technology Committee in another place and the new Science and Technology Committee of this House chaired by my honourable friend the Member for Pudsey.
"Very many of the responses I received from industry affirmed the quality of Britain's scientists and engineers. I believe that I will speak for the whole House when I say that I agree with that judgment. I hope I will also speak for the whole House when I add to that my belief that on those scientists and engineers rests a very large part of our hopes for the future of our country. They represent one of our fundamental national assets. The Government now wish to build on this national strength by developing a closer and more systematic partnership between the scientific and engineering communities, industry and commerce, and government. The purpose of this new partnership will be the strengthening of the contribution of science and engineering to wealth creation and the quality of life. This is the focus for the White Paper Realising Our Potential, a Strategy for Science, Engineering and Technology which we are publishing today. Copies are available in the Vote Office.
"The principal themes which emerged from the consultation exercise were as follows. First, there was a widely perceived contrast between our continued excellence in science, engineering and technology and our relative weakness in exploiting it, particularly to economic advantage. Secondly, many felt the absence of a clear statement of a national strategy in this area. Thirdly, many felt that there was a need to manage the Government's investment in science and technology better.
"The proposals in the White Paper address these themes and some others which are complementary to them. First, we have decided to provide a clear, annually updated, statement of the Government's strategy for science and technology, to be known as the Forward Look. This will give an assessment of

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the balance and content of our own science and technology programmes over the medium and the long term.
"The Forward Look will draw on the results of our second innovation: namely, a new technology foresight exercise, to be jointly conducted by industry, the science and engineering communities and government departments. The aims of this exercise—which reflect best practice in our leading companies and in other advanced countries—are to gain early notice of emerging key technologies and to provide a systematic process for the exchange of ideas, people and know-how. It will be steered by a group chaired by the Chief Scientific Adviser and will aim to bring together working scientists and engineers with those in industry and commerce who are close to markets. Reflecting this and the other increased responsibilities laid upon him by this White Paper, I should tell the House that the Government's Chief Scientific Adviser will be paid in future at the Grade 1A level.
"Thirdly, I have decided to establish a new council for science and technology—which I will chair on behalf of the Prime Minister—to provide the Government with independent and expert advice at the highest level on research spending priorities. This will replace the present ACOST. We will also look to the newly established National Academies Policy Advisory Group as an authoritative source of independent advice.
"The Government believe that we need to clarify what we expect from scientists and engineers in universities and research council institutes in relation to the creation of wealth and improvement of our quality of life. We intend, therefore, to restructure the research councils, to reformulate their missions and strengthen their links with those who use their research, and to improve their management arrangements.
"In particular, the Government wish to build on the steps taken by the present Science and Engineering Research Council to develop structures more clearly related to the needs of users of research. I have therefore decided that the Science and Engineering Research Council should be divided into two new councils: an engineering and physical sciences research council, which will underpin key industries based on engineering and the physical sciences, and a particle physics and astronomy research council. The Agricultural and Food Research Council will be modified into a biotechnology and biological sciences research council, reflecting the increasing importance of the life sciences. The coverage of the Natural Environment Research Council, the Medical Research Council and the Economic and and Social Research Council will remain broadly as now.
"Reflecting advice given in the consultation process, the functions of the Advisory Board for the Research Councils will be absorbed within the Office of Science and Technology.
"Next, the Government's arrangements for the promotion of innovation, for technology transfer
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and the spread of best practice will be substantially strengthened, taking account of the Faraday principles on the interchange of ideas, know-how and skills. Access to technology will be improved, irrespective of its source, for firms of all sizes. The secretariat of the LINK programme will be transferred from the DTI to the Office of Science and Technology to emphasise the importance of its role in bringing the science base and industry together.
"The Government have reviewed the dual support mechanism under which funding for research in universities is provided through both the higher education funding councils and the research councils. They have concluded that uncertainty about its future should be ended. Funding for teaching and general research should continue to flow together. We have therefore decided that the present dual funding arrangements should be retained. Arrangements for co-ordination with the science and engineering base will be strengthened to ensure that the funding councils and the research councils establish close co-ordination.
"The Government wish the research councils and universities to develop research training more closely related to the needs of potential employers and designed to encourage young people to see science and engineering careers as worthwhile and attractive. This will involve further development of the content of postgraduate courses and changes in the balance of the support provided by research councils, with a Masters course becoming the normal initial post-graduate degree in science, engineering and technology. More care should be taken to manage the careers of those postgraduates who go on to do academic research.
"Over the past 20 years the Rothschild customer-contractor principle has been successfully applied in the management of departments' spending on the R&D which is directly related to the support of their policies. The Government now wish further to strengthen the role of departments as customers for R&D and to create a fully open market for the provision of research and development to departments so that all competent contractors can compete for work. Further work is being set in hand on the best ownership and organisational arrangements for civil research establishments in the public sector.
"The Government also recognise that science and technology must now be seen in a global perspective. Co-operation with other countries is essential and the United Kingdom will play its full role while aiming to improve our take-up of research carried out overseas.
"Our future depends on the effective exploitation of science and technology. This is not just a question of producing excellently educated and trained scientists, engineers and technicians at all levels, crucially important though that is. We need also to ensure that our society as a whole appreciates the role and the importance of mathematics, science, engineering and technology.

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The Government intend to raise the profile of the work presently done to improve public understanding of science. We will do this by extending our partnership with the charities and other bodies who are already doing much good work in the schools and elsewhere. I shall be committing additional funds from my budget to this purpose.
"This White Paper sets out the framework within which we can better develop and exploit the work of our many excellent scientists and engineers in industry, the academic community and government. It represents the beginning of a process of change, not the end. I am confident that we shall have the backing of British industry and of those who work in our science and engineering base in building the stronger partnership which is crucial to Britain's success. It is a strategy which is indeed designed to realise our potential and I commend it to the House".
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
4.17 p.m.
Lord Morris of Castle Morris: My Lords, the House will he grateful to the Minister for repeating the Statement made by her right honourable friend on the issue of the White Paper which has been eagerly—nay, impatiently—awaited by many of us, since the subject is of central importance to the economic, academic and industrial development of this country in the coming decades.
It is, I believe, generally accepted (indeed the Minister herself paid tribute to the fact) that scientists and engineers—I stress the inclusion of engineers in this country have been responsible for most of the great scientific discoveries of the world. Even now, United Kingdom scientists are making equally significant discoveries. So, from the towering intellect of Isaac Newton, through Rutherford and Faraday to John Logie Baird and people like professors Stephen Hawking and Steve Jones, there is a clear line in our scientific community of intellect and innovation which has made British scientists, even today, the envy of the world. However, the central question of investment by the Government remains less than fully answered by the White Paper. Only too often have British scientific discoveries been developed abroad because of lack of government interest and investment.
It would, however, be churlish not to welcome the White Paper as we welcomed from these Benches the establishment of the Office of Science and Technology. Each of them is a much-belated recognition—but a recognition—of the place of science and technology in government.
Clearly, we on this side of the House shall need to study the White Paper very carefully before giving a considered response. It is a heavyweight document and it repays study. There are parts of the Statement which we on these Benches can welcome and with which, broadly, we can agree. In stressing the importance of science, engineering and technology to the national economy and the international industrial scene, it says what we would all agree, just as we would all agree about the importance of motherhood, sliced bread and the cultivated mushroom.
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Similarly, we all recognise the importance of research and development both in industry and in the universities. Like the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals, we on these Benches regret that the Government's interest did not go even further and that a similar importance was not conceded to the humanities when it was announced by the Government last week, in a Written Answer, that there is to be no separate humanities research council—a fact which, I believe, many of us on all sides of the House regret. I suppose that we must be grateful for the crumbs which fall from the Government's table but we must—if I may mix the metaphors—look this particular gift horse very carefully in the mouth.
First, we welcome the announcement that there will be a new research council for engineering and the physical sciences (which will include chemistry and materials) and a new research council for particle physics and astronomy. We hope, however, that this is not simply a cosmetic exercise and that it will not be, in the traditional words, a "rearrangement of the deckchairs on the 'Titanic' as she goes down". We understand the reasoning behind the new research councils (the importance of wealth creation), but we would beg leave to question whether they will have the resources to do anything much more in the way of applied work without damaging basic research if they do so. We would welcome the Minister's comments on that possibility.
Secondly, we are relieved that international subscriptions (such as those to CERN and ESA) are to be safeguarded. But, of course, that carries a concomitant problem with it; it means that the Secretary of State will have to fight even harder for his money in the Cabinet and while we wish him well, at this particular time we have some doubts about the extent to which he will succeed.
Thirdly, we are very interested to learn that a committee will be established to identify key technologies and to have some sort of research foresight role. Once again, the Statement does not tell us whether there will be any substantial amount of extra money for that or whether that body will be allowed to publish its reports. We hope that it will. We also warmly welcome the proposal for an annual statement on strategy for science, engineering and technology. Once again, from our point of view, it does not go far enough and phrases such as "long-term planning" have been sedulously and studiously avoided. But we must be grateful for what we can get. Although welcoming the proposal, we recall the words of ICI in its reply to the consultation exercise when it was talking about advisory bodies of this sort. ICI said:
"It will be hard to find the folk unless they feel that this time something will happen".
I commend to your Lordships those words from one of the great scientific and industrial companies of the United Kingdom. I repeat that ICI said that it would be hard to find the folk for the advisory bodies,
"unless they feel that this time something will happen".
So we urge the publication of all reports of this type. I believe that the DTI is still refusing to publish its aerospace advisory body's strategic technology

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acquisition plan. I must ask whether there will be any money to back the new technologies when they have been identified.
We understand, too, that some sort of public understanding campaign will be put into place. We believe that it is the case that the Government have secured the co-operation of Welcome and the Gatsby Charity in doing this, and that is to be welcomed. But, of course, we have had the British Association for the Advancement of Science with us for a long time, and there are still plenty of our fellow citizens who do not know a sub-atomic particle from a sub-aqua wetsuit. There is a vast job to be done here and, while a little may well be done by a public understanding campaign, I hope that the Government will take note that the splendid work of the British Association for the Advancement of Science has still not been totally successful.
The news that the Teaching Company Scheme and LINK will be removed from the DTI and brought under the umbrella of the OST is again welcome. It is where they logically belong, but their correct placement does not guarantee their effective operation. We also welcome the news that the ABRC will be wound up and its function carried out by the OST internally. I think that it is generally agreed that the ABRC has not quite been the total success that was hoped when it was set up. Of course, the OST must still be held accountable, not just to Parliament, but also to the science and industry community. Again, we urge the publication of all reports made by it so that we can see the transparency of OST decision-making.
Our priorities on this side of the House would include many of the proposals outlined by the Government in the Statement, but we would go further and deeper, and assert those priorities somewhat differently. We believe that the Government, in co-operation with industry and the science base, should set long-term national science and technology objectives and provide the mechanisms for achieving them. We believe that an EC research office should be created to market, inform and guide the uptake of international opportunities by United Kingdom science and industry.
We note that government expenditure on science and technology is still lower than that of many of our competitors. It should therefore be a priority of the Government to increase the total spend. We fervently believe that the dual support of university funding should be maintained. Here, we appear to be at one with the Government if the words of the Statement mean what they appear to mean. It is our view that the current policy of not funding near-market research is both divisive and damaging. We think that the Government should fund research into strategic, generic technologies—as close to the market as is necessary—so as to strengthen British industry.
We would go further. We believe that a system of tax credits for research and development should be urgently considered. We believe that the creation of intermediate institutions or so-called "Faraday Centres" should be supported. We believe that the Government should support the development of a
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national technology database. We believe that A-levels should be replaced with a broader curriculum to enable science students to continue to study languages and humanities and vice versa. We believe that there should be more support from government for continuous professional development. We believe that the Government must take the lead in developing a proper career structure that can span the research councils, government service and the universities. These are by no means the same priorities as the Government seem to be suggesting in the Statement and the White Paper. We would urge the Government to think more widely, more radically, and to agree with us that long-term planning is what the scientific community urgently needs.
On 6th May 1993 I asked the noble Baroness a supplementary question to the Starred Question of the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil. I asked whether the Minister could inform the House how many scientists in this country were on contracts under five years long and whether the Minister agreed that it was essential to give scientists longer contracts as they tended to do their best work in middle age and this encouraged them to stay in the profession. Quite understandably, the Minister was unable at that time to provide the figures I asked for. She asked me to absolve her from the necessity of writing to me on the question, and I was happy to provide that absolution. Clearly, she will not have any of those answers this afternoon, but I hope that she will now agree that the question is important because it bears so strongly on the long terms plans for science so vital to the health and morale of the scientific community, a community which, I suspect, will receive today's Statement with true, trained and traditional scientific scepticism.
Lord Mayhew: My Lords, I join the noble Lord, Lord Morris, in thanking the noble Baroness for repeating the Statement. We on these Benches agree with many of the points that the noble Lord made. We agree, for example, with the proposal for Forward Look and for technology foresight. We also agree that the Government should have supported the establishment of a humanities research council. However, we shall leave our detailed reactions to the White Paper to the debate which will no doubt follow in due course.
I should like to make just one or two points about the Statement. First, the consultation exercise which preceded the White Paper was useful and interesting. There was a consensus, apparently, among the 800 well-informed replies that all was not well and, in particular, that we needed a clear statement of national strategy and that the Government's management of science and technology and of their investment in it should be better. Those matters are important and a strong criticism of the Government's record. The Government have been in office now for 14 years and those are things which good government would not have allowed to arise during that time.
We welcome parts of the White Paper, but on the whole we on these Benches find the Statement and the White Paper disappointing. The Statement seems curiously out of balance: massive attention to administration; little about innovation; nothing about funding. Will the new bureaucracy be any better than

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the old? It is hard to judge. If it takes place, we shall have to judge by results. The White Paper seems merely to be putting eggheads into different baskets. That is the long and the short of it. It is difficult to judge what the result will be. We can only hope for the best. There is nothing about funding—a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Morris.
Why is it that investment in R&D has declined as a percentage of GDP? Was that government policy? I am told that of all the OECD countries that is true only of Turkey and Britain. Did the Government intend that? What do they propose for the future? It is a disaster. This is one of the most important things in our national life. How has that decline been allowed to come about? What precise measures do the Government propose to take to keep our brightest people in British universities? What action are they taking to smooth the exit of talented scientists and engineers from the defence to the civil sector?
There are a number of other points that I know my noble friends would want me to make. They will be made in the debate in due course. In the meantime, on their behalf, I have to register considerable disappointment with the Statement and the White Paper.
Baroness Blatch: My Lords, perhaps I may start by accentuating the positive.
Lord Dainton: My Lords—
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: Order! Order!
Baroness White: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Dainton is the only real scientist here.
Baroness Blatch: My Lords, I understand that it is the convention of the House that I respond to the leaders of the Opposition Benches. Perhaps I may do that.
Perhaps I may accentuate the positive and welcome the comments of the noble Lords, Lord Morris of Castle Morris and Lord Mayhew. There is a great deal that unites us. I find it almost inconceivable that the House will not wish to return to the White Paper in considerable detail. It will almost certainly form the subject of a debate at some point, although that must be a matter for the usual channels.
Underlying much of what noble Lords said in welcoming parts of the White Paper was the issue of resources. The essential point here is being missed. We now have a coherent framework accentuating partnership and emphasising the importance of government, charities, industries and commerce working together, making much more effective use of resources, focusing what is spent on those areas that will contribute considerably to the wealth and health of the nation, and, as I said at the outset in repeating the Statement of my right honourable friend, properly exploiting, in the best sense of the word, the excellent work of the scientific community.
The noble Lord, Lord Mayhew, was rather disappointing when he said, "Nothing about innovation; nothing about what the whole scientific, engineering and technological world is about". Everything is about promoting, facilitating and
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making it possible for the brains of this country to flourish. We want to ensure that we have a framework that does not thwart those talents but promotes them and makes it possible for them to flourish.
The colleagues in another place of the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, produced, only a matter of a few weeks ago, a document called The Challenge for Waldegrave which was a response to the consultation. Most of the material used in it was taken from the submissions made to my right honourable friend as part of the consultation process. In its introduction it said that,
"too many organisations simply stated the case for more money or influence for their own narrow interests rather than voicing broader concerns on the future of science and technology".
That is all that has been said. If I sum up what the noble Lords, Lord Morris of Castle Morris and Lord Mayhew said, what they were asking for were more resources. Of course my right honourable friend will fight his corner for his fair share of available resources, but we have to concern ourselves about the sensible and effective application of those resources. That is what is important.
I return to the introduction of that same document. It was said that the document should not be seen as a definitive statement of Labour policy on science and technology, but it then goes on to say that,
"we outline the policies that Britain's scientists and engineers wish to see and which the Labour Party has advocated repeatedly".
On the one hand, we have a document that is not definitive, while, on the other hand, we have a document that is definitive. There is a good deal of debate left in all of this.
Reference was made to the lack of the establishment of a humanities research council. I notice that my noble friend Lord Renfrew is not in his place: I know that it is a matter of great interest to him. I can assure noble Lords that the Government thought long and hard about whether a humanities council should be included in the arrangements set out in today's White Paper. We came to the conclusion that the balance of advantage lay in retaining the present arrangements, for the reasons set out in my Answer to the Question asked last week by my noble friend Lord Mountevans.
The Government have made clear their commitment to high quality research in the humanities. The 11 per cent. increase—11 per cent. at a time when the parameters for all other Whitehall departments are tight—in the British Academy's grant for 1993–94 demonstrates that commitment. I hope that noble Lords will agree that it was right to announce our conclusions ahead of the publication of today's White Paper, so allowing us today to concentrate upon science and technology and avoid the accusation that almost certainly would have come across the Dispatch Box that we had slipped it in somehow or another into today's proceedings.
We intend to strengthen the Office of Science and Technology's policy, research and analysis; improve co-operation between government, industry and the science base in pursuit of shared objectives; review the workings of the EUROPES system under which UK

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expenditure on research projects is attributed to government departments; increase transparency—this is an important point—of how government money is spent; maintain the dual support system, something which has been welcomed; retain broadly the same research council structure; improve communications and co-operation between different research councils; wind up ABRC—I am aware that that has also been welcomed—and allow it to be absorbed by the Office of Science and Technology; and create a more diverse range of postgraduate opportunities for young people, with a growth in the role of Masters degrees. All of that will contribute substantially to the health and wealth of our nation.
4.39 p.m.
Lord Boyd—Carpenter: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that this interesting Statement which she read so well contains one significant omission? She made the point which I believe everyone will accept that a major factor in our troubles is that the wonderful work done by our scientists and engineers by way of research too often fails to be put into operation by industry. There is a failure by British industry, in particular, to exploit the results of that high grade research.
Is the Minister aware that one of the reasons for that is that the use and development of that technology is subjected to very severe taxation? Any profits are subject to income or profits tax and a good deal of the work is subject to charges for VAT. Will the Minister indicate that the Government are aware of that? If we are to have full value from the research carried out and full value for British industry, it is necessary to make it financially more immediately attractive for industry to invest in the development of such technology. I do not expect my noble friend to anticipate any Budget Statement but I should like an indication that the Government are aware of that. One of the most important factors in the exploitation of that research is the knowledge that those who risk their money and take the opportunities to try to develop and exploit the technology should not he stunned by heavy taxation.
Baroness Blatch: My Lords, as always my noble friend makes several important points. I believe that I touched upon the point made about exploitation. My noble friend is absolutely right that we need a much stronger link between the work of our scientists and some manifestation of that work in the productivity of companies. That is important.
The other point which my noble friend makes is about taxation. The United Kingdom has tax incentives for research and development which are relatively comprehensive by international standards. The overall position is set out in paragraph 2.12 of the White Paper. The results of an objective study were set out in response to a House of Lords Select Committee in June 1991. However, I am sure that that does not go as far as my noble friend would like it to go because I believe that he is hinting at incentives.
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We have almost made a culture of talking down our country, not just in terms of the practical sense of what we do as regards science and technology but also our position vis-a-vis other countries in the world. I should like to return to a very important point made by the noble Lord, Lord Mayhew. He asked why, as a percentage of GDP, our spending had gone down while that of every other country appeared to be increasing. As a statement, that is absolutely wrong. If the noble Lord looks at the figures of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan or the United States, he will find that their spending has fluctuated over the past 10 years. I can say to the noble Lord, Lord Mayhew, that in terms of civil R&D as a percentage of GDP, the United Kingdom is ahead of the United States and Japan and we fall behind only France and Germany. If we take government expenditure on R&D for all seven countries, we are fourth out of seven countries. That is not a bad record.
Lord Dainton: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for repeating the Statement. I apologise for the fact that I was late entering the Chamber. That is because I was chairing a meeting of the Select Committee on Science and Technology. I apologise also for the fact that the usual chairman of that committee, my noble friend Lord Flowers, is out of the country. Therefore, it falls to me, having just heard the Statement, to try to give a few preliminary views on what has been said and what I imagine the White Paper largely contains.
It is quite clear to me that this paper is not concerned in any way with funding. I understand it to be a framework paper. I believe that she used those words. That carries me back to a time 21 years ago when a White Paper called A Framework for Government Research and Development was issued which contained a report by Lord Rothschild as well as a report written by myself. Therefore, I am quite familiar with traversing matters of organisation and policy while leaving out considerations and questions of finance.
The impression that I gained from the Minister is that the White Paper is trying to stake a claim for science in the life of this nation in all its aspects; for example, as a social activity, as an economic activity and so on. At one point I believe the Minister said that the White Paper constitutes a wide-ranging review of scientific spend and the purposes for which money is spent in a whole range of departments, research councils and universities. She said also that she wanted transparency. In the sphere of science I believe that openness is absolutely essential. It is the oxygen that we breathe as scientists. Unless there is openness, we cannot criticise one another and cannot get the best out of one another. That applies to the organisation of science just as much as it applies to the scientific process itself.
My immediate and personal reaction to the Statement is one of welcome. There has been a long gestation period for the production of the White Paper; that is understandable. I know from my own experience that consultation has been extremely wide. That is a merit. However, I must reserve my position until I have had time to read the White Paper.

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From what has been said, the following comments occur to me. First, the White Paper is very timely. In the past few years morale in the scientific and engineering community has been slipping. That is an undeniable fact. Years have slipped by with no fundamental review, with no sense of a vision for the future or the part which science and technology can play in our national affairs. There has been no sense of a planning horizon. At least we now have an attempt —and I cannot say that we have it because I have not read the paper and I shall make a judgment on it when I have—to put science into some kind of perspective in the life of the country, to see how it can best be fostered in the interest of the United Kingdom.
It struck me from what has been said that the Minister has tried to get a grip on scientific policy right across government, which is badly needed. Scientific policy is a term which is very much misunderstood by many people. There are two elements to it: there is a policy for science—how priorities are arranged, how much money should be spent and so on; and secondly, there is science to serve public policy. That is not a new thought. That distinction was made clear by Lord Haldane only 90 years ago. The point is that although those are two distinct concepts, in terms of administration they are intermingled. It is against that background and in a philosophical sense that I shall examine the White Paper to see whether the balance is right and whether the inter-relationships between those two aspects have been rightly interpreted.
Some of the devices which were mentioned seem to be sensible. The notion that there is to be a strategic council for science and technology to be chaired by the Minister, which will replace ACOST, will be an improvement on the present arrangements.
I believe also that the requirement for annual reports will be good provided that there is a mechanism for setting those annual reports against what I hope will be—I use modern business jargon which I very much dislike using but which seems to have come into general currency—the mission statements and programmes of the bodies which should be set out at the beginning of the year. Therefore, there will be a constant monitoring.
As I understood what the Minister said, that kind of monitoring will be part of the role of the chief scientific adviser and the Office of Science and Technology. That can only be good. Therefore, there is a sense of openness in the annual forward looks which the Minister mentioned. However, those looks must be compared with the performance as detailed in the annual reports. There should be an open scrutiny so that everybody knows what are the strengths and weaknesses and how best to address them.
I like the reference to a sense of research foresight being achieved by a kind of partnership between industry, on the one hand, and communities of scientists and technologists on the other. That can be very important because it could be built upon in order to develop not necessarily a national strategy but a kind of consensus. If you can develop a consensus with the troops behind you, then whatever you want to do will go forward with some speed and determination.
Viscount Tonypandy: My Lords, will the noble Lord give way?
Lord Dainton: Certainly, my Lords.
Viscount Tonypandy: My Lords, we are not discussing the White Paper today. As the rule of the House is that 20 minutes only should be allowed for Back-Benchers and we have in fact thus far taken 41 minutes on the Statement, I must point out that it is grossly unfair to those who are taking part in the main debate.
Noble Lords: Hear, hear!
Lord Dainton: My Lords, nevertheless, I hope that I may be allowed to make a few more observations.
Noble Lords: Questions!
Lord Dainton: My Lords, I am not sure as to the ruling of the House on the matter.
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: My Lords, with the greatest respect to the noble Lord, I believe that when we are discussing a Statement that usually consists of questions to the Minister and the briefest of comments to enable a number of noble Lords to speak. Longer speeches are made on the debate. Am I right in that assumption?
Viscount Astor: My Lords, perhaps it would help if I were to point out that ministerial Statements are for the information of the House. Brief comments and questions for clarification from all quarters of the House are then allowed. I think it would be convenient if my noble friend replied now to the noble Lord's observations so that other noble Lords will be able to put their points.
Baroness Blatch: My Lords, I shall try to be brief because I know that the Clock is ticking over. The noble Lord, Lord Dainton, is absolutely right. What we intend is, in fact, staking a claim for science; it is making science, together with technology, absolutely central in our affairs. That is not just from higher education onwards, but also in the whole of the national curriculum. Our young people from the age of four and five will be studying science as a course subject in the national curriculum. Therefore, we shall increase scientific awareness and competence, and also technological competence, in our young people leaving school, thereby enlarging the cohort of young people qualified to get into higher and further education and exploit their talents.
On the question of openness, the word "transparency" has been used. That is absolutely right. If I can paraphrase it, what we have is a manifesto for an open society. The new Forward Look will be a public document which I know will be welcomed. Again, it would be inconceivable if opportunities were not taken annually to discuss that report as it is published. The contribution made by the Director General for the research councils and his expert group will be incorporated in that public document.
The Council for Science and Technology, which my right honourable friend will chair, will be devoted to generating a top level partnership about the strategic

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direction of science and technology in the country. Accordingly, he will fully expect that any reports which the council commissions or produces will normally be made publicly available. As I have already said, the council is also intended to turn for independent advice to the National Academies Policy Advisory Group and the other expert bodies in the field. Their reports and the Government's responses to them will also be made public.
My understanding in terms of the chain of command and how it will work is that, as the noble Lord knows, there is basically a five-year rolling programme for the councils. They will deliberate and pass the fruits of their work to the Director General who, in turn, will inform my right honourable friend Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster who will then endorse it. It will become the bank of information which will inform government policy.
Lord Beloff: My Lords, as my noble friend the Minister referred to my noble friend Lord Renfrew and his unfortunate absence this afternoon, perhaps I may point out that it is perfectly clear what he would have said had he been here. He would have shared my disappointment and that of other noble Lords who spoke in the debate on the humanities research council that both the decision of the Government and the arguments put forward by my noble friend in her reply ignore that advice. What is the use of our collection of expertise in this House if the Government take no notice of the advice that they receive?
Baroness Blatch: My Lords, I thought that I had replied to that particular point. My right honourable friend took advice from a number of areas. Simply because he did not specifically take the advice that came out of the short debate that we had in the House is not an argument for it not being the right decision. Moreover, not everyone who spoke in that debate was absolutely in agreement with the idea that there should be a separate research council.
Lord Howie of Troon: My Lords, is the Minister aware of the pleasure with which I heard her use the word "engineering"? Indeed, I heard her use it not once but several times during the Statement. That, in itself, is a step forward and an innovation. I have two questions only and, I am happy to say, they will be brief. I do not think that I heard any mention of the engineering council among the many bodies and organisations that were referred to in the Statement.
First, is the Minister aware of the current discussions that are taking place between the engineering council and several of the engineering institutions in an effort to reorganise the council? Do the Government have any view in that respect at present? My second brief question is one that I have raised several times previously in the House. Is there any possibility of the Government funding the engineering council in the same way that they have, for many years, funded the Design Council, which carries out work that is not dissimilar?
Baroness Blatch: My Lords, now is not the time to go into any detail on that particular question. Perhaps
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the noble Lord will read the document and then, if he finds his questions are still unanswered, he can return to me. I can tell him that the Science and Engineering Research Council will be converted into an engineering and physical sciences research council. I am also absolutely assured that there is no aspect of science, technology or engineering left out of our plans; absolutely every aspect of it is subsumed.
Moreover, although I have given the broad subject headings for the different research councils under the new arrangements, there may well be some modification at the margins where one aspect of science may belong with another.
Lord Mackay of Ardbrecknish: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the concentration this afternoon on science and technology will be welcome to many of us who feel that perhaps over the many decades humanities has had more than its fair share of a place in the sun and that it is time that the importance of science, technology and engineering was fully recognised? Did my noble friend say that the role and status of the Chief Scientific Adviser is to be enhanced? Perhaps I may pay tribute to the current holder of that position, my fellow West Highlander Professor Stewart, who I know has been heavily involved in writing the White Paper.
Is my noble friend further aware that a great deal of work will be needed if we are to enhance the status of science, technology and engineering in our schools? That does not just include the curriculum; it also includes making youngsters and their parents aware that there are positive and meaningful careers to be had in science and, in particular, engineering. Will my noble friend ensure that her department underlines the difference between engineering as a generic name and graduate engineers in civil engineering, electrical engineering and chemical engineering who are so vital if we are to translate fundamental scientific research into productive manufacturing capacity?
Baroness Blatch: My Lords, my noble friend raised a number of important points. However, on his final point, there is certainly an awareness programme which will be funded. It is absolutely essential to put status back where it belongs; that is, in properly qualified engineers. We know the casual way in which that terminology is used.
As regards humanities, it must be a question of equal value and of a proper balance between what is important in the humanities and what is important in science and technology. My noble friend also made the important point about the raising of awareness and understanding the importance of science and technology. He also mentioned competence in science, technology and engineering. That is now absolutely central for all our community, especially for our young children starting school, throughout their school life and going on into higher and further education. On that society depends.
Viscount Astor: My Lords, we have now passed the 20-minute time limit allocated for Back-Bench speakers.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, I should like to make a point about the procedure of the House. We have just experienced the fact that many noble Lords have been frustrated because of the lack of recognition of the Standing Order which governs the proceedings following a ministerial Statement. I wonder whether, in looking at ministerial Statements in the future, we could do the same thing as we do with five-hour debates or short debates and give some guidance to the House on the disciplines involved before the ministerial Statement begins.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Earl Ferrers): My Lords, I think that the principle which has been agreed by both this House and, if I remember correctly, the Procedure Committee, is that there should be 20 minutes for questions and answers from the Back Benches. That is a simple fact. When 20 minutes have elapsed, for the convenience of the whole House we have to draw the discussion to a conclusion.

The Police Service
Debate resumed.
5 p.m.
The Earl of Winchilsea and Nottingham: My Lords, I wish to join other noble Lords in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Trevor, on his admirable maiden speech. As I rise to speak in this debate I must declare an interest as I am the representative in your Lordships' House of the Police Superintendents' Association of England and Wales. I must also pray for the indulgence of the House as I am getting over rather a bad cold.
There has been a great deal of media coverage and public debate recently on our beleaguered police service and whither its future. Indeed, we all await the delayed publication of the Sheehy inquiry into the future of the police service with keen anticipation, not least police officers themselves. The contents of this report are the subject of much speculation, uncertainty and concern among police officers, which is having an adverse affect on morale. The fact that the report has been further delayed compounds this effect and lowers morale even further.
Noble Lords cannot have failed to notice the tone of the recent conference in Blackpool of the Police Federation. The mood there was a mixture of anger, despair and disbelief at some of the dottier proposals put forward by the Home Secretary in his Statement to the other place on 23rd March. Among other things he was accused of being an arrogant, rude social snob with no concept of the problems of policing. He also stands accused of having sinister designs on the police due to his plans to introduce new disciplinary procedures which would make it easier to sack officers on the word of criminals without bothering about such expensive inconveniences as the burden of proof of misconduct. In other words, the police would undoubtedly be much more vulnerable to malicious complaints being made against them than they are now.
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It is not just rank and file police officers who are most concerned and worried over Mr. Clarke's proposals. Their concerns are shared and mirrored by the Association of County Councils. Indeed my own county of Somerset has expressed to me in no uncertain terms its grave and serious objections to the Home Secretary's plans. They and the ACC feel that there has been little, if any, prior consideration given to the subject before the publication of the Statement on 23rd March. The proposals contained in it, they say, raise important constitutional issues which should have been widely canvassed before any public Statement was made. They regard his plans with deep suspicion and mistrust and see them as further positive proof of this Government's determination to undermine local democracy by removing as many of its functions as possible in order to reduce its power and influence and increase that of Whitehall. One has to look no further for proof of that than to the 23rd March Statement in which Mr. Clarke clearly states his intentions to take as his right the nominations of 50 per cent. of police authority membership including the nomination of the Chair. That seems to me a decidedly curious way of devolving more responsibilities to local managers. In fact I believe it is irreconcilable with another part of the same Statement where he states that he proposes to strengthen local police authorities, give them greater autonomy, ensure that policing responds to "local needs and concerns", and to consult local people in setting "the local policing agenda". Surely that will be rather difficult to achieve from Whitehall and Queen Anne's Gate?
Although we have seen big increases in police pay since the recommendations contained in the Edmund Davis report—quite right too when one considers the difficult and often dangerous duties we expect them to perform on our behalf—we have also seen considerable obstacles placed in their path, albeit unwittingly. Nevertheless those obstacles often hamper their given and expected roles and duties. Those obstacles could have been avoided with a little more mind-jerking and a little less knee-jerking from Westminster.
I find it a bit rich to say the least for this Government to claim to be the great preserver of law and order, thereby insinuating that other parties are against law and order, when the same Government have presided over the worst set of crime figures in our history, and have been responsible for placing those same obstacles in the path of the police. I accept that it was not done on purpose, or with any malicious intent; nevertheless it was done, despite the Government having available to them the very best information and advice. The sooner the Government recognise this sorry state of affairs, admit to it, and take steps to rectify the mistakes made as a matter of considerable urgency, the better it will be for our struggling and demoralised police service.
I will mention but a few of the obstacles I have referred to. Probably the largest of these is the enormous increase in paperwork that has taken place since the Police and Criminal Evidence Bill became the Act in 1984. I include in the term paperwork the cascade of forms that are required to be filled in for every arrest made, and the transcribing of audio taped

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interviews conducted by police officers at the time of the arrest into written statements. That process consumes vast amounts of valuable and expensive police time. This veritable rain forest of paperwork-demands indicates that it is the modus operandi of the Crown Prosecution Service that has been the largest single factor in removing police officers from the streets of our cities and towns.
For example, I refer to a simple case of shoplifting, pre-Police and Criminal Evidence Act, where the shoplifter was caught red-handed and confessed the crime to the shop and to the police. The person was charged, all details were noted in the officer's note book, the case went to court the next morning, a fine or whatever was imposed, and that was that. The officer who was called to the incident was most likely off the street for 60 minutes or less, plus the time needed for him to make a brief court appearance.
Now under PACE, and with the various demands made by the Crown Prosecution Service, a simple case of shoplifting is anything but simple even when the same conditions of being caught red-handed, followed by a ready confession apply. All must be recorded on audio tape with the arresting officer doing the interview in the presence of a solicitor. Then a transcript of that tape must be made by the same officer and sent to the Crown Prosecution Service. This officer is not a trained audio typist and that task alone can take him up to five or six hours to perform, often on an antiquated, semi-derelict typewriter. I know that is the case as I have seen those typewriters. That is quite simply ludicrous.
Another problem we have to consider is that of a police officer being injured in the course of her or his duties. I agree that this has always been a problem. Indeed it is an accepted hazard of the job. However, while it used to be possible to find either a desk job, or to put an officer who had sustained injuries which left him or her in some way incapacitated and unable to carry out full operational duties onto light duties, now a period of recuperative duties is the order of the day for a period of time considered to be reasonably flexible. If after this period of around six months or so the medical officer's opinion is such that the police officer will never be able to return to full duties, that officer will be asked to leave the service. It goes without saying that the chances of an officer being injured have increased enormously in recent years.
Officers need to carry adequate protection against assaults made on them. The present truncheon is pathetic and totally inadequate. What I find encouraging, and quite remarkable when one takes into account the numbers of assaults made on police officers every year and the often extremely vicious nature of those assaults which tragically frequently result in serious injury to the officers concerned, is that in all my travels around England and Wales where I have listened to what police men and police women have had to tell me, I have not heard one demand for the police to be armed with guns. I am sure there are those who make those demands but they must be in a very considerable minority. In fact, I have frequently heard the reverse: "We don't want guns. They don't
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solve anything. They just encourage more and more guns until you finish up with a deplorable situation such as that which exists in the USA which no one can now do anything about". What I am told though is that they urgently need something other than the present truncheon which in the face of a knife attack is virtually useless. No doubt your Lordships will be interested to know that here at the Palace of Westminster the number of knives that are taken away from ordinary visitors to this place is quite staggering, so many people seem to be carrying them these days.
So what can we do about removing some of these obstructions that we have placed in the way of the police without making them less accountable to the public they try to serve? I believe that there are some relatively simple remedies available to us that would certainly be cost-effective. One of them would be to allow civilian audio typists to do the transcriptions from the audio interview tapes to the written statement. Often such civilian personnel already work at the police station and it is only the insistence of the Crown Prosecution Service that prohibits this from taking place. I understand its reasoning for insisting that the police officer does this work as it says that only he or she would be capable of putting the correct emphasis on words, sentences or phrases. But surely that would be done by the police officer when reading the written statement that the audio typist had transcribed. At least to allow this to happen would make one contribution towards achieving what everyone wants; namely, to see more uniformed police officers out on our streets. They cannot be in two places at once: out on the streets keeping the Queen's peace, giving advice and assistance, communicating with the general public, preventing crime just by being there, arresting criminals and apprehending ne'er-do-wells and at the police station coping with mountains of paper and going mad in the process.
Another thing that we could do is to hand out much stiffer sentences to those who are convicted of assaulting a police officer; often these people get away with it altogether or else are fined piffling amounts, which gives the impression to the assaulted officer that the system favours the criminal rather than the victim. It is not just assaulted police officers who feel this. The general, law-abiding public feel exactly the same way, which is what prompted the comment from the Police Federation in Blackpool which queried this Government's priorities of putting carpets in prisons and cardboard boxes on the streets.
Perhaps I may close by suggesting that an early end is brought to all this uncertainty surrounding the police service. Many of the changes that have taken place since the Brixton riots have been welcomed by the public and the police alike. Many have not and I have mentioned a few this afternoon. What I think is vitally important for the future health of our police service is that we stop tinkering with it and that much more consideration and consultation take place before changes are initiated rather than after, when it is often too late. I also think it is high time that the views of all serving police officers are sought and listened to, as it is they who are out there dealing with the day-to-day

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grimy and hazardous business of keeping law and order as best they can given the operational strait-jackets which we have issued them with.
The public are anxious for the police to succeed but they will be able to do so only if they are supported by the government of the day rather than undermined by them. Public support for the police, although still high, is slipping. And who can blame the public when the system forces the police to reveal the names of those who are to give evidence for the prosecution, thereby subjecting them to intimidation, threats of physical violence and worse, while the criminals brought to trial often get away with it completely, leaving their victims with nothing except the bitter memory of the police telling them that there is nothing they can do? Victims of crime do not need that; they need support, like the police. I think that it is more than time we gave that support.
5.15 p.m.
Lord Monkswell: My Lords, I wish to identify a couple of problems related to the control and management of the police, to give three examples which emanate from those problems and to identify the emergence of some good practice. I wish finally to comment on the Government's proposals and to suggest an alternative structure.
Before I begin my contribution today it is worth pointing out that I have arrived at my views as a result of listening to professionals in the field and my experience as a member of the local community watching what is happening. When I say "listening to professionals" I do not mean only those professionals who are currently in the job and who, therefore, may have an axe to grind in terms of their own advancement. I am sure that we need to listen to professionals who have retired from their positions and in doing so to listen and say, "Yes, that is a considered professional view, but from what point of view does it come? Is it held to substantiate their previous existence or professional expertise or does it come from their knowledge and experience?"
One of the most significant pieces of advice was given to me by a professional during the mid-1970s. I had a conversation with a retired deputy chief constable of the Salford police force. It was shortly after the amalgamation of the Greater Manchester police force, the Salford police force and a number of smaller forces into the Greater Manchester Police. I asked him why we were experiencing the rising crime rate and difficulties with policing. His explanation was two-fold. He said first that we had given all the young policemen panda cars to run around in and that therefore they lost contact with the community. That was perhaps the kind of comment an old policeman would make. However, his second explanation was significant; that we had created large police forces in which the chief constable no longer had any knowledge of the personal capabilities, strengths and weaknesses of individual policemen.
The first problem which we need to address, therefore, is the size of our police forces. Once a force is more than 1,000 strong, the chief constable effectively loses track of the individual strengths and
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weaknesses of members of his force. Another point is that with an increase in size comes an increase in the geographical area. There then arises the problem of police officers who live in one particular area being called upon to police a totally different area. They have no common bond with the local community.
The second problematical aspect is the lack of accountability of the police force. My noble friend Lord Merlyn-Rees earlier identified the problems that he, as Home Secretary, had with the Chief Constable of Lancashire. Perhaps I may explain that I come from Manchester, where we had "God's own cop". Noble Lords will appreciate that our experience was not amenable to the police committee, the chair of the police authority, successive Home Secretaries, or the combined might of the Home Office. Noble Lords will appreciate the reason why I and many citizens in Manchester and across Britain have grave anxieties about the accountability of police forces to the local community.
I cite three examples. They may explain the problems which emanated from the large size and lack of accountability of the police force. The first example arises from the situation that obtained in the mid-1970s in Manchester. James Anderton was fairly recently appointed chief constable. One of his initial activities was to require his officers to seize what was described as pornographic material. So far as I am aware no prosecutions were ever brought but an immense amount of goods was seized from newsagents' shops across the conurbation. That was at the personal whim of the chief constable. So far as I and many other citizens of Manchester could see, it was totally outwith the rule of law. However, because he was waging a campaign against pornography, very little public criticism could be attached to it, and in some quarters it was supported.
He then ordered his officers to raid the working men's clubs. Those are clubs in which local community and working men can drink after hours. Such clubs have membership requirements. The custom and practice was that the membership requirements were not strongly enforced. James Anderton determined, again personally, that such a practice should not be tolerated. His officers raided the working men's clubs and threatened closure of those in which non-members were allowed to drink. Because of the distribution of the Labour Party working men's clubs in Manchester, that was seen to be an attack on working men and on the clubs of the Labour Party. Again, some circles in Manchester almost applauded—until the police began then to raid the Conservative clubs. Those are similar organisations with late night drinking for local Conservatives and other members of the community. Conservative politicians then realised that this was a person who would not just have a go at working men and pornography but who was intent on doing his own thing. They realised that he was out of control.
Viscount Tonypandy: My Lords, perhaps the noble Lord will give way. Is he aware that he is making a personal attack upon an individual outside this House

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who has no chance to answer him? If he were in another place, he would be made to justify every remark he passes on the honour of a public servant.
Lord Monkswell: My Lords, I appreciate the point that the noble Viscount raises. One of the difficulties in dealing with the subject is not to bring personalities into it. I take the advice of the noble Viscount. In my subsequent remarks I shall endeavour not to bring individual personalities into it. The noble Viscount is right.
In the early 1980s, this country was subjected to a fairly vicious recession. Vast swathes of manufacturing industry in particular were laid waste. Mass unemployment resulted, in particular in northern areas and in London. We had riots in Brixton, Toxteth and Moss Side. Living only a mile and a half from Moss Side, my experience was that those were not spontaneous riots. Subsequent information is that what started as a smash and grab incident—a shop window being broken and someone reaching in to grab something—developed into generalised criminality because of the lack of police response. It was described as a riot. Subsequent police actions effectively made the situation worse.
Subsequent information is that it was a deliberate act by the police to signify to the local community—local councillors and MPs—that the police were necessary, important and significant public servants. They deliberately did not initially attend the incident for some hours on the basis that the problem would escalate and then the civil authorities would demand that the police take action. The police would take action and the position of the police would be justified.
That attitude equates poorly with the argument on the accountability of the police. Perhaps I may tell noble Lords of my own experience. Standing in my front garden, I saw vanloads of police driving past on their way to Moss Side with officers shouting through the windows and leaning out of the back of the van, saying, "We are off to give them another good hiding". Those are not experiences that I wish ever to see repeated.
My third example refers to the miners' disputes. In 1984–85 many policemen across the country thought that it was Christmas, birthday time and Easter all rolled into one. They were making money hand over fist and seemingly indulging in the exercise that they like best, which is running around in vans and beating people up. Allusion has already been made in the debate to the miners' dispute and the damage that it caused in certain communities.
Baroness Seear: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord. On reflection would he like to withdraw the statement that what the police most like to do is to run around and beat people up?
Lord Monkswell: My Lords, I am sorry if I was misunderstood. I hoped to explain that that was the impression given to a number of people: that that is what the police like doing. I do not believe that that is
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true of the vast majority of policemen in this country. Unfortunately it appeared that way to a number of people at that time.
Those three experiences demonstrate to my mind the problems due to the size and the lack of accountability of the police force. It is interesting that over the past few years, the attitudes and views of police forces, police officers and chief constables seem to have shifted. I give an example of what I described earlier as positive good practice. Wythenshawe, in the south of Manchester, has been described as the largest council estate in Europe. It was an overspill, built on the outskirts of Manchester just before and just after the war for slum clearance purposes. It is a homogeneous community; people think of themselves as Wythenshawe people. It has all the characteristics of the inner city, with poverty, unemployment and, until a couple of years ago, a rising crime rate such as has been experienced right across the country.
A few years ago, the police force local boundaries were reorganised within the Greater Manchester police and a particular division came to cover the whole of the local conurbation of Wythenshawe. At the same time, a new chief superintendent took up post with fairly radical ideas on relationships with the community and the public. He engaged in a dialogue with his senior officers, with local councillors and members of the local community. He developed an atmosphere of trust and respect, to a certain extent.
The result has been a reduction in the crime rate in Wythenshawe. It was not terribly significant, but set against the increase in the crime rate nationally, bearing in mind the increase due to the latest recession, with unemployment and poverty, we can see that it has been a considerable achievement. To my mind, that is a positive and significant result of a specific action by the police who related to the local community and became accountable, and were seen to be accountable to the community.
I am sorry I have spoken for so long but we now come to the Government's proposals for the police which seem to take them in completely the opposite direction from the one which our experience and advice, received over the past few years, would suggest. The idea of creating larger and larger police forces, with the Government appointing chairs of police authorities and significant numbers of members of the authorities, runs totally counter to the concept of local accountability which can be so beneficial not only for the crime rate but for the stature and status of the police, and also for aspects of the local community.
I argue that we should go in the other direction. We should not seek to reduce the size of the police force, because that would be misinterpreted. We should increase the number of police forces and improve their accountability to the local community.
5.34 p.m.
Lord Rippon of Hexham: My Lords, I join other noble Lords in congratulating and thanking the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, upon his initiative in raising in his Motion and his speech important constitutional issues. I regret that from time to time we

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have appeared to drift away from the main theme. I have a high regard for my right honourable friend the Home Secretary and my noble friend the Minister of State. I know that, for their part, they have a high regard for the police and the service they render to the community.
However, I feel that, while their proposals for reform of the structure of the police authorities are no doubt prompted by the best of intentions, they have unfortunately met with a degree of criticism which might largely have been avoided. Of course, no change, not even change for the better, is accomplished without difficulty. But not all change is for the better and it is certainly unwise to attempt it when one has nothing more than—with due respect to those who occupy such high positions—the blessings of the mandarins in Whitehall. The introduction to the House this afternoon of the noble Earl, Lord Woolton, reminded me of what happened after the noble Lord, Lord Jay, as President of the Board of Trade, made his famous observation that, "The gentleman in Whitehall really does know best". That prompted the first Earl of Woolton to coin the slogan, "Town hall, not Whitehall". Like this debate, I believe that the Conservative Party and the Tory Party have drifted away from that original slogan.
The purpose of the Motion is to draw attention in particular:
"to the proposal that the Government should appoint the chairman and some other members of the police authorities".
Like the noble Lord, Lord Harris, I particularly regret the proposed reduction in the number of locally elected members of the new police authorities and the appointment of the chairman by the Home Secretary. I regard that as yet another regrettable erosion of local accountability.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris, referred to continental practices and reminded me of how Professor Hayek, in his famous book The Road to Serfdom, said:
"You cannot have real, effective democracy without real, effective, local self government".
He spoke from his experience of what happened in Germany before the war, when the duly elected mayor of Cologne, Mr. Adenauer, was not thought to represent the people as. well as someone like Mr. Krupp, for example, who had, no doubt, local managerial expertise at his disposal.
I share the view of those who believe that locally elected democratic accountability is fundamental for effective policing by consent. I should like to quote from a letter which Mr. S. J. Day, Chairman of the Police Committee of the Association of County Councils, sent to the Home Secretary on 8th January. It seems to me to summarise the position more effectively than I can:
"In any reorganisation of the constitution of police authorities there should be no dilution of the scale of responsibilities of democratically elected local authority members, who should predominate in at least the present proportions.
Elected members do of course come from all sections of the community, including the business sector, although in their capacity as members of local or police authorities they represent the community as a whole, rather than their particular sectoral interest. Voluntary bodies and local business communities have a legitimate interest in the work of
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a police authority, and can make a valuable contribution. However, if representatives of those sectors were to be members of police authorities, as such, as distinct from local consultative committees, measures will be necessary to guard against the exercise of self-interest in their decisions. Subject to this qualification, the [Association of County Councils] accepts that such representatives could be included among the non-elected members, together with representatives of the Magistracy. Non-elected members should however be co-opted or appointed locally as is presently the case with magistrate members and not centrally appointed, in order to preserve the local aspect of policing".
That is to say nothing of the danger of appointments on a political basis by whatever party may happen to be in power.
There are just one or two other matters which cause me concern. One is taking any action which might anticipate or predict the Local Government Commission's recommendations. For example, any eventual review of force size should not be restricted to possible amalgamations. It should take a broad view of other possibilities such as smaller forces which might better reflect local communities.
The noble Earl, Lord Winchilsea and Nottingham, made the point that he came from Somerset. I too have been approached by the Somerset authorities, since I now live in that part of the world. Also, because I represented Hexham for some time in the other place, the Northumberland police authority has made much the same points to me. It says that an all-party attitude has been adopted. There is very grave concern about the increase in crime, particularly in rural areas, and the often inequitable sharing of resources between urban and rural areas. That is arguably the case in relation to the Avon and Somerset police authority. Perhaps that authority should be split rather than amalgamated with another body.
I do not want to dwell on the changes to be made in the finances of police authorities, to which the noble Lord, Lord Allen of Abbeydale, referred. I have made my views on standard spending assessments and rate capping known on many other occasions. Certainly the finances of police authorities need reform. I took particular note of what the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees, said in his very powerful speech about the observations of the Audit Commission. I hope that the Home Secretary will take account of the more recent report of the Audit Commission, appropriately entitled Passing the bucks, which finds considerable faults in the standard spending assessment system, which both confuses the public and leads to cosmetic and not very satisfactory accountability.
I noted with considerable satisfaction that the Home Secretary, at the conclusion of his Statement in the other place on 23rd March, indicated that government policy had not been finalised. I am sure that the Minister of State will confirm that again this evening. He went out of his way to ask interested parties to make their views known. I believe that in this case, as in many others, real and effective consultation is vital to the success and the acceptability of any reforms of this nature. I hope that this debate and the other representations that have been made by, among others, the Association of County Councils and individual police authorities will

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help the Home Secretary to find a satisfactory conclusion to his deliberations of a kind that will command general support.
5.42 p.m.
Viscount Tonypandy: My Lords, it is a very great pleasure and privilege to follow the noble Lord, Lord Rippon, with whom I served in another place. For the first time today I heard the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees, speaking in this House. I listened with respect to him in another place, as I have today. I join with noble Lords in expressing deep gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for the masterly way in which he introduced this subject today. He had obviously done careful research. All of us have been approached by many bodies about this subject.
I should like to pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Trevor, who is from North Wales and who made his maiden speech today. It was a speech well worth hearing. Unless I am very much mistaken, one of his distant forebears was once Speaker of the House of Commons. If that is true, it means—if I may digress for just one second—that the House of Commons has had two honourable Members with Welsh constituencies elected to the Chair of the House. The first was the forebear of the noble Lord, Lord Trevor. After the Commons had been meeting for 300 years it decided that it would choose a Welshman. After him it took another 300 years before I had my turn. I listened with pride to the way in which the noble Lord spoke in the House today. I hope that we shall hear him very often.
The first job I had was that of junior Minister at the Home Office. That was 19 years ago. It was a very different world then. When the allocation of duties was shared out among the junior Ministers, I found that I had the general department, immigration and police. That gave me an insight into the problems of our police service.
Secondly, I should inform the House that so far in this debate I am the only former policeman to speak. I had the privilege throughout the war years of serving in the police force. I reached the height of sergeant. We voted on such matters in the Rhondda Valley. That was why I was there. To have worn the uniform and looked at one's community through the eyes of a policeman is very different from sitting here and pronouncing in very serious tones on what policemen are like and what they should do. I say to the noble Lord who was critical of van-loads of police going to where there was trouble, that of course there are policemen who are not of the same high standard as is generally accepted. Not all Members of this House are the same. Our virtues are not the same—and, thank goodness, neither are our vices. The police force is not a matter for party consideration. It would be a dreadful day for Britain if the police force became a party football, or if either side tried to make it appear to be on its side.
It takes a clever man to upset the police force and local government at the same time. But, like the noble Lord, Lord Rippon, I do not underestimate the Home Secretary. He has a rare gift—one which is very
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important in politics—for arousing emotion, as well as for challenging the intellect. There is no doubt at all that throughout England and Wales the police are now anxious. That is bad for the country. It cannot be good. As for consultation, as the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees, reminded us, the White Paper is due in June. We shall be listened to a great deal, I am sure. I wish that the Government would resort once again to Green Papers, whereby they could garner opinions before they finally formed their own. After all, both this House and the other place have accumulated wisdom. We have a contribution to make. Every government department, in my experience, will take more powers to itself if these Houses do not themselves assert an opinion.
I do not want to be at all unfair to the Home Secretary. I might have sounded a bit rough on him. I know that he is well capable of looking after himself, but I do not wish to do him an injustice. But I want him to listen and to move cautiously. In the judgment of the county councils, under the guise of managerial reforms major changes to the British Constitution are proposed. If we weaken local responsibility even further, we shall change the very character of British public and social life. Local government is much older than parliamentary government. There was a Lord Mayor of London 200 years before there was a Speaker of the House of Commons. Today, local government is under fire. The noble Lord, Lord Rippon, naturally loyal and kind to his own side, indicated a certain unease about the attitude toward those who carry local responsibility.
The proposed new police authorities will be highly unresponsible bodies. As we have been reminded, they will draw 90 per cent. of their finance from Her Majesty's Government. They can precept the other 10 per cent. and make councillors add it on to the rates that have to be paid.
To whom are they responsible for even a penny? They are responsible only to the Government. All that the local authorities will be able to do is accept their demand—the Minister can correct me if I am wrong. They will have to accept the precept which the new police authority will be able to put upon them. That being so, there are bound to be fierce rows and arguments.
When I prepared for this debate, I reminded myself that every bobby has a number on his shoulder. I recall an occasion when a policeman had been helping me on the M.4 motorway. As I was writing down his number, he looked at me and asked, "What are you doing?" I said, "This is a free country. I am writing down your number. You know that your number is for us and not for you. It is for the public to be able to identify the bobby with whom they have been dealing. As a matter of fact I always send a letter of thanks to the chief constable if anybody has helped me. So you will not lose out on it." I hope that he did not.
I know that our democracy depends on the quality and the loyalty of the police force. Without it the bully boys would take over. Democracy is possible only because we have a police force which has the feel of the community. I agree with the noble Lord that it is

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dangerous beyond measure to play with that. The proposals to which the Home Secretary referred on 23rd March are not little proposals. These are major proposals. I wish that he would delay until further consultation has taken place.
5.56 p.m.
Baroness Hilton of Eggardon: My Lords, following
that impassioned plea on behalf of the police, I shall obviously have difficulty in rising to such heights of eloquence. I made a speech about this topic only a month ago, on 21st April. Inevitably I shall repeat many of the points that I made then about the democratic deficit and the Home Secretary's plans.
The Home Secretary has declared that the objectives of his proposed reforms are to encourage the devolution of responsibility to local police units and to make force headquarters co-ordinators and supporters, not commanders, of local policing. That devolution of power and decision-making to the local level is a highly desirable objective since it is only at the local level, as has been said by numerous noble Lords, that policing can be responsive to the needs of the local community.
During the past 10 years, since some of the events described by my noble friend Lord Monkswell, considerable progress has been made by the police service in the direction toward greater community policing and greater local accountability. Chief inspectors and superintendents in charge of police divisions have been encouraged to be more autonomous and more flexible in their response to local needs and problems. Most problems occur at the level of community needs on housing estates, in shopping centres or in other urban equivalents of villages. Above that level patterns of crime, traffic or drunken hooliganism become averaged into apparent homogeneity.
Mr. Clarke, however, sets out to achieve his objective of greater devolution through the contradictory mechanism of seizing all power over the police service and transferring it to the centre of government, as the noble Earl, Lord Winchilsea and Nottingham, said. To place the police service effectively under the control of the Home Office seems to be a totally paradoxical and contradictory way of achieving his objective. It removes all local accountability and democratic communication. I fear that that will be a recipe for either anarchy at local level in the police service—what is known as front line deviation—or dictatorial control from the centre. One cannot determine what is happening locally if' one is as far removed as the Home Office from the local beat or the local community. I therefore fear that Mr. Clarke will set out to achieve dictatorial control but will inevitably produce anarchy within the police service.
To underpin his plans the Home Secretary intends to set national objectives. Those will inevitably be meaningless at local level if they are as bland as, for example, injunctions to reduce crime or to improve the flow of traffic. Objectives set at that sort of level are quite pointless. Only local objectives set within the context of local policing can be effective.
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For the past few years Her Majesty's inspectors of constabulary have been trying to develop common performance indicators for the police service. What is new about the Home Secretary's plans is that he now proposes to convert those indicators into league tables, as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Harris. One would have thought that the problems that occurred in the education system through attempting to introduce league tables for schools might have given him pause for thought; or is it intended that the police force will have to compete for customers, like schools and the gas boards?
In the past there have been problems with the tripartite system of accountability set up by the 1964 Police Act. But at least that system was arrived at after a Royal Commission and has stood the test of time—nearly 30 years. Some police authority chairmen in the past clashed with chief constables on openness and accountability and the limits of operational independence. Some chief constables perhaps resented having to provide information to police authorities. But during the past few years those problems have largely been eliminated. Increasingly effective and fruitful partnerships have developed between police forces and their police authorities, leading to initiatives in the community which have reduced crime and improved the quality of life for local people.
Some police authorities are still too loosely constituted. They meet infrequently and rarely ask for special reports from their chief constables. Some chief constables still have too high an opinion of their own unaided judgment. However, those are problems that could be overcome while retaining the essential principle of local democratic accountability. For example, the Home Secretary could legislate to limit the size of the police authority or allow it to co-opt non-executive members with particular skills of accountancy or personnel management. He could lay down rules about sub-committees and the regularity of meetings. A study made in 1980, for example, found that more than half the police authorities met only four times a year.
I cannot but view the Home Secretary's objectives as being other than part of the present Government's long-standing and vindictive vendetta against local authorities—all the more so, if the report in yesterday's Evening Standard is to be believed, if the Home Secretary has already abandoned his ideas to have local authority representatives on the proposed police authority for London.
For many years I have been an advocate for having some democratic accountability for the Metropolitan Police. When we still had the Greater London Council it was possible to imagine some such body with constituent members from the GLC and the London boroughs. It is much harder, without a strategic authority for the whole of this great city, to imagine a police authority for London. Nevertheless, what the Home Secretary was originally planning seemed to have some small element of local democracy in it. If he is now to have an entirely appointed advisory board of the Metropolitan Police, that is extremely sad. His original plans were welcomed by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and I imagine that he will be as

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disappointed as I am that all that the Home Secretary will do is to reinforce his own hand and not to increase democracy for the people of London.
I believe also that the Home Secretary's attack on the police service and on police authorities is largely intended as a smokescreen to divert the attention of the public from the real underlying cause of crime, which is the encouragement of greed and selfish self-centredness that have become the national ethos over the past 14 years.
In outlining his plans to police representatives, I was amused to notice the Home Secretary's tactics. When addressing chief constables he stresses the measures he will take to eliminate lazy and incompetent constables, implying that crime levels are so high because they have failed to catch the criminals. When addressing constables and sergeants at the Police Federation conference last week, however, he suggested that the problem was the dead weight of ineffective and democratic management that was inhibiting their crime-fighting abilities. When addressing the nation at large he suggests that the whole police service needs reorganising.
When I spoke last month of the Home Secretary's plans, my chief concern was the loss of democratic accountability of the police authority through his appointment of five out of the 16 members and of his choice of the paid chairman. Since then I have realised the extent to which his plans would also undermine the position and operational independence of chief constables, thus transferring even more power to the Home Office.
Chief constables will be undermined in the following ways. First, it is proposed that they will be appointed on short-term contracts which will be renewable on the say-so of the police authorities—not exactly a recipe for independence of thought or action, especially when the chairman is a paid Home Office appointee. Secondly, there will undoubtedly be regular meetings between the Home Secretary and the 22 or so paid police authority chairmen if the proposed amalgamations go ahead. That will exclude chief constables from real influence and strategic decision-making. Thirdly, if for some reason the chief constable and the police authority chairman disagree, the Home Office will no longer be able to act as a neutral referee and will undoubtedly support the Home Secretary's appointee.
At present the relationship between the chief constable and his police authority chairman is crucial. If it breaks down, the chief constable can appeal to the Home Office or to Her Majesty's inspectorate for support. That would no longer apply, and chief constables, who may have more regard than politicians or businessmen for the rule of law and the practicalities of policing, will be in a greatly weakened position.
The proposed police authorities may also work to the disadvantage of the public in other ways. Combined police authorities—presumably there will be more of those if amalgamations take place—already experience stresses and strains due to competing demands. Curiously enough, it is Avon and
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Somerset with which I have most contact, as has already been mentioned by previous speakers. I know that Somerset County would like to have its own police force again because its officers are continually being removed to deal with crises in the policing of Bristol, such as riots, murders or football matches. Force headquarters and their police authorities tend to be based in large conurbations and therefore see the problems of urban policing as more important than those of policing the countryside. That imbalance would be exacerbated in larger forces.
Rarely have I seen such unified opposition to a Home Secretary's plans for the police service—not just the municipal authorities but also the county councils. The Police Federation, the Police Superintendents Association and the Association of Chief Constables are united in their condemnation of this seizure of power by the centre. Perhaps I may quote from the paper issued by the chief constables after their spring conference this year. It states:
"it is vital that … great care is taken to retain those important elements which underpin the constitutional position of policing in this country—which enables the police to be of the people, not of the state … the relationship between policing and the community, made legitimate through the authority's accountability to the local electorate, must not be lost".
It is that relationship which is being jeopardised by the Home Secretary's plans. I ask the noble Earl when he replies to say how he expects that degree of local democracy and accountability to be retained.
6.5 p.m.
Lord Finsberg: My Lords, I shall resist with difficulty the temptation to answer some of the highly politicised remarks of the noble Baroness. The speech of the noble Viscount, Lord Tonypandy, made me extremely sad. I am a quarter Welsh and it seems that perhaps I should not have taken the voluntary decision to leave the other place; I might have stood a chance of being the third part-Welsh Speaker in that House. But he put an idea into my mind and I am grateful to him.
Like many other noble Lords, I have had close contact with the police since I first became a member of Hampstead Borough Council in 1949. Many rising stars passed through Hampstead; for example, Richard Wells, who is now the Chief Constable of South Yorkshire. Another was Alison Halford, whose career was sadly cut short by some small-minded vicious people in the Merseyside area. The police service sadly misses someone of her calibre.
I too received the briefing paper from the AMA. I do not see the proposals of Mr. Kenneth Clarke with quite the degree of horror that it does. For example, it says that:
"The Home Secretary will appoint and pay a member to chair each force, who will as a consequence be accountable to him rather than to the authority".
I was deputy chairman of the old AMC. Any chairman of an authority will act under statute, not under the direction of a specific Minister. I believe that that is a degree of unnecessary scaremongering and does not do credit to the AMA.
That is one reason why I do not object to many of the proposals in Mr. Kenneth Clarke's suggestions to reduce the number of local authority representatives.

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However, I positively welcome his apparent change of plans regarding who will control the Metropolitan Police. Those of us who have spent a lifetime in local government in London recognise that the prospect of some form of elected body to run the Metropolitan Police would be anathema. I held that view long before the rise of the Lambeth phenomenon. I hope therefore that my noble friend Lord Ferrers will be able to say that the rumour in the Evening Standard is correct. It will be welcomed by the vast majority of Londoners. Those who believe that Londoners sadly miss an elected body ought to know that in the marginal constituency that I represented over the years I received only seven letters from people objecting to the disappearance of the GLC.
I want to concentrate for a moment on one specific aspect, the City of London. I do not believe that it would be right for me not to mention to my noble friend that I hope that, for the sake of tidiness, no one is going to suggest abolishing or amalgamating the City of London Police. That would be a grave mistake. I remind your Lordships that the Royal Commission in 1962 said this:
"The City of London has an importance and position out of all relation to its size. In the field of policing, its problems arc unique and specialised. It has to contend with a daily influx of three-quarters of a million people; it has to protect some of the most valuable property in the world; and it has been forced to develop in a very high degree means of combating crime in technical fields, such as company fraud".
I believe that one needs just to look for a moment to see how far that should go. Besides reasons of tradition, there are many practical reasons why the City of London Police should not be touched. First, there is the question of uniqueness. It has to carry out many difficult tasks. It has special protection responsibilities, a point mentioned earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees. Events of immense international prestige attract members of royalty, overseas leaders and many other people. All of these events have security implications which require rigorous pre-planning.
Furthermore, because of the high degree of tension over many trials-2,000 of them in 1992—the Old Bailey requires special police protection, and on the occasion of trials involving terrorism, additional policing is required. The force has to combat terrorism. Anyone who watched the City police after the Bishopsgate bomb would have nothing but the highest admiration for what they did. Perhaps I may say, incidentally, that I hope that the events that followed the Bishopsgate bomb will kill any idea of not leaving Bart's with a 24-hour accident and emergency service.
There is also the problem of fraud, which centres, obviously, on the City. Here again the City police have responded with immense sophistication to combating fraud. Whether one looks at the success rate they have had in actual numbers or whether one looks at what they have achieved, I am sure that your Lordships will be interested to know that money lost or at risk from fraud in the City in 1992 amounted to some £514 million, of which, thanks to the efforts of the City police, £493 million was actually recovered.
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Is the force effective? The Inspector of Constabulary in 1991 referred to a very busy force, with far wider operational commitments than the casual observer would actually anticipate. I believe that the case for retaining the City of London police as a separate force is made out over and over again, and I hope that my noble friend the Minister will go a little further than the Home Secretary has gone. The Home Secretary has not actually said that he completely rejects any idea of amalgamating the City police. Precedents exist for special legislation covering the City of London. I believe that it should be possible for my noble friend to give some comfort to me on this issue.
Other occasions will arise when one can talk about the interaction of local government and the police force in various parts of the country. There have been examples of very good co-operation; there have been examples of very bad co-operation. I need only mention Derbyshire to point to your Lordships that it is not always a good thing to have a majority of local authority representatives on a police authority. In the City one has the ideal combination that the Home Secretary is asking for. I believe it is important to have that kind of mix available when one is considering a new police authority.
Of course, it is always better to wait to see a White Paper. I agree with those who have said that perhaps a Green Paper would have been even more helpful. The trouble nowadays is that Green Papers take a long time to prepare. They require an even longer time for consultation. A White Paper, therefore, has some advantages if one is looking for a sensible way of changing the police structure. Changing the police structure does not, in my judgment, involve tampering with the Constitution. Those who say so have not, I believe, examined Dicey or any other expert on the British unwritten Constitution. No one has suggested the creation of a national police force.
Of course it would be ideal if the various police authorities were able to concentrate on some of the most important issues. For that reason meetings between the Home Secretary and the new chairmen of police authorities must be invaluable. As a former health Minister, I found meetings with health authority chairmen extremely valuable, but it was not laying down for them a national policy that they had to follow. It was pointing out the strategy that was acceptable in the field of the resources being allocated to that service. There is no reason why the Home Secretary should not have meetings similar to those he has now with chief constables, so that one gets the interplay of the professional and, as it were, the political, with a small "p", chairmen of authorities. I have no doubt at all that those chairmen will be selected on the basis of their merit
Noble Lords: Oh!
Lord Finsberg Lord Finsberg:—and of a wide cross-section of political opinion.
Perhaps I may say to those on the other side of the House that when I became the junior environment Minister, one of my tasks was to look at appointments to various bodies. I took one chunk and found that in

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that chunk there were three times as many known Labour supporters as Conservative supporters. I do not remember any abject apologies from the party opposite on that point. I have enough faith in this Government, and in the next Conservative Government which I hope will follow them, that they will select people on their abilities to be good chairmen of police authorities.
One message must go out from this House. It is that we are all united in believing that the police in this country, an unarmed force, do a first-class job. They deserve our full support and I believe that the public would want us to give that message of support.
6.16 p.m.
The Earl of Carnarvon: My Lords, one advantage of being low down in the batting order is that one can have one hit and can be brief. That I shall attempt to do. I think that the hit might be against the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, because I disagreed with virtually everything he said.
I must congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, on bringing this debate to the House, and it was wonderful to hear the noble Viscount, Lord Tonypandy, and the noble Lords, Lord Merlyn-Rees and Lord Rippon, speak from three sides, united in their views.
I was vice-chairman of the police committee of the County Council Association and at one time I was on the Police Council. My main claim to fame was getting the boot allowance incorporated into the wages structure. In Hampshire the police authority has 24 elected members; 20 from Hampshire and four from the Isle of Wight; and there are four magistrates; eight from Hampshire and two from the Isle of Wight. The chairman is always a member of Hampshire County Council; the deputy chairman is from the Isle of Wight; and the vice-chairman is from Hampshire. Not only the police authority itself but also the Association of Chief Police Officers remain committed to being accountable locally and to being an integral part of the local government system.
It is perfectly reasonable to accept the concept of co-opting a small number of members but this should be done by the authority itself. They should not be nominated by the Home Secretary. Local accountability, however, can be assured only if elected members continue to form the majority of the authority's membership. I believe that it is very important—underline "very important"—that the chairman be appointed from among the elected members and not by the Home Secretary. I hope very much that the Minister, when he winds up the debate, will give us some indication as to whether he sympathises with the view expressed pretty well unanimously all round the House today.
6.20 p.m.
Lord Cocks of Hartcliffe: My Lords, I too would like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for introducing this debate. There was only one slightly discordant note which jarred on me because he made reference to the Government giving
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in to pressure from a few MPs in the other place. I must say that as a former Whip I do find that rather deplorable. I draw your Lordships' attention to the latest edition of the House of Commons Weekly Information Bulletin which, being the 500th edition, takes a little trip down memory lane. On page 5 it gives the state of the parties in the House of Commons on 2nd November 1978. Out of a total of 635 Members there were only 308 Labour MPs. But we still formed the Government and we still kept going. I certainly did not allow my colleagues to give in to the pressure of a few Members of Parliament. So I hope that that will stiffen up the Government's arm.
Like so many others who have spoken, I too have been approached by the Avon and Somerset police. I am very glad to lend my support to them, particularly as I live in the area and I need to keep in good standing with them. But they say that they support the general remarks made by the Association of County Councils. I shall not weary your Lordships by going over a number of points which have already been made more than adequately. But, clearly, the question of more local control is going to enhance confidence. Although I am not well versed in financial matters, I understand that local financial control is also to be welcomed because it is possible to have the money disposed to the best advantage.
One thing which I am not so sure about is the question of league tables of performance because it seems to me to be a two-edged sword. If it is seen in one particular authority that there is a fairly low clear-up rate of crime, then surely there will be a migration of criminals to that area because they will know that they will stand a much better chance of getting away with it. It is almost like the pre-war days when I was told as a boy that tramps and other mendicants going around well-heeled areas used to put signs on gateposts indicating information for others of their kind either that there was a vicious dog on the premises or that the people were a soft touch and always good for a cup of tea and a wad. As my noble friend Lady Hilton said, it is a very great difficulty to equate one area with another because inner city problems cannot be put on a par with those in rural areas.
I would like to reinforce the plea for the retention of a number of locally elected councillors on these authorities because I believe that it is very important that this link is maintained. I do not know whether it is generally known, but from conversations with Members on my own side and with others on the Government side of the House, I understand there is much more difficulty now in getting people to go onto panels of potential candidates for local government service. I shall not go into the possible reasons for that, but I believe that to be a fact. Anything which tends to devalue the contribution of the locally-elected councillors is to be resisted very strongly.
Other noble Lords have dealt with the difficulties of more central control and the possible threat to the service. I wish to dwell for a moment on the question of the police as a whole. If the police are not seen to be involved with the local community the effects can be disastrous. I am told that in the United States—in

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Los Angeles, for example—the police are not involved so much with local affairs and therefore the opinion of the police is very much more moulded by the sort of incidents that we see on television and the accusations which are made against them.
The burden on the police is very much increased by such incidents. In a sense they have been used as a tool by the extreme Left and the extreme Right in recent years because we know that in industrial disputes, where there has been perfectly legitimate picketing, members of extremist groups such as the Workers' Revolutionary Party and various Trotskyite splinter groups have gone along deliberately to try to cause trouble and involve the police in unpleasant incidents. Similarly, I showed a map to the then Minister of Sport in the other place some time ago showing that there was a direct correlation between the football ground in London where there had been serious trouble and the votes obtained by National Front and British National Party candidates in the adjoining constituencies. So we have to realise that the police have a very difficult job.
When we talk about the police we are not actually talking about an amorphous mass, or just an anonymous body which can be pushed and prodded into whatever shape we fancy. We are actually talking about some 180,000 men and women who have consciously and deliberately taken the decision to join the force and to render service to the community. We have to ask ourselves whether we are going to go on getting people who are prepared to give that kind of service to the community if the current tendencies in society become worse.
I am told that regularly on television in the United States in the commercial breaks advertisements already appear, from law firms, that are particularly directed against the medical community. Those advertisements say—and I have been given this as a quotation:
"If you or a loved one think that you may have been the victims of medical negligence or wrongdoing, give us a call".
There is then mention of a particular firm.
"We will fight for you until you have been awarded everything that you deserve in a court of law".
This tide of litigation against professional people and those who are making a conscientious decision on the basis of the best available knowledge is a very serious threat to the structure of our community services. I believe that the police are no exception to that danger.
Already there is difficulty in recruiting people to go into the specialism of gynaecology. There are other branches of medicine where increasing litigation is occurring. I am told that in the United States, and to some extent in Canada, some professional consultants now have to pay out something like one-third of their income in order to get insurance to cover possible medical claims. That cannot be a healthy state of affairs. Nobody wishes to deny the right of redress to someone who has suffered a wrong, but that can be carried too far and become a positive deterrent to people entering a service such as the police. The medical profession, the social services, and all other services where there is a sense of vocation and purpose, are in jeopardy because of this increasing litigation.
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Personal litigation is on a micro-scale—I have to be careful with these technical terms. On a macro-scale I believe that we are beginning to get more use of people forcing public inquiries and using all kinds of objections to hold up economic developments in various parts of the country. The irony is that the people who organise these things are usually prosperous upper or middle class people who have already reached a good standard of living by economic developments elsewhere in the country.
We must always bear in mind that the police are individuals: they have taken the decision to join the force. We must make sure that they are not the victims of persecution by various elements in society, but if there are to be changes in their conditions and organisation we must make sure that it is done with the fullest consultation with them and, wherever possible, with their fullest consent.
6.28 p.m.
Viscount Tenby: My Lords, I am sure that we are all grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for instigating this most important debate today concerning an area in which he has great experience. As a fellow Welshman and JP, and a fellow member of a police authority, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Trevor, on an excellent maiden speech.
This is such a fundamental issue that when it was powerfully brought forward by the noble Baroness, Lady Hilton, in the debate on local democracy in April, I, like many others, was surprised and disappointed when the Minister involved failed to touch on the topic at all in his summing up. After today, I believe that there will be no doubt in the Minister's mind of the importance that the House attaches to the subject.
I should make my position clear at the outset. As I said, I am currently a member of a large police authority and, as a magistrate, a non-elected member—which your Lordships may feel is not entirely a new experience for a Member of this House. However, I hope that it is not just through feelings of guilt that I oppose so vigorously the concept that the control of such authorities should in future lie in the hands of non-elected members, answerable only to the Secretary of State for the Home Department.
I propose tonight to confine my remarks to the proposals concerning police authorities. I am aware that, coming as I do at the end of an innings, most of the plums have already been pulled out of the pie, but important facts sometimes bear repetition. The practice of policing with the support and consent of local communities has a long and honourable tradition behind it in this country. As has been said, it is also almost certainly the chief reason why, despite some latterday hiccups, the police continue to be held in such high esteem. If that were to be removed in the misguided belief that it would increase efficiency, something very precious would be removed with it. I need hardly add that at a time of continuing high levels of crime in both urban and rural areas, that would be a considerable misjudgment on the part of the Government.

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There were, it is true, some helpful initiatives in the Home Secretary's Statement in March, but one of them has been removed. There was the greater freedom of chief constables to establish their priorities rather than the Home Office doing it for them; there was the monitoring of performance against objectives. It was also a considerable relief to see the importance of the operational independence of chief constables emphasised, but there, I am afraid, the plaudits peter out.
What is being proposed is, in effect, the removal of police authorities from the area of local government—nothing more, nothing less. First, authorities are to become autonomous—that is, as far as their former county council parents are concerned. To the Government's credit, no attempt is made to disguise the fact that in future all strings will be pulled in the Home Office. It is yet another example of deadening central control where once there was healthy local independence.
Secondly, 91 per cent. of the authorities' money —and I must apologise to my noble friend Lord Tonypandy because I really do think that the figure is 91 per cent..—will come from central funds, with only 9 per cent. coming by way of council precepts.
Thirdly, finally and most devastatingly, local, democratically elected members will be reduced to a parity with non-elected ministerial appointees. Of course, elected councillors can be an irritant at times and in certain places. I have experienced what I may perhaps call "erratic behaviour". Somewhere, in this country of ours, at any one time, there is the "Ridiculous Right" as well as the "Loony Left". But that is the price that we pay—albeit through gritted teeth—for democracy.
Perhaps I may deal with the point about elected councillors in more detail. The Secretary of State said in another place of authorities:
"Their job will be to ensure that policing responds to local needs and concerns".—[Official Report, Commons. 23/3/93; col. 766.]
In my own county of Hampshire, the proposals will entail a reduction from 24 elected members to eight. That means that a member who currently represents the equivalent of 60,000 people will in future have to represent some 200,000 people—that is, three times the present number or, if one prefers, three times what might be regarded as the size of the electorate of an average parliamentary seat. Some response, some feedback!
Perhaps I may now turn to the appointees: five businessmen/managerial experts and true. I hope that noble Lords opposite will not mind when I say that this Government appear to have something of an obsession about businessmen and businesswomen. Supermen and Superwomen all, they can provide all the answers whether they serve on police authorities or magistrates' courts committees. Banish the thought that they might be better employed sorting out the problems of their own companies, many of them, it must be said, brought about by this very Government. No, their country needs them in foreign fields and, for many of them, they will undoubtedly be very foreign fields indeed. Like all good obsessions, however, it
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ignores fact. Not all magistrates are antediluvian buffers. The House must not take me as an example. Some actually are businessmen and women—and quite good ones at that. As for police authorities, I can speak only for my own. Almost 50 per cent. of its members are drawn from the business world—not a good enough reason surely for removing democratic control from its proceedings.
The Government are also proposing that the chairman of an authority should in future be appointed by the Secretary of State. The chairman will have a casting vote on all but fiscal matters, thus ensuring endless problems between policy and resources. He will be answerable to the Secretary of State for the efficiency of the local force, but, quite rightly, must leave all operational responsibility to the chief constable. And to cap it all—rather an appropriate word in the circumstances-9l per cent. of its funding will come from central government. In any case, however, the chairman will not be able to vote on the 9 per cent. precept from local sources. As we are dealing with chairmen who are businessmen first and foremost, perhaps I should say that any businessman who accepted such a job in the hard-headed world of commerce—a job not of power without responsibility, but rather of responsibility without power—might well be thought a candidate for what is euphemistically known as the "funny farm".
We are told that these are only proposals and that a White Paper will follow. It is to be hoped that before then some of the following questions will be answered. Indeed, the noble Earl the Minister may, with his customary courtesy, of which I have had much experience, even supply some of the answers in the course of his summing up of the debate. Have the powers-that-be taken into account the funding implications of depriving authorities of the back-up services currently provided by county councils? Are appointed members to be reimbursed for their trouble and, if so, by whom? How are the authorities' reserves, critical in meeting the peaks and troughs of expenditure which are always a fact of life in the police service, to be built up? That is a particular concern in Hampshire because of the problems with New Age travellers. What new formula will be devised to set the standard spending assessment fairly, so that authorities such as my own, which have historically underspent, are not penalised? What are the legal implications of putting ownership of the police estate and the increasingly important employment of civilians under the chief constables? Those are just a few of the questions.
The debate has underlined two of the Government's most dominant characteristics. The first is their inherent belief that Whitehall knows best, and not the people on the ground. I really believe—and it pains me to say this—that this is the most centrist government of my lifetime. Secondly, this Government have surely developed patronage to a fine art. Let us, by our reasoned irrefutable arguments today, ensure that on the question of the future of the police authorities, the tide will be rolled back and local democracy preserved.
6.40 p.m.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords—
Lord Rennell: My Lords, I apologise for speaking unannounced. I missed the inclusion limit by two minutes, and I shall be brief. The greatest worry and fear in our society today is the threat of violence to our families and the threat to the security of our possessions and our homes. I therefore welcome the proposal of my right honourable friend the Minister to reform the police service. My heart bleeds for the bobby on the beat. It seems to me that he is abused from every angle. He can expect it from hardened criminals, young and old, but why should he face that abuse from so many other quarters: New Age Travellers, football hooligans, political extremists, and even from households where it is assumed that the policeman is the enemy and not the friend?
Whenever dirty, unpleasant, unexpected and dangerous situations occur, it is the police who are called in. They do a wonderful job, and deserve every penny we can give them. Furthermore, they deserve and welcome the reforms which my right honourable friend the Home Secretary will be proposing. A policeman spends 70 per cent. of his time on duties not directly connected with crime and the fighting of it. Police training costs are, and so they should be, high. It is absurd that, after all their training, only 30 per cent. of their time is spent fulfilling their proper role. That type of problem will be tackled.
Many of your Lordships have expressed concern over plans for the composition of the new police authorities. One wonders from where the five or so members of the local community will come, and how competent they will be. On the other hand, the de-politicising of the police authority can be no bad thing. It will give a broader representation of the local community. I read nothing sinister into the fact that the Secretary of State should nominate the five local people and the chairman of the police authority. The Government have, after all, been elected to govern. Indeed, in the event, in the distant future, of a change of government I am sure that noble Lords opposite, or wherever, will be delighted to take over a strong health service, a flourishing education system, and a modern and effective police service.
6.42 p.m.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Rennell, for rising to my feet at the same time as he did. One is usually informed if someone is going to speak in the gap. Something must have gone wrong with the machinery.
Speaking after the gap is usually a nice job. One has an opportunity to pick up what one's opponents have said, and to contradict it. But in this debate we have had virtual agreement, with the possible exception of the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, whose arguments were slightly flawed since the only authority that he wanted to keep democratic in London was that of the City of London. The rest of it was not to be kept democratic. I did not see the logic of that argument or that the chairmen would not be biased by having been appointed by the Home Secretary, because they would
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have been appointed under statute. The problem is whether they would be re-appointed if they differed from the Home Secretary. There was not too much in that argument that I need to answer.
Those of your Lordships who know Dickens's Our Mutual Friend will remember the character Sloppy. His great virtue was, as his guardian said:
"He do the police in different voices".
It was a remark taken up by T. S. Eliot, and used later in, I believe, Sweeney Agonistes. It comes originally from Dickens. It is one of the problems we face when we are dealing with the tricky system of the police. The police are seen by people to be speaking in different voices. It is not that they do, but that they are seen to do so. When I was last arrested some 10 years ago, the officer arresting me assured me, in front of witnesses, that he was not arresting me. He took me to the police station and made me surrender the contents of my pockets and put me in a cell. I was already a Member of your Lordships' House. I had, therefore, some self confidence. My criminal record was relatively minor. (The first time I went to jail I was bailed by the noble Lord, Lord Dacre. The second time I went to jail I was defended successfully by my noble friend Lord Hutchinson.) I did not have a great criminal record. On this occasion I was innocent of any offence. Indeed, the police were unable to find any offence with which to charge me. What happened was that I was responsible for collecting evidence which is now being examined by your Lordships' Select Committee on Medical Ethics. That was considered to be a dangerous operation.
Yet, although I knew that I was innocent; I knew that I had only a minor criminal record; I knew that I was a Member of your Lordships' House; and I knew that I was an ordained member of the clergy of the Church of England, I was frightened. I imagine that if any of your Lordships had been arrested in a similar way you would also have been frightened. The police seem suddenly menacing. If I, with my advantages, was frightened, what about other people?
The police are seen by the general public to be speaking with different voices. One voice is that of nanny: helpful, moral and protective. Another, probably irrationally, is seen to be rather more frightening. The relationship of ordinary citizens to the people who govern them (to us, to the police, to whoever it may be) is always subject to traumas caused by the awareness of those different voices. The ordinary man in the street, on the whole, trusts members of the Cabinet, although he may disagree strongly with what they do, and hate the laws they pass. Nevertheless, he does not think of them as terrible villains. The reason that he does not is that we have a chain of connections through society so that we all know someone who knows someone who knows someone who says, "Despite what you say, Norman Lamont is not a villain from outer space. He is really quite a nice man and he is kind to his dog". It is upon that that democracy depends. It is all the more important that it depends upon that when one is dealing with the police, because the police are seen as rather more threatening than Mr. Lamont. One

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therefore has to have the connection of being in touch with whoever knows the police and whoever is in charge of them.
That is the basic importance of the democratic control of the police authority. Everyone in the House, with two possible exceptions, has talked in favour of that democratic control. The proposals which have been put forward, and are being put forward, touch upon that sensitive area. The proposals are dangerous. Such changes should go forward only after a depth of examination similar to that which was given in 1964. They are not to be thrown off at the tail end of a decaying government when something must be seen to be done and no one can quite think what. The case for the suggested changes are unproven. I suffer from the disadvantage that I have not yet heard from the noble Earl and I am sure that he will produce a manful defence of some kind. However, like many noble Lords, I cannot visualise what such a defence may be.
One case which is sometimes put forward is that local government is subject to extremism. I believe that that was the view of the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, as regards London; namely, that there may be extremists in charge. That might be so. As one of my noble friends has just remarked, that may be the price that one must pay. However, that price need not be paid because a small matter of electoral reform in local government would make certain that extremists were never in charge of any local government. (Perhaps I may say in passing that it would make certain also that Conservatives are properly represented on a number of local authorities. An example of that is Richmond, where only three out of 60 councillors are Conservative although the Conservatives have 47 per cent. of the vote. Conservatives might consider that such a measure would be to their benefit.) More importantly, it would be a safeguard against the only objection advanced against community control of the police force.
We should trust the people and the community. It is a system which has worked over a long period of time and, as I say, there are methods of making it work better. It should not be overturned at very short notice at the drop of a hat in an ill-considered measure.
6.52 p.m.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, I believe that at one or two stages of the debate I detected a hint of criticism of the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for introducing this Motion at this time. If that were so, I am bound to say that I believe that his initiative for bringing forward the Motion has been amply justified, not only in the timing but also in the subsequent content of the debate. As has been pointed out, only the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, gave any comfort whatever to the Government. I do not refer to the noble Lord who spoke in the gap because he did not give any notice that he was going to speak and I do not believe that that is in accordance with the customs of the House.
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It is not only that there has been no active support for the Government in the debate but also that the opposition to the Government's proposals has come from all parts of the House. I refer in particular to the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Trevor. His seemed to be the authentic voice of conservatism in the community. He made a very valuable contribution and did so in only four minutes. I suggest to the noble Lord that he has an oratorical credit in his cheque book and that if he cares to use up the remainder of his account, that would be extremely welcome.
Rather than criticise the timing of the debate, it is more appropriate to look at the timing of the Government's White Paper and the way in which it was trailed in the Commons Statement in March of this year. As I understand it, the Government are now proposing to issue a White Paper—not a Green Paper: there is no element of consultation involved—in the middle of June. The Sheehy Report into the organisation of the police force is to be published in late June and the report of the Runciman Royal Commission on Criminal Justice on 30th June. Therefore the Government are expressing their opinions on those extremely important matters before the public have had an opportunity to see the conclusions either of the lengthy and detailed Sheehy Report on the way the police is to be organised or—and I suggest that this is equally germane—the views of the first Royal Commission which we have had for many years on criminal justice. That seems an extraordinary piece of timing. That the Government are prepared to act in that way shows a considerable degree of contempt for public opinion.
The Motion before us concentrates on the organisation of police authorities and their political control. I shall devote most of my attention to that because it is important that we should not be diverted. At the same time, that cannot be done without referring to some extent to the way in which an effective and accountable police force can be achieved.
I am always rather suspicious of those who say about any issue with which they are concerned that it should be a above party. I believe that that is an excuse for saying, "My view should prevail regardless of whatever anybody else thinks". But my noble friend Lord Merlyn-Rees is right to say that it would be wrong for any political party to claim to be the party of law and order. Crime has been rising in this country since the war. It has risen under Labour and Conservative governments—I dare to think that it might even rise under a Liberal Democrat government—because the causes are social and too fundamental to be addressed readily by government action.
However, that does not mean that there are not ways in which the Government can help to improve the efficiency of the police force and help to secure that the police force devotes its efforts to matters which will enable it most effectively to combat crime. I say that not because I propose to embark on a debate on the efficiency of the police force but because the Government are proposing a particular measure; namely, a reduction in the number of police forces.
It is not just that smaller police forces cannot be shown to be less efficient than larger police forces. I

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rather believe that the reverse is the case. My noble friend Lord Monkswell and the noble Lord, Lord Rippon of Hexham, argued effectively for smaller and more locally accountable police forces rather than larger police forces.
It is also the case (is it not?) that the nature of the argument for larger police forces is distinctly fallacious. The Home Secretary applies what he calls the "helicopter test". He says that a police force should be of the size that when it has a helicopter, it does not spend most of its time sitting on the ground. The use of a helicopter is determined by the number of occasions on which it must be used, which will vary from one part of the country to another, and the distances which it must travel. There is a trade off between those two which has nothing to do with the size of the police force. If a police force is either too restricted, too small geographically or too peaceful to have a helicopter of its own, it can share it with another police force. That is what happens as regards the RAF air-sea rescue. That is what happens with most uses of complicated equipment. Many of the examples which have been given—notably that of the regional crime squads—show that it is possible to have that co-operation without allowing the size of the police force to be a determining factor. I am afraid that the helicopter test, as applied by the Home Secretary, is simply a vulgar error in argument.
We have had a lot of discussion about the structure and financing of police forces. It has always been my experience in local government that those who start to talk about structure before they start to talk about functions have it the wrong way round. It has always been my experience that until you have determined what is the job of any organisation—a local authority, a police force or a health authority—and the limits of its responsibilities, it is irrelevant to talk about structure. The Audit Commission's comments on the tripartite system, which I take seriously, as I take seriously all the views of the Audit Commission, simply do not address the issue, as I suggest they would normally do, in that way.
So we come to the most important issue of the debate; namely, the issue of the political control of the police force. Of course, there were good elements in what the Home Secretary said in March. My noble friend Lady Hilton referred to the proposals for delegation as being sound in objective. But the financing of a police force—and this is critical to the nature of the composition of the police authorities—is not the financing of a well controllable organisation.
By its nature, a police force has to be reactive. For example, there may be hugely expensive activities, such as the disturbances at the time of the miners' strike, the IRA bomb in Warrington or that in the City of London or, indeed—I know that some of my noble friends would not care for this to be said in the same breath—at large football matches, which cannot be isolated or anticipated. Yet, we have the curious situation proposed where the Home Secretary appoints a considerable part of the police authority. As has been said, he is responsible for 91 per cent. of the expenditure of the police authority on the police
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service. He appoints a paid chairman to the police authority. The police authority, now out of the control of the local authority, sets its budget for the year. That budget goes into the local authorities' budgets for the area. If it exceeds the standard spending assessment, the Secretary of State for the Environment starts to take action and to cap the expenditure of the local authority, including the expenditure of the police authority.
Can we not cut out the middle man? Can it not just be done in a direct confrontation between Mr. Clarke and Mr. Howard? Do we need to have local people involved in the matter? The whole idea of having a paid chairman of a police authority, appointed by the Home Secretary, confronting, as my noble friend Lady Hilton rightly said, a chief constable—that is, if we expect the Sheehy recommendations on contract to be adopted—is inconceivable to me. It is inconceivable that there will not be the kind of conflict between policy and resources to which the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, referred. That is even if we assume, as we were invited to do by the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, that those appointments will be made without regard to politics. The noble Lord, Lord Allen of Abbeydale, described himself as a political innocent. The noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, is certainly not politically innocent. If he believes that there will be anything other than Conservative Party members as chairmen of police authorities, he has another think coming.
There was a nice little article in The Times on Saturday in which a senior Minister was asked the question, "How will these chairmen of police authorities be appointed?" He replied, "No problem. He will go round to the Whips' Office, as we all do". That is exactly what will happen. It happens now with the training and enterprise councils; it happens with the health authorities, both regional and district; and it happens with all government appointments. We shall see it happening again. The noble Lord, Lord Rippon, was not exaggerating when he referred to the situation in Germany before the war when Konrad Adenauer was not acceptable as mayor of Cologne whereas Herr Krupp was considered acceptable.
The noble Earl, Lord Carnarvon, who I am sorry to see is not in his place, made an effective plea for the chairman of the police authority to be appointed from among the councillors. I am afraid that that does not go far enough. Under a Conservative Home Secretary—if there is one—the danger is that there would be a Conservative councillor from County Durham or from Northumberland appointed there as chairman of the police authority, or in South Wales if that were possible. I fear that under a Labour Home Secretary there might be the same temptation. I hope that it would be resisted, but I do not think that anyone can be sure.
The debate goes to the heart of the relationship between central and local government. A number of speakers quoted the words of the joint declaration by the Association of Metropolitan Authorities (Labour led) and the Association of County Councils (then Conservative led) in February of this year. The local authority associations said that policing had to be carried out with the involvement and consent of the

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community. I put it to your Lordships that, under the conditions proposed, the chairmen of the police authorities will be appointed centrally. They will have an enormous degree of authority over contract chief constables, and they will be able to rely on a considerable number of members appointed centrally from among local residents to represent the business community. Under those conditions there can be no involvement and consent of the community in the sense that the local authority would wish.
In a very effective speech, the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, referred to the fear of extremists in local authorities. I have at least as good a reason—in fact, probably greater reason than he has—to know about extremists in local authorities. But I know where the extremists are now: they are in Queen Anne's Gate and they are attempting to take away democratic responsibility from a critical part of our national life.
In the years immediately after the war, the communist parties in Eastern Europe, where they had control, and in Western Europe, where they had participation in government, were very clear about their priorities. Where they were in government, they made sure, wherever possible, that they took control over the Ministry of Justice and over the Ministry of the Interior. That is exactly what this Government are proposing to do to what has been an independent police service. It must be resisted.
7.7 p.m.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, it is not surprising that the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, worked himself up into a lather at the end of his speech and came to totally the wrong conclusion. He knows perfectly well that there is no thought or consideration of politicising or taking control of the police force. If that is the conclusion which the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, has drawn, it just shows the lack of depth with which he has considered the problem. However, I shall try to put him right in due course.
The House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for providing us with the opportunity to debate such an important matter as the future of the police service. Your Lordships expressed many views which will be especially helpful to the Government and which we shall take into account. The debate was notable for the speech made by my noble friend Lord Trevor who, if I may say so, made a remarkable maiden speech. It is always the maxim that maiden speeches should be brief, knowledgeable and non-controversial. I believe that my noble friend scored 10 out of 10 for being brief, 10 out of 10 for being knowledgeable and eight-and-a-half out of 10 for being non-controversial. But, after all, as he has taken 43 years to make his maiden speech I think that he is entitled to express his views with a little force. I only hope that we do not have to wait so long before hearing him again. I am really sorry that it was the matter of the police that stimulated my noble friend to break his vow of silence. Nevertheless, I am glad that he did so.
The noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, enlightened the House on his experiences as a priest in
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Holy Orders and the various occasions when he was arrested by the police. Speaking for myself, I am bound to say that it put my imagination into overdrive. But I am quite certain that, in both capacities, the noble Lord is well equipped to speak from the Liberal Democrat Front Bench on police matters.
The noble Viscount, Lord Tonypandy, also enlightened the House by telling us that he had been a policeman but that he only reached the position of sergeant. That is a very elevated rank. I am glad that he achieved that position. I can only say that he went slightly higher up on what one might describe as the Richter scale in another place, where he eventually achieved the position of Speaker of the House, than he did in the police service. I am not quite sure whether that is a reflection on the noble Viscount's ability as a policeman or whether it is a reflection on the ability of the police to determine what one might describe as nascent ability when they see it.
I admired the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees. He made a broad and thoughtful speech which was non-partisan. That is what one would expect from an ex-Home Secretary. The noble Lord was right to say that no governments can be blamed for crime. Crime is a matter that every government has to deal with. That applies in this country and throughout the world. It is not an easy matter to tackle. I was sorry that the noble Baroness, Lady Hilton of Eggardon, with all her knowledge, succeeded in making a highly controversial political speech.
As your Lordships will be aware, the Government will set out their proposals for the future of policing in detail in a White Paper. The noble Viscount, Lord Tonypandy, said he would have liked a Green Paper. I can assure the noble Viscount that the paper will have green edges. It will contain plenty of matters that can be discussed. The Government have not made up their mind on many issues. Anyone would imagine, after having listened to noble Lords speaking this afternoon, that the Government had made up their mind on this matter. The Government are open to people's views. Sometimes noble Lords say the Government should listen to people. We must listen, but it is important that the Government should set out some proposals for the public upon which there should be discussion. This matter has been considered for a long time. People from every quarter, and the police, have given their views about what steps should be taken. The Government must produce some proposals, set them out in a White Paper and then leave that open for discussion. I believe that to be the right procedure.
As this debate is being held before the White Paper has been issued I am in a somewhat difficult position as regards being able to reply to all the points that have been made in the debate. However, I shall do my best to reply to those points. The noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, festooned me with questions. One moment he accused the Government of being centralist and not listening and the next moment he asked what we were going to do. As I said, it is difficult to provide answers before the White Paper is

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published. I am sure the noble Viscount will find some of the answers to his questions when the White Paper is published. No doubt if there are still worries about this issue there will be opportunities to consider it further.
I know that some of these matters are considered to be controversial. It may be helpful if I set out briefly the role which we envisage for each of the three parties to the so-called tripartite structure on which policing is based and the reasoning behind the changes which we propose. I agree with the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, that it would be quite appalling if the police were to become a political football. I believe those were his words. I believe it was the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, who referred to political control of the police. The Government have no intention of assuming political control of the police.
In the 30 years that have passed since the previous police Act became law the old tripartite structure, which consisted of police authorities, chief constables and the Home Secretary, has provided an effective police service which can still truthfully be described as being not only the best in the world but also the envy of the world. However, society has changed beyond recognition in that time. The structure of the police service must now be changed to reflect the demands of today. I wish to make it perfectly clear that this is not a criticism of police officers or of policing. The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, paid tribute to the police and I agree with that tribute. I, for one, have an almost boundless admiration and respect for our police officers and for what they do and how they do it. Of course, from time to time things go wrong. I suppose that is inevitable in any large organisation, even if it is not excusable. When things go wrong they become subject to what one might describe as the "heavy metal" of the media.
However, I have no hesitation in saying that we—in the current jargon we are the customers of the police—owe a great debt of gratitude to the work, the loyalty and indeed the bravery of the police who are sometimes subjected to the most appalling violence. I agreed with the noble Viscount, Lord Tonypandy, when he said that much of the success of the country has depended on the loyalty and the quality of the police. I am sure he is right.
We consider, however—this has been a common expectation, even within the police service—that the time has now come to bring up to date the structures within which the police operate. Many people have said that the structure needs reforming. There seems to be a unanimity of view on that, but there is no agreement on how that should be done. As soon as the Government suggest a course of action everyone says, "You cannot possibly do that". Inevitably, change is controversial. It is bound to be controversial. Everyone is apprehensive of the unknown. My noble friend Lord Rippon made a most helpful speech. I agreed with him when he said that no change is possible without upheaval. Those might not have been his exact words but I believe that was what he inferred.
The Home Secretary, chief constables and police authorities all have different roles to play in achieving good policing. What we are proposing to do is to
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adjust the roles of all three to meet the changed circumstances of today. The noble Baroness, Lady Hilton of Eggardon, said the Government were taking all power over the police and local authorities and that the police would be under the control of the Government. If that were the case, I would be the first to say it would be a disaster. I do not believe that is the right thing to do and I do not believe that it will be the effect of what we are going to do. The basic underlying principle of these reforms is to release some of the power which is at present in the hands of the Home Secretary and to give it to the police authorities and to local chief constables whose business it is to provide proper policing for their local communities.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, said our proposals are the biggest piece of centralisation he has seen for ages. I am sorry the noble Lord feels that way as that is the reverse of our intention. We are devolving much of the power which the Home Secretary has to localities where that power will be used. I can assure your Lordships that we do not wish to centralise the control of the police. We intend to do the opposite. We do not intend to impose control by central government of local policing. What we want to do is to strengthen the role of police authorities so that local people clearly know who is responsible for policing in their area. We also want chief constables to have greater freedom to manage their resources to meet their own local needs.
I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees, that police authorities must be local. He was right to say that. I do not believe there is anyone who is better placed than local police officers and local people to know best what kind of policing is required in their local area. However, if the Government are to provide 90 per cent. of the funds for the police authorities, amounting to some £6,000 million a year, and if the Home Secretary is to release much of his control over how that money is spent, it is not unreasonable that he should have some assurance—as should the public—that that money is being spent wisely. To achieve that we are proposing that the Government should set a small number of key objectives for policing. These will be national objectives and they will highlight those areas of police performance which the Government consider are crucial to the provision of a good police service.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, was worried about that matter. Establishing key performance indicators will assist in focusing police efforts on fighting crime. The detail of the indicators will need to take account of the points which the noble Lord raised and due weight will need to be given to the more serious offences. The publication of results will be considered on the basis of comparisons between similar police forces and similar areas. The success which the police have in meeting these objectives will be published. That will enable people to see how their force is performing and how it compares with other forces. The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich. did not like that proposal. However, I do not understand why people should not be able to see how their local force is performing. The noble Lord, Lord Cocks, said that that would encourage criminals to go

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to the areas of worst clear-up rates. I thought that that was slightly fanciful but, if it is so, that is exactly the kind of pressure that will be put upon chief constables to ensure that it does not happen.
The new police authorities which we are proposing for the provinces will therefore play a very important part in local policing. The existing police authorities often have a large membership and, as a consequence, they can be unwieldy and unbusinesslike. Often they have prolific and complex structures and therefore the Government believe that they need to be smaller and more workable. They need to have clear tasks that they are required to perform, to have the right people to perform them and to have a local voice.
A number of your Lordships were anxious about the smaller authorities and the appointing of the chairmen. The noble Lords, Lord Harris and Lord Trevor, the noble Earl, Lord Winchilsea and Nottingham, and my noble friend Lord Rippon were anxious about that. I am not surprised to hear that noble Lords have been lobbied by local police authorities. Of course they have, because they are about to be changed and no one likes change. Therefore, it is understandable that those who are about to be changed should lobby some of your Lordships and obviously they have done so effectively.
My right honourable friend is proposing that the new authorities should have a maximum of 16 members. The noble Earl, Lord Winchilsea and Nottingham, was wrong about that because he said that the Home Secretary would nominate 50 per cent. of the membership. That is not so; half the members will be local councillors and half will consist of a mixture of local people, who will be appointed by the Home Secretary, and of magistrates—
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, will the Minister tell the House who will appoint the magistrates?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, if the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, will wait until the White Paper he will see—
Lord Graham of Edmonton: Oh dear!
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, there is no point in the noble Lord, Lord Graham, saying, "Oh dear". The noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, asked many questions which will be answered in the White Paper. It would be wrong of me to anticipate the White Paper. That is the kind of issue about which the Government have no particular fixed views—
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, forgive me, but the Minister was attempting to respond to the noble Earl, Lord Winchilsea and Nottingham. He was denying that 50 per cent of the members of the police authorities would be appointed by the Home Secretary. In order to give substance to that denial the Minister will have to deny that the magistrates will be appointed by the Home Secretary.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the people who will be appointed by the Home Secretary are the five to whom I referred. The way in which the magistrates become
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members of the authority has yet to be decided either by—it is difficult to reply when the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, pouts. He asked me many questions. The debate has arisen before the publication of the White Paper but the noble Lord expects me to answer all the questions. The Government are accused of railroading the whole lot but as soon as I say that there is an area in which we should welcome people's views the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, becomes sour. He will have to wait a little longer.
In an admirably brief speech, the noble Earl, Lord Carnarvon, asked about the appointment of the chairman. He will be appointed by the Home Secretary from the overall membership of the authority and it is intended that he should receive a suitable remuneration for his responsibility. The chairman will have the key role in leading the authority and in maintaining the effective working relationship with the chief constable. I do not assume that the chairman will have his office in the police headquarters. He will probably be busy enough dealing with the running of the police authority and it is right that he should be properly renumerated for that work. One must remember that the chairman runs the police authority and the chief constable runs the police force.
My noble friend Lord Finsberg was right in saying that it would not be difficult for the chairman to operate in such a way because he will operate under statute and not as an appointee of the Home Secretary. Many noble Lords have said that the appointment of the chairmen by my noble friend could be seen as being controversial. I accept that that is the case but the noble Baroness, Lady Hilton, the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, and the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, claimed that my right honourable friend is seen to be taking power for himself rather than relinquishing it. Therefore, it is essential to understand the reason behind the decision.
Of course some people say that the Government's nominees for the police authorities will be under the patronage of the Home Secretary of the day and that party politics will be the deciding factor in making the appointments. The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, referred to that. However, the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees, interestingly informed the House that when he was Home Secretary—and a privileged position it was—he appointed the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, as chairman of the Parole Board. In those days the noble Lord, Lord Harris, was a member of the Labour Party, which happened to be the same party as that of the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees. Since then the noble Lord, Lord Harris, has moved around the political arena and now graces another party. However, I am certain that when the noble Lord, Lord Harris, was chairman of the Parole Board he never considered that he was a lackey of the then Home Secretary and that he was not free to run the Parole Board in the best way he thought possible.
That will be the case with chairmen of the police authorities of the future. It is certainly not the intention of my right honourable friend that chairmen should be appointed on a political basis. I am bound to say that I was horrified to hear the noble Lord,

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Lord McIntosh, say, "Oh, we know how this is done. We just go round to the Whip's office and ask for names". If that is a reflection of the way in which the party of which he is a distinguished member carries out its business it is a revelation, but it is not the attitude which we take. I do not believe that it is the attitude that any responsible government would take.
My right honourable friend believes that it is necessary that police authorities should have a different relationship with local government. The noble Baroness, Lady Hilton, said that it was a vindictive vendetta of Her Majesty's Government against local authorities and that it was a smoke screen to divert the public's attention away from crime. I thought that that was an excessive description of the problem. Of course one does not deflect the public's views and worries about crime by making alterations. That is not the reason for making alterations. The reason for making them is in order to try to deal with crime even better in the future than we have in the past and in order to take account of future problems.
The noble Lord, Lord Allen of Abbeydale, was concerned about the level of funding for the police authorities. The Government propose to retain a system of joint local and central funding. The central government contribution will be cash limited. As the noble Lord said, a new mechanism will be needed to distribute it to police authorities and work will begin shortly to develop a distribution formula. Under the new funding arrangements which we have proposed local government will continue to make a contribution to the funding of the police service.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris, and the noble Viscount, Lord Tonypandy, were anxious about the precepts. The idea is that the full authority will vote on the budget. Special arrangements will apply in any vote to determine the size of the precept so that if the eight council members of the authority unanimously take a different view to the other eight members the local councillors will have the deciding vote. The noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, was also worried about the police authorities' reserves. The new police authorities, as free-standing bodies, will be able to build and hold financial reserves to deal with contingencies. The noble Viscount also asked me a number of other questions but I am afraid that I do not have time to answer them.
In future, all police authorities will be independent of local councils. They will be separated wholly from local authorities. They will be organisations with the power to run their own affairs and they will be able to set their own budget. The police authorities will have a number of new tasks to perform. They will be involved in setting the budget and in publishing costed plans for local policing. They will have to know the requirements of policing their areas, to consult local people about them and to ensure that the police force meets those requirements.
If part of the job of police authority members is to act as a means of communication between the police and the local community it follow that the members must be active in the community. They must also have the skills necessary to enable them to discharge the
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functions which the new police authorities will be performing. My right honourable friend is anxious, therefore, to be able to tap all the ability and talent in the area and not to have it confined only to that which is found in those who have been elected to the local authority or who are magistrates.
Some noble Lords have described it as "appointing business people". The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, did so. The noble Viscount seemed obsessed with businessmen. It is not so. In some areas many local councillors and many magistrates are business people, as the noble Viscount said. In other areas that may not be so. By appointing some members of police authorities we aim to build on the existing skills and to draw in a wide range of other experiences.
Suggestions from organisations or individuals who think that a particular person would bring something of value to the police authority in their area will be welcomed. Such people might be a teacher, a vet, a farmer, a member of Victim Support, a member of the Samaritans, or whoever. It would be bizarre to suggest that only people who run local businesses or who have been elected to a local council have the skills which police authorities need.
My noble friend Lord Finsberg was right when he stated how he understood that the system would work. He was chivvied for supporting the Government. I advise him not to be worried about that. It was Shakespeare who said,
"the fewer men, the greater share of honour".
My noble friend is in that happy position today.
The direct appointment of some members of the police authority is, of course, as I readily recognise, an innovation. The principle which underlines the role and the composition of police authorities will remain exactly the same as that which was set out by the Royal Commission on the police in 1962. The Royal Commission said that the police authority should, "…constitute a body of citizens concerned with the local standing and well-being of the police, interested in the maintenance of law and order, and able to give advice and guidance to chief constables about local problems."
That is a principle which we have no intention of changing. It is one upon which our proposals will have no effect. I have tried to emphasise the importance which the Government attach to the local voice in policing. That is the cornerstone on which good policing is built, as the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees, said.
Because the Home Secretary will be loosening his own direct control, the new police authorities will have an important task. The Government are determined to help them to perform their task as effectively as possible. The chairman must have good leadership qualities and be someone in whom the Home Secretary can have complete confidence. It is just as likely that the chairman will be one of the local councillors or magistrates as one of the Home Secretary's nominees. He or she will he chosen simply as being the best person for the job. That is what my noble friend Lord Finsberg said.
By setting objectives, and by publishing the results, the Government will be giving local people a yardstick by which to judge whether their needs are being

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addressed. If they are not, then the buck will stop firmly with the chairman of the police authority, and with the authority itself.
To the noble Lord, Lord Harris, the noble Lord, Lord Allen of Abbeydale, and others who are concerned about the future of the Metropolitan Police, I say this. London is a special case. It is huge. It is the capital city. Its problems are often unique. The Metropolitan Police has a number of special responsibilities and functions which are not seen in any other force. I refer to royal and diplomatic protection, the national counter-terrorist work, war crimes and record-keeping functions. Policing in London is not simply the clear-cut, local matter which it is in the provinces. Of course, Metropolitan Police officers catch London's criminals. They walk the streets of Tottenham in just the same way as their counterparts walk the streets of Taunton. However, policing London also involves special responsibilities which arise because London is the capital city. I refer, for example, to the policing of demonstrations and the need to protect Parliament.
Even so, the Government intend that, so far as is possible, London will benefit from the reforms which we are proposing as in a similar way will the remainder of the country.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris, the noble Baroness, Lady Hilton, and my noble friend Lord Finsberg referred to newspaper articles. I can only say that my right honourable friend the Home Secretary will be publishing a White Paper outlining the Government's proposals for police reforms next month. That will set out the detailed plans for London. It will take full account of the national and exceptional responsibilities of the Metropolitan Police.
Contrary to what some newspapers have suggested in a blaze of publicity, my right honourable friend has given no specific undertakings as to the membership of the police authority for London. At present the Home Secretary is the police authority for the Metropolitan Police district. The day-to-day work of the police authority is carried out by his officials. However, my right honourable friend intends in future that there should be a police authority for London outside the Home Office and he will delegate to that authority many of his existing responsibilities. Our detailed proposals for London will be set out in the forthcoming White Paper. They will take account of the national and other exceptional responsibilities which the Metropolitan Police has.
The overall aim of the Government's proposals is to improve the structure of policing. It needs to be adjusted to take account of the vast changes which have occurred since the last police Act. All those changes require changes to the structure of policing. However, they do not need a change to the principles of policing. Those are to fight crime and to see that the law is upheld by a constable whose authority comes from Her Majesty.
7.35 p.m.
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, first may I express my thanks to all who have participated in the debate. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Trevor, on his maiden speech. I agreed with everything that he said, and indeed with the other two Members of this House, both members of police authorities, who took precisely the same view as the noble Lord—namely, in flat opposition to everything that the Home Secretary suggested in the Statement at the end of March.
I do not propose to go over the arguments again. That would be unduly wearisome. However, perhaps I may make one or two brief comments; first, on the policing of London. Last night we were presented with a story in the Evening Standard which has not been denied by the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers. Perhaps we may recall what was said at the end of March in the Home Secretary's Statement. It was stated that the character of the police authority in London would be exactly the same as in the remainder of the country. Last night the Evening Standard said that that had been dropped. What is significant is that the noble Earl has not denied the truth of that report. We can therefore draw our own conclusions—
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, perhaps I may‐
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, I shall finish the sentence. I think that the House will draw its own conclusions as to what the Home Secretary has decided. The noble Earl wishes to intervene.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I do not like interrupting the noble Lord, but when he misquotes my right honourable friend I think it right to put the record straight. My right honourable friend said:
"I propose to establish for the first time a police authority for the Metropolitan police on the new national model separate from the Home Office and with essentially the same tasks as police authorities elsewhere".—[0fficial Report, Commons, 23/3/93; col. 766.]
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, the noble Earl has confirmed the accuracy of what I said. That is exactly what the Home Secretary said.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, perhaps I may—
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, perhaps I may just finish. Perhaps the noble Earl will contain himself for a moment. All I say to the noble Earl is that last night the Evening Standard announced, and it is confirmed in this morning's newspapers on the basis clearly of guidance from his own department's press officers, that there has been a major change of policy by the Home Secretary. The point that I put to the noble Earl, I hope in a most agreeable way, is this. The fact that he has not denied the truth of what was said last night and what is said in every morning newspaper today, is in itself highly significant.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the noble Lord kindly gives way. I took issue with the noble Lord because he used the word "exactly" and I do not believe that that word was used. He stated also that what appeared in last night's papers and today's papers must therefore be right. I know that the noble Lord is an avid reader of newspapers, but he is wrong to suggest that any

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substance of that must necessarily come from the press office in the Home Office. Newspapers have their own sources. They are not always accurate. I leave it at that.
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, I do not propose to pursue the noble Earl. He and I have both been Ministers in the Home Office. He and I know perfectly well that if a totally inaccurate statement appears in newspapers one gives instructions to the press department to deny it in the most emphatic terms. That has not been done. We now know perfectly well that the Home Secretary has retreated within a period of eight weeks from a fundamental position on the policing of London; and we have to wait for the Evening Standard to tell us the truth of the matter.
The noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, undertook the heroic responsibility of being the one Member of your Lordships' House who was apparently in favour of what the Government have decided upon. He spoke eloquently about the quality of policing in the City of London. He appeared to be satisfied, as my noble friend Lord Beaumont indicated, about the fact that the City of London police authority consisting exclusively of elected members was wholly acceptable. However, he added that any form of elected authority in the rest of London would be wholly objectionable and would be opposed passionately by the entire citizenry of London. That seems to me a slightly exaggerated point, if he will forgive me saying so.
Lord Finsberg: My Lords, I did not interrupt the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, because I have known him for many years. For the sake of brevity, I must say that I did not go on to explain that the composition of the City has all the elements for which the Home Secretary is looking: local government, business and others. That is why it is different.
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, I am glad to have that explanation because until the noble Lord produced it I had not followed the full subtlety of his argument. All I say to him is this. As I tried to indicate in my speech, there are a substantial number of business people on police authorities throughout the country. The idea, therefore, that for the first time ever a benevolent Home Secretary will appoint business people to police authorities is a little far from the truth.
The only other point I wish to make was made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hilton of Eggardon, with whom I very much agree. This is one of the most ominous proposals in the Home Secretary's policy announcement. Given that there will be national government appointees as chairmen of police authorities, those new creatures will have substantial influence in every police force area. They will be divorced from local government, as the noble Earl pointed out. They will operate entirely either within a police headquarters or a building immediately adjacent to police headquarters. Both the chairman and the other nationally appointed members will be the Home Secretary's representatives.
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This is being considered at the same time as it is suggested that, for the first time, chief officers will be on short-term contracts. In other words, the police authority—the chairman and members—will decide whether to renew a contract. All I put to the House and to the noble Earl, if the Government are seriously prepared to look at matters again, as I hope they will, is the dangers involved in such a situation. It is all very well for a chief officer to say—as I am sure the overwhelming majority would if asked to do something which they regard as unacceptable by one of the new nationally appointed chairmen—"Chairman, I am afraid that I cannot contemplate doing that. It is an operational matter for which I must take responsiblity". However, is there not a possibility that if, six months later, that chief officer's contract is coming up for renewal, one or two might in the future be tempted to give a rather different answer to the chairman of the police authority? The difficulty with this set of proposals is that they have not been carefully thought through. There has been no departmental inquiry, no Royal Commission. The department is making it up as it goes along, without realising the full implications of what it proposes.
We shall clearly spend many months arguing over the contents of the police Bill, when it appears in the next Session of Parliament. I close by saying that I agree very much with what the noble Viscount, Lord Tonypandy, said in his striking speech. It will be dreadful if the police service in this country is dragged into a major political confrontation. The noble Earl knows the position as well as the rest of us. He is opposed by a united police service: the Association of Chief Police Officers, the Superintendents' Association, the Police Federation and by many of the most prominent members of his own party who are members of police authorities. It seems to me that the Government should now consider their position extremely carefully before proceeding with highly divisive legislation. I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

New Towns (Amendment) Bill [H.L.]
7.44 p.m.
Lord Finsberg: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
When I became deputy chairman of the Commission for the New Towns in 1992—and here I declare my interest—having had ministerial responsibility for the new towns a decade or so before, I found that there was a problem facing the commission arising out of a gap in the 1959, 1981 and 1985 Acts. No specific delegation powers exist for the commission.
Sections of the statutes require the commission to make certain judgments to carry out its functions. For example, the legislation states:
"as soon as it considers it expedient to do so";
"due regard being had to the considerations specified in subsection (2)";
or

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"consideration which is less than the best reasonably obtainable".
There is an implied power to allow officials to carry out the day-to-day administration of the commission, but where an Act of Parliament imposes major functions on it, only the commission's full board of members can exercise them.
In 1987 the commission took two counsels' opinions. A further conference was held in 1992 with another Queen's Counsel, and all three confirmed the legal position as I have summarised it. Those opinions were made available to the department. The possibility was raised of what is known as a "letter of comfort" for the Minister, but that was not acceptable and the advice given to the commission was that it would not cover us at all.
We met the Minister, who agreed that delegation was required but that there was at present no appropriate government Bill and no time for such a Bill. We rather naively thought that the Housing and Urban Development Bill seemed right, but the Long Title prevented an amendment being put forward.
Perhaps I may explain the background. The commission's board meets 11 times a year. Its membership is selected from persons who have expertise in the world of property or who have held government or local government office and who have special knowledge of the matters with which the commission deals.
The position is that the commission holds extensive property throughout 21 new towns in England and Wales, valued at over £1 billion. There are many tens of thousands of separate properties owned by the commission. We have a staff of about 750 and we make extensive use of outside consultants. Typically, over 100 property transactions are entered into every month. All of those are presented to a property committee of members of the commission whose deliberations have to be confirmed by the board meeting.
The net effect is that members' time and attention are wasted on receiving reports and endorsing recommendations on many hundreds of minor matters during a year; for example, the sale of garden extensions, the sale of free-standing garages, grazing agreements etc.
More importantly, as your Lordships will understand, the commission is operating in a difficult and competitive property market. Without the necessary authority to approve deals between board meetings, there are considerable difficulties in letting premises and closing deals when at the conclusion of negotiations the potential customer is told that there will be a wait of several weeks pending approval of the deal by the commission's board. Therefore the effectiveness and efficiency of the commission is unnecessarily impaired.
What I ask for in the Bill is not unusual. It has been recognised by Government and Parliament that it is appropriate for public bodies such as the commission to delegate routine matters to officials or committees, as appropriate. Those of us who serve in local government know that only too well. It is illustrated in
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the terms of appointment of accounting officers for non-departmental public bodies. It is also illustrated in the constitution of the National Rivers Authority, as set out in the Water Resources Act 1989, as well as the constitution of the proposed urban development corporation, as set out in Schedule 16 to the Housing and Urban Development Bill, which received its Third Reading only yesterday. The omission, therefore, in the New Towns Act 1981 can be remedied only by primary legislation. All we require is the same power as the urban development corporations have been given. I trust that the Second Reading will be granted.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord Finsberg.)
Lord Graham of Edmonton: My Lords, first of all I do not profess to be a good substitute for my noble friend Lord Williams, who is not here to deal with this matter. Nevertheless, I am not unfamiliar with the general background, having served on many local government and new town Bills in another place. In this House I have spoken for my party on local government matters for many years.
I share with the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, the feeling that this is a proper matter—namely, delegating authority from a major body to a smaller body—for an amendment to an Act of Parliament. I just take it as, if that is how it has been done, that is how it has got to be done. Therefore our job tonight is to listen very carefully to the persuasive arguments, which undoubtedly are greatly relevant. We all understand. We all served in local government, and we recognise the importance not just of delegated authority but of the terms under which that authority is given.
I read the Bill very carefully. Looking at the power of delegation under sub-paragraph (a), the important words are:
"who has been authorised for the purpose, either generally or specifically, by the Commission".
In other words, there is a proper procedure, a proper proposal, a proper undertaking, a proper liability and a responsibility, codified properly.
When one looks at the powers of the committee or sub-committee which needs this procedure tonight, they have been properly authorised. The noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, does the House a service by pointing out some of the minor matters which have had to be delayed simply because the terms of the Act needing to be complied with did not allow a speedier process.
We on these Benches, certainly in this matter, do not enter at all into the demise of the new towns or the eventual demise of the New Towns Commission. We recognise that tonight we have been asked to approve a speeding up of power, properly controlled, properly documented, and properly the subject of scrutiny by other people.
If the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, intends to make even the odd comment at the end, I should simply be interested to ask what kind of consultation there has been outside the commission itself, perhaps with the other local authority associations, with local communities or in any other way. I do not say that that is required. But this would be done by a normal board of directors or management. My experience is

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in the Co-op Society. If we wanted to delegate power we should not have to go back to the membership. But I should be interested to know whether any steps have been taken simply to get a feel that this is right. Certainly I believe that it is right, both democratically and in a business sense. Therefore we support and approve this very modest measure.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, it may be helpful if at this point I gave the Government's view on this Bill. I understand that the need for the Bill has arisen because, as the New Towns Act is silent on the matter, the board feels constrained to deal personally with every minor issue relating to the disposal of the commission's assets. The commission feels that this is not an effective use of board members' time and prevents them from deploying their staff in the most efficient way. It is making it difficult to conclude sales of property and potentially impeding the rate at which the commission can dispose of its assets.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment has discussed with my noble friend Lord F'insberg the proposals contained in the Bill and we are broadly sympathetic to its purpose. I hope therefore that the House will give the Bill a Second Reading so that it can proceed in the usual way for more detailed consideration in Committee.
7.54 p.m.
Lord Finsberg: My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for what he said, and also the noble Lord, Lord Graham, who outside this Chamber I would call my friend, for what he said.
There has been no consultation because no consultation was possible. The board of the commission is in the position that unless it gets these powers, it has to continue with this time-wasting process. We were advised by no fewer than three sets of legal experts (the people who usually make the money in these matters) that for safeguarding the public purse and ourselves we had to get this addition to the statute, so on this occasion there was no body that could be consulted. Had there been one, we would certainly have done so. I hope that that will satisfy the noble Lord.
Lord Graham of Edmonton: My Lords, it does satisfy me. There is also the very great stop-gap that the Department of the Environment continues to have an oversight of the activities of such bodies as the New Towns Commission. I cannot believe that the propriety of what has been proposed as an amendment, as the Minister has said, is not seen as sensible and realistic. So the point is well taken here.
Lord Finsberg: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord. I have responded to the debate, and I therefore commend the Bill to your Lordships.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

Juvenile Offenders
7.55 p.m.
The Earl of Longford The Earl of Longford rose to ask Her Majesty's Government, in the light of their Statement of 2nd March, what proposals they have in mind for the treatment of juvenile offenders.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, just before I came to the House, I received a letter from someone whom I revere very much—if possible, even more than most of my colleagues, and that is saying a lot. That is the noble Lord, Lord Rix. I regard him as having done more than anybody I can think of for the distressed in our time. Unfortunately, he cannot take part in this debate. But I should like to quote a passage from what the noble Lord would like to have said:
"I am sure noble Lords understand the vulnerability of offenders who have learning disabilities. Juvenile offenders with learning disabilities are not only vulnerable by their intellectual impairment, but by their inexperience of life through their lack of years which … is not a fault of their own making! It is crucial that their special needs are recognised immediately and that they receive the attention of trained specialist stall".
I am sure that the noble Earl should be regarded as something of a hero in that, having argued about something else all afternoon, he should join us again this evening to look after our debate. I cannot expect him to respond to what the noble Lord, Lord Rix, says. I have only just been notified myself. I am sure, however, that he will be sympathetic to what the noble Lord says.
I wish to concentrate on what I might call the narrow aspect of my Question in other words the proposals brought before the House of Commons, and repeated here, on 2nd March by the Home Secretary, Mr. Kenneth Clarke. But before doing so I wish to say a few general words about young offenders. Perhaps I may be forgiven for mentioning the fact that I have written a book on the matter. If any noble Lords are still in this country on 26th August they may want to buy it at that time. But that is a long way on. I should like to say something about juvenile crime and its background. I do not want to restrict anyone. This Motion throws the whole question of juvenile crime and young offending open to everybody.
I shall make just a few observations before coming to the main issues that I wish to raise. I do not know how many of my colleagues—there are not all that many of them here—have visited a Conservative conference in recent times. I had the pleasure of visiting a Conservative conference last October. I was suitably decked up with a little card on a chain round my neck which described me as a Catholic Herald reporter. Whether noble Lords want to go in that particular disguise or otherwise, I recommend the experience to them in their search for truth. I had the pleasure of hearing Mr. Clarke speak. I shall not discuss that aspect. I heard him say with justifiable pride—worth bearing in mind when we hear the comments on juvenile crime, although it was last October:
"You will be as surprised as I was to be told that overall the number of young offenders is happily declining".

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That is the aspect that he wanted to present at that time. It was presented as a credit to the Government that they were managing to reduce the amount of juvenile crime. That was last October. A lot might have happened since then. I appreciate that one would have to embark on a statistical survey, which other noble Lords may wish to undertake, to analyse the figures. I shall not do that now. The fact is there.
On the other hand, there is also the fact, according to the criminal statistics, that overall crime in this country has been increasing over the past 10 years—and long before that—by about 6 per cent. That is the background to our discussion. It is an unfortunate fact about our society, which also has so many delightful features. It is a fact that crime is steadily increasing and it is difficult not to feel that young offenders play their part. On the evidence I would say that they play a smaller part than they used to play, even making allowance for the fact that they are a smaller proportion of the population. However, I shall not become involved in those issues tonight. I have been warned by the Home Office in a letter:
"We do not have any accurate measure of youth crime".
That is the official view. I say that to try to preclude any suggestion that we are facing a situation of appalling youth crime.
I come to the Government's proposals. On 2nd March Mr. Clarke produced his proposals. The main feature was that a small number of secure units would be set up which would take care of persistent young offenders. There was also, it may be said, a wider philosophy involved; namely, that more discipline ought to be introduced into schools and children's homes. Tonight, I shall deal with the particular proposal that there should be a small number of units made available.
I do not think it was in the original statement but one way or another it became understood that the Home Secretary had in mind five units with 40 people in each. That is quite a small number: 200 compared with more than 300,000 young offenders who are convicted of small or great crimes during the course of a year. That is what he said: that there was a small number of young offenders and those units should be set up.
The proposal was immediately denounced by the leading penal reform and children's organisations. There was widespread criticism also in the serious—I suppose one might also say dispassionate press, most of which would normally favour our Conservative friends. The leading article in The Times was typical. Under the heading "Panic Over Crime" The Times greeted the proposals which the noble Earl, no doubt with extraordinary skill, will defend later this evening. The Times recognised the recent public alarm as a result of the murder of a two year-old boy allegedly by two boys of 10 and 11—and there have been one or two other appalling incidents. The Times concluded that the Home Secretary's statement had all the hallmarks of being conceived and announced in panic—I repeat, panic. It added that,
"the best thing Mr. Clarke can now do is to cast about for ideas from the public".
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I hope and believe that our debate tonight will play a part in providing those ideas from the enlightened public.
I am personally rather wet among penal reformers in regard to the proposals. I am not one of the people who denounce the whole idea of some new units. I am very strongly opposed, as I shall show as I proceed, to an important aspect of them. If that aspect is not corrected the proposals will do more harm than good. But in general I am not against the idea that some units of some kind are necessary.
I therefore approach this Question in the form of questions to myself and answers first provided by myself. Then, no doubt, other noble Lords will tackle them. The first question to myself is: do I agree that a limited number of young offenders aged 12 to 15, who have committed grave crimes or who have persistently offended, should be removed from home and put into some kind of secure unit? To that question I give a qualified yes. I believe that some people should be removed from home. I am sure that the number is very limited. I shall come to the question of how many we are talking about later. At the moment the Home Secretary appears to be talking about a figure of 200.
I would say that 200 may be more than is necessary at the moment. We must bear in mind that penal reformers—at any rate a leading penal reform organisation such as NACRO—would like to see the age raised to 18 and no one under that age referred to any kind of penal custody. That means that a lot of people aged 16 or 17 who are not given penal custody would have to go somewhere else. Very few people would say that they all ought to be let loose in the community.
If we are looking ahead, certainly as penal reformers we must ask ourselves what will be the future in the next few years of those people who are not going to go to local penal custody, to Feltham and such places. One has to ask where they would go. That means that more than 200 people will eventually have to be catered for in that way. That is the future. If we are discussing the issue and making plans for the next few years, we must think beyond the immediate situation for 12, 13, 14 and 15 year-olds.
The children we are talking about are all boys. Apparently, the question of girls does not arise. I do not think that anyone will complain about that. No one, however feminist (and I of course am a feminist and think all enlightened people are) will ask, "What about the girls?" We are able to discuss this matter in terms of boys. When we remove a child from home, we take a heavy responsibility. We must all agree with that. We are under a powerful obligation to provide a better environment for the child than is provided at his home. We know that in some, perhaps many, cases the home environment may be very unsatisfactory. We know that a large number of children in residential homes are abused in one way or another. Nevertheless, taking a child away from home certainly involves a heavy responsibility on those who undertake it, and it should not be undertaken lightly.
Foster homes may be part of the answer. I shall leave that over for the moment. Let us assume that we are not just saying to these people, "Well, we know

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what prison is like. Let us make it another form of prison or even another form of young offender institution." Something better has to be provided. It has to be something educational and therapeutic. That is the responsibility that we take upon ourselves when we remove these people from home.
The next question concerns which government department should accept responsibility for these young people. I hope that the Minister will not give the final answer tonight. I hope that he will keep a constructively open mind about the whole question. I hope that he will not say, "The Government's and Mr. Clarke's reputation depend on the Home Office doing it, so they have to do it". I hope that that will not be his answer. I would rather have no answer at all than that answer. But we must consider which government department will accept the responsibility.
Initially, on the face of it, the Government indicated that the Home Office should do it. That would be a grievous mistake. The noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, who is to follow me, knows much more about the world of the social worker than 1, though I try to keep in touch. I do not believe that any social worker or former social worker would think that the Home Office was best equipped to do it. We shall hear from the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, with her experience on the matter.
The approach of the Home Office at its most high minded is bound to be penal. It may just be a word but it represents in the minds of social workers an entirely different approach from their own. I cannot express sufficiently my own horror at the thought of the Home Office taking responsibility. I hope that it will not come about and there is no reason why it should. Mr. Clarke could go down in history as having invented a helpful idea as long as he did not claim the credit for himself or his department.
The situation today is that local government secure units—I have visited a good many of them—come under the Department of Health. It would be ludicrous for the Home Office to provide some units and the health department to provide others. Total chaos would result. That is all that one could expect. When I visited an exceptionally progressive local government secure unit, social workers were present. I was told that it had been assumed until recently that the Department of Health had a strategic plan for increasing the number and quality of local government secure units. Then, suddenly, Mr. Clarke emerged with a scheme of his own.
I sympathise with Mr. Clarke. People say to him, "You are the Minister for law and order. That is what you stand for. What are you doing about all these juvenile crimes?" What does Mr. Clarke say? He replies, "I am opening a lot of units. It is entirely my own idea." That is a difficulty he faces. I am not saying anything unpleasant about him. I am giving him credit for rising above that personal situation and joining in consultation with other Ministers to find the right answer.
The question then arises of whether the existing local government secure units provide the answer. I say that to a limited extent they do. I have visited quite a few. They vary dramatically in size, from two in
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some cases to 45 in the case of Aycliffe, which is an impressive and famous institution in the north of England. The units are scattered higgledy-piggledy throughout the country. There are only seven units with more than nine inmates, so they are usually small units. The south of England is badly represented.
One must recognise the point of view of the police. That is why I am not as unsympathetic to Mr. Clarke as it may be thought. If one talks to the police, for instance in Oxford, one finds that young people who are found joy-riding are picked up but laugh at the magistrates. They say, "We know that there is nowhere you can send us." Taking the country as a whole but the south of England particularly, there is nowhere that we can send these persistent young offenders at the present time. That is the situation.
The question arises further in relation to how large the units should be. In that I would not like to be dogmatic. The one that I mentioned earlier was exceptionally enlightened and had eight beds. On the other hand, it hopes to have 15 later. Is that the right answer? I cannot be dogmatic on that point. I am sure that in any plan drawn up by the Home Secretary—I will take this up with other Ministers—there will be the wish to consider carefully how large the unit should be. If one intended to send a young person away from home for a few months—say three—a unit with eight beds may be sufficient. But if it is to be one or two years, an extremely therapeutic task will need to be performed and something much larger will be needed. I am not dogmatic about it. It needs to be looked at in the context of a national scheme.
One or two questions arise to which there can be no perfect answer. First, how do we ensure that these people are kept in touch with their homes? We are talking of only a few hundred people out of thousands of offenders; I do not want to mislead anybody. If there are only a few units, with a few hundred people being taken away from home, then clearly every effort must be made to keep those people in the closest touch with their families. The obvious answer is to make it easier for the families to visit, and that is done in the case of one unit that I have in mind. It should also be made possible for the young people to visit their homes at weekends or whenever the occasion arises. There is no perfect answer. There are only a few units in existence and they cannot be situated next door to everybody.
There may be no answer to the second question regarding how we make sure young delinquents do not corrupt each other. There can never be an answer to that question. When people are taken away from home because they have gone wrong and are put with other people who have gone wrong, difficulties arise. The secret must lie not only in the dedication, but also in the human understanding and skill, of the social workers.
We require what are called specially trained staff in the units which are dealing with the most vulnerable people in our society. There are only a few hundred and we must have people specially trained to look after them. That training may take different forms. In

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a place like Aycliffe some of them are trained educationally, some in the social services and some as nurses.
I repeat that we must make sure that somehow or other the social workers involved with these exceptionally vulnerable people are specially trained for the job. I have gone on rather longer than I expected, but I reach one practical conclusion: we need a national plan. I might add that I do not like the word "unit"; I hate the thought of anybody being sent to a "unit". People hate the phrase "approved school" because schools have a bad name too. We must find a suitable name for these places.
Somehow or other, if a system of this kind is to be brought into existence, it will depend on a national plan. It will not happen through incidental initiatives from local authorities. It will certainly not happen through some brilliant intuition of a Home Secretary who has reasons for wanting to take positive action. We must have a national plan. It will need a great deal of working out, but that is what we must have.
These sound like administrative questions but they are deeply human questions. That is how I approach them. I suppose that social workers generally, whether they are Christian or non-Christian and whether consciously or not, are committed to the message conveyed in Matthew: 25, where Jesus Christ said, "I was in prison and you came to me. In as much as you have done it to the least of these my brethren you did it to me". That is the spirit which animates social workers, Christian or non-Christian. However feebly, that is what animates me.
8.20 p.m.
Baroness Faithfull: My Lords, first, I pay tribute to the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers. He has sat through a long debate for the whole afternoon. We are all grateful to him for being on the Front Bench for this important debate this evening. I am sure that those on these Benches and noble Lords on other Benches would wish to thank him.
Noble Lords: Hear, hear!
Baroness Faithfull: My Lords, this debate on juvenile crime, initiated by the noble Earl, Lord Longford, to whom we are indebted, asks Her Majesty's Government what proposals they have for the treatment of juvenile offenders. It is not clear in the Statement made by the Home Secretary on 2nd March 1993 whether he has put forward recommendations set in stone or whether they are proposals as a basis for consultation and discussion.
The Home Secretary stated:
"The courts will be provided with a new sentence, which for the present"
is this therefore a suggestion only or a policy?—
"I am calling a secure training order. The order will be available for 12 to 15 year-olds who have been convicted of three imprisonable offences and have proved unwilling or unable to comply with the requirements of supervision in the community while on remand or under sentence … The order might"—
the Statement did not say "must" or "may"—
"last for up to two years".—[Official Report, Commons, 2/3/93; col. 139.]
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It is stated that the new secure training centres will be set up to provide high standards of care and discipline and opportunities for the juveniles to develop as individuals. It is further stated that the secure training orders will be different from anything that has been provided before. Does this apply to the order or to the type of secure training centre?
The Home Secretary went on to say that the Government had established a £10 million programme to help schools in 74 authorities to get to grips with the problem. It is not clear how this £10 million is to be spent. Is it to be spent on the secure training centres? Who is to administer such centres? Which are the 74 local authorities; and how were they chosen? Does this £10 million cover short-term, small local secure units, where a child's needs would be assessed and a plan made for greater co-operation with the parents? Does it cover the training of staff?
There are positive and commendable assertions in the Statement. The Statement says that parents should be involved in the responsibility for their children and that there must be a joint approach with the educational authorities, police, probation services and other agencies. On the assumption that the Home Secretary's Statement on 2nd March sought views and invited consultation, may I ask on what grounds the Home Secretary considers setting up secure training centres? These cannot be much different from the old approved schools where care, discipline, training and education were given.
Home Office Research Study No. 32 (1965–73) carried out at Kingswood Approved School, which was thought to have been the best of its type in the country, showed that in one house 70 per cent. of boys were reconvicted within two years, 69 per cent. in' a second house and 68 per cent. in a third house. In 1979 the University of Lancaster carried out research at Rochdale. It found that two-thirds of the boys from community homes with education were reconvicted within two years. In 1978 the Dartington research study headed Locking Up. Children showed high reconviction rates after discharge. Furthermore, the Department of Health and Social Security, as it then was, Research Report No. 5 (1979) also showed a high reconviction rate. The authors of the research wrote that,
"for the majority of boys the secure units"—
the approved schools—
"provide a brief sojourn in an expensive ante-room to the penal system".
I think it is accepted by us all that there must be local secure units where a child's individual needs may be assessed and a plan made for each individual child in co-operation with the parents. The children are all different. They are all individuals and their needs should be met individually and not by way of every child having two years and then being discharged.
What is going to be different in the composition of the secure training units? Should the country be spending £10 million on a scheme that has been proven to have failed by the Home Secretary's own department and other research units? On the assumption that the Home Secretary seeks the views of those whose work lies with juvenile crime, he must be aware that most young offenders can be best dealt

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with in the community. In 1983 the Department of Health and Social Security made available £15 million to finance intensive supervised activity schemes for juvenile offenders who would otherwise have received custodial sentences or care orders. The research shows that only 15 per cent. of juveniles attending those projects appeared in court for further offences. Such programmes allowed the boys to live at home. Attendance at the community centre involves training, sport and counselling.
I could take noble Lords to many good centres; notably, in Hampshire, Kent and up and down the country. I visited one of these centres run by Barnardos. I met a boy who had a long history of juvenile crime. He was living at home and attending the centre. He was helped through clubs, various recreational activities and also work. He also received counselling. I asked him why he was no longer involved in crime, as he had been for so many years. He said to me:
"I receive counselling two days a week. My counsellor has asked me about my home. My father drinks. He knocks my mother about. We are all very unhappy at home so the only thing for me to do is to get out, commit crime and get myself away from home. Now that I have had counselling I understand how unhappy my mother must be and how difficult my father is. The counsellor has suggested to me that I might help my mother and bring her sometimes to the club".
The boy is no longer committing crime. That story is true of many other boys receiving counselling, support and help.
I was worried about the criminal justice legislation, approved schools and the fact that they were very expensive and achieving very little. Ten boys who had been in approved schools visited your Lordships' House. They came before a group of Peers, one of whom I believe was Lord Seebohm and another the noble Baroness, Lady Serota. Lord Seebohm asked a boy, "While in the approved school, were you happy?" The boy replied, "Well, it was good food and it was very comfortable". Lord Seebohm said, "What did you do when you came out?" The boy said, "I had learnt to pick a lock, I had learnt how to get out of a window and I had learnt to steal and not be caught. I was fit so that I could run away". That is what the approved school gave the boy. I suggest that it will be the same with the secure units which we understand are to be set up.
Furthermore, with community-based work parents are involved. Section 1 of the Children Act 1989 recommends that the welfare of the child is paramount, but responsibility for the children lies with their parents. If we make plans for children without the co-operation of the parents, we are cutting off one side of the child's life. Juveniles sent away to custodial care lose contact with parents, family and community. On discharge they are the children who become homeless. They are the children on our streets and a proportion of them take to drugs and prostitution and later become a cost to the state, usually within the penal system.
I am not putting forward these views personally; they are based on research done by the Salvation Army in co-operation with Reading University. I urge the Home Secretary to consider community-based projects rather than custodial care. Even juveniles who
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commit crime need care, education and training. They also have feelings for their homes, their parents and their community. It is those feelings which are distorted and damaged and which have to be fostered and developed and certainly not repressed.
I believe profoundly in the setting up of secure units. I accept that we must have such units, but I believe that they should take the form of assessment centres. Each child should be assessed as to his or her particular needs and a plan made, as I said earlier, in co-operation with the parents. If a plan is made for that child to move out of the assessment centre (that is, the secure unit), it may be that when he goes into a community base and to his home, he should go back before the court to give an assurance that he is willing to conform to community care.
In schools children are disruptive, difficult and uncooperative. Under the new Education Act, as it will become, I wonder whether children could be assessed at an earlier age, because many of them show disruptive, unhappy and delinquent tendencies at quite an early age. If those children are dealt with by the social workers and the teachers at an earlier age, those children may be caught young and therefore not go into delinquency at a later stage.
There are vacancies in independent residential schools run by charities which give a splendid service where such children could be cared for. Perhaps it would be helpful if they were to have the £10 million. Saddest and perhaps most significant of all, family life is diminished. The Hesley Group is running a family group centre for a month in the summer where children at risk and their families are taken in. There is another such centre which is called Frimshurst.
A wide sweep of policies needs to be addressed. Juvenile crime cannot be dealt with by one set of people, and not by the Home Office or the Department of Health or the Department for Education alone; they must all work together. If they were to do so when the children are much younger, we may not wipe out juvenile crime but at least we should diminish it to a very great extent. I beg the Home Secretary to listen, hear and act accordingly.
8.35 p.m.
Lord Addington: My Lords, it often happens that when one has two such knowledgeable speakers earlier, much of what one wanted to say has been covered and in a better way than one can imagine oneself saying it. I find myself with many of the points that I considered making tonight in that situation. I also have a degree of sympathy for the noble Earl. Not only has he had to be here for almost the entire sitting but he also finds himself in a debate which touches on many departments beyond his own. As the noble Baroness has reminded us, the Department for Education is very much involved in this situation. If I remember the Statement correctly, on which we are holding this debate, the moral welfare of children and other types of education are involved.
As both previous speakers have said, nobody is denying that on occasions there will be a need for some restraint and custody for certain young people for the protection of society and of those people

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themselves. But these will be comparatively few cases. Also, it is well documented that custody tends to lead to a much higher level of reoffending. The noble Baroness has spoken about the academies of crime. We have heard about them very often and the fact that young offenders and adults go into prison and all they learn is how to survive there. That often leads to the greater use of violence because prisons, even with the best will and effort in the world, tend to be more violent establishments than the world outside. Prisons also teach people how to become criminals because that is the subject which invariably such people have in common and it is all they can talk about.
Even the limited amount of work which I have done in prisons and young offender institutions has shown me that people share this culture in which they have to survive and so they become part of it. It is very difficult to rehabilitate someone inside that culture. Now and again one is occasionally able to help a person to rehabilitate himself, but one cannot rehabilitate him.
When dealing with the very young, surely we want to avoid that situation wherever possible. For instance, it has been pointed out to me that, if we are considering some form of custodial sentence of up to two years—once again I agree with the noble Baroness that we are not quite sure what that means, although the figure of two years has been mentioned—we are actually imposing a slightly higher level of custody than we are for 16 year-olds, who are limited to one year. That is what I have been informed.
In addition, we are not sure who is to be in charge of the new units or whatever they are to be called. The simple reason is that we are considering social security, health and education aspects which come into this matter in a very important way. Therefore, there is a series of questions being asked: what exactly are the criteria for people to be sent to the units? I understand it has to be three "sensible" convictions. As the noble Baroness said, there are no hard and fast rules here. Everything is flexible as we are dealing with individuals.
I could go on in this vein, but I feel that I shall be repeating not only what has been said but also to a great extent what will probably be said later on. However, I should like to draw attention to and put some new dimensions on two very important points which were raised earlier on. One appeared in the letter written by the noble Lord, Lord Rix, and read out by the noble Earl, Lord Longford. It was also mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull. It refers to the fact that inside the prison system we have very many people who have educational problems.
A considerable amount of study has been done recently into the number of people in prison who have dyslexia. It suggests that those who are failures educationally thus become failures in the workplace and resort to crime. This and other special needs situations means that, if people start to fail young, there is a very good chance that their educational failure will lead to a higher incidence of offences being committed. Indeed, special needs is probably the only area that we have not yet considered in relation to crime. I say all this almost from instinct and for the
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simple reason that it is known that academic under-achievement tends to lead to bad behaviour. Virtually all teachers say that the least able pupil in the class is the one who is paying the least attention because he is getting the least out of the lesson.
If we are to try to avoid the problem of juvenile crime, we must address the problems which cause it. That means that we must invest in dealing with those problems. We must not merely lock those youngsters away, because in doing so we are locking them into what effectively becomes a pressure cooker environment or, ultimately, an academy of crime. That is what we have created whenever we have placed people in custodial situations, no matter how hard we have tried.
We must address the problems that arise when people are placed in custody. We cannot teach moral and spiritual values in places where people are denied even a degree of self-discipline and control because somebody else is imposing it upon them to a greater extent than would be the case in even a strict family regime. I suggest that everybody concerned looks very long and hard at any idea that suggests that we should lock more people away, especially when they are young.
8.41 p.m.
Baroness Mallalieu: My Lords, perhaps I may first pay tribute, as other noble Lords have done before me, to my noble friend Lord Longford, who is tireless in his work on behalf of those in trouble. He should know that his humanity is widely recognised and admired by those of us who come into contact with offenders in the course of our work. I am particularly grateful that he has tabled this Unstarred Question, not least because I hope that it will provide the noble Earl the Minister (who is, I know, also greatly concerned to reduce crime and to whose stamina in this Chamber I should like to pay tribute, as the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, has already done) with an opportunity to improve upon the Statement made by the Secretary of State on 2nd March, which I am afraid simply will not do.
I know that I am not alone in feeling that that Statement was profoundly pessimistic and depressing. Effectively, it contained no hope. There was no attempt in it at any new initiative or even encouragement to those who believe, as I do and as other speakers before me have indicated that they believe, that steps can and should be taken to discourage young people from becoming offenders in the first place or later from offending again. There was no apparent insight in that Statement into the causes of juvenile crime or even the will or intention to try to discover or to tackle them. Despite the wording of the Statement, it contained no new proposals, no new thinking and no hope.
To my noble friend Lord Longford, who has been in this House rather longer than I have, it must have seemed that we were coming around full circle and back to the old approved schools. The distilled essence of that Statement, cutting away the verbiage, was that

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all that this Government propose to do, it seems, is to lock up those who have already run through the system and become a public menace.
The Secretary of State's proposal was, I fear, made as a hasty response to then recent sensational press coverage of a small number of crimes which involved (or appeared to involve) young people. Now that some time has elapsed, I hope that in his response tonight the Minister will be able to be both more optimistic and more constructive than his colleague in another place was back in March.
The proposal for a secure training order for 12 to 15 year-olds is, I believe, misconceived. Further, I believe that it is likely actually to increase juvenile crime rather than reduce it. There are, I accept as others before me have done, a small number of 10 to 15 year-olds who will need to be detained. A figure of about 200 has been mentioned, but no one knows for certain. There are adequate powers to detain already—and in a variety of ways. Those under 14 can be placed in secure accommodation up to the age of 14 under a supervision order with a condition of residence in a secure unit, if need be. Those of 14 and above can be placed in secure accommodation under Section 53 of the Children and Young Persons Act. The powers are there for the courts if they choose to use them and are able to use them, but the facilities are often not there—at any rate not in the locality of the court.
Two years ago the Government made a promise that 65 further secure places would be provided. They have not been provided as yet. When the Minister replies, can he say whether it is still the intention of the Government to provide those 65 further secure places, and could he be good enough to give us an indication of the cost of such secure accommodation as compared with the cost of the proposed secure training order, for which a sum in the order of £2,000 per week per child has been suggested?
The existing secure units can be first-rate. Although my experience of them is rather less than that of the noble Lords and the noble Baroness who have already spoken, I hope that your Lordships will permit me to give a single recent example from my personal experience. It relates to a boy of 15 charged with rape. His mother was a single parent. There was no close male relative. Despite her very considerable efforts, she had been unable to prevent him from mixing with contemporaries in the area in which they lived who had bad records and who led him, via a history of truancy, into committing minor offences, until ultimately he was present and played a role (albeit minor) when others attacked a young girl. He was remanded into secure accommodation provided by the local authority where I visited him prior to his trial. There he had the good fortune to come under the care of a social worker who recognised him as a basically decent youngster. That social worker spent a considerable amount of time both with the boy and with his mother. He befriended the boy and helped the mother to obtain alternative accommodation. He accompanied the boy to his trial, stood with him and was present and helped him throughout that period.
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Even out of his own money he bought the boy a jacket so that he could appear in court looking smartly dressed.
After the boy's conviction and sentence, and after his release, the social worker continued to provide the male guidance which had been lacking, it seemed, throughout the boy's life. Only time will now tell if he reoffends. He was detained in secure accommodation where he was treated in a way that was based on care rather than punishment, which is surely the appropriate procedure in relation to someone of 15 who is, after all, only a child. I am in no doubt that that young man's chance of avoiding reoffending was greatly enhanced by his experiences in that unit.
Young offender institutions, whatever their intentions and whatever the quality of the staff within them (which may be of the highest), cannot produce that sort of individual care. Following that example, it came as no surprise to me to learn that the research that was carried out by the Home Office last year found that secure accommodation was more effective in reducing recidivism and in reintegrating children into the community than young offender institutions.
The proposed secure training order is effectively the approved school order rechristened. But approved schools did not work. That is why they were scrapped. Indeed, research back in the 1970s, of which I have no doubt the Minister is well aware, indicated that those who were graduates of approved schools were about 49 per cent. more likely to re-offend than those treated differently. Those of us who appear in the courts—this is something to which the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, referred—see day after day the antecedents of offenders which show the classic pattern of approved school, detention centre, Borstal and then on to prison as adults.
The Government's proposal goes backwards. It may well be more expensive, in any event, than providing extra secure places. I hope that the Minister will tell us. There will be a substantial delay before it can be implemented. Large capital expenditure would be needed before it could take place. It is likely to be less effective in preventing further crime and, it is fair to say—I do not believe that this is an exaggeration—that it returns to an approach which was tried and tested and which failed.
The powers to detain exist. What is needed is extra secure places in some areas. I urge the Minister to be constructive in his reply. I shall try to be so myself in what I say now. We need to try to identify those who go on to offend before they do so. It is clear that in many cases offending is related to family disturbance. If an illustration of that were needed, it is provided most graphically by the figures for the 10,000 or so 16 to 18 year-olds who leave care each year. Of those in young offender institutions, 38 per cent. have a care background, and 23 per cent. of those in adult prisons have been in care at some time.
Teachers tell me that they can spot potential offenders when they are young. Indeed, those of us who have small children come to know from them which children disrupt the class, or even the play-school class, at a very early age. Identifying those

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at risk of being the juvenile offenders of the future and heading them off is what the Government's prime task should be. It should not be just to deal with the effects.
What is needed is a true, comprehensive crime strategy, not just the paying of lip service to such a strategy, as we read and heard in the Statement. It must be implemented at a local level. As the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, said, it must involve not just the police, but parents, schools, social services, voluntary organisations and charities in a wide variety of different ways, ranging through merely befriending children in need, counselling them, providing them with activities and giving the help which may not be available within the family. The strategy must aim at picking up the problems which are the key to the offending which may come later—behavioural problems, lack of parental control, family breakdown, inadequacy and truancy—and giving help to those people at home, at school and, above all, in the community. We should not wait until the police become involved.
We need money to be directed to schools, not merely on the basis of pupil numbers, but specifically to those in disadvantaged areas so that parental care can be supplemented where necessary. To take one example, schools could be used by teachers and by others in the community outside school hours. There are many ways in which the estimated £2,000 per child per week that the secure training scheme will cost could be used to help. In many cases that would result in preventing crimes occurring later.
I said that the Statement was a depressing one. So much could have been said in that Statement and so little was said. So little is apparently to be done when so much needs to be done. Having heard similar views and criticisms of the Statement from all sides of the House, I hope that when he replies the Minister will feel that he can give us some cause for the optimism which was notably lacking from the Statement made by his colleague in another place back in March.
8.55 p.m.
Lord Desai: My Lords, as the last speaker and the least expert of all those who have gone before, I shall be brief. I thank my noble friend Lord Longford for allowing us to discuss the issue. Various false notions persist, and this proposal is a good example of that, as other speakers have already pointed out. One false notion is that the hard, tough, violent response to crime is more likely to cure a criminal or prevent a criminal returning to crime. It seems that labelling people as offenders early and putting them into prison is a good response. People argue that the soft strategy of trying to reform, paying a great deal of attention to the social, educational and parental background is somehow mollycoddling or indulging the person and will not cure the problem.
We have heard today that the more painstaking, slow and so-called soft, careful approach, which builds upon the community and parental background and uses schools, local authorities, probation officers, charities and so forth, is not merely likely to be more effective in preventing the person from reoffending
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but, if someone took care to examine the costs of the two rival approaches, they would find that that so-called soft approach may be cheaper in the short term but will definitely be cheaper in the long term. Once one labels someone at an early age—we are talking about 12, 13, 14 or 15—that person has been landed with a criminal character for a lifetime; and that person causes a great deal of damage, financial and otherwise to society. We know that they will reoffend.
That small boy of two was killed because we had had a complete failure of leadership on all sides. No one stood up and said, "Hang on, yes, it was a heinous crime. By some accident it was committed by very young boys, but that does not lead us to throw away everything we have learnt about the nature of crime and the way to approach it. That failure of leadership is what led to the Statement of 2nd March. We are looking forward to hearing about a correction of that failure from the Minister.
8.58 p.m.
Baroness Seear: My Lords, I believe that it has been agreed by all speakers and most commentators on the not very well received Statement of March, that there is a need for secure units for a limited number of people. Where the disagreement starts, which is soon after the beginning of the discussion, is when we talk about what those secure units should be. The noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, said tonight, as she said when the Statement was made in your Lordships' House, that there are suitable places available in independent institutions and also in local authority institutions which could be used for this purpose and which have a good record of dealing with youngsters of this kind.
I had the opportunity to discuss this issue with two senior magistrates only the day before yesterday. They were of the same view as the noble Baroness and gave the impression that that was a view widely held among the magistracy. However, they said that they thought that there were not enough of those places in independent institutions. If there are not enough places but they are the right places, surely it is more sensible to add to existing accommodation rather than to embark upon new building and a new scheme altogether.
The one good thing about the Statement is that it recognises that a great deal of money must be I committed to solving the problem. Noble Lords this evening have already produced a number of ways in which that money would be better spent in order to achieve the objectives which the Secretary of State wishes to achieve. Therefore, we do not start by being told that it is no good making suggestions because there is no money and therefore nothing can be done about the problem. The money is there and we are putting forward ways in which we believe that that money can be put to better use.
I believe that it is agreed also that, although there is a great deal of juvenile crime, only a very small number of youngsters are seriously and deeply into crime at an early stage. I understand that the people dealing with those problems recognise that that is the

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position. The numbers are not large and, to a large extent, it is known who are the people involved. We are not dealing with a vast number of people.
We talk about juvenile crime as though every offender were of the same order. That is wildly different from the truth. There are a small number of serious persistent offenders and there are a large number who get into trouble from time to time, who do not do anything desperately serious and who grow out of it. As one of my colleagues on the criminal Bench says, the thing to do to get rid of crime is to encourage people to grow old, because they drop it. We cannot do much about that, although your Lordships' House is rather good at it.
I wish to make the point that, since we know that there are not large numbers involved and since we recognise that money must be spent on solving the problem, the Secretary of State should be encouraged to re think how best to use that money. I speak now as chairman of the Apex Trust, which many of your Lordships have helped in the past. That trust is concerned with obtaining jobs for ex-offenders and very largely they are young ex-offenders, because a high proportion of ex-offenders are young. The Apex Trust has found that a youngster who has offended repeatedly as a child and a very young person is extraordinarily difficult to place. By the time such youngsters reach the Apex Trust, they are, except in a few fortunate cases, beyond what such an organisation is able to do for them. I suspect that that is the experience of any organisation which is attempting to deal with youngsters of that kind.
As young people grow older with long records of delinquency and offences, repeatedly serving prison sentences, they are an enormous burden not only to themselves but also to society. They will certainly cost society a great deal of money. Money spent on preventing that delinquency would pay one thousand fold—that may be a slight exaggeration but it would pay over and over again—compared with the cost to society if those people become perpetual offenders, constantly in and out of penal institutions. Therefore, if the Government will take a slightly longer-term view, they will see that that expenditure is not only intelligent and humane but it is also, in a hard-headed sense, the most economic step to take. We must plough in the money at an early stage to see that delinquency does not develop and, if it does, a great deal of trouble must be taken to deal with it.
I should like to say one or two things about how that money should be used. I suppose that we all remember the phrase, "give me a child until he is seven". As the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, said, we are told by teachers that they can recognise very early on the children who are likely to turn into offenders. Not so long ago—and I hope it still happens in some cases but I am sure that it now happens to a much smaller extent—infant and primary schools were able to employ additional staff in order to help with children who were showing behavioural problems. If you can win the children round at that stage and head them off from the delinquent tendencies which they are already showing, you may avoid the problems which will otherwise develop.
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One difficulty that we recognise is that that means collaboration between government departments. I believe that government departments are downright delinquent in the way they refuse to collaborate. We shall not solve this problem without collaboration between education and health departments and the Home Office working together. We must start to plough some of the money into schools so that extra help will be available to deal with these youngsters.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, said and as the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, illustrated, when you are dealing with delinquent youngsters in trouble, it is almost certain that personal contact and personal links will make all the difference. Those links can be established only if there is a good teacher, a good social worker, or, if the youngsters are lucky enough, a good friend who is able to give the time, the guidance and help to encourage at a point in time at which that help is most urgently needed. Personal attention by skilled people is needed so that a young delinquent can understand the nature of, and reason for, what he is doing. That is hard personal casework which is time consuming and expensive. However, again and again, it shows results.
The noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, gave one illustration and I shall give another. I know a family which is always in and out of trouble in one way or another. One child was constantly being picked up at school for stealing. On one occasion he was picked up at school with £80 which plainly did not belong to him. He was sent to an institution where there was a very high staffing ratio. One of the teachers there discovered that the boy was good at football and was able to build up his self-esteem and confidence by starting with the appreciation of his skill at the game. That boy, unlike the rest of the family, completed his training to be a carpenter and has never been out of a job. It all started, after the schools had failed, when someone in an institution with a high staffing ratio had the time and, having the skill, the training and the knowledge, was able successfully to turn the boy just at the point at which there was a chance of doing so.
It cannot be just chance that at least three speakers have been able to produce examples of that kind. I think that one would be hard put to produce similar examples resulting from locking people up in approved schools. Moreover, that is also very expensive. Therefore, money spent now on the right treatment, instead of spending much money on the wrong treatment, is surely one of the best ways to tackle the problem. I only wish that the Secretary of State would take the matter back and think again about the reallocation of resources and the collaboration between departments.
I have one further comment to make which may be quite beside the point. It relates to the serious offenders about whom we have talked. I detest organised games; indeed, I spent a great deal of time in my youth successfully avoiding them. But, having had three brothers, I am also aware of the enormous amount of aggression that the young male has to get rid of somehow or other. That is a very common experience and I believe—dare I say it?—that there is quite a considerable sex difference involved. I do not

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believe that women have quite the same amount of aggression that we have to get out of our system compared to a young male.
I believe it is absolutely deplorable that so many city schools have such totally inadequate playing facilities. The opportunity to give youngsters the chance to knock things about within a legal framework has been taken away from them. If they cannot knock things about in a legal framework, then they will do so in an illegal framework. If some money could go into providing better opportunities for hard, physical, rough games which would exhaust the youngsters and get the aggression out of them, we might solve a great proportion of these troubles.
9.10 p.m.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Longford is the latest and one of the most humane and civilised in a long line of people in this country who have been concerned with young offenders. We must be grateful to him for the initiative that he has taken this evening in raising the matter in your Lordships' House. The history of our treatment of young offenders is not a happy one. Without going any further back, 150 years ago the Australians refused to take any more transported people; that is, both young and old. So we had to build many more prisons where, quite rightly, the emphasis was that so far as possible children should be kept separate from adults. That developed into a system of reformatories many of which, incidentally—if not all—were privately run. Can the Minister say what is the likely gap between the establishment of the secure training units and their privatisation? As I said, many of them were privately run and by 1900 there were no fewer than 22,000 young people in such privately-run reformatories. It is a horrible thought that that was deemed to be necessary at the time.
In the 1920s we had the setting up of the borstals which were supposed to be a more civilised form of custody than the reformatories. Under the great Alexander Paterson, there was an attempt to civilise them further by making them more like public schools. Personally, that thought fills me with dread, but clearly it was thought to do some good. Then, as has been said, we had the approved school experience. All those experiences have surely shown that keeping children in custody away from their families and parents does not actually work.
We then come to 2nd March, or perhaps we should start a few weeks before, because in January there was the horrible murder of James Bulger in Bootle. Without any change whatever in the law, the immediate effect was that more magistrates and judges were giving custodial sentences to children. It is an astonishing state where magistrates and judges have the ability to choose the kind of sentence that they will give and where, because of the panic that followed the murder of James Bulger, so many more in fact chose to respond by giving custodial sentences.
I rather fear that the reaction of the Home Secretary when he made his Statement on 2nd March was very much the same. I believe that it was a panic
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reaction to a perceived problem which does not actually exist. All the evidence available shows that not only is juvenile crime not increasing, but also that the hard core of juvenile crime—which is what the Statement was supposed to be about—does not appear to be increasing. We must be cautious in that respect. Clearly there is an element of what the National Association of Senior Probation Officers call "diversion"; in other words, the increasing tendency for the police to give cautions to young people rather than to take them into the criminal justice system. If that results in less reoffending, that is a good thing. If it is caused by a lack of resources of the police and of the criminal justice system to enable them to deal with young people, clearly it is something we must consider with much greater scepticism.
However, the evidence is that, compared with detention for young people, cautions work. My noble friend Lady Mallalieu pointed out that the figures for recidivism among graduates of approved schools were 49 per cent. higher than among those who had been treated differently. Some 87 per cent. of those who have been cautioned do not reoffend within the next two years. That is a remarkable achievement. It requires a great deal more research to discover under what circumstances cautions can be used instead of bringing young people into the criminal justice system.
The conclusion reached on 4th and 5th March at a conference organised by Action on Youth Crime at Cumberland Lodge—the noble Baroness, Lady Faithful, and my noble friends Lady Hilton and Lord Henderson of Brompton were present at that conference—was that if we need anything it is improved standards and more comprehensive provision in existing institutions. We need to use existing methods in existing institutions rather than set up new institutions, new offences and new secure units. That is the conclusion that I draw from all the speeches we have heard tonight. I do not believe anyone has spoken of the justification for new secure units. Those at the conference also reached that conclusion.
At the time of the Statement on 2nd March it was pointed out that what is needed are more resources for local authorities to provide a youth service, to reduce exclusions from schools and to provide nursery places. It is well known that all those factors are heavily associated with lower levels of offences among young people. It is also well known that crime among young people and older people is heavily associated with poverty, bad housing, a poor environment, family break-up, difficult family problems and aversion to and exclusion from education. I do not say that crime is caused by those factors—I will not get caught in that trap—but I insist that unless we deal with those social problems our chances of reducing crime among young people and adults are severely reduced.
It has been made clear in this debate that what is being proposed by the Government is an extreme solution. It is an expensive, small-scale and long-delayed solution. It will be a long-delayed solution because it will require legislation. It is a solution that applies to a small number of people. What has been suggested by almost every speaker tonight is that there are alternatives which the

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Government should be considering. I agree with what has been said and I wish to spell out what we consider to be the right approach to this problem.
I have already said that cautions work. We should study the conditions under which cautions can be made to work better. We must improve the way in which we deal with young people who are on bail or on remand because one of the most significant problems as regards offences among young people is the number of offences that are committed when they are on bail. We need a better bail support and enforcement programme. We need, where necessary, to get these young people away from damaging home environments and therefore we need better provision for fostering for young people on remand. We need much closer supervision of young people who are on bail.
We also need something it does not matter what it is called that is comparable to a reparation order. That might be quite limited. It might only have to last for three months. Under such a scheme the young person would not just perform community service. He or she—I believe young women are involved in this matter despite what the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, said would be required to make reparation to the victim.
While that is taking place I suggest that we need to give greater support to the families of these young persons and to their parents. We need to concentrate on the young persons' education needs, as often an aversion to school, a failure at school or truancy from school are associated with offending. We need to provide leisure activities to occupy these young persons' time; if necessary, away from young people of the same age. Only as a last resort should we impose custodial sentences. Only as a last resort of that should we impose custodial sentences in new institutions because I am simply not convinced that supervision orders for under-14s, with a residential requirement, are not adequate for the purpose. There is special provision for those who are accused, or are convicted of, homicide. There is certainly perfectly good provision for those aged 14 and over who come within the age group the Home Secretary has been concerned with.
The setting up of secure accommodation in perhaps five centres throughout the country under the central direction of the Home Office rather than local authorities and the Department of Health is the last thing that we should want. Inevitably, those institutions will be remote from the young person's home and young people will be cut off from their families. Even though the centres are called "training institutions"—and perhaps significantly because they are called "training institutions"—there will be a break in any educational development. All the evidence has shown—I do not need to go back further than the 150 years I have already gone—that locking up young people in such institutions will result in more people, in the phrase of the Dartington Social Trust, moving into the ante-room of the criminal justice system.
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I do not accuse anyone in the Home Office, Ministers or officials, of bad faith in this matter but I sincerely suggest that they may be mistaken.
9.21 p.m.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the House will be grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Longford, for raising the important issue of juvenile offenders and how best to respond to the problems which they cause. It certainly has been a most interesting debate, as often happens in your Lordships' House, in particular late in the evening. The debate has been complemented by the participants having a knowledge of an intricate and important subject.
The noble Earl's Question refers to the Statement made by my right honourable friend the Home Secretary outlining a programme of measures aimed at alleviating some of the worst aspects of crime caused by juveniles. One of the main proposals is the new sentence which is provisionally called a "secure training order". That is designed for 12 to 15 year-olds who repeatedly offend and who have shown that they will not comply with community supervision.
During the past few years great efforts have been made to divert young people away from custody. The noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, said that cautioning works. I agree that it does and that it has been effective. The new guidance which is being issued to police forces will improve still further the process of cautioning. But it is precisely the success of cautioning and of other community-based responses to crime which has revealed a small hardcore of potential and persistent juvenile offenders who do not stop offending despite being cautioned or being given supervision orders. Police cautioning has proved to be an effective way of responding to minor crime. Less than 15 per cent. of those who were cautioned in 1985 were convicted again within two years. Supervision in the community has proved to be an effective method, and in some cases a good deal more effective than custody, of reducing reoffending. Those efforts have been successful for the large majority of young offenders.
The noble Baroness, Lady Seear, referred to the Apex Trust. I recognise the importance of trying to find offenders jobs when they have left custody. I agree that the Apex Trust offers a wide range of employment support to offenders. I am glad to say that the Home Office has funded the trust to the tune of £320,000 per year, which is a considerable sum of money. I hope that the noble Baroness will agree that that is a recognition of the work which is done.
Many noble Lords referred to the regrettable fact that imprisonment can be an expensive way of making bad people worse. That of course applies equally to young offenders as to older ones. But for young people the removal from their home, their family, their school or even their work can have a particularly damaging effect, as many noble Lords have said. The Government have therefore tried to extend and to strengthen the range of community sentences which are available for young people.
The noble Baroness said that there should be collaboration among government departments. I

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agree that that is vital. In the Statement of 2nd March which my right honourable friend made, he announced initiatives by the Home Office, the Department of Health and the Department for Education, and that joint approach to juvenile offenders is continuing through a series of meetings at both ministerial and official levels.
The noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, was also concerned about the joint approach to juvenile crime. I can tell her that the 24 criminal justice area liaison committees are already helping to develop that joint strategy. A circular called Young People and the Youth Court has been sent to relevant agencies on the operation of the youth court. That has already encouraged the police, probation and social services to work together to prepare for the youth court. It is important that those organisations and departments should work together.
Since October of last year the full range of community orders—probation orders, supervision orders and the new combination order which combines probation and community service—has been available for 16 and 17 year-olds. National standards have also been introduced for those orders. They include tough enforcement provisions if offenders fail to comply with the order.
The Criminal Justice Act 1991 has introduced new measures which will involve parents taking some responsibility for their children when they offend. However, there is a particular problem which relates to a small minority of juvenile offenders. The noble Earl, Lord Longford, and the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, referred to a decline in juvenile crime. The statistics are notoriously difficult. The discrepancy is partly explained by differences between the number of offenders and the number of offences. While the number of known offenders may have gone down, each known offender has on average committed more offences per caution or conviction.
Over the past 12 months the Government have been looking very closely at the problems which are caused by the small hard core of young criminals who commit a disproportionately large number of crimes. The noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, said that there is no evidence of the need for that and that no one can see any justification for those orders. That may be the view of the noble Lord, but it is not everyone's view.
Those young people have shown themselves to be beyond the influence of the existing systems of child care and of criminal justice. They have shown themselves to have exhausted the ability and the resources of the community—and its ability to deal with reaction to crime. They are children who consistently play truant, who run away from their homes and who constantly continue to commit crimes. It is, of course, right that the Government and all those who deal with young people should do their utmost to bring up the young properly: to educate them; to cultivate their minds; to teach them to know what is right and what is wrong; and to understand the difference; and, where they go off the rails, to try to get them back on again with the least permanent damage.
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However, one has to accept that for some young people in the community that approach does not work.
Whenever I have been around the country and visited places where there have been disturbances, such as the Meadowell Estate in Newcastle, South Wales or Bristol and other places, I have invariably been told that there are a number of young people—sometimes 20, sometimes 12 and sometimes more—who are known to the police, who are known to be destructive and who ruin the lives of everyone else on the estates.
On many occasions those are young people—sometimes very young—for whom the law has so far had little impact and who hold it in no respect. My noble friend Lady Faithfull said that those young people ought to be rehabilitated within the community. She gave an example of a boy who was counselled and who gave up crime. That was an excellent example. I agree with her that counselling does a great deal of good, and I am glad that it worked. But I am also glad that my noble friend the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, and even the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, agreed—
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, the noble Earl says "even".
Earl Ferrers: Yes, I say "even" because the noble Lord contradicted himself. They agreed that there was a place for secure units. The noble Viscount, Lord Addington, made an impressive speech and spoke with feeling.
Lord Addington: My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for the promotion.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the noble Lord said that custody leads to reoffending and therefore, by inference, that custody was bad. It is for those people that the secure training order has been devised. They have been given every chance and they have rejected it. For the people in the community whose lives have continued to be ruined by the young people, I think that the only course is to hook them out in order to give others a more peaceful life. It is for them that the secure training order has been devised.
My noble friend Lady Faithfull was worried about parental involvement in the secure training centres. Of course, they will be flexible and will assess the trainees as individuals and establish a care plan in conjunction, where possible, with the parents and the training supervising officer. We accept the need to draw in parents and involve them, where possible.
The noble Earl, Lord Longford, does not like the word "units" and I do not blame him, but I am not sure that "institutions" is much better. Nevertheless, perhaps we may call them that for the time being.
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, I should not like them to be called "institutions" either.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, that is what I was saying. Let us not get involved in semantics but accept the expression for the moment. If the youngsters can be improved, so be it. However, I believe that the prime purpose of putting those young people into secure

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institutions must be realised to be for the benefit of the community from which they have come. Then we must try to improve them. It is in that order. Those children need to be provided with a place where they can be kept in security. They will be given education; they will be given care. And it is to be hoped that they will emerge better and more law-abiding citizens at the end.
My noble friend Lady Faithfull, the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, said that custodial institutions for juveniles of that age group have in the past failed and that youngsters who have left borstals and approved schools have in general only increased their rates of re-offending. In many cases, that has been so. My noble friend Lady Faithful] referred to the failure of the approved schools. However, in developing the secure training order, we shall be drawing on the lessons of past experience. The approved schools catered for a wide range of children in large numbers: they failed to ensure that the children were supervised when they returned to their home community. The secure training centres will not repeat those omissions.
The noble Lord, Lord Addington, referred to the drawbacks of custodial institutions. I recognise that institutions can, as they say, be universities of crime. But the secure training centres will aim to prevent that by developing good, positive relationships between staff and the juvenile offenders and by having much smaller numbers of juveniles than was the case in the borstals and approved schools. The noble Lord was also worried about the culture in the secure training centres. The staff in the centres will strive to ensure that a criminal culture does not take hold. In a programme of care, education and discipline, offending behaviour will he tackled.
We hope that the failure of approved schools and borstals in the past will not be repeated this time, but we cannot be too starry-eyed. Some of those young people, for whatever reason, have shown themselves to be bad. We may not succeed in reforming them, but we have to try.
How will the institutions work? First, they will be limited to those children who genuinely need to be contained. Courts will only be able to make an order where statutory criteria are met. Secondly, the regime in the new secure facilities will concentrate on tackling offending behaviour. Many of the successful community programmes which have been developed in recent years have included techniques designed to confront offenders with the consequences of what they have done and make them realise the consequences, both for themselves and for society, of their continued bad behaviour.
The noble Lord, Lord Desai, was worried that those people would be labelled as criminals if they were sent to a secure training centre. To qualify for a secure training order, the young person will already have been convicted of three imprisonable offences and will have proved unwilling or unable to comply with a supervision order. So he will have got into that position of his own volition.
One of the drawbacks of the existing secure accommodation for juvenile offenders is that it caters
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for a wide range of youngsters with a variety of problems. Some are related to offending. Others are not. The noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, said that more secure accommodation was needed. But in the Statement on 2nd March it was said that regulations under the Children Act will be amended to allow private and voluntary sectors to provide secure accommodation.
The noble Baroness was also concerned about the extra 60 to 65 places in local authority accommodation. Those places are designed to end the remanding of 15 and 16 year-olds to prison. Plans for the extra accommodation are well advanced and the places are expected to be available in 1995.
In addition, the noble Baroness was concerned about the existing powers. Local authorities, and not the courts, have the responsibility of deciding whether a juvenile under 15 needs to be held in secure accommodation. The local authorities will be reminded of that responsibility. Section 53 of the 1933 Children and Young Persons Act allows the courts to detain only those 10 to 13 year-olds who are convicted of murder or manslaughter. The secure training order is designed to allow courts to deal with the persistent offender committing less grave crimes. The new orders will be served in places which are designed to deal with offending and also designed to deal with how to avoid it.
Then there is greater emphasis on what is termed "through care" or "aftercare". The period in security is only the beginning of the sentence. A later period of supervision when they are released will provide a bridge back to the community in which the youngsters will have returned to live. This is an area which previous custodial orders have not always addressed. My right honourable friend's Statement set out a number of other measures which are designed to prevent children from committing crime and for dealing better with those who do.
The noble Earl, Lord Longford, concentrated in his remarks upon the new secure training order. He suggested that, in the words of The Times newspaper, the best thing for the Government to do would be,
"to cast about for ideas from the public".
We are casting about for new ideas. No government—and certainly not this Government—can be sufficiently arrogant as to consider that they have a monopoly either of ideas or of innovation.
My noble friend Lady Faithfull was concerned about the expenditure of £10 million by the Department for Education. She asked whether we should be spending that on a scheme known to have failed. I tell my noble friend that the money has nothing to do with the secure training order. The £10 million is to help schools to tackle truancy.
We are discussing with interested individuals and organisations how best to put this new policy into practice. We have distributed copies of my right honourable friend's Statement widely, and we have invited comments from more than criminal justice and social work organisations. The replies from experts, interested parties and the public will play an important part in ensuring that the new order is as

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effective as possible in dealing with the small group of juveniles for whom other methods simply have not worked.
The noble Earl, Lord Longford, raised a number of important questions to which the Government are still giving consideration. The precise number of places which are to be made available and their location has yet to be determined.
The answer to the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, is that we intend that a variety of organisations from the public, the voluntary sector and the private sector will be able to provide the new places which will be required. But, of course, they must all meet the standards which are set by the Government.
The noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, referred to costs. I am bound to tell her that I cannot at present tell her what the cost is for places in secure training centres as we are still consulting interested parties on the likely content of the work which they will undertake.
We are still working out the likely specification for the new places. This is one of the areas about which we are particularly interested to hear from those who have experience, expertise or views and who can suggest the sort of regime which is likely to be the most effective.
The noble Earl, Lord Longford, wanted to know which department was going to be responsible. He said that he hoped that my right honourable friend's reputation would not depend upon it being in the Home Office. He told me the answers that he did not want me to give. I do not know whether I will give him the answer that he would like me to give him, but I can tell him that—
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, would the noble Earl be good enough to repeat his last remarks?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I was reminding the noble Earl of what he said. He said that he wanted to know which department was to be responsible. He said that he hoped the reputation of my right honourable friend the Home Secretary would not depend upon it being the Home Office. I can assure him that my right honourable friend's reputation will not depend on such an important decision. He takes many such decisions.
The noble Earl also told me the answers that he did not want me to give. I said that I would give him the answer that I wanted to give him and I hoped that it would meet with his approval. He suggested that the
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new places should be overseen by the Department of Health and that those places should form part of a national network of secure accommodation.
We have established an interdepartmental working group, which includes representatives from the Home Office, the Department of Health, the Department for Education and other government departments. The noble Earl will be delighted to know that it is chaired by a senior Home Office official.
It is envisaged that the order will be a sentence of a court in criminal proceedings. The Home Office must, therefore, have responsibility for ensuring that places are available in which those sentences can be served. The new places may have some similarities to existing secure units, and they will certainly seek to provide high levels of care, discipline and education.
The Department of Health's social services inspectorate will play a part in ensuring that the standards are high. But the fact that all the youngsters in the new places will be persistent juvenile offenders—offenders who are serving a sentence of the court—makes it eminently sensible for the Home Office to be primarily responsible for them.
The proposed new order will require primary legislation and, in due course, your Lordships will have the opportunity to discuss in detail the criteria for the new sentence and how it will work in practice. As my right honourable friend said in his statement on 2nd March, we have not come forward lightly with proposals which have the serious effect of depriving children of their liberty and of removing them from their families. But we have to take account of the quite unacceptable and intolerable effect which constant criminal behaviour by some juveniles has had on the rest of the community of which they form a part. In school-boy language, "it is not fair" on the rest of the community that their lives should be ruined by selfish youths who have a total disregard both for the law and for others.
The noble Earl, Lord Longford, is quite right in saying that we have a moral duty to ensure that the children who become subject to this new order should be dealt with in a way which tries to enable them to become law abiding adults. It will not be easy. But we must certainly try.

Pensions Schemes Bill [H.L.]
Reported from the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills with amendments.
House adjourned at eighteen minutes before ten o'clock.