Lords Sitting of 11 June 1999

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

Protection of Children Bill
Lord Laming: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Laming.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [Duty of Secretary of State to keep list]:
Earl Howe Earl Howe moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 1, line 13, at end insert ("or should no longer be included in it")
The noble Earl said: The Bill is quite rightly concerned with closing loopholes that have in the past enabled child molesters to move from one childcare job to another, sometimes with complete impunity, over a period of many years. There is an urgent need to ensure that such people are prevented permanently from working with children. I am the first to recognise how important that need is.
As a result of amendments passed in another place, the grounds for including someone on the Secretary of State's list are now confined, in Clause 2(7)(a), to,
"misconduct … which harmed a child or placed a child at risk of harm",
combined with the Secretary of State's opinion that the person concerned was unsuitable to work with children. "Misconduct" is a term that I take to mean several things. It includes the case of the child molester whose deliberate actions cause harm to a child, but it also includes the case of someone who has been relieved of his position within an organisation, perhaps transferred elsewhere within it, as a result of gross incompetence that harmed a child or placed a child at risk of harm. In other words, it is quite possible to imagine circumstances where a person's name is included on the list as a result of an act of inadvertence, albeit a serious one, as opposed to an act involving deliberate predatory behaviour.
For example, we can well imagine a young person of, say, 18 or 19, working in a children's home who puts a child's life at risk by virtue of sheer thoughtlessness or even ignorance. The children's home decides that it cannot afford to take a risk again with that individual and therefore dismisses him for misconduct. Assuming that the Secretary of State shares that view and believes that the individual is unsuitable to work with children as a consequence of what he has done, his name will go
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on the list. There is then only one way that his name can be removed from the list; namely, following a successful appeal to the tribunal.
However, let us suppose that the tribunal dismisses an appeal. The young person grows up, becomes wiser and more experienced, perhaps has a family of his own, perhaps even persuades a voluntary group such as the Scouts to let him supervise a Scout group, and that person comes to be regarded as a thoroughly reliable and trustworthy individual in the supervision of children. The question we have to ask is whether in a case such as that there should be no mechanism whatever open to the individual to enable him to have his name removed from the list.
Under Clause 1(3) the Secretary of State is enabled to remove a person's name from the list if he is satisfied that it should not have been included in the first place. That is entirely reasonable and right. But it does not cover the case of someone such as I have described who has lost an early appeal to the tribunal but who has then convincingly redeemed himself of his past incompetence by virtue of a long and satisfactory track record looking after children.
I therefore need to ask the noble Lord, Lord Laming, via the amendment that I have tabled, whether he thinks that in the interests of natural justice there should be another means whereby someone is able to rid himself of the stigma of appearing on the list by having his name removed from it.
I do not suggest that there are many cases that ought to be eligible for such treatment—quite the contrary. I emphasise again that I am not talking about allowing wilful child molesters to apply to have the slate wiped clean after an apparently blameless few years. But as we debate the Bill we must all the time be mindful not only of the interests of children but also of what is fair and right. Blacklists are powerful tools. Including someone's name on a blacklist for the rest of his life may be further than we should want to go in certain exceptional cases. I hope very much that the noble Lord will be able to give me some satisfactory reassurances in response to the concerns that I have raised. I beg to move.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: I support the amendment, for all the reasons that have been given which the Committee may think are entirely logical, humane and right. I seek clarification on one matter that troubles me. It relates to this amendment and is not itself the subject of an amendment.
It appears that the individual concerned may not write to the Secretary of State directly and say, "Could you now remove me for these reasons?" That avenue seems to have been foreclosed upon by Clause 4(1) (b), which seems to ordain—this is the trouble—that a person has to go to the tribunal and seek leave in order to have his name removed from the list. That is a nonsense. A person whose name is on the list should be able to write a letter to the Secretary of State saying, "I am represented; the parson thinks I am all right". and one thing and another, and provide a few references. The Secretary of State can write back and say no; then the person can go to the tribunal. As I said, no

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amendment has been tabled to that effect. I merely ask that consideration be given to the point at some stage. It relates to a more orderly and proper system of administration.
Lord Meston: This amendment and the questions that have been asked are important. As I read the Bill, it provides an appeal mechanism. It appears to allow for only a single appeal; however, I may be wrong about that. It does not allow for a subsequent review. The intention may be that there will be some form of administrative review of the list, but that is not apparent on the face of the Bill.
Presumably there must be circumstances such as the noble Earl described in which an entry on the list ought to be reviewable. Indeed, there must be other circumstances in which entry on the list should be extinguished. Presumably some time limits will be allowed for; otherwise the lists will simply grow and grow. While I agree with the noble Earl that the circumstances in which a review should be allowed are likely to be extremely limited, perhaps we should be reassured that some such mechanism will be in place.
11.15 a.m.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: First, I welcome the support that the noble Earl has given to the general intent of the Bill, which the Government, too, support. The noble Earl has raised an important issue and this has been a helpful debate. He has alerted us to the careful balance that needs to be drawn between the interests of children and the interests of the individual concerned.
The safeguards in the Bill—in terms of the procedures that have to be adopted in relation to the inclusion of a person on the list and the ability of that person to appeal to an independent tribunal—have been carefully drawn. The noble Earl's amendment strikes at one of the important principles of the Bill. I hope that I can reassure him that there are sufficient safeguards to meet the specific concerns that he raises.
Clause 1(3) is intended to enable the Secretary of State to remove an individual's name from the list if he is to avoid injustice and needless appeals and litigation in cases, for example, where fresh evidence has come to light and the Secretary of State is satisfied that the basis on which the original decision was taken was in some material way incorrect and for that reason the individual should not have been included in the list in the first place. For example, a relevant conviction could have been set aside, or evidence upon which the original decision had been based could subsequently have been discredited. In such circumstances the Secretary of State could act without the individual having formally to appeal to the tribunal as the only means of redress. However, it should be noted that that right may be exercised regardless of whether an individual has exercised his right of appeal to the tribunal.
The amendment proposed by the noble Earl would have the effect of requiring the Secretary of State not only to consider responding to information of this kind,
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but also to undertake reviews to see whether names should remain on the list. The amendment runs against the whole principle behind listing; namely, that once a name is finally placed on the list, that decision is permanent. The whole intention is that, if individuals have shown themselves to be unsuitable to work with children, they should not be able to work with children again.
I very much appreciate the noble Earl's concern that this may appear heavy-handed. Should, as he described it, a youthful indiscretion or a momentary lapse of attention in the case of immature young people be held against people for the rest of their lives? If that were a danger, I am sure that the Committee would be likely to agree. However, I believe that I can remove any understandable doubts on that score. Certainly, this same point troubled the Committee's deliberations on the Bill in another place. At that time the Bill provided that individuals might be listed on grounds of incompetence as well as misconduct. The Bill was amended precisely to respond to similar concerns, for example, where a youthful care assistant had carelessly left a gate open and a child had, as a result, run out into a busy street. The removal of incompetence grounds has therefore raised the threshold for referral to the list.
On that basis, when deciding whether it would be appropriate to include the name in the list, the Secretary of State must be satisfied that the employer has come to a reasonable conclusion that the individual has harmed a child or placed a child at risk of harm and that he is unsuitable to work with children.
Furthermore, in connection with appeals against listing, the tribunal will go into all the circumstances of the case afresh and will review the alleged misconduct and any resulting harm to a child. At the same time, however, it is clear that gross incompetence should meet the definition of misconduct so that that area of behaviour will be subject to referral. But, of course, that would then be a matter, in relation to the tribunal, for it to be decided on a case-by-case basis.
It must be borne in mind that there are other important filters which would screen out trivial cases. In the first place, only those cases where a child has been harmed or placed at risk of harm are to be referred to the Secretary of State. Secondly, under Clause 2(4), cases are not entered automatically into the consideration procedure following reference from an organisation. On the contrary, for the process to carry on at all, the Secretary of State has to be satisfied from the information submitted, with the original reference, that it may be appropriate for the individual to be included on the list.
It is only then, after observing closely stipulated statutory procedures that include considering observations from the individual concerned, that the Secretary of State may make a determination.
As I have already pointed out, this is subject to appeal to the independent tribunal to be established by the Bill: a tribunal which does not merely review the procedure followed by the Secretary of State but which also looks again at the whole case from the beginning, quite separately from and uninfluenced by the Secretary of

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State's consideration. In all those circumstances, it is difficult to see that cases will slip through to listing which should not be so listed.
Lord Laming: I am also grateful to the noble Earl for giving us the opportunity to discuss the amendment. It raises an important matter. It is necessary to emphasise that this Bill introduces a number of safeguards which do not exist at present. I consider that it contains five safeguards which will improve the way in which these matters are handled and provide safeguards both for the person against whom allegations are made and children who have been put at risk.
With that in mind, perhaps I may say to the noble Lord, Lord Campbell, that there is a difference between Clause 3, which sets out the responsibilities of the Secretary of State, and Clause 4, which sets out the opportunity for the individual to go direct to the tribunal to appeal. That is quite an important measure.
Turning to the amendment, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, indicated, the Bill provides for the test of gross incompetence. The fact that "incompetence" was removed in the other place is of great significance. "Gross incompetence" is not a matter which can be used to refer to a trivial act. The way in which the procedures are set out in the Bill allows for consideration to be given not only to the allegations of behaviour but to such matters as the inexperience of the person concerned.
It would be erroneous to suggest that someone could be placed on the list, having gone through the procedures, either because of youthful indiscretion or because they have acted in a way which, in years to come, would be thought to be less than gross incompetence. It is not only gross incompetence but gross incompetence that has resulted either in children being exposed to undue risk or experiencing abuse in one way or another. So the Bill is designed not only to protect children but also to ensure that there are proper balances and safeguards for staff.
We need to take these matters seriously because, as the noble Lord, Lord Warner, said at Second Reading, at the end of the day the adults concerned can get another job not working with children, but children can have their lives ruined through abuse from powerful adults in positions of trust. I support those sentiments because we must keep our attention clearly focused on the fact that these are people in positions of trust and authority. Matters that would be considered as justifying someone being placed on the list are matters of sufficient seriousness as to make them be regarded as unsuitable to work with children.
This is not a Bill that would prevent people working. It is simply a measure which prevents them working with children. I emphasise that youthful indiscretions do not fall within the definition of gross incompetence. For that reason I hope, after the consideration that the Committee has given the matter, the noble Earl will be willing to withdraw his amendment.
Earl Howe: I am grateful to the Minister and the noble Lord for their explanatory comments. I recognize
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that the safeguards in the Bill are carefully drawn. As the noble Lord emphasised, we must be mindful of the need above all to protect children from those who represent a risk to them.
I accept that the term "misconduct" necessarily implies a serious act of commission or omission and that it would not be used to refer to a trivial act of any kind. However, I confess to remaining slightly worried. What the noble Lord said, helpful though it was, did not seem to me to cover the case of someone who in every way merits inclusion on the list at the time or shortly after the act was committed, but who after a lapse of time—perhaps many years—can demonstrate that his continued inclusion on the list is not in the interests of natural justice. That case remains in the air and unaccounted for.
The noble Lord is effectively suggesting that one cannot apply common sense to a situation. The logical conclusion of his position is that whatever someone does to prove that he is capable of being trusted with the care of children, he should nevertheless remain on the Secretary of State's list just in case he might do the same thing again. I find that proposition in the abstract difficult to accept. It runs counter to the best traditions of civil freedom that we are used to in this country.
I would appreciate an answer from the noble Lord or the Minister on the question posed by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, about the possibility of an individual being able to put in a second and subsequent appeal, having already lost an initial appeal, perhaps many years down the road, if it becomes clear that it would be right to remove his name from the list in the light of a lifetime of unblemished work. I should appreciate some guidance on that point.
11.30 a.m.
Lord Laming: I believe that the noble Earl referred to misconduct. It is important to emphasise that the Bill is concerned now with gross misconduct. The term "misconduct" has been removed. "Gross misconduct' in these circumstances is intended to describe behaviour that exposes vulnerable children and young people to unacceptable risks or behaviour. It is important to note the difference between misconduct and gross misconduct.
Earl Howe: With the leave of the Committee, I am a little confused. The Bill makes reference to "misconduct", not "gross misconduct". The term is a simple one.
Lord Laming: The misconduct is concerned with the protection of children and is not something of a trivial nature. I can give examples but I do not want to delay the House. Something done in innocence would not be regarded as misconduct. Something done deliberately in the knowledge of the likely outcome would be the test of misconduct. This is the first time that people will be able to put their case to an independent tribunal, describe their inexperience and the supervision that they did or did not have. The tribunal will take into account all of these matters.

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I am sorry that earlier I used the wrong term. The term "incompetence" has been removed. Therefore, innocent activity due to incompetence is not now being considered. Misconduct is something that is deliberate and determined. It is right that there should be an appeal mechanism but only if there is new information. There is no procedure in the Bill to review decisions taken earlier simply because someone now wants to have his circumstances reviewed. To ensure that these procedures are regarded with great seriousness, no one should be put on the list without a necessary appeal mechanism and until the tribunal has considered all the circumstances and come to the conclusion that the person is unsuitable to work with children. That decision will not be reached if the matters are trivial or the person has a justifiable defence of one kind or another. Therefore, I urge the noble Earl to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: I had not intended to speak in this debate, but everything that the noble Lord has just said seems to me to justify the amendment. There must be some form of reconsideration at some time in some circumstances. To clear away one point raised by the noble Lord, he said that the Secretary of State would be required to keep these matters under continual review. No. It is only if a representation is, or could be, made that he is asked to consider it. I thought that I should clear that away. I hope that we come back to this very serious point about freedom of the subject. It seems to me that it is tied up a tiny bit too tightly.
Earl Howe: I am grateful to the noble Lord and to my noble friend. I was a little confused by one observation of the noble Lord. He said that the term "misconduct" necessarily implied a deliberate act. That was not my understanding. It seems to me that gross incompetence can include an act of omission, if you like, inadvertence, rather than an act of deliberate commission. Be that as it may, I shall reflect carefully on what has been said in this debate between now and the further stages of the Bill. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 1 agreed to.
Clause 2 [Inclusion in list on reference to Secretary of State]:
Earl Howe Earl Howe moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 2, line 3, leave out ("considered dismissing") and insert ("been minded to dismiss")
The noble Earl said: This amendment, in common with Amendment No. 6 to which I shall also speak, addresses what seems to me to be vague, and therefore unsatisfactory, wording in Clause 2. Subsections (2) and (3) set out the circumstances in which a childcare organisation must refer someone's name to the Secretary of State for provisional listing. We all understand the kinds of situation that should merit such a referral. One situation that undoubtedly must be covered is that of a person who has resigned or retired before the employer is able to invoke any disciplinary procedures against
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him. Another is the situation in which the procedures are commenced but the person disappears before they can be completed. This type of situation arises all too commonly. The employer is left having to form a view of the alleged misconduct without the benefit of having the accused person on hand to question. Such cases need to come within the scope of Clause 2 to ensure that potential malefactors do not slip through the net merely because they have avoided being formally dismissed from their jobs.
I do not argue in the least with what the clause seeks to do but merely with the manner in which it is expressed. It seems to me that the second test set out in subsection (2)(b) is not at all precise. It requires an organisation to refer someone's name to the Secretary of State not only when it has concluded that it would definitely have dismissed him had he not resigned or retired but also when it would merely have considered dismissing him. I am not sure that I know what that means. I know what it should mean; namely, a situation in which, on the balance of probabilities, an employer forms the view that a person has been guilty of misconduct but has not been able to complete the formal disciplinary process because the individual concerned has disappeared.
But to consider dismissing someone could mean anything from having the fleeting thought of dismissal crossing one's mind to going through a proper deliberative process, the conclusion of which is that the person would probably have been dismissed. It is the situation at the latter end of that spectrum that the Bill should seek to describe. I believe that it fails to do so. There are two aspects to this defect. One is the general principle that legal language should be precise and not vague. The other is that the wording of the Bill should point to a clear test which an employer knows with certainty he has fulfilled. The alternative wording that I propose in these amendments attempts to do just that.
To say that an organisation would have been minded to dismiss someone carries, I hope, the much clearer connotation of a considered, deliberative process rather than simply saying that it would have considered dismissing the individual. It also points to a more precise test that an employer must meet. That is important if one believes, as I certainly do, that the law should be capable of being policed. I look forward to hearing what the noble Lord and the Minister have to say. I beg to move.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: The noble Earl again raises an important issue. I hope to be able to clarify the views of the Government upon it and the reasons why the current wording of the Bill satisfies the needs. As drafted, the objective of including provisions for referral in circumstances where an employer would have considered dismissing is to cover the situation, as the noble Earl suggests, where, before the employer has had the opportunity to complete his investigation into the alleged misconduct or come to a firm conclusion that dismissal is appropriate, the individual retires or resigns. Until the employer completes that investigation, he

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cannot conclude with any degree of certainty that he would have dismissed the individual. To reach such a conclusion would be premature.
Although the employer should in principle undertake all necessary investigations, in practice it may not be possible for him always to conclude his inquiries. For example, if a child made an allegation of abuse, the employer would need to interview the child and seek any corroborative evidence available. He should also seek to obtain the individual's comments on the allegations. In circumstances where the employer has been able to obtain only one side of a story, it would be difficult for him to conclude that he would have dismissed the individual. He can only conclude that, as the present wording said, he would have considered dismissing the individual.
This does not give rise to an obligation to refer where only passing consideration was given to dismissal. Dismissal must be a real possibility or within a band of reasonable responses to the alleged misconduct. The obligation to refer does not arise where only fleeting consideration was given to whether dismissal was appropriate. If the present amendments seek to safeguard an individual from those eventualities, they therefore seem to be unnecessary, in particular taken with all the other safeguards in the Bill in relation to the procedures which have to be followed.
Lord Laming: I agree with the noble Earl, Lord Howe, that the law should be as clear as possible. It is for that reason that I believe that "to be minded" seems to have within it a presumption; whereas "would have considered" makes a claim that all the facts will be allowed before any decision is reached.
It should be remembered that the Secretary of State can commence the process of deciding whether someone should be listed only,
"if it appears from the information submitted with a reference … that it may be appropriate for the individual to be included in the list".
In other words, although the amendment might restrict the threshold for referral by an employer, it does not in any way restrict the position of the Secretary of State.
There is a further important consideration on the noble Earl's point on the law. The terminology in Clause 2, "would have considered," is used in a great deal of legislation including the Education (Teachers) Regulations 1982 in relation to the reporting of misconduct cases. It is still used in the current version of those regulations; namely, the Education (Teachers) Regulations 1993. Section 15 of the Teaching and Higher Education Act 1998 also relies on those words.
There is consistency in the way the provision is framed. I urge that the amendment be withdrawn.
Earl Howe: The Minister and the noble Lord have gone some considerable way to assuage my concerns. I am most grateful. It is helpful to have on the record that the phrase "would have considered dismissing him" will in practice be interpreted strictly in the way I sought to define.
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However, I remain uneasy that the Bill contains terminology that at least in ordinary language seems inherently vague. Perhaps there is an argument from precedent, as the noble Lord said. But riot having considered that precedent, I wonder whether it is a proper parallel to the situation envisaged in the Bill. If the guidance to be issued by the department will spell out the whole issue, there is a good argument for it to be spelt out on the face of the Bill. If we do nor do so, in one breath we are inviting an employer to refer someone's name to the Secretary of State, even in a case where that would be manifestly inappropriate. For example, if an employer receives an allegation of child abuse, investigates it, and finds it to be wholly without foundation, he would be obliged, nevertheless, to refer the name of the alleged abuser to the Secretary of State because dismissal of the person had seemed a real possibility at the outset of the investigation. So the lack of clarity in the drafting of the Bill could lead to an absurdity, or worse, bearing in mind that having one' s name referred to the Secretary of State is mortifying to anyone who is innocent. Where we are dealing with civil liberties, as we are here, we should have no truck with imprecise terminology.
I am sorry to say to the Minister that I do riot find the answer entirely convincing. However, I am in large measure reassured. I shall reflect carefully on what has been said. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
11.45 a.m.
Earl Howe Earl Howe moved Amendment No. 3:
Page 2, line 8, leave out paragraph (d).
The noble Earl said: In the previous amendment I highlighted my concern that the Bill. may unintentionally bring about a situation in which someone's name could be referred to the Secretary of State in quite inappropriate circumstances. However, we have here a paragraph which appears consciously to encourage the possibility of inappropriate referrals.
Clause 2(2)(d) provides that a childcare organisation must refer to the Secretary of State the name of someone whom it has suspended or provisionally transferred on the ground of misconduct before it has decided whether to transfer the person permanently or to dismiss him or her. As I have said, we are all in favour of closing as many loopholes as possible against those who might harm children. But the more I consider this paragraph the less desirable I think that it is; and the less I understand how it meshes in with the remainder of the Bill.
We can easily imagine the situation of an employee in a childcare organisation being subject to a malicious and wholly unfounded allegation of abuse. Nevertheless, the organisation feels duty bound to suspend that individual at the outset of the investigation as a precautionary measure. At the same time, it will be required under the Bill to refer the person's name to the Secretary of State. I fully accept that the Secretary of State will not proceed to a provisional listing of that person unless he is satisfied that there is at least a prima facie case, of misconduct

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presented to him. In the situation that I describe, there may well not be. I question whether it is good practice to create a situation in which there is a statutory duty to refer someone in circumstances where the Secretary of State would clearly determine that it was not appropriate for that person to be included in the list.
The organisation should not be encouraged to be trigger-happy as regards the referral process. If it refers someone's name to the Secretary of State, it should at least be persuaded at that juncture that, on the balance of the information available to it, there is a real case for that individual to answer. But that is not what paragraph (d) states. The threshold for referral is a great deal lower than elsewhere in the clause; and I am worried about that.
Before the noble Lord accuses me of not understanding the clause, I believe I know the reason that the paragraph has been included in the Bill. It is to cover the case of someone who, as soon as the shadow of suspicion falls on him in his place of work, applies for another job intending to do a runner from his present employer before he is brought to book. When that individual is suspended or provisionally transferred within the organisation, and before an internal investigation of the allegations against him commences, he knows that time is not on his side. I entirely understand why the noble Lord believes that one should minimise the risk of such a person slipping through the net and securing alternative employment. However, my question to him is this: what will constitute a prima facie case for the Secretary of State in these circumstances?
The suspension of an individual, and no more than that, is the trigger for a referral. The Secretary of State is unlikely to have anything more solid in front of him than an unsubstantiated allegation on which to make his judgment. If he tries to look beyond that, he will be prejudging the organisation's decision on whether the person's suspension should be upheld.
Some unsubstantiated allegations have a good deal of credence to them, as we all know. Much will depend on how and by whom they are made. However, in general, I do not believe that an unsubstantiated allegation, which might have led to an immediate and automatic suspension, should constitute sufficient grounds for the Secretary of State to decide to place someone's name on the provisional list. There should be more than that. The danger of having suspension as the trigger here is that we are encouraging referrals in circumstances where it is not obvious that there is a case to answer. Therefore, I wonder whether the wording in this part of the clause is appropriate. I beg to move.
Lord Meston: Like the noble Earl, Lord Howe, I try to envisage the situation that is contemplated by Clause 2 (2)(d). The situation in which an individual jumps before he is pushed is covered by Clause 2(2)(b) and therefore one is left wondering what, in practical reality, will be covered by Clause 2(2)(d).
It may be the limited circumstances in which someone is suspended, but manages to draw out the suspension procedure such that he is still technically employed and
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therefore his employment has not come to an end by resignation, retirement or dismissal, and yet there are serious misgivings about his suitability. In those situations, it might be appropriate for the employer to take action, but I am by no means sure about that. I hope that the Minister or the noble Lord can enlighten us.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: Again, the debate has shown the delicate balance which must be drawn between the overriding question of protecting children and the rights of the individual. Each amendment is testing the boundary between the two. Clause 2(2)(d) allows referrals to be made where the organisation has suspended an individual or moved him to a non-childcare post while investigating an allegation that a child has been harmed or placed at risk of harm.
The amendment would remove that provision and, as such, it would not be until a final decision was made by the employer that a referral could be made under subsections (a) to (c) of Clause 2. In answer to a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, Members of the Committee will recognise that it will take some time to carry out a full investigation to decide whether an allegation can be substantiated. Witnesses will need to be interviewed and internal appeal procedures exhausted. During that period, if the amendment were accepted, that person's name would not be included in the list. As such, if the individual sought employment elsewhere in a childcare position and the check was carried out by a potential employer, the fact that an allegation was being investigated would not be revealed.
Although I accept the point that the individual would be concerned about inclusion on the list before a final decision on suitability had been taken, this clause is seen as the only way of providing the necessary protection to children and, as the noble Earl suggested, of ensuring that there are no loopholes in terms of someone trying to circumvent the overall safeguards in the Bill.
The noble Earl asked about a prima facie case against the individual for suspension. The name can go on the list only if there is an allegation of harm, or risk of harm, and if the Secretary of State believes that inclusion is appropriate. One grants that the Secretary of State would not know the individual's side of the story at that stage, but we turn to the other safeguards in the Bill. They are that a final decision on inclusion will not be taken until the employer has decided to dismiss, if that is the action that can be taken.
Lord Laming: I am grateful to the noble Earl. I begin by saying that I should be the last person to accuse him of not understanding the purpose of the Bill. I should not dream of having such temerity.
This is an important area of debate and I shall first answer the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Meston. Paragraph (b) deals with resignation, retirement or dismissal. Paragraph (d) deals with suspension. That is the justification for the provision. It is important to emphasise the two safeguards. First, the Secretary of State must be satisfied that there is a prima facie case. Everyone operating in the field will recognise that vexatious allegations can be made. The fact that an allegation has been made is not in itself grounds for

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suspension. Secondly, for the first time, the Bill allows for limits on how long the suspension can last. That is an important safeguard for someone in this situation.
It is also important to see suspension and the issues surrounding it within the wider employment legislation and guidance to social care and educational organisations about how they should deal with allegations. One recognises that allegations can be ill-founded and therefore—to quote the noble Earl, Lord Howe—one should not become trigger-happy. There is guidance to prevent authorities being trigger-happy, and for that reason the Secretary of State must be satisfied that these matters have been handled in an appropriate manner.
It is important to emphasise that it is only at the previous employment check stage that information can be made available to a prospective employer. Therefore, it is possible to envisage a situation where a prospective employer is considering offering a job to someone, makes a proper check, is given clearance as a result, and only after the offer of employment has been made learns that serious matters are being investigated elsewhere.
As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, indicated, sometimes such allegations need several months to be properly investigated. Therefore, it is most important that during that period, if someone is suspended, a prospective employer is informed that the person is the subject of investigation elsewhere. For that reason, I believe that this is an important and essential feature of the Bill and I urge Members of the Committee to reject the amendment.
Earl Howe: Once again I am grateful to the Minister for his comments. In tabling the amendment, it was not, of course, my intention to seek to delete those provisions from the Bill. That, 1 hope, was clear.
I have listened carefully to all the comments made, and I am entirely persuaded that the balance that the Minister referred to has been struck, in this instance, correctly. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Noon
Earl Howe Earl Howe moved Amendment No 4:
Page 2, line 47, after ("applies") insert ("and shall use his best endeavours to notify the individual accordingly")
The noble Earl said: This amendment reflects my deep concern that there could be circumstances in which the Secretary of State confirms someone's name on the list without that individual ever knowing that it has happened. Should such a thing be allowed to occur, it would he a profoundly damaging development for civil liberties.
I recognise that in many, if not most, cases an individual who has been provisionally listed and who has then submitted observations to the Secretary of State will be made aware in some way of the proceedings' outcome. But that will not always be the pattern. Let us reflect, for example, on what might happen under Clause 2(3). An organisation might uncover evidence about an individual's behaviour many years after he has left his job. It may not be possible to trace his whereabouts. The
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Secretary of State will determine the case on the basis of the evidence before him. Let us say that he decides to list the person. How is that individual supposed to know that this has occurred?
The question has particular relevance if, as we are led to understand, the Government intend to make it a criminal offence for a person to apply for a childcare position while on the list. In this context, it is instructive to look at the Home Office consultation paper, issued on 30th April. The paper puts forward proposals that would make it a criminal offence for a banned person to apply for, accept or be engaged in work with children, or to provide services to them.
Leaving aside the last element, which begs a whole host of questions, it is further proposed that there would need to be a defence of ignorance on the part of the individual, that he did not know that the position involved work with children. That is fair enough as far as it goes, but I see no mention of a defence of ignorance that the person did not know that he was on the list of proscribed individuals. If ignorance of one's inclusion on the list is not to be an excuse, this whole area of legislation begins to assume a somewhat Kafkaesque quality. I do not believe for one minute that that is the Minister's intention, but as the Bill stands he is implicitly allowing for that risk.
In debate in another place, quite a bit was made of the consequences that flow from Clause 2(3). The provision was, of course, inserted in the Bill because of concerns raised in Standing Committee. It is a useful subsection, but it brings with it certain risks. The longer the time that has elapsed since an act of wrongdoing was committed, the greater the scope for error, faulty memory and, therefore, miscarriages of justice. It is not for nothing that the Statute of Limitations, in its basic form, is one of the oldest statutes in the corpus of English law. Whenever we countenance a departure from the principle that it enshrines, we should do so only with the greatest caution. Here we do so in the context not of a judicial but of an administrative process.
We are saying that no matter how long ago an alleged misdeed took place, those who work with children must reckon on being in perpetual, open-ended jeopardy as regards the risk of being included, by an executive decision, on an employment blacklist. That is very serious. We may decide to take such a step in the interest of protecting children, but we certainly do not want to do so if the system that we put in place allows for the blacklisted person to remain in ignorance of the mark that society has placed upon him.
My amendment says that whenever the Secretary of State confirms someone's name on the list, he should use his best endeavours to notify him of the listing. 1 realise that the wording may not be precisely right in terms of legalese. However, it does recognise that in some cases an individual will prove to be untraceable. It does not impose a blanket duty on the Secretary of State to trace that individual and notify him no matter what, but a reasonable effort should be made to inform him regardless of the circumstances, and the procedure should be automatic. The Minister may tell me that that is what is intended as a matter of practice. However,

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when dealing with such a fundamental aspect of civil liberties there is an almost unassailable case for placing the requirement on the face of the Bill. I beg to move.
Lord Meston: Delayed disclosure of child abuse is a real problem with which the courts have to grapple. Occasionally, as has been said, it throws up quite acute difficulties in respect of limitation periods.
I sympathise entirely with the proposition that anyone included on one of these lists should be notified, if at all possible. It is right to say that in terms of legalese, "best endeavours" may no longer be the most favoured phrase. Perhaps something along the lines of "should use all reasonable endeavours" would be preferable. I hope that somehow the points raised will be taken on board in considering how the legislation will work in practice.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: I do not think that there can be any argument with the thrust of the noble Earl's proposal. Clearly it is important that every effort should be made to ensure that the individual concerned is aware. However, we see problems with the amendment. I hope that I can convince the noble Earl that these matters can be covered by effective administrative procedures. The amendment would impose an explicit duty on the Secretary of State to try to inform an individual when confirming his inclusion on the Department of Health's list. While the instinct behind the amendment is entirely understandable, I cannot recommend proceeding in the way proposed.
The question is not whether to achieve the amendment's intention, but rather how best to secure it without inadvertently complicating an essentially administrative process. As I understand the position, there should normally be no difficulty about informing the individuals concerned because they will have participated in the careful procedures laid down in the earlier provisions of Clause 2. Their whereabouts, therefore, will be known, and in the normal way they will be informed, possibly through their advisers, what the outcome of the reference has been. In their case, making this a statutory requirement adds nothing to the situation.
I am glad to give the assurance that the Government will in all cases seek to inform all parties of decisions that are taken. There will, however, be other cases where matters might not be so straightforward. For example, it is possible that there will be instances where individuals break contact with their advisers, or otherwise choose to go to ground. Such actions may be intended deliberately to frustrate or protract proceedings. In such cases, the imposition of the requirement proposed, reasonably worded as it is, could be used against the Secretary of State; for example, it may be alleged that his best endeavours were not good enough and that they ensured that the whole procedure was at fault. The tribunal may be invited to go into all the detail of attempts made to notify. In that way, attempts may be made to abuse the process.
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Experience with the current consultancy list in the Department of Health and List 99, which is operated by the Department for Education and Employment, shows that there are only handful of cases in which it has not been possible to contact the person contacted.
The noble Earl, Lord Howe, raised the issue of inclusion where the individual is not found or told that he is on the list. Although an individual who cannot be found may be included on the list, the time-limits relating to his right of appeal will not start to run until he is informed or finds out that he is not on the list. We shall deal with those matters in regulations concerning the tribunals.
The noble Earl referred to the new offence, following the work of the inter-departmental group and the Home Office report. I assure him that we shall consider that point.
Lord Laming: I am grateful to the noble Earl and to the noble Lord, Lord Meston. It is important to see this amendment in the context of the procedures set out in the Bill; namely, to provide protection for both children and employees.
It is helpful that we are discussing this amendment immediately after we discussed the amendment on suspension because it is almost inconceivable—I would say that it is inconceivable—that a person could not know that allegations were being investigated which could lead him to have his name included on the list. Therefore, in normal circumstances, he would not only be invited to participate in the procedures envisaged by the Bill, which enables those matters to be explored properly and provides a right to go to an independent tribunal, but he would also know from the outset what possibilities will flow from the actions which have been investigated.
For that reason, it is important to recognise that individuals who fall within the purview of the Bill will be informed fully from the outset about possible outcomes. It may help to say that in the present arrangements the procedures followed by both the Department for Education and Employment and the Department of Health go to considerable lengths to ensure that people are informed of the outcome of any decision made.
Furthermore, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, indicated, the department will produce guidance on the implementation of the legislation in due course. I feel sure that the department will be very happy to consult the noble Earl and the noble Lord to make sure that the point is covered adequately in the guidance. For that reason, I hope that the noble Earl will not press the amendment.
Earl Howe: I am grateful to the noble Lord for his answer and for the comments which the Minister made. I am not sure that my concerns have really been covered fully. I welcome the assurance that notification of inclusion on the list will take place as a matter of course. But, if so, why can we not have this provision on the face of the Bill, although perhaps not as I have drafted it which is in a rather unprofessional layman's manner?

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The Minister raised valid objections to the form of words that I used but I am sure that there is a way round those objections if the will exists to find one.
The noble Lord, Lord Laming, said that individuals who fall within the purview of the Bill will be informed fully from the outset of the procedures. That certainly will be so in the majority of cases, but not necessarily, I suggest, when an act of abuse comes to light in the circumstances envisaged under Clause 2(2)(d) where an employee may be long gone. He will not be involved at all from the outset of the procedures. It is in those circumstances that my worries really surface.
To say that the amendment which I propose will complicate the administrative processes is no reason whatever for dismissing the validity of the central point at issue. We are talking about an absolutely fundamental issue affecting civil liberties. I am far from clear that that should simply be relegated to departmental guidance. The Bill should make explicit provision in that regard.
However, I shall reflect carefully on what has been said. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
12.15 p.m.
Earl Howe Earl Howe moved Amendment No. 5:
Page 3, line 2, leave out paragraph (a)
The noble Earl said: Clause 2(7) sets out the twin criteria upon which the Secretary of State's decision to confirm someone's name permanently on the list must be based. I have no difficulty with the thinking which underlies this subsection. But as drafted, it may give rise to some anomalies.
Let us suppose that an organisation refers a person following an allegation of misconduct; the case is investigated; and the allegation is not upheld. However, quite separately, the Secretary of State is made aware of details surrounding the individual, perhaps something in the domestic context, which make it quite clear that he is unsuitable to work with children.
As regards the organisation, the Secretary of State is obliged to reach the opinion that the verdict of misconduct was not reasonable. Therefore, he will be unable to confirm the person's inclusion on the list. But in every other way, it will be clear that that is a travesty of justice. Therefore, the word about which I am most concerned in this subsection is the word "and" right at the end of paragraph (a). Is the noble Lord happy for that word to be included?
In moving the amendment, perhaps I may ask a further question relating to the phrase "is of the opinion". What is the difference between the meaning of that phrase and the word "satisfied" in Clause 1(3) in the context of the Secretary of State's power to remove the name of someone from the list? The word "satisfied" appears also in Clause 4(3) in relation to the tribunal's determination of an appeal. Is there any significance in that? Does being "satisfied" about an issue represent a
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stiffer test in some way than being "of the opinion"? I hope that there is no substantive difference but if there is, I should like to know about it. I beg to move.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: This amendment would remove the first limb of the test which must be satisfied before the Secretary of State may confirm an individual's inclusion on the Department of Health list in the circumstances specified in Clause 2(6).
The test to be removed is the one requiring the Secretary of State to be of the opinion that the referring organisation reasonably considered the individual to be guilty of misconduct which harmed a child or placed a child at risk of harm. The sole test which would remain is whether the Secretary of State was of the opinion that the individual was unsuitable to work with children.
Rather than consider two matters before the test may be satisfied, the Secretary of State will be obliged to address only one because he would no longer have to consider whether the referring organisation had acted reasonably and addressed relevant criteria before deciding to refer. The Secretary of State would still have to decide whether the individual was unsuitable to work with children. The basis upon which he must do that is not clear. Either he would do that on a review of the papers before him, or he would be required to carry out a fact-finding exercise to decide whether the individual was guilty of the misconduct as alleged.
If the former were the case, the criteria for the Secretary of State's decision would be unspecified. Presumably, he would simply decide whether the person was suitable to work with children on the basis of information provided on the initial referral and any representations received from the parties. However, that is an insufficiently precise test, bearing in mind what turns upon that decision. For that reason, I believe that the amendment would not be welcome.
Alternatively, it is arguable that the amendment would mean that the only way in which the Secretary of State could discharge his function would be to carry out a fact-finding exercise, as he would need to be satisfied that the individual was guilty of a misconduct, as alleged, and would not be entitled to rely on the findings. of the employer. Of course, the Secretary of State would not be in a position to carry out such an exercise and I do not believe that it would be right to expect him to do so. Among other things, the standard of proof that he would be required to apply would be wholly unclear.
When read together with Clause 4, the effect would be one of duplication, as the Bill would then contain provisions for two fact-finding exercises in place of the one already available in the case of a tribunal. That is because under Clause 4, in determining appeals from decisions of the Secretary of State, the tribunal undertakes a fact-finding role to determine whether the person is guilty of a misconduct that harmed a child, or placed a child at risk of harm, and whether the person is unsuitable to work with children. Not only 'would there be wasteful duplication of effort, but there would also be significant cost implications.
Lord Laming: This provision is one of the safeguards to which I referred earlier. The Secretary of

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State needs to be of the opinion that the way in which the organisation has considered the issues of misconduct has been reasonable and—it is important that there is this second arm—that the evidence means that someone is unsuitable to work with children.
Earlier the noble Earl referred to what I call vexatious allegations being made. It is important that the Secretary of State forms the opinion that the way in which such matters have been handled has been reasonable and that the proper tests have been applied.
The Secretary of State needs to form an opinion about the procedures. He does not consider the merits of the case. He does not provide a rehearing. Therefore, the significance of the opinion is that he is not expressing satisfaction at the outcome because that matter will be considered by the tribunal with all the safeguards that are built into the tribunal. He will form an opinion about the way in which the matter has been handled and whether the person is, therefore, unsuitable to work with children.
There is significance in the words of the opinion in this paragraph. For that reason, I invite the Committee to reject the amendment because I believe that subsection (7)(a) provides an important safeguard in the Bill.
Earl Howe: As so often happens when one tables an amendment in Committee, which is expressed in a form that suggests that a deletion of a certain part of the Bill should be considered, a literal interpretation is placed upon it. I tabled this amendment as a standard device to enable the Committee to debate this part of the Bill.
I have listened carefully to what has been said. Of course, I entirely understand why this part of the clause has been framed as it is. I do not dissent from it. In the remarks that I made earlier, I was merely suggesting that the double hurdle represented by subsections (7)(a) and (7)(b) may, in some circumstances, be too stiff a test and that someone could slip through the net as a result of the double hurdle.
If that is a risk that the noble Lord is willing to carry, I am the last person to dissent from his opinion on that. As he, rather than I, has been instrumental in carrying out the work on this Bill, I simply raise it as a possibility—a not altogether unreasonable possibility.
I am grateful to him for the explanation that he gave of the difference between the words "is of the opinion" and "is satisfied". I understand that the tribunal will sit in a quasi-judicial role and, therefore, the opinion that it reaches will necessarily be of a different kind, in terms of the way in which it is reached, from the initial decision taken by the Secretary of State.
That begs the question as to why the word "satisfied" is included in Clause 1(3) which states that the Secretary of State must be satisfied that the individual should not have been included in the list prior to a decision to remove him from it. That implies that the Secretary of State will, in certain circumstances, be sitting in a quasi-judicial role. I do not know whether there is any
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significance in that. If there is, perhaps either the noble Lord or the Minister will write to me. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 6 not moved.]
Clause 2 agreed to.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Earl Howe Earl Howe moved amendment No. 7:
After Clause 3, insert the following new clause—
NOTIFICATION OF INCLUSION BY SECRETARY OF STATE
(" . Where the Secretary of State—

(a) provisionally includes an individual in the list in accordance with section 2(4)(b) above;

(b) confirms the inclusion of an individual in the list in accordance with section 2(6) above; or

(c) includes an individual in the list in accordance with section 3(3) above, he may, if he thinks fit for the purpose of protecting a child from harm or the risk of harm—

(i) notify the Social Services Department responsible for the area in which the individual resides, or

(ii) notify an organisation employing the individual, of such inclusion or confirmation.")

The noble Earl said: Amendment No. 7 reflects a further concern of mine that a malefactor, whose name is included permanently on the list, nevertheless may escape the notice of his current employer and the social services department in the area where he lives as being a risk to children. The list kept by the Secretary of State will be, of course, confidential and subject to a considerable degree of privileged access. If that is so, what authority does the Secretary of State possess to disclose its contents, other than in response to an inquiry initiated by a recognised organisation? The amendment attempts to put it beyond doubt that, where circumstances dictate, for the purpose of protecting children from the risk of harm, he make take the initiative and notify those with a clear interest in the matter.
The noble Lord will doubtless tell me that the amendment is unnecessary, or perhaps even that it attempts to move outside the strict ambit of the Bill which is concerned with employment. I do not take that view. One can easily imagine a case falling under the scope of Clause 2(3), once again, in which a person's abusive behaviour (as a result of which he is listed) comes to light long after he has left an organisation. His new employer may be completely unaware that there is a shadow hanging over that person, yet the employer clearly needs to be informed about that if the person's job involves working with children. Furthermore, such disclosure should not lay the Secretary of State open to a charge of breach of confidentiality.
Similar considerations apply to the person's domestic circumstances. The social services department involved in an individual's place of work may not be the same social services department responsible for the area in which he resides. Yet it is clearly appropriate that that department should be informed. That is not a case of wanting to widen the scope of the Bill, but of saying that a particular statutory organisation should be notified

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as a consequence of wrong-doing in the workplace. I should be grateful if the noble Lord would reassure me on those points. I beg to move.
12.30 p.m.
Lord Meston: I certainly support the intention behind Amendment No. 7, as long as the power for which it provides is exercised with extreme caution. Like the noble Earl, I am a little uncomfortable that this Bill is so confined to the employment sphere. That is something I shall address in a later amendment standing in my name.
Recently I read a decision of the Court of Appeal, reported in Family Law Reports, Volume 1, 1999, page 267, called Re V (Sexual Abuse: Disclosure). On the facts of that case the Court of Appeal felt that,
"it was inappropriate to direct disclosure of findings of abuse in Children Act cases",
in the circumstances of the two cases there under consideration. But the court did go on to say that,
"nothing in the judgment was intended to inhibit the necessary exchange of relevant information between agencies; local authorities were under a duty to respond to inquiries from other local authorities and to pass on information where children moved into a different area".
Applying that reasoning to the slightly different situation envisaged by this amendment, I suggest that the same general duty to pass on information ought to apply to those who are to be responsible for keeping these lists so that they pass on information, in appropriate circumstances and with appropriate caution, to employers or to social services departments as is suggested. That is not when the specific children move around, but rather when the individual concerned is moving around or is likely to be moving around in the sort of situation described by the noble Earl.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Laming, will wish to respond in detail to this important consideration. But perhaps I can say that, although I am entirely sympathetic to the principles behind the proposed amendment, discussion on these matters in another place demonstrated that it is an unnecessary additional provision. Moreover, it seeks to tie the Minister's hands; for example, it limits the grounds upon which notification might be made and specifies that there should be a choice only between two possible destinations for notifications.
Although the intention is to encourage discretionary activity for a scrupulously designated purpose, the amendment's effect may be restrictive since specifying actions in statute are normally considered to imply that those actions alone may be lawful. It follows that his ability to pass on this information to other relevant parties such as the police may be called into question if the amendment is accepted.
I turn to the matter of notifying a person's current employer. That matter was also fully debated in another place and the real difficulties of such a provision were considered. The amendment could be taken to assume that the Secretary of State knows where the person is employed, which may not always be the case. The Government, in another place, gave a firm assurance that if the employer is known, the Secretary of State will
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notify him or her that the person has been included on the list. As a matter of good practice, that would always be done if the information came to the Government's attention.
Lord Laming: Taking first the issue of notifying the social services department where the individual now resides, the Secretary of State does not require specific statutory authority to pass on this information, provided he is satisfied that it is necessary in all the circumstances and having weighed the relevant issues of confidentiality and proportionality.
It is also helpful to mention the Department of Health working document, Working Together. That provides guidance on the way in which these matters should he dealt with, not just for social services departments, but for all the relevant agencies involved in the protection of children and which have responsibilities under the provisions of the Children Act 1989.
I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Meston, for mentioning the recent judgment because the Working Together document is currently being revised and it will address issues raised in a number of recent cases. In particular, it will be giving guidance to area child protection committees on the way in which all such matters should be handled at a local level. This guidance will be issued under Section 7 of the Local Authority Social Services Act 1970.
As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, also indicated, where the Secretary of State is aware of a person being employed in situations that give rise to concern, the Government have given an indication of how they intend to handle that. For that reason, I urge the noble Earl to withdraw his amendment.
Earl Howe: I am grateful to the noble Lord and the Minister for those explanatory comments. I am entirely content and beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Earl Howe Earl Howe moved Amendment No. 8:
After Clause 3, insert the following new clause—
LIABILITY FOR CIVIL PROCEEDINGS ON GROUNDS OF DISMISSAL
(" . Where a child care organisation, or any other organisation, is made aware that an individual who is employed in a child care position is included (otherwise than provisionally) on the list and by reason of that discovery either dismisses him or transfers him to a position within the organisation which is not a child care position, that organisation shall not thereby be rendered liable to civil proceedings on the grounds of unfair or constructive dismissal (as the case may be).")
The noble Earl said: This amendment, I hope, is self-explanatory. An organisation may be made aware that someone working for it has had his name included on the Secretary of State's list as a result of an incident that occurred sometime earlier with a previous employer. If that person is working with children, the current employer may, quite reasonably, take the view after making appropriate inquiries that it cannot continue employing that individual.
On the other hand, the person concerned may have an unblemished track record with the current employer. What is the employer able to do? If he dismisses the person, he lays himself open to an action for unfair dismissal. If he transfers the person to a job that has no contact with children, that may not be to the employee's liking and he may resign to pursue a claim for constructive dismissal. That is why it should be a matter at least for discussion that an employer who takes a well-considered decision to dispense with someone's services, purely on the grounds of their inclusion on the list, should not thereby be rendered liable to an action in the courts under the employment laws.
The Minister in another place said that case law existed to show that an employer may act in response to evidence of previous misconduct that directly relates to a person's ability to perform his or her current employment. But is that good enough? I am thinking particularly of the sort of case I mentioned. An employee placed on the list as a result of a misdemeanour committed many years in the past, but with an otherwise unblemished track record with his current employer, might feel that he has been unjustly treated were he to be dismissed simply on the grounds of being on the list. But this is surely an issue for the employer to determine. A responsible employer will look at each such case on its merits and take the action he thinks appropriate. We ought to give the employer the benefit of any doubt and explicitly free him from the threat of legal action in cases where an employee refuses to go quietly.
I hope that the noble Lord will be sympathetic to my central point in this amendment. I beg to move.
Lord Meston: I take a purely technical objection. The amendment does not in fact cover wrongful dismissal; it covers unfair and constructive dismissal. That is purely technical. As a matter of principle, I do not support the suggested immunity which this amendment proposes. The question of whether or not a dismissal was unfair or wrongful surely has to be looked at on the facts and circumstances of the individual case, and, if necessary, be assessed by the court or employment tribunal which is considering the problem.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: Again, I understand the reasons why the noble Earl tabled this amendment. I sympathise with what he is seeking to do. But in principle what he is proposing is wrong—on very much the grounds put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Meston. However, I hope that I can provide some words of comfort to the noble Earl in this matter. Essentially, the amendment seems designed to give employers immunity from proceedings before the employment tribunal for unfair or constructive dismissal, where the dismissal or transfer to a non-childcare position was made as a result of the employer discovering that the individual is included on the Department of Health list.
While it is doubtful whether the amendment, as drafted, could in fact have the intended effect, perhaps I may address the merits rather than the technicalities of it. There is undoubtedly a sense in which it may seem
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onerous for referring organisations to be left open to possible proceedings before an employment tribunal when they consider that they have acted in good faith in accordance with the spirit of this legislation. However, I am unable to advise Members of the Committee to accept the amendment, even in principle. It would be wrong to confer such a sweeping immunity with such indiscriminate disregard for the many circumstances in which it would have effect.
It is precisely the function of the employment tribunal to discriminate between cases and to weigh each according to its particular merits. Effectively removing access to the tribunal in this way would benefit not only those employers who have acted properly and in good faith and who would, therefore, have nothing to fear from tribunal proceedings, but also others who might have taken advantage of the immunity to disregard the normal obligations imposed by Parliament under employment law.
The employment tribunal will look at a wide range of issues when considering whether a dismissal was fair. The fact that an individual is included in the list will be but one of those issues, and other relevant issues might arise. As such, it would be inappropriate to remove the individual's right to have his case heard by the employment tribunal.
In seeking to improve child protection, it is not the intention of the promoters of this Bill, as I understand it, to remove or diminish the reasonable protections already available to relevant parties. What we are seeing here is another indication of the very careful balance to be drawn between, on the one hand, the need to protect children and, on the other, the rights of the individuals concerned who may be placed on the list.
I did say that I hoped to be able to offer some comfort to the noble Earl. Despite the strong view that I expressed in relation to the principle, I believe that there is some comfort to be drawn in relation to the practice as the crucial question is whether an employer who dismissed someone from the childcare position, because the individual was found to be on the list, would be likely to lose before an employment tribunal on the grounds that he dismissed the person unfairly. Although the noble Earl was perhaps a little dismissive of the comments made by the Minister in another place concerning case law, I think that there is some comfort in that regard.
Lord Laming: In the presence of distinguished lawyers, I hesitate to rely upon the law in reply to the noble Earl, Lord Howe. However, it is my understanding that if an employer needs to defend a claim of unfair dismissal of an employee he has five possible statutory grounds on which to do so. The one I would expect an employer in these circumstances to rely upon is as follows:
"He would state some other substantial reason of a kind such as to justify dismissal of an employee holding the position which that employee had".

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In other words, the position which the employee held at the time justified the action of the employer. Where decisions have been made in good faith, following the proper procedures, experience shows that this has provided proper protection for the employer.
However, it would seem entirely wrong to seek to remove rights from an employee to go to a tribunal because there are circumstances where the employee may have legitimate complaints about the way in which he or she has been dealt with by the employer. I believe that this amendment strikes at the heart of employment law. It would deprive people of what I think are essential rights in respect of which, as the Minister indicated, the Bill before us attempts to strike a balance. Although I have considerable sympathy with the noble Earl, having been in a similar situation myself in the past, I hope that he will agree that the existing employment law should remain undisturbed.
Earl Howe: We have had a helpful short debate. I am grateful to all noble Lords who have commented on the amendment. I realise that it has severe drawbacks. The question I seek to pose is simply this: should a person's inclusion on the list be sufficient ground in itself for dismissing him from a post? The answer seems to be that in some cases it may and in some cases it may not; and that each case will be decided on its merits in the normal way. I have no argument at all with that. My concern was to establish that the opposite would not apply—namely, that a business dismissing someone on those grounds would automatically find that it did not have a leg to stand on. That would worry me greatly. However, from the comments made by the Minister and the noble Lord, that does not seem to be the case. Therefore, I am entirely happy to beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clauses 4 and 5 agreed to.
12.4.5 p.m.
Clause 6 [Appeals against prohibition or restriction of employment]:
Earl Howe Earl Howe moved Amendment No. 9:
Page 5, line 39, leave out ("may") and insert ("shall")
The noble Earl said: In moving this amendment, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 10. These amendments are prompted directly by comments made by the Delegated Powers and Deregulation Committee of this House in its recent report on the Bill. I hope and believe that the point at issue can be dealt with relatively easily. In Clause 6(2) and (3) we see a provision for regulations to be made under Section 218 of the 1988 Act in relation to an appeal to the tribunal against a decision to prohibit or restrict a person's employment.
The wording of the clause is permissive rather than mandatory. The Explanatory Notes to the Bill and, one understands, the Department of Health memorandum to the committee present the provision in Clause 6(3) as directly mirroring that in Clause 4(4). However, as the committee points out, the prohibition contained in
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Clause 4(4) is an absolute provision on the face of the Bill and not, as here, a permissive power to be introduced by regulation. Therefore, the two powers do not mirror each other. I believe that my question on this occasion needs to be addressed to the Minister. Can he give me an assurance that, if this Bill is enacted, the Government will bring forward regulations in pursuit of the powers granted in Clause 6(2) and (3). I beg to move.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: I understand the noble Earl's desire to ensure that the matters mentioned in subsections (2) and (3) of Clause 6 are included in the regulations to be made by virtue of the clause. However, it is not necessary to make these amendments to achieve that aim. Those matters will have to be addressed in regulations in any event.
The reason that the word "may" is used in the subsections and not "shall" is to ensure consistency with the wording of Section 218(6) of the Education Reform Act 1988, which is expressed as a discretionary power to make regulations. The intention is to provide that the arrangements for appeals under regulations made by virtue of Clause 6 should be the same in all essential respects as the arrangements set out in Clause 4 of the Bill for appeals against inclusion on the new Department of Health list.
I am assured that the regulations will make provision for anyone who is included on List 99 in the future to ask the tribunal to consider whether there were grounds for barring him and, if so, whether barring was the appropriate sanction. If the tribunal is satisfied that there were not sufficient grounds to bar, or that barring was not appropriate in all the circumstances of a particular case, it will be able to remove the bar. The regulations will also ensure that appellants will not be able to challenge any facts on which a criminal conviction is based in an appeal to the tribunal. I hope I have given the assurance to the noble Earl that regulations will be made.
Lord Laming: I am tempted to respond. I hope that the noble Earl, Lord Howe, will not think that I am in this respect a leopard which is not able to change its spots. For many years I have advised Ministers on the virtues of the word "may" rather than "shall". I remain absolutely convinced of those virtues. I hope that the noble Earl will feel that these matters are best dealt with in the regulations.
Earl Howe: If the noble Lord, Lord Laming, is convinced of the virtues of the word "may" rather than "shall" I shall follow him down that path immediately. I am grateful to the Minister for his comments. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 10 not moved.]
Clause 6 agreed to.
Clause 7 agreed to.
Lord Meston Lord Meston moved Amendment No. 11:
After Clause 7, insert the following new clause—
SEARCHES OF BOTH LISTS IN CERTAIN CASES
(" . Where—

(a) in any family proceedings within the meaning of section 8 of the Children Act 1989 a welfare officer or guardian or litigation friend appointed by the court, or a local authority enquiring into the circumstances of a child, is directed by the court or otherwise reasonably requires to investigate the suitability of any individual in a child care position; or

(b) a local authority exercising its duties under sections 17, 22 or 47 of that Act reasonably requires to investigate the suitability of any such individual,

the person or authority so directed or requiring to investigate shall ascertain whether the individual is included in the lists referred to in section 7 above.")
The noble Lord said: This amendment proposes that those who are directly and properly concerned in the welfare and safety of children within the family justice system and in local authorities exercising statutory duties under the Children Act 1989 should have the ability to check the lists. Court welfare officers, social workers and those who represent children in proceedings need access to information about people who are or may become associated with the care and upbringing of the children concerned. At present they have access to criminal records, but not to the existing list or index. I believe, subject to correction, that local authorities may have access at least to the existing consultancy index when they are preparing reports for adoption agencies under the Adoption Agencies Regulations 1983. If that is correct, it is anomalous; if it is incorrect, surely local authorities should have such access when inquiring about potential adopters and their families and in all other situations which they have to investigate.
The wider point is that these are situations in which responsible people are required to carry out actual investigations to discover whether there is an identifiable risk to a specific child. At present the Bill is confined to inquiries by employers and potential employers, but clearly there are others who need to know as much as possible about people coming into contact with children in a domestic or non-employment context. Section 47 of the Children Act, for example, imposes a duty on local authorities who have reasonable cause to suspect that a child is suffering, or is likely to suffer, significant harm to make such inquiries as they consider necessary to enable them to decide whether they should take action to safeguard the child. How can they properly discharge that duty if they cannot in appropriate cases have access to the lists?
Information available in the area of child abuse is partial enough. Far from all offences or suspected offences are reported; fewer still result in convictions or cautions. The best available information should be available to all with responsibilities for children from a properly integrated database. The childcare system is based on the philosophy of Working Together, to which the noble Lord, Lord Laming, referred a short while ago. The objective of this Bill is in its title, the protection of children. I beg to move.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: The noble Lord, Lord Meston, brings a particular expertise to the
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Committee's deliberations on this Bill. However, notwithstanding the title of the Bill, which the noble Lord has pointed out, the Bill does not claim to be comprehensive. It is best seen as one plank in a whole series of efforts to try to ensure that we provide as much protection to children as possible. As the noble Lord explained, he is concerned to ensure that investigations undertaken either in connection with family proceedings in the courts, or otherwise by a local authority in the exercise of certain functions under the Children Act 1989, should include checking the names of individuals under investigation against the departmental list dealt with under this Bill.
The proposed new clause seeks to achieve its object by specifying that checks should be carried out in respect of individuals being investigated for the purposes of family proceedings listed in Section 8 of the Children Act 1989. It also provides that checks should be carried out by local authorities when carrying out the duties imposed on them under Sections 17, 22 and 47 of the Act when investigating the suitability of such individuals. Section 17 deals with the provision of services for children in need, their families and others. Section 22 concerns the general duty of local authorities in relation to children looked after by them. Section 47 concerns the duty of local authorities to investigate in certain circumstances whether they should take any action to safeguard or promote the child's welfare.
As the noble Lord, Lord Meston, has said, as it stands the current Bill's provisions are confined to the actions of organisations in respect of employment in childcare positions. The present amendment would extend the Bill to cover checks on individuals where there is no employment relationship with the organisation concerned; for example, checks on the partner of a parent where a residence order is being sought. This is an area which was considered to be outside the scope of the present proposals. I do not think this is surprising because, as I said at the beginning, this Bill, which has never been claimed to be the last word on the subject of child protection, has to be seen as a building block for a more complete situation and is concerned only with employment situations. That is, it is aimed at protecting children from harm where they are being provided with care for whatever reason.
Before I sit down I shall respond to the question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, about access to the current list. Local authorities now have access to the list, and under the Bill will have access to the one-stop-shop provisions for checks on prospective adoptive parents when Clause 8 is enacted.
Lord Laming: I fully understand the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, who has great experience in this field. I support what the Minister has said in that this amendment would take this Bill into a whole new area of family proceedings which I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Meston, would agree is a complicated area, at least for a layman such as myself. I emphasise that this Bill is a Private Member's Bill which can address only the narrow but important field of employment. I hope that there will be opportunities elsewhere for the

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noble Lord, Lord Meston, to pursue his legitimate concerns. I hope that the Committee will not feel that this is the place to pursue them.
Lord Meston: I am grateful for that predictable response from both noble Lords. I am sorry that this situation is outside the scope of the Bill, which I believe is unfortunately and indeed unnecessarily confined in respect of the points which I have sought to raise. At Second Reading I gave the example of individuals who deliberately insinuate themselves into families, particularly single-parent families, where they know there is a child or children. If proceedings result, in whatever context, the welfare officer or the social services department will reasonably want to know all there is to know about that individual before approving him—usually it is "him" but sometimes it is "her"—as someone suitable to be involved in the upbringing of the child concerned.
It seems an anomaly that a welfare officer can check a criminal record to establish whether an individual has a conviction or caution recorded against him but cannot check his other record—we all know that it exists and its details will, no doubt, be greatly improved when the Bill comes into force—which shows that the person has been sacked for gross sexual impropriety. It is an omission which will, in years to come, be seen as a deliberate omission.
I understand the constraints of time and the limitations of the Bill and I shall not press the amendment. However, I suggest that it is a matter that needs urgent consideration. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clauses 8 and 9 agreed to.
1 p.m.
Clause 10 [Power to extend protection of Act]:
On Question, whether Clause 10 shall stand part of the Bin?
Earl Howe: Perhaps I should make clear straightaway that I have no intention of trying to remove the clause from the Bill or of suggesting that that might be desirable. I seek merely to probe the noble Lord and the Minister as to the intentions behind it.
It is quite clear that the position of adults suffering from mental impairment has a close parallel with that of children in terms of their vulnerability, particularly their vulnerability to all forms of abuse. How does the clause fit in with the Government's wider intentions to introduce legislation to protect vulnerable people in society, both young and old? When might we expect to see the Government bringing forward regulations in pursuit of Clause 10? Can the Minister say what practical issues, over and above those raised by the main body of the Bill, need to be addressed before such regulations can be implemented?
The problem with the clause—if I can call it a "problem"—is that it does not go quite far enough. It seems to me that in focusing on adults with what is
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called a "mental impairment", it draws an arbitrary dividing line between one group of vulnerable adults and another; for example, it excludes adults suffering from dementia or a degenerative illness such as Alzheimer's disease. The disability suffered by the latter group in terms of loss of social functions and capacity of expression is, for all practical purposes, exactly the same as that suffered by the former.
If the starting point for the clause is to extend the scope of the Bill to those adults to whom society owes a duty of care similar to the duty it owes to children, then I do not understand why the clause does not go further. If it is the case that the Government are currently addressing the needs of vulnerable individuals across the board, young and old, are we likely to see Clause 10 being implemented in isolation from any measures that may be brought forward in that wider context?
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: I understand that the noble Earl has chosen this device not only to probe the Government's intentions in respect of using the power in Clause 10 to extend the protection in the Bill to mentally impaired adults, but also to establish our intentions on a number of other matters, particularly with regard to the way in which protection may be strengthened for other categories of vulnerable adults. I shall try my best to respond, although I fear that I may not be able to give as great a clarification as the noble Earl may seek.
On the point about when the power in the clause might be exercised, the position is as follows. As the noble Earl will realise, a great deal of work needs to be undertaken before the main provisions of the Bill can come into force. Subordinate regulations, some of which we have discussed already, and regulations relating to the tribunal and to the education Acts, will be of some complexity. Setting up the tribunal will be a substantial task. Although no final decisions have been taken on the matter, at the moment we consider that it would be. unwise to seek to use the powers in this clause until such time as the main architecture of the scheme is in place and operating satisfactorily.
On the point about why the Bill should not contain a power similar to that contained in Clause 10 in relation to mentally impaired adults, the short answer is that they are very different issues. The point has already been made that it would be too much to expect that a Private Member's Bill would be an appropriate vehicle to extend the protection that it affords to children to all other vulnerable members of the community.
We have to be clear that the Bill is targeted on improving our child protection system. It would not be practical to expect that that system could satisfactorily encompass the needs of quite distinct groups beyond those already set out in the Bill. The position of mentally impaired adults is most similar to that of children.
Clearly it will be a considerable challenge to resolve the many and varied problems concerning vulnerable adults. We have to examine different groups individually and to produce the right solutions according

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to the circumstances. I am given to understand that the interdepartmental working group is studying these matters at present. I hope that the noble Earl agrees that the best course of action is to await the group's recommendations. I assure him that his comments will be fed into its deliberations.
I accept that my response may have been less precise than the noble Earl wished, but I assure the Committee that the Government have no intention of dragging their feet. Returning to the point I made earlier in relation to the operation of the Bill if enacted, it is very important to ensure that we get the main scheme in place and operating satisfactorily.
Earl Howe: I am grateful to the Minister. I was not suggesting that the scope of the Bill should be extended to all vulnerable individuals, but merely that the dividing line created by Clause 10 in terms of who is and who is not included in the clause is somewhat artificial. I was pleasantly surprised to see Clause 10 in the Bill at all. Given that it is there, I wished to ask whether perhaps it is too narrowly drawn. However, I am grateful to the Minister for the pointers he has been able to give, such as they are. I understand entirely that, inevitably, there is still much work to do and much uncertainty ahead.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: Clearly the points made about clarification of the definition are matters which will need to be taken on board as we move forward, both in terms of the implementation of the Bill and in terms of the work of the interdepartmental group.
Earl Howe: Again, I am grateful to the Minister. I had assumed on reading Clause 10 that the phrase "mental impairment" would not necessarily prohibit the inclusion of those suffering from dementia or a degenerative illness. They would normally not be included in the definition of "mental impairment". Nevertheless, I am grateful for what the Minister said. I look forward with interest to the way in which the provisions are implemented and lay open the way for Clause 10 to come into full operation.
Clause 10 agreed to.
Lord Meston Lord Meston moved Amendment No. 12:
After Clause 10, insert the following new clause—
PERSON SEARCHING LIST TO BE INFORMED OF COMPARABLE LISTS
(" . The Secretary of State shall by regulation make provision for a person searching the list kept under section 1 above or the list kept for the purpose of regulations made under section 218(6) of the 1988 Act, or applying under subsection (3A) of section 113 of the Police Act 1997, to be informed if an individual is included on any comparable list held elsewhere in the British Islands.")
The noble Lord said: This is a geographical amendment. As drafted, the Bill applies to England and Wales. At Second Reading, the noble Lord, Lord Laming, told us that a parallel system may well be brought into force in Scotland. The purpose of this amendment is to ensure that the system in Scotland and indeed any other systems which exist or may come to
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exist elsewhere are joined up. In that way, employers who seek information will truly be provided with a single point of reference.
We have reminded ourselves several times today that child abusers exploit the gaps in any system. They move around. It certainly must be likely that a conscientious employer, faced with an applicant for a job whose accent or name suggests that he comes from other than England and Wales, would wish to be assured that in checking the list, as he is obliged to do, he is getting information that is as comprehensive as possible. Indeed, I would hope that it could work both ways so that the prospective employer in England, Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man or wherever it may be, could likewise feel confident that when he checks the point of reference available to him he is getting comprehensive information throughout the British Isles. On that basis, I beg to move.
Lord Elton: The noble Lord has chosen a term which is variously interpreted in the north and the south of Ireland. I wonder whether it was his intention, which would not be a bad one, to include some form of communication between the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom or whether the term was intended to sweep up the Isle of Man and Jersey and was not intended to set a quite considerable flutter in the political dovecotes of the Republic.
Lord Meston: No, it was not intended to cover the Republic. The phrase "the British Islands" comes from the Interpretation Act. I did in fact take the trouble to look it up before drafting the amendment and it is on that basis that I used the phrase.
Lord Elton: My intention was not entirely frivolous. There seems to be a whole area here where we ought to be moving closer to the government of the Republic of Ireland because there is such a massive interchange of personnel working in these fields between the two states. It would be extremely helpful on both sides of the Irish Sea if some such links could be established.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: Although I cannot recommend that the Committee accepts the amendment, I have a great deal of sympathy with the points raised. particularly the noble Lord's concern that individuals might seek to exploit the gaps. The noble Lord, Lord Elton, also raised an important question, not just in relation to Ireland but also to other European countries. As part of what I described earlier as the building block towards greater child protection, these matters, while not necessarily ones for the Bill, must clearly be taken into account and considered carefully.
Neither Scotland nor Northern Ireland yet has statutory lists comparable to those proposed in the Bill. However, my understanding is that putting Northern Ireland's pre-employment consultancy service on such a basis is under consideration and that it is anticipated that proposals for a list in Scotland will be put forward in due course. Until such times as these lists are available, it would not be possible for comprehensive reciprocal checks to be carried out, although I gather that

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reciprocal criminal record checks between Scottish and English authorities take place via the respective police forces and the Scottish Criminal Records Office.
My understanding is that the question of a system for arranging cross-border checks at UK level is, and continues to be, one of the very important issues under discussion by the inter-departmental working group under the chairmanship of the Home Office. Both the Northern Ireland authorities and the Scottish Office are full participants in the inter-departmental working group. Additionally, Part V of the Police Act 1997 provides for different levels of criminal record checks. Both Scotland and Northern Ireland are already included within the UK provisions of that Act. Similarly, the names of people struck off the register of teachers by the General Teaching Council for Scotland and the names of people barred from teaching in Northern Ireland by the Department of Education for Northern Ireland are included in the appendices of List 99 covering education staff in England and Wales.
In those circumstances, I hope that the noble Lord would recognise that we take very much to heart the points he raised and that the matters are under urgent consideration in the inter-departmental working group and elsewhere. But that is as far as I can go today on that.
Lord Laming: For the reasons clearly set out by the Minister, I am satisfied that the Government are addressing these matters urgently and seriously. For that reason I hope that the noble Lord will be willing to withdraw his amendment.
1.15 p.m.
Lord Elton: The word "urgent" has been used, I am not sure how advisedly. It is now more than 20 years since the Maria Caldwell case caused us all in horror to look at the risk that children were at. It was then quite clear that a lack of communication between the voluntary agencies, the statutory agencies and the local authority lay behind the difficulty. At the same time the importance of keeping the local authority children at risk list up to date to follow the movement of the children was a priority. I add my voice to that of the noble Lord, Lord Meston, in saying that the cross-border updating of this information—it is the same issue, but on a larger scale—should be treated as a matter of urgency. Otherwise the whole system will fall to the ground when someone crosses a line on the map.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: I shall ensure that the points raised by the noble Lords, Lord Elton and Lord Meston, are taken on board.
Lord Meston: I thank the noble Lord, Lord Elton, for reinforcing the points I was seeking to make. The amendment is not meant to be prescriptive. It is simply to enable the Secretary of State, wherever and whenever comparable lists are established elsewhere, to ensure that people seeking information can seek it in one go with a single point of reference. It is not dependent on there already being similar lists elsewhere. Therefore, I find it difficult to see why this enabling provision
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cannot fit into the Bill as presently drafted. I had the impression—perhaps the Minister will correct me if I am wrong—that whenever the new system is set up in Scotland, Northern Ireland or wherever else, further primary English legislation will be necessary to bring into force regulations such as those I suggest in the amendment. If further primary legislation will be needed, it is perhaps unfortunate that that has to be so when an opportunity is provided for an enabling measure in this Bill. However, I do not intend to press the point at this stage. Accordingly, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Remaining clauses and schedule agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported without amendment.

Breeding and Sale of Dogs (Welfare) Bill
1.20 p.m.
Lord Soulsby of Swaffham Prior: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
The primary aim of the Bill is to improve the welfare of dogs kept and puppies bred in commercial breeding establishments. The Bill should be read in conjunction with the Breeding of Dogs Act 1973 and 1991 and the Pet Animals Act 1951.
For several years, a number of bodies—for example, the RSPCA; the British Veterinary Association; the British Small Animal Veterinary Association; the Kennel Club; and the National Canine Defence League—have been concerned about indiscriminate dog breeding and dealing and have suggested ways in which the welfare of dogs at breeding establishments might be improved and "puppy farming" brought under control.
In 1995, the All-Party Group on Animal Welfare commissioned a working party to identify defects in existing legislation and to indicate where changes in the law were required. The resulting report was objective and balanced. The descriptions of some of the conditions under which dogs are bred and puppies reared were quite appalling, situations to which I can attest. The term "puppy farming" now implies an abuse of breeding bitches and their offspring. That report has helped significantly in the construction of this Bil1.
There is, of course, no good reason why large-scale breeding should in any way compromise the conditions under which dogs are kept, the way in which they are looked after, or the quality and health of the stock produced. Unfortunately, however, that is all too frequently not the case, and in a determined effort to get rid of much of the bad practice once and for all a group of 11 organisations representing animal welfare, dog breeders, local authorities, the veterinary profession and the pet industry have worked together over many months to prepare this much-needed Bill. Those organisations are: the Blue Cross; the British Dog Breeders Council; the British Veterinary Association; the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health: Justice for Dogs; the Kennel Club; the National Canine Defence

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League; the National Dog Wardens Association; the Pet Care Trust; ProDogs; and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
It would be totally remiss of me if I did not particularly mention how much I, this House, another place, and indeed all the organisations I have mentioned are in the debt of the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton, who not only chaired the group meetings so competently, but also consulted widely and closely with the Home Office officials at all stages of the drafting process. We are also indebted to Home Office officials and lawyers for the immense amount of help and advice they have given us over the past few months.
The Bill addresses a number of key issues which have been identified over the years. As I indicated, it should be read in conjunction with the Breeding of Dogs Act 1973. The key issues are as follows. There are new rules for the inspection of premises. Bitches are not to be mated until they are at least 12 months old. No bitch will be allowed to have more than six litters in her lifetime. Accurate breeding records must be kept and be made available for inspection. The provisions also include: stiffer penalties for offenders, including imprisonment; flexibility of licence fee charges to reflect local authority inspection costs; exemption from licensing for most hobby breeders; new rules for pet shops and dealers; new penalties for misrepresentation; and individual identification for puppies sold through third parties. These new measures will not only improve welfare standards for dogs and puppies; they will also provide import and new protection for puppy buyers.
The various clauses and the reasons for them are as follows. Clause 1 deals with the licensing and inspection of premises. Before granting a breeding licence for the first time a local authority has to consider both welfare and environmental issues. Clause 1 provides that, before considering the grant of a licence, the premises must be inspected by a veterinary surgeon or veterinary practitioner and a local authority officer. The clause provides that the local authority shall consider the report prepared by those persons before determining to grant a licence. For subsequent inspections, the local authority is given the flexibility of sending a veterinary surgeon or practitioner or an officer of the local authority, or both. That will in many cases save on costs but will not weaken the inspection process.
Clause 2 deals with licence conditions. This provision greatly strengthens the 1973 Act by including a number of new conditions in addition to those set out in that Act dealing with accommodation, food and drink, bedding, the control of disease, protection against fire and the transportation of dogs.
Subsection 2(f) is based on the fact that experience shows that far too many bitches are mated at too early an age. The clause makes it an offence for a bitch to be mated if she is less than one year old—which is the time when she is fully physiologically mature to become pregnant.
Sub-paragraph (g) is based on the fact that Kennel Club records indicate that many bitches produce litters every time they come into season. The sub-paragraph
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will remedy that by including a restriction on breeding to a maximum of six litters in a bitch's lifetime—in other words, allowing a rest period. To allow for that rest period, the clause contains the provision that bitches do not give birth to puppies within 12 months of producing a previous litter.
Sub-paragraph (i) is intended to regulate breeding programmes. It will ensure that accurate records are kept at every licensed establishment and made available for inspection.
Clause 3 deals with the commencement and duration of the licence. In the past, probably because of pressure of work, some local authorities have been slow in processing initial licence applications, which has resulted in some breeders technically breaking the law. This clause puts a duty on local authorities to process all applications within three months of receipt. The licence shall come into force on the day stated in the application and be valid for one year. At present, pet animal licences run from 1st January for one year. Local authorities are obliged to carry out all inspections of pet shops, dog breeders, boarding kennels and catteries during a busy period around Christmas and the New Year. The clause gives them extra flexibility as each licence under this legislation will run for a 12-month period and not from 1st January as at present.
Clause 4 deals with the increased penalties, including imprisonment for keeping an unlicensed establishment. In the interests of animal welfare and to highlight the seriousness of the offence, the Bill includes new provisions to include as a penalty a term of imprisonment of up to three months for operating an unlicensed dog breeding establishment. In addition, a fine may also be levied.
Clause 5 deals with disqualifications. In addition to the preceding fine or imprisonment clause, this allows a court to make an order which will cancel a licence held under the 1973 Act and will disqualify the offender from keeping any dog breeding establishment. It also provides that a court may make an order to have any dog in the custody of an offender at the time of the offence delivered to a specified person and for the offender to pay specified amounts for that dog's care until permanent arrangements are made for its long-term care. It will be a punishable offence for the offender not to do so.
If the offender is not the owner of the dog, this clause gives the owner the opportunity to appeal to the Crown Court in England and Wales or to the High Court of Justiciary in Scotland.
The clause also provides that a court may make an order disqualifying a person who contravenes the Breeding of Dogs Act 1991 by obstructing an inspector of premises not covered by a licence under the 1973 Act and to disqualify the person from keeping an establishment under that Act or from having custody of a dog of a description specified in the order.
Clause 6 deals with fees. Where local authorities are responsible for inspecting dog breeding premises and granting licences, they are given powers to charge fees for this work. The Bill enables them to set a level of fees to recover their reasonable costs in this respect. In

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the past, most local authorities have charged a standard fee, regardless of the size of breeding establishment, the amount of work involved and the number of visits they have considered to be necessary during any licence period.
The clause enables them to charge a range of fees based on the amount of time and cost involved in dealing with the different licence holders and premises.
Clause 7 deals with the definition of establishments. Under the current legislation, the 1973 Act, the need for licensing has been based on the number of bitches kept at an establishment, whether or not the bitches are bred from. Clearly, this is an anomaly. The Bill sets out to redress the situation and to apply a business test to dog breeders.
Most dog breeders are essentially hobby breeders whose only interest is to breed a line of puppies in order to improve their bloodlines and to compete at dog shows. For the vast majority, the breeding of dogs is not for financial gain and is usually a loss-making exercise, rather than anything else.
For the purpose of the Bill a distinction is made between the hobby breeder and the person who is breeding for profit by defining the term
"carying on a business of breeding dogs for sale".
That is, in terms of numbers, breeding for sale five or more litters. In order to circumvent the law, a number of commercial breeders have been in the habit of spreading the ownership of breeding bitches between members of their family or people with whom they live at the same premises or elsewhere. They also make deals, known as breeding contracts or breeding arrangements, with other persons. Under these breeding arrangements they give, sell or lend bitches to third parties and agree, either verbally or in writing, that in return they will be handed back one or more puppies from one or more litters produced or will be handed the proceeds of sale of those puppies. This clause overcomes the problem of evasion of their responsibility to be licensed.
Clause 8 deals with the sale of dogs. This supports the terms of the Pet Animals Act 1991 and the Welfare of Animals (Transport) Order. Currently many puppies are sold through unlicensed third parties, the puppies being shipped to dealers and retailers for sale to the general public. Other puppies are bought in by licensed breeders from unlicensed breeders for resale. Many puppies are also sold to private purchasers at too early an age. This clause sets out to overcome those problems.
First, it will be an offence for a licensed breeder to sell a puppy to its final home until it is at least eight weeks old. This period is important because imprinting with its mother will take place during that time. It will be an offence for a licensed breeder to sell a puppy to an unlicensed dealer or retailer, as these already need to be licensed under the Pet Animals Act, or to sell puppies acquired from an unlicensed breeder.
It is essential that all puppies sold to dealers and retailers are clearly identifiable, usually by a collar bearing an identifying tag or badge.
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Clause 9 deals with penalties and refers to Clause 8 of the Bill. It includes a penalty of imprisonment and fines not exceeding level 4 or both.
Clause 10 deals with repeals. It makes provision for certain repeals of provisions of certain enactments.
Following the Short Title, commencement and enactment, the Act will come into force at the end of the period of six months beginning with the day on which it is passed. Finally, the Act does not extend to Northern Ireland. I beg to move.
Moved, that the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord Soulsby of Swaffham Prior.)
1.37 p.m.
Lord Hardy of Wath: My Lords, the House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Soulsby, who has presented the Bill in detail and will have regard to his considerable professional experience which lends authority to which we should pay heed. I join the noble Lord in expressing thanks to the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton, who has worked indefatigably on this matter for a long time.
The Bill has quite a long history and it is to be hoped that this time it will reach the statute book without further delay. It is certainly needed. It will be of no disadvantage to responsible dog owners and dog breeders. Any responsible dog owner—I hope that I am one—will rejoice if the Bill goes on to the statute book.
There are too many irresponsible profit-seeking people involved in an unseemly trade. That position did not improve when, unfortunately, some years ago when farmers were facing difficulty, under the previous administration the Ministry of Agriculture advised farmers who needed to make money to take up dog breeding for profit. Some of us protested and I think the advice was quickly withdrawn, but one or two people may have acted upon it. There have been some rather distressing cases.
My conviction about the need for the Bill goes back a long time to the days when I was a schoolmaster. One of my colleagues and his wife, who were childless, went to get a puppy. They did not seek advice, but went to one of the puppy farmers. The puppy came into their home and brought a great deal of joy, but shortly afterwards a great deal of distress. It had never had a chance because the conditions in which it had been nurtured were so unsatisfactory. The House has an opportunity to prevent that kind of distress.
I should declare an interest. The noble Lord, Lord Soulsby, referred to the Kennel Club. I have an interest in the sense that I am an honorary member of that club. I have no financial interest, but a great personal one. I have been involved in dogs throughout my life and from time to time I judge them. Quite often, I judge for charity at the rather enjoyable exemption shows to which people bring their family pets. There are four classes for pedigree dogs. Some of the dogs do not appear to be particularly good representatives of the breed that they purport to be. Occasionally, one sees among those dogs evidence of lack of nutrition early in

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life. If one talks to the exhibitor after the show and asks where the dog came from, one finds that it came from establishments of the kind at which this Bill is aimed.
I never want the breeds with which I have been involved to become popular. If they do, they attract the attention of puppy farmers. At the moment, the West Highland white is the most popular of the terrier breeds. There are some very odd West Highland white terriers about these days. Norwich terriers are not quite so popular. They remain typical of the breed in both character and conformation. But not long ago I was horrified to see an Irish wolfhound at a show. I had some difficulty in identifying it as such, but it seemed to me to send out danger signals that that breed was popular.
The Bill provides that people should not sell puppies until they are eight weeks-old. That is a necessary provision. But the responsible Irish wolfhound or deerhound breeder, or anyone concerned with the larger breeds, would not dream of selling a puppy as early as eight weeks-old. If they want a puppy to bring credit to their kennels and to their own record of responsibility, they will wait until 12 weeks. That should certainly apply to novice breeders. They will also ask questions about the circumstances, capacity and understanding of those who seek to acquire such a dog.
I recall that on one occasion when my noble friend Lord Cocks applied a very long Whip—we were in the other place from Monday morning until Friday evening—I got home on Friday and said to my wife that I could see a difference in our Irish wolfhound since I had left home on Monday. He appeared to have put on about four pounds. That breed is not easily or cheaply raised. Breeding dogs of that size for profit provides some people with an enormous temptation to cut corners with regard to nourishment and care. I believe that that is another reason why the welfare organisations, the Kennel Club and other organisations to which the noble Lord referred, are united in their view that this Bill needs to be enacted as soon as possible.
The Bill will not disadvantage responsible breeders. For most people engaged in activities controlled by the Kennel Club, the dogs are part of the family and have a great deal of human contact. If one wants to see a dog succeeding in the show ring, in obedience or any of the other activities at the annual exhibition at Crufts, that dog must have had contact with people and be part of the family. For a bitch to be incarcerated in a squalid shed and treated as if she is a breeding machine providing stock for supermarket shelves is a monstrously horrible approach, and the sooner it is outlawed the better. I am therefore convinced of the necessity for the Bill.
I am aware that the people who are responsible for the 957 breed rescue schemes within the ambit of the Kennel Club will welcome this Bill, especially where the breed is a popular one which receives the attentions of puppy farmers. The people who run those schemes are the ones who have to pick up the pieces left by those who see dogs purely as an instrument for gain. Those responsible for that essential and valuable work will,
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with all the other welfare organisations in the country, share the hope that this Bill is enacted and implemented at the earliest possible date.
1.45 p.m.
Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes: My Lords, I start with an apology. As the debate began somewhat later than I expected I must leave before the end. I express my gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Soulsby, for the way that he introduced the Bill. It has had Second Readings before in a somewhat chequered career.
The first of a long line of tributes must be paid to those of my honourable friends in another place who were lucky enough to win a place in the ballot in order to introduce the Bill, first unsuccessfully but then successfully. I pay tribute also to all those who made possible a quick passage of the Bill to your Lordships' House. It involved a great deal of very good management for which everyone who wants to see the Bill enacted as soon as possible must be grateful.
I join in all the tributes paid to the various welfare organisations, my pet one being the National Canine Defence League. I am a grandmother and I am told that I can have a favourite. I turn to the tributes to the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton. Perhaps the greatest accolade she received was in the Standing Committee in another place where one of the Labour Members said that she had almost converted him to supporting the hereditary peerage. I believe that that was a bit churlish; he could have gone the whole way and omitted the word "almost".
However, the kinds of cases that have led to the need for this Bill are so terrible that it is almost impossible to contemplate that any of the penalties will be sufficient to stop the puppy farmers who have gained such an unscrupulous reputation. Bitches are kept in cages, have their food thrown at them, and have never eaten from a bowl. They are made to breed over and over again and never see a human face near them. Eventually, if they have not died from natural causes they are not put down but often thrown onto the scrap heap and found dying.
This is a terrible state of affairs. I am very sad that it has taken so long—it is no one's fault—to introduce the legislation. I pay tribute, like the noble Lord, Lord Hardy, to the carers and re-homers of these poor dogs. As many noble Lords will be aware, when first rescued the poor creatures are like zombies. They have never had any human contact and have no idea of how to socialise with either humans or other dogs. One sees them at the corners of a room in their baskets and beds—which they never had before—and their eyes are absolutely blank; they are zombies. Bit by bit, wonderful people with patience and devotion can bring some of these creatures—many cannot be saved because they are too ill—to a stage where they can be offered to re-homers who will look after them and for the first time give them a decent life.
I wish to pay tribute to those people who re-home these dogs after the carers. They have to give them a great deal of love, commitment and devotion to restore them, if possible, to the normal happy life that a dog should have; and they do that. Those thousands of people should be mentioned in the tributes paid.

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Finally, I find myself for the first time in my life without a dog, our last darling Jack Russells having died last year. My husband and I decided that we were too old to have another dog because it would probably outlive us—and what would happen then? The idea of adopting an older dog and re-homing one of these poor creatures crossed one's mind. A new vista of dog ownership opened up which we are now pursuing.
I again express thanks to all those who have made the Bill possible, to all who will help it to pass speedily, and to the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton, in particular.
1.51 p.m.
Baroness Wharton: My Lords, I am delighted that my noble friend Lord Soulsby has chosen to pick up this Bill on behalf of James Clappison—he is here today—who so skilfully piloted this Breeding and Sale of Dogs (Welfare) Bill through all stages in another place. As chairman of the working party group—it has been mentioned by the noble Lord—I think that I can speak for all of us when I say that we are grateful for the help and assistance we have received from all quarters within the Palace of Westminster.
I should like to tell noble Lords something of the history of the Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Oppenheim-Barnes, went into it a little. The first Breeding and Sale of Dogs Bill was introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Maddock, when a Member of another place. It did not complete the course. It ran out of time, which is one of the hazards facing a Private Member's Bill. A second attempt was made in another place last year with a Bill sponsored by Mike Hall. It underwent considerable change in Standing Committee. It then became apparent that most of the canine and welfare organisations could not support it, so David Maclean blocked it because he believed that the Bill was flawed.
Several organisations, such as the Kennel Club, the Pet Care Trust and the National Canine Defence League, to name but a few, wrote to David Maclean asking for a meeting with a view to drafting a new Bill. He suggested that they elect an independent chairman. Since July of last year, it has been an honour and a privilege for me to act on their behalf.
Roger Gale, myself and others have long wanted to see such a Bill become law. The noble Lord has mentioned that the All-Party Parliamentary Animal Welfare Group commissioned a report with recommendations on what is known as "puppy farming". Much of that document makes grim reading. On re-reading the report, I still find it hard to believe that breeding bitches could have been kept in such appalling conditions. As the noble Lord, Lord Hardy, said, apart from filthy, cramped pens, the state of the animals' health was dreadful; and inadequate feeding was not uncommon. Although Wales was highlighted then as an area causing deep concern, similar problems also existed in other parts of Great Britain, so nothing much has changed in that there is still scant regard for the welfare of the dogs. They are simply breeding machines—nothing else.
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Clearly, many breeding establishments are well run, but far too many come to the attention of the RSPCA inspectors who never cease to be sickened by the way in which these bitches are kept. Regulations are blatantly ignored. Hence the derogatory term "puppy farming". The Bill is designed to improve substantially the conditions in all commercial breeding establishments by tightening the regulations under which they will be able to operate in the future.
At the first meeting of the working group, it was agreed that welfare should be the emphasis of the new Bill. With the word "welfare" in the title, it would be clear that the welfare of the breeding dogs was paramount. It was agreed that I should consult Home Office officials as we progressed through the Bill, clause by clause. I talked to the noble Lord, Lord Williams of Mostyn, outlining our agenda. He suggested that I, and ultimately Barry Huckle of the Pet Care Trust, meet regularly with Rick Evans, Bernard Diver and Ashley Marks, the Home Office officials dealing with animal welfare, as was the noble Lord at that time. I am extremely grateful to them, in particular Bernard Diver, who has always been at the other end of the telephone, including last night.
Home Office lawyers regularly monitored our changes. I was assured that the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, George Howarth, was made aware of every change we made. I also sought Roger Gale's advice from time to time. The Bill gradually took shape. Barry Huckle took care of all the paperwork and presented us with revised drafts of the Bill at each meeting that we held at the offices of the National Canine Defence League.
The input of so many specialists in their various fields was invaluable. Bernard Diver said that he could not recall a Bill being drafted by so many people representing so many organisations.
We had a draft Bill ready by November. Now we needed some luck. We eagerly awaited the results of the Private Members' ballot in another place. A copy of the draft was sent to each of the 20 winners and we waited. We knew we would be lucky and our luck came on 15th December, two days before the House rose for the Christmas Recess. James Clappison introduced himself and said, "My daughter Charlotte says that I should adopt this Bill because she is very keen on animals". He said that he would look at it and let me know. I said, "Please don't take too long because you will ruin my Christmas if you do". Our sponsor rang me the next day and said, "Yes, I'll take it".
James Clappison was 15th on the Private Members' ballot list. He is a Home Office Front-Bench spokesman for the Opposition and as such has a heavy parliamentary load. I thought: no matter; he has a good Bill and we are fortunate to have an experienced MP I told the noble Lord, Lord Carter—he is sitting in his place—the good news. Like the noble Lord, Lord Williams, he had also been kept up to date on our progress throughout the summer. The exact words of the noble Lord were, "Only the first five or six stand any chance of getting a hearing, let alone getting through all the stages". However, he offered help and support which I gratefully accepted.

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The Bill was scrutinised by parliamentary counsel and 18 amendments were tabled in Standing Committee. Those amendments did not change the essence of the Bill; rather they strengthened it. Our tired sponsor had been up all night on another committee and had to return to it when this stage was finished. Again, all went well because the Committee accepted all his amendments. The Members of the Committee were drawn from all sides of the House and all had a strong interest in animal welfare. They included the current chairman of the Associate Party for Animal Welfare, Ian Cawsey; vice-chairman, Angela Smith; and past chairman Roger Gale. Again Members spoke of the need to improve the health and welfare of dogs in breeding establishments. Finally, the Bill returned to the Floor of the House on 7th May. David Maclean had tabled several amendments for Report stage. Three were needed, so the name of James Clappison was added to those.
The Minister, George Howarth, accepted them and again gave the Bill his full support. David Maclean said that he was delighted to have played a small part in improving the Bill. The Bill was read a third time and passed.
The process of drafting any Bill is lengthy and consensus has played its part. But it has not weakened the Bill. We all wanted the Bill to succeed because we knew that the opportunity would not come our way again. Failure was never an option. James Clappison allowed us to help him wherever we could; and I took that as a sign of confidence. At the same time, he had to cope with many other duties as an Opposition Front-Bench spokesman. Private Members' Bills are a minefield. Not many get through; but with the right ingredients, 15th on the ballot list is not so bad after all.
The noble Lord has already outlined all the clauses, but significant improvements have been made and existing loopholes closed. I echo him in saying that now bitches will not be mated under a year. They will have no more than six litters in their lifetime and there must be a gap of 12 months before another litter is born. That is a major welfare improvement in the quality of their lives. The physical damage done by constant breeding with no let-up is most distressing to see.
This Bill has gone a long way to improve the welfare standards of both adult dogs and their puppies while at the same time giving protection to the buyers. I firmly believe that prospective buyers should visit breeding establishments to see the conditions under which the puppies are reared. Furthermore, they should take a look at the parents before making a decision to buy.
This is the third time that a Bill of this kind has come before Parliament and I believe that this time all those who have contributed to it, both inside Parliament and outside, have got it right. As I said earlier, it has been thoroughly scrutinised by Home Office lawyers and parliamentary counsel, and I hope that your Lordships will agree that James Clappison's Bill deserves to find its way on to the statute book.
2 p.m.
Baroness Fookes: My Lords, I warmly welcome the Bill, which is long overdue. Knowing what I do of the processes in the other place, it is a virtual miracle that it has reached this stage. I nearly lost a Private Member's Bill when I was No. 2, let alone No. 15. The warmest congratulations are to be bestowed on all those who have played such a fine part. I add my tribute to James Clappison, my former colleague, to the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton, and to those organisations which have come together in order to produce a consensus on what is needed. I have been a long time in the animal world and that, too, is a minor miracle.
I say that the Bill is overdue because my memory goes back to the "parent" Act of 1973. Even then the RSPCA was dismayed by the loopholes it saw in the new Bill. That is not in any way to criticise the sponsors of that Bill. Such Bills, privately introduced, are notoriously difficult to get through without being weakened. They have to come in a weakened state in order to get through at all. But it has meant that over the years we have seen all the horrors described by various speakers today. I add to that by reading from a report of an inspector of the RSPCA about a particular visit on a particular day. It is written in plain, factual language, but it sets out clearly the typical situation which has caused us all to think of puppy farms as places of disrepute. He wrote in 1996:
"On Monday 15th April I visited three different premises … The first visit was to the house of an elderly woman who kept and bred Airedale terriers. The building was at the end of a dirt track and comprised a farm cottage with land at the rear. The woman had approximately 15 Airedale terriers on the premises and about the same number of mongrels. A number of the dogs were emaciated and most were in a filthily condition as a result of having nowhere clean and dry to rest. The house was littered with dog mess. In one corner of the kitchen a hitch was weaning her puppies in a small box under a bright spotlight. The backyard contained various sheds and barns. On inspection, we found that the sheds had within them a number of pens, some of which contained bitches weaning puppies. The conditions inside the pens were filthy, with excrement and mould covering the floor, and no adequate sleeping provision for the dogs. Some of the empty pens had obviously not been cleaned since the last occupant had been moved out."
Worse still—I shall not continue to quote—they found one dog very seriously ill and clearly the woman was not intending to call in a vet. They took it away and it died within 24 hours.
That is a cameo of the kind of situations we have seen all too clearly. In my capacity as a member of the council of the RSPCA for many years, and of the National Canine Defence League, and now a vice-president of the RSPCA, I have seen over and over again appalling incidents illustrating the fact that the law simply has not been tough enough to deal with people who engage in puppy farming. So I warmly welcome the Bill.
I am particularly pleased that in order to obtain a licence for the first time a veterinary surgeon will have to be accompanied by an officer of the council. That was one of the weaknesses of the original Act. Often, the person going with the best will in the world did not know what ought to be the conditions for the welfare of the animals as opposed to the physical lay-out of buildings or land. That redresses a great weakness. I am

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pleased to see that when licences must be renewed it will be possible, although not obligatory, for a vet to visit again to see how things are going.
I welcome in particular the arrangements for ensuring that bitches do not become "breeding machines." That is a most distressing sight. I am pleased that the Bill makes very clear and unambiguous the requirements for resting periods and the total number of litters (six) that a bitch may have. However, I am slightly concerned about what may happen to the bitches after they have completed their total breeding cycle. I hope that those who are responsible for ensuring that the premises are maintained will inspect the bitches after they have completed their breeding cycle. Otherwise, I foresee problems with unwanted bitches being cast out and adding to the enormous number of dogs.
I hope that those matters will be considered by the authorities when they look at breeding establishments and how they are run. Apart from the benefits for dogs and puppies, there will be an added bonus. Many owners have been distressed to find that they have unhealthy animals, no doubt as a result of overbreeding. That, in itself, brings distress and concern to those who buy dogs in good faith, unaware of the intensive breeding that has gone on. There is, then, that added bonus, although that is not my primary reason for supporting the Bill.
I turn to a matter that looks very ordinary and dull. I refer to local authorities' ability to charge their own fees to meet the cost of inspections, and so on. Many local authorities find themselves a bit strapped for cash. If they found that they had an extra expense for which there was not sufficient income, they would be tempted—and have been in the past—not to carry out their duties fully. Boring though this looks as a provision, it is an important part of the Bill. I am pleased that variable and reasonable fees can be charged by local authorities. They will then have no excuse for not acting thoroughly and promptly in carrying out the duties imposed by the Act, as I hope this Bill will shortly become.
The other point that pleases me is the reference to the clear identification by means of a tag of puppies as they leave the breeding establishment. Ideally, I had hoped for a microchip, as that is the best way of ensuring that there is no jiggery-pokery and that the purchaser really has the animal in question. But I would not want to hold up the Bill for any reason. I hope, however, that even if microchips are not required by the Bill, they will become the usual way of ensuring that an animal is properly identified. That point is extremely important. If a dog cannot be traced back to its source, one means of keeping an eye on breeding establishments will be lost. I compare it with the ease with which money is laundered from drugs. Once it gets into the system, it is almost impossible to see where it has come from.
All in all, the Bill is a vast improvement on existing legislation. I wish it a fair passage, and I hope shortly to see it on the statute book.
2.12 p.m.
Viscount Simon: My Lords, there are a number of animals which give much pleasure to the human
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species—none more so than the dog. Dogs are adored by youngsters, mature and very mature people, whether owned as house pets, as working dogs or as therapy dogs visiting hospital patients.
It has been said that we are a nation of dog lovers, and I would be the last to disagree with that. My wife and I have had a number of pet dogs over the years, and in order to avoid two of our dogs becoming big headed, we refused to tell one that she was the progeny of the supreme champion of Crufts and the other that she was from the supreme champion of America and Canada. I cannot imagine life without a dog forming part of our family.
But the Bill does not seek to protect those dogs which are brought into this world by conscientious breeders. It seeks to make further provision for regulating the commercial breeding and subsequent sale of dogs, due to the fact that some breeding establishments seem to exist solely for the purpose of making large profits at the expense of the poor animals. Both puppies and their mothers are suffering in the interest of big business.
It is my intention to mention briefly a few cases of puppy farms in order to underline the need for this Bill. There is the case of a gentleman who lives next-door to a puppy farm where there are about 50 breeding bitches, together with another 50 other dogs. They are kept in pig sties, cattle pens, a caravan and a car—none of which has been converted from its previous use. They are poorly fed, sometimes receiving only bread, and at least 70 per cent never get any exercise. The gentleman has also witnessed older dogs killing younger ones.
Then there is the case of a disabled lady who purchased an underweight puppy with mange from a Kennel Club registered breeder. The puppy developed hip dysplasia in both legs, and it turned out that the breeders had some problematic litters—spastic puppies which had to be destroyed. She eventually got her money back.
There is also the case of a Scottish lady who purchased a dog which immediately needed treatment as it had diarrhoea. It subsequently needed further treatment for a wide range of problems, and eventually died of congenital liver failure, which the vet believed was due to interbreeding.
Honey, a nine week-old Labrador puppy, was bought by the Creswell family. Six days after getting her home, she died. Parvovirus was revealed by post-mortem as being the most likely cause of death. This fatal disease is acquired through unhygienic breeding conditions, which are, tragically, rife in many puppy farms.
I have been told of many other tragic cases of dogs purchased from puppy farms and breeders which have caused much distress. I could tell your Lordships about them all but I shall not do so because it is too distressing. Suffice it to say that this Bill is to be welcomed by all who care about the welfare of animals. If it results in less suffering, then it is to be commended.
2.15 p.m.
The Earl of Liverpool: My Lords, it is a sad reflection of the times in which we live that it is necessary to introduce and seek to pass into legislation

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this Bill before your Lordships today, but necessary it is. I congratulate all those who have worked so tirelessly on getting it this far.
I join with other noble Lords in paying tribute to the many charitable and other organisations involved; in particular, the RSPCA, the National Canine Defence League, the BSAVA, the Kennel Club, the Pet Care Trust and others too numerous to mention. I join with other noble Lords who have singled out the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton, who has probably worked harder than anyone else to improve the lot of dogs.
The objectives of the Bill were set out very clearly by my noble friend Lord Soulsby of Swaffham Prior. The harrowing stories which abound—some of which we have heard today—convince me that, although this legislation may create an additional cost burden on breeders, that is a price well worth paying because it is hoped that it will bring to an end those unkind and cruel practices.
There is something deeply distasteful about the unscrupulous exploitation of dogs for breeding purposes and the cruelty and ill health which follow from it. Not all breeding establishments are guilty of malpractice and, indeed, many go to great lengths to ensure that high standards are maintained and that the health of the puppies and bitches is their primary concern. Those establishments will have nothing to fear from this legislation and, indeed, should be relieved that at long last the law will have some teeth to deal with those who are giving the industry a bad name.
I turn now to the detail of the Bill. Clause 1 refers to inspections and reports before the granting of a licence. The puppy farming working group, in its excellent and thorough report completed in 1996, recommended that any inspection should be carried out by a veterinary surgeon who is fully independent and not connected with the breeding establishment in question. That is a very important safeguard which, unfortunately, has not been included in the Bill. I do not wish in any way to impede the progress of the Bill but I wonder whether it is possible somehow to incorporate that particular safeguard.
In the same report concern was expressed about the long-distance transportation of puppies, which causes stress and ill health. I understand that an EC directive has been issued and it may be that the matter is covered in other legislation. However, it is not on the face of the Bill. When the Minister replies, he may be able to reassure me that the long-distance transportation of puppies is covered in other legislation.
On a very small point of detail, my noble friend Lord Soulsby said that Clause 7 referred to five or more litters. In fact, the Bill refers to four or more litters. I may have misheard him on that and, if I did so, I apologise.
This Bill was introduced under the 10-minute rule in another place. I understand it has full government support and backing. That is excellent news which should ensure its swift passage onto the statute book. I join other noble Lords in wishing it well on its journey.
2.18 p.m.
Lord Dholakia: My Lords, I too am delighted to support the Bill. It has two extremely noble aims: first, to outlaw illegal puppy farms; and secondly, to improve the welfare standards of registered commercial breeders.
Only a few weeks ago, we had a debate on animal cruelty. Behind the respectable veneer of our love for animals, there are still practices which are cruel and of which we should all be ashamed. Puppy farming for crude commercial gain is one such practice which all decent people should condemn. This Bill is designed to outlaw such practices.
In many debates in your Lordships' House, we express different views and opinions. This debate is different. This is one Bill which I believe will command the support of all sides of the House. We shall support it in the full knowledge that the existing provisions are insufficient, ineffective and have not lessened the cruelty which it is designed to stop.
The Bill before us is designed to close the loopholes which, at present, allow the barbaric trade of pups bred in horrific conditions to continue. We are indebted to noble Lords who have supported the Bill today and we are grateful to James Clappison MP for tabling this Private Member's Bill in the other place.
The Bill has the support of key welfare organisations involved with animals. A good many people with detailed knowledge would never dream of going to a breeder who, effectively, exploits animals. The breeders are in business to make money, irrespective of the pain and suffering caused to pups and bitches.
When my two daughters were growing up, we went through the normal pattern of pet ownership, as most families do. We started with guinea pigs, gerbils and rabbits. We had no doubt at all that the next request would be for a puppy. We saw a big advertisement in a local newspaper for dogs for sale. When we visited the establishment, we did not realise that the puppies were obtained from various puppy farms. Families were picking up little furry things, with no knowledge of where the pups had come from. We then saw a number of people confronting the owner because the pups that they had bought were either ill or had died. We retreated quickly and, eventually, the place was closed, leaving many youngster in tears.
We then searched for a reliable and reputable breeder. One was recommended to us by an animal welfare organisation. The breeder would not sell us a dog. We had to wait to be interviewed to see whether we were fit and proper people to have a dog, and rightly so. We were given a couple of weeks to reflect on our decision. That was a cooling-off period in case our decision to buy was taken on impulse. We were invited to visit the pups when they were born and we saw them growing up and being properly weaned. Eventually, we took a puppy home. I suspect I am probably the only person of Indian dissent who has owned an Old English Sheepdog, named Popadum.
My point is that there are reputable breeders who care about their animals and who would never tolerate cruelty. The Bill would not only outlaw unscrupulous traders, but indirectly help the genuine breeders. Good

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breeders have nothing to fear. Many of them prevent impulse buying and they educate people on how to care for the pet that they are introducing as a family member.
The primary aim of the Bill is to amend and extend certain enactments relating to the commercial breeding and sale of dogs. We need this legislation to ensure that we ban the horrible conditions in which puppies are bred. We should never tolerate the dark, dingy and damp conditions in which bitches are forced to breed excessively. We must ensure that the puppies and bitches are disease-free and that no animal is deprived of exercise and affection. That is the minimum for which the RSPCA is asking—and that organisation should receive our support.
We should not hesitate to close down puppy farms. We should ensure that local authorities have effective enforcement powers. We do not object to selective breeding, but we must make it clear that the interests of the dogs must be put first. That includes having social contact with human beings and making sure that they are properly exercised and have the opportunity to play. That is the minimum that the National Canine Defence League is seeking. That organisation also should receive our support.
What started 10 years ago as a small cottage industry has turned into a multimillion pound puppy business. The National Canine Defence League estimates that the largest farms have up to 150 breeding bitches on their premises. Of course, in the end such farms depend on customers buying their animals. If the customers knew the conditions under which such pups were bred, they would stop buying them.
The Bill will help to set standards. With imaginative publicity by animal welfare organisations, customers would think twice before being "conned" into buying such pups. Children are often too young to understand the issues and often their love and affections are cruelly exploited by bad breeders. The Bill will help to put a stop to that.
Clause 1 of the Bill is the first step in improving the present legislation. It relates to,
"the inspection of the premises by a veterinary surgeon or veterinary practitioner and by an officer of the authority".
I ask the Minister whether it is possible also for local authorities to designate animal welfare experts for such inspection. There are a growing number of scientifically trained people involved in animal welfare these days. RSPCA inspectors are very good at that sort of work and there is no reason why they too should not be designated for such purposes. We should also encourage local authorities to publish lists of breeding establishments.
Licence conditions are important. They set the minimum standards which breeders must observe. It is right that bitches should not be mated if they are less than one year-old. It is right that records should be kept and monitoring inspections carried out. It is right that bitches should not be overbred and made to produce more than six litters of pups; and it is right that there should be a gap of 12 months between matings.
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No legislation can be effective unless there are adequate enforcement provisions and penalties for non-compliance. The cancellation of the licence and the disqualification prescribed by the court could serve as a salutary lesson to those whose greed knows no bounds. But let me add a word of caution. How often when someone is disqualified do we see others stepping in to continue the practice by by-passing the legal process?
I also welcome the provisions in Clause 8 relating to the sale of dogs. Again, it is right that dogs should be sold at licensed breeding establishments or licensed pet shops and that puppies under eight weeks-old should not be sold to the public. Also, I support the provision which makes it clear that it will be an offence to sell to licensed establishments dogs bred at unlicensed establishments. Using an identity tag or a badge is a good suggestion, but I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Fookes, when she says that implants would serve a better purpose. They would go a long way to identify the licensed breeding establishments.
The Breeding of Dogs Act 1973 has been ineffective. It does not focus sufficiently on welfare and health and it does not involve vets or animal welfare organisations. The Bill before us rectifies many of those anomalies. More importantly, those who flout the law will know what to expect. There must also be a message for those who use dogs for advertising purposes. Using dogs to sell a specific brand of paint or toilet rolls may sound an attractive proposition, but it often results in generating a demand for pups which look cuddly and exciting in the television adverts.
Let me conclude. The plight of extensively farmed puppies is a cause for concern for all of us. Enshrined in this Bill is a message that we shall not allow our animals to be subjected to cruelty for the purpose of financial gain. We should support and enact this legislation because we wish to be judged by our compassion and caring attitude for those who are the least able to speak or fend for themselves.
2.29 p.m.
Viscount Bridgemdan: My Lords, I hope that the knowledge that the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, called his dog "Popadum" does not spoil my next Indian meal!
We are all extremely grateful to my noble friend Lord Soulsby for initiating this debate. I pay tribute to my honourable friend Mr. James Clappison for succeeding with this Bill where others have failed, and I add my congratulations to the compliments from all parts of the House paid so effusively to the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton, both here and in another place during the passage of this measure on the indefatigable work she has put in to enable the Bill to reach its present stage.
The Bill has been rightly welcomed from all sides of the House. It seeks inter alia to put right a defect in the Breeding of Dogs Act 1973, which had the deficiency in particular that, although anyone breeding from two or more bitches was required to have a licence, that licence could be granted by a local authority without any reference to a veterinary surgeon. But this Bill is a tightly drawn and effective measure.

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My noble friend Lord Soulsby took us with admirable clarity through the detail of the Bill, and referred to the control now to be exercised by local authorities, from the licensing and supervision of breeders, through the inspection of their premises, the welfare of the animals therein and the requirements for the involvement of vets at every stage, to regulation of the sale of puppies and the curtailment of activities of unlicensed dealers and pet shops. Most crucially, the Bill will give local authorities effective power to take prompt action against breeders or dealers who infringe the law and will also provide for fees commensurate with the obligations so that they can carry out their obligations conscientiously and properly. I particularly welcome the fact that the legislation will not inhibit hobby breeding or, indeed, legitimate multiple breeding of puppies.
This country has always prided itself on its humane treatment of animals—a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia—and particularly of pets. I am sure that that is true in the vast majority of cases, but the horrific cases outlined by many noble Lords today show that there are, sadly, exceptions.
Reference was made to the debate initiated by the noble Lord, Lord Hardy of Wath, a few weeks ago which called attention to cruelty to animals. In that debate several noble Lords gave disturbing instances of cruelty to both domestic and wild animals which was sometimes negligent, in many cases premeditated and occasionally with the particularly unpleasant overtones of ritual maiming associated with Satanism.
The noble Lord, Lord Hardy, also drew attention to the disturbing increase in dog fighting and the suspicion that this is a practice which has attracted the attention of organised crime. The noble Lord tabled a Question shortly after that debate on the importation of American bull terriers. All one can say is that the Bill now before us is likely to be of use both directly and indirectly in inhibiting and, it is to be hoped, stopping the breeding of dogs for this thoroughly distasteful practice of dog fighting. In this connection, I should particularly like to welcome the suggestion of my noble friend Lady Fookes for electronic tagging by microchip where such clandestine breeding is clearly involved.
This Bill is an admirable one. Many noble Lords have given graphic illustrations as to why it is necessary and why the 1973 Act has to be improved. In addressing this problem, I very much hope that it will receive a Second Reading.
2.33 p.m.
Lord Burlison: My Lords, perhaps I may join other noble Lords in thanking those people who have worked extremely hard to bring this Bill to the Floor of the House today. I believe that all the contributions have been made with sincerity and, indeed, with deep warmth towards dogs. I know that each and every one of the contributors cares about the welfare of his or her dogs. I should also like to join other noble Lords in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Soulsby of Swaffham Prior, on introducing the Bill. The noble Lord has a long and distinguished career in veterinary
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medicine and it is particularly fitting that he should be introducing this measure. Our congratulations are also due to the honourable Member for Hertsmere, to whom reference has been made, who successfully piloted the Bill through its stages in the other place.
I also pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton, who has throughout been the principal driving force behind the Bill. She has worked tirelessly behind the scenes to maintain the necessary consensus among the Bill's sponsors, which—as noble Lords have said—comprise animal welfare bodies and other interested parties, including dog breeders, the veterinary profession and local authorities. Indeed, the fact that the Bill has progressed to the point of being debated by your Lordships today is due in large measure to the efforts of the noble Baroness. Her contribution cannot be overstated.
I must confess to being the owner of dogs and indeed a dog lover. I do not have to remind your Lordships' House that the two do not necessarily go together. I have listened to the debate carefully and I know that every speaker in this House who has contributed to this debate is committed to the welfare of dogs.
We are all aware of concerns about establishments where, notwithstanding the controls in existing legislation, dog breeding is undertaken for commercial gain with apparently inadequate provision for the comfort and welfare of the animals involved. These activities can cause suffering and distress, not only to the mature dogs kept in such establishments, but also to the puppies which are bred there. This in turn increases the likelihood of unhealthy puppies being sold down the line to an unsuspecting public.
Furthermore, the practices of unscrupulous dog breeders unfairly taint the many legitimate breeders who maintain high standards of care for the animals in their charge. The Bill seeks primarily to tighten controls over breeders' activities so as to ensure more effectively that high standards of animal care are observed at all commercial dog breeding establishments through to points of sale.
The noble Earl, Lord Liverpool, asked whether the welfare of dogs will be safeguarded during their transportation. The Welfare of Animals (Transport) Order 1997 contains many safeguards on the welfare of animals during transportation. I hope that we shall not have to amend the Bill to any great extent as it passes through its various stages.
The noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, asked about the inspection of breeding establishments by RSPCA inspectors. I shall need to discuss this matter with the sponsors of the Bill. I shall write to the noble Lord on that point.
My role today is, I hope, straightforward. The Government support the aims of the Bill. Any measures that seek to improve animal welfare are to be applauded. Accordingly, the Government support the aims of the Bill in this respect. It has been evident from the debate that noble Lords on all sides of the House support the Bill. Therefore there are grounds for believing that it will pass through the House and on to the statute book, as it clearly deserves to do.
2.39 p.m.
Lord Soulsby of Swaffham Prior: My Lords, I greatly welcome the support for this Bill that has clearly been given from all sides of the House, including from the Front Benches. I especially welcome the contributions of those noble Lords who have deep interest, knowledge and experience of dogs and dog breeding, especially the noble Lord, Lord Hardy of Wath, who speaks with great knowledge and conviction on many aspects of dogs, dog breeding and puppy farming. He mentioned the problems associated with what happens at the rescue centres after dogs are discarded.
My noble friend Lady Oppenheim-Barnes, who is no longer in her place, spoke with fervour and passion in support of the Bill. I greatly welcome her support.
My noble friend Lady Fookes has great experience of matters of animal welfare both here and in the other place. She, too, spoke passionately of the need for the Bill. She raised two points which I hope will be taken into consideration in due course. Her first point was that adequate arrangements should be made post-breeding for bitches when they have had their six litters. That is a matter about which local authorities should assure themselves when granting licences. Secondly, she mentioned the matter of micro-chipping for puppies. I agree that in due course micro-chipping will become the most effective means of identification. However, some work still needs to be done on this.
The noble Earl, Lord Liverpool, raised the point that not all breeders can be accused of bad practice. They, too, should welcome the Bill so that the disrepute of dog breeding does not fall unfairly on them. He also raised the question of whether it is five or more or four or more breeding bitches. The five or more comes from the fact that four or more other litters in addition to the breeding bitch mentioned in Clause 7(3) would make up five.
Finally, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Wharton, for her determination and efforts—and, indeed, luck with a Private Member's Bill in another place—in bringing forward the Bill. She had the help of many other people but, nevertheless, it was a major effort on her part.
We have seen today a remarkable tidal wave of support from both Houses, from Ministers and from officials. In view of the universal support for the Bill, I ask the House to give it a Second Reading.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

Academic and Academic-related Staff Pay and Conditions Bill. [H.L.]
2.42 p.m.
Lord McCarthy: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. I am not certain whether I should declare an interest as a member for some 36 years of the Association of University Teachers which, after all, favours the establishment of a separate pay
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review, except in so far as the AUT affects my emoluments, as the Oxford University insists on calling them. They are related to what the AUT did or failed to do in the past as against what the AUT may succeed in doing if we have a system of pay review. I certainly express a great personal interest in the Bill. Perhaps I may put forward the arguments in favour of it.
The purpose of the Bill is quite simple: it is to establish a system of independent pay review for academics and academic-related jobs in universities and colleges of higher education. The Bill recommends the establishment by the Secretary of State of a pay review board or body which would make appropriate recommendations on pay and conditions of employment and take appropriate action, if the Secretary of State thought it advisable, on other similar issues such as the recruitment and retention of staff. The Bill will enable the Secretary of State to choose sorne five to nine people, one of whom will be the chairman. That will be entirely a matter for the Secretary of State. They will make recommendations and it will be entirely in the hands of the Secretary of State to decide what is to be done with those recommendations. Indeed, the Bill proposes a system very similar to that which exists for doctors and dentists, nursing professionals, the police, the armed services, school teachers and those covered by the Senior Salaries Review Body.
The system is largely modelled on the successful pay review body established for school teachers in 1992. We would argue that virtually all comparable professions covered in the public sector have pay review. The one significant group of professionals in the public sector that does not have pay review are academics and those in academically related posts.
Four main reasons can be advanced as to why this is a most appropriate moment to introduce a system of pay review for academics. First, it is very much in line with the underlying proposals and assumptions of the Dearing report, which the Government have welcomed and have taken as the central thrust of their analysis of higher education and its future needs. The Dearing report made three important points which are particularly relevant to what I am arguing today. First, the report said that the current arrangements for pay had produced "chaos"—the report's word—and had failed to determine effectively and efficiently pay and conditions in the academic profession.
Secondly, it said that, as a result, the existing system had caused or presided over a substantial decline in the relative position of academics and related grades in comparison with almost anyone else with whom one might reasonably compare their pay and conditions. The report then gave some figures to illustrate that point. Thirdly, the report said that there was an immediate need for an independent review of current levels of pay and conditions in the profession. After that came the independent review under Sir Michael Bea which was established by the employers. We are all waiting for the report of Sir Michael. It is expected in the very near future, perhaps towards the end of this month.
I do not intend to speculate on what is in the Bett report but I do know what I read in the newspapers. How accurate those reports are and to what extent the

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information has leaked to the newspapers and, in particular, to The Times Higher Education Supplement, I do not know. I merely report what I have read. It is said that Sir Michael will recommend a 9 per cent increase in the pay bill over a period of three years. It is said that he will recommend an inter-related national negotiating body. It is said that he will recommend that, whatever system of negotiation of collective bargaining is established, it should deal with a number of important problems; for example, the problem of equal opportunities and the sex imbalance in pay and promotion. But I understand—no one has suggested that I am wrong—that Sir Michael is doing a one-off job. He is recommending a relatively short-term solution. He does not intend to deal with the long-term problem of maintaining a reasonable relationship between pay and performance and productivity in the academic profession. I submit that the only way that can be done is by the establishment of a system of pay review.
I come to my second argument, the almost unbelievable reduction in the relative position of academics and academically related trades and professions during the 1980s and 1990s. In a period when academics have been expected to deal with almost twice as many students, when the conditions of their work have deteriorated in a number of ways, when they have lost tenure and when their profession has become to a significant extent casual, they have received no significant increase in real pay. The increase has been only 1.1 per cent over 20 years. I do not know of another group remotely comparable. One would have to go to the poorest paid in the public sector who have not received any real increase in pay over the past 20 years. At least it can be said that those in that group are still slightly better paid than people doing comparable jobs in the private sector. That cannot be said for academics. There is no other group of similarly qualified people in the public sector, or indeed the private sector, whose remuneration has been chained, whose conditions of work have deteriorated and whose security has declined in this way in the whole of the British labour market.
There is an abundance of figures in broad terms to support that argument. The public sector as a whole has, over the period since the early 1980s, received 50 per cent more in money rates of increase than academics. Nurses, the police, doctors, teachers—those who have been favoured by pay reviews over this period—have received real increases, not merely money increases, of between 30 and 35 per cent. So have most private sector non-manual workers. If we look at the many groups with whom academics might think to compare themselves in terms of qualifications and with whom they compared themselves in the past, the relative disparity in the pay of academics is even more remarkable. If we think of business economists, consultants, investment analysts, solicitors, barristers and MPs, the relativities have declined much more markedly within the public sector.
The only group among academics—one might say "pseudo-academics"—who have significantly improved their position over the past 20 years are vice-chancellors. They have done so because they have
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broken out of the system. Historically, vice-chancellors received much the same as professors and heads of houses. They now receive more than twice as much. Why? Because, by and large, they pay themselves out of their own system. That is why they stand for local bargaining—because they would be in charge of it. So there is an evident disbalance. There are inverse relativities between academics and anyone else with whom they might be compared. They should be put in a special category.
My third argument relates to pay review. Anyone who looks objectively at pay review must concede that in general terms over the past 15 or 20 years it has been an outstanding success from the point of view of all involved: workers, employers and companies. In the past, it was pay review which averted a pseudo-revolution among doctors. Without pay review we would not have any doctors in the health service; it would have broken up. We remember the problems with the police. The police were almost at the stage of introducing forms of industrial action until they had pay review.
The most recent examples of the success of pay review have been the nurses and teachers. The teachers are an example of an outstanding—and recent—success. Anyone in the House who goes back in industrial relations as far as I do—and few people can—will remember what happened to teachers. Before the interim advisory committee in 1998 and the establishment of pay review in 1992, morale and conditions of service in the teaching profession appeared to be in a hopeless state. Yet pay review, which first came in a shadow form and then in a real form in 1992, has made possible the transformation of industrial relationships in employment in the teaching profession. It has made it possible for this Government and to some extent the previous one to put in radical changes in the workload and systems in the teaching profession without significant resistance because the pay problem had been solved, put on one side. The issues were about what teachers did, not about what they were paid.
The significant point I am trying to make to the Minister is that it was done without runaway wage inflation. The real wage rise of the teachers as a result of their pay review, year by year, is about 1.5 per cent. The teachers' pay review body recommended something slightly or significantly above the level of inflation. The Government accepted it in principle, then staged it and cut 1 per cent. off the cost. For a real income improvement of 1.5 per cent. per year, we had peace in the teaching profession. Whether or not one agrees with them, radical changes were able to be introduced. What was done for the teachers, doctors and police can be done for the academic profession at a relatively small cost.
My fourth argument is that the existence of pay review enables all kinds of other reforms to be introduced, as in the pay review boards. For example, the Dearing Committee said, and I am sure the subsequent committees will say, that one of the great scandals is equal opportunities in the academic profession. Pay review has presided over the virtual solution of the problem of equal opportunities in the

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teaching profession. Women teachers now get 88.4 per cent. of what male teachers get. It has been done by pay review. Nurses and midwives now receive 95 per cent. of what male nurses and midwives receive and it has been done under a system of pay review. However, in the poor old administrative and clerical grades in the NHS, the situation is probably getting worse. There remains a 37 per cent. or 40 per cent. gap between men and women because they do not have a flexible system of pay review. Whether we are talking about greater flexibility by subjects or local labour markets, it can be introduced via a system of pay review.
I turn to my penultimate point. There is always a case against everything and there is a case against pay review. There is a case against it among academics, not because it would cost a lot or would not bring benefits, but because, in a sense, it is said that they do not deserve it. If academics are prepared to put up with that and with 20 years during which their real income has not increased, if they are prepared to put up with a situation in which despite the doubling in the number of students and growth in quality appraisal form filling, the ending of tenure and decasualisation and there is no general observable shortage of academics, there is a case for saying. "If they have put up with it, why shouldn't they go on putting up with it?" But it is a very short-sighted view, especially for this Government.
If one looks closely one finds that things are happening in the academic world which no one who is concerned with higher education can possibly disregard. I take one small fact which I find very illustrative. There has been a 400 per cent increase in the past four years in the number of health-based retirements among academics. Academics are retiring like mad, particularly at the end of the scales. One wonders why. One may say that they have fairly good retirement provisions, but there has been a very significant increase in the number. One may say, "Well, these old fellows and girls might as well go. What do they have to give us?" I understand that some 2,000 academics under 35 were recruited to permanent posts last year, and there has been a 65 per cent loss in turnover in 12 months. That cannot go on for very long.
I am aware from personal experience—no working academic would deny it, although there are no statistics to support it—that there are real shortages in the number of first-class degree graduates coming forward to fill academic posts. In some posts in fields such as law, accountancy, IT and so on, there are very real shortages. Finally, there is growth in a kind of self-defeating militancy among academics which takes the form of recent industrial action. It reminds me most depressingly of what happened to teachers before they got forms of pay review.
We all know that when the Government were elected and the Prime Minister was asked what he believed epitomised and summarised the essence of their endeavour, he replied, "Education, education, education". Can it really be sensible to stand by and allow this decline in the quality, commitment and morale of those who are supposed, at least formally, to be engaged in the highest levels of education?
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I am aware that, more than anyone else, the Minister knows the truth of what I say. I also know that as a Minister she is limited in what she can say today. But I am also aware that, because she has been an academic all her life, she appreciates this crisis and dilemma. I hope that she can say something which will be helpful.
I conclude on a personal note. One of the most rewarding aspects of my career as an academic—I am sure that this is true also of the Minister—is the moment when I can encourage young students who are hovering on the brink of becoming academics to take up that life because I believe that it suits them. I have long since stopped feeling that I can do it with enthusiasm. One must tell young people who like the academic life that it may need more than commitment, intelligence and a sprit of adventure; it may also require a very highly developed penchant for self-sacrifice. It is in the hope that we can do something better than that that I commend the Bill to the House.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord McCarthy.)
3.4 p.m.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire: My Lords, I hope to make a brief speech on this useful but modest Bill. I must declare an interest as a member of the academic staff of the London School of Economics. To come here today I rearranged my normal Friday teaching, so this morning I managed to fill in only four of the forms which the Government now require us to complete. I drafted and signed two references; saw two anxious research students; and have 10 more examination papers to mark before I finish this evening—because as noble Lords know, academics do not really do much work!
There are two aspects to the Bill, the content and the procedure, which interrelate. I shall concentrate on the problems of the next generation of academics and on how we can manage to recruit them. When we were recruiting in my own department last year, I was struck that we offered a salary of £18,000 to people who would have worked for four years after their initial degree, and accumulated in almost all cases considerable debts. I can walk out of my department, and cross the road at the Aldwych to see in Pret a Manger that after six months' training one can earn £16,500 working for that company.
The attractions of working for universities at present are very low. The Minister is aware that Economic and Social Research Council figures indicate that the number of British students applying to do graduate work to PhD level has declined by 10 per cent in each of the past two years; and that there is a catastrophic decline in particular in the number of people entering economics for graduate and research study. In my own field of international relations, the number of British students applying for research degrees last year declined by over 20 per cent. The age structure of the profession has a large number of people like ourselves who entered academia in the balmy 1960s and who will be retiring in the next 10 years.
The consequence is that British universities are making do, as far as they can, by recruiting people from abroad. I noted the other day that 40 per cent of the

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academic staff of the London School of Economics are now non-British. I welcome much of that, but I worry slightly because on the past two or three panels for junior academic staff there were almost no good quality British applicants. I am happy that there were a number of others from abroad—refugees from the German system and others—but it should be a matter of considerable concern to the Government that we have to find the next generation of academic staff if we are to maintain the quality of our universities.
The system has been enlarged considerably in the past few years. We still have the highest quality university system in Europe, but as quantity has been increased, so there is a real problem that quality may now begin to decline.
I say a little about procedure. Over the past 15 years, in the higher education system we have also seen a remarkable growth in direct state control—socialism imposed by the former Conservative Government. I recognise that the Minister and this Government have inherited a deeply unsatisfactory situation: a demoralised profession which had seen its salary go down; a huge funding crisis; and the Dearing committee which was in many ways a deliberate fudge. I suspect that the Minister privately believes that the current funding situation is unsustainable. I also suspect that she is unable to say so in public. It seems desirable from the Government's point of view that they should be able to stand back from too direct an intervention in levels of academic salaries. That is part of the attraction of a pay review body, such as exists for doctors and other professions—I hope that we may all agree that academic teaching is a profession. It adds a certain degree of distance between what Ministers have to decide and what universities may have to accept.
There is of course the danger—I am sure that the Treasury has added this point to the Minister's brief—that the Government fear that they may lose control of a major element in higher education funding. I note from the AUT briefing that a 10 per cent increase in academic salaries would add £340 million to academic costs over the course of a year. Having been involved in my party's manifesto exercise in 1997 and worked out how much one gains for education from an additional 1 per cent on income tax, I am conscious of just how far £340 million goes.
Nevertheless, there is a problem of content and procedure. We all agree that academic salaries have sunk too low for quality to be sustainable. Therefore, the question for the Government is: do they wish to hold on to direct responsibility for them or do they accept that it is time to distance themselves by accepting a permanent pay review body, which this useful Bill proposes? I hope that the Government will welcome the Bill and that we may take it further.
3.10 p.m.
Lord Shore of Stepney: My Lords, this is an important Bill and I am grateful to my noble friend for giving us the opportunity to debate this well-judged and well-timed measure. Unlike my noble friend Lord
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McCarthy and the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, I am not an academic. However, I am pleased to say that I have friends, acquaintances and relatives in academia. While they are good in not clamouring for my attention, it is useful to be able to talk to such a range of people in order to discover what is happening and to hear from those at the coalface, as it were. I always dislike industrial metaphors applied to academia, but I hope that I shall be forgiven.
I shall be brief because much of the ground has been covered very well. However, I wish to add my voice to establishing four unassailable and significant facts about academia. If those facts are accepted, as I believe they are—they are not controverted—the conclusions and the need to act will be unarguable.
First, we have gone through a period of massive expansion in higher education. The latest figure indicates that 1.8 million students are now in academic life. That is an increase of more than 100 per cent over the past 10 to 20 years, and probably much in excess of that.
Secondly, it is relevant that that magnitude of increase has brought with it a substantial increase in the workload of academics. That cannot but be so. I accept that a lecturer can give the same lecture to a group of 10 students as to a group of 50, but when one has to tutor and supervise them and mark their essays and look at their examination papers the difference between 10 and 50 becomes all too obvious. Our academics are heavily overloaded with that vast increase in their workload and the tiny increase in their number during that period.
The third fact has already been strongly emphasised. It is the almost unbelievable failure of the system of rewards in academia to keep pace with either some compensation for the workload or with the relative pay and rewards of virtually all other public sector employees and indeed everyone else in the country. It is amazing, and I almost chide myself for not being more aware of that, because it has been happening for a long time.
The AUT has circulated a short document and I shall quote only one passage. I could hardly believe it when I read it and I shall be grateful to my noble friend Lady Blackstone if she can confirm it. Is it really the case that between 1981 and 1996 or 1997, whichever is the latest date for which figures are available—a period of more than 15 years—academic pay rose, in real terms, by only 1.1 per cent? Is it possible that that could be true? That is an incredible criticism, mainly of previous Ministers who manned the Treasury Benches in the 1980s and the first part of the 1990s. If correct, it requires our urgent attention.
The fourth fact, which is again incontrovertible, is that our success as a nation depends crucially on our country's intellectual performance and, in particular, on the contribution made to research and development in industry and many other areas of our life by those who are the products of our universities. The first report of the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology considered research expenditure in Britain

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and the Dearing report. The report notes that Dearing concluded that:
"The funds available to support research are barely adequate".
The Select Committee itself then referred to the funds available and stated:
"It is our view that they are wholly inadequate and that without substantial and sustained additional public investment the Government will be putting the nation's future prosperity and quality of life at risk".
That is one of the most powerful warnings that I have ever read; and I have read an awful lot of Select Committee reports.
That establishes the facts, which are incontrovertible.
What are the consequences? One is the increasing difficulty in recruiting academics. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, quite properly drew attention to one manifestation of that, namely, the way in which the number of British students with first-class degrees enrolling for PhDs has fallen away. They are nearly all foreign students. It is ludicrous to be in such a position.
As a nation, there is an incredible shortage in a number of specialist areas where we should be in the lead. We are a creative country, and we have in the past, and still do, take the lead in many areas. But good heavens, we have fewer trained doctors per ten thousand of the population than virtually every other developed country in the OECD. Professor Jarman's recently published report makes that point. It is unbelievable that the country which pioneered the National Health Service should find itself desperately short of doctors. That is why we cannot get the waiting lists down quickly and effectively; we do not have the doctors available. Then there is the constant temptation, due to the inadequate pay here, for the trained people that we do have to be attracted to universities, research institutes and other places of learning in other countries and, in particular, the United States, where the rewards are much higher.
What conclusions can be drawn? I do not know if others among your Lordships have read the quite remarkable article by Martin Wolf in the Financial Times on Monday. Mr Wolf is a serious journalist. He begins by saying—and let the words again sink in—that:
"The quality of teaching and research in British universities faces collapse".
The quality faces collapse. He goes on to say:
"By global standards, there will soon be no first-rate universities in the UK (if there is one today)".
Surely that must make people sit up and start to think about what they should be doing. I do not think any stronger words could be deployed.
I do not mind what the actual arrangements are, and I am sure that my noble friend who introduced this Bill does not mind either, provided that we have a body which will examine and constantly update the needs of the academic profession. I hope greatly that the Bett committee will do something about raising its pay substantially in the short term. I hope that we shall then have a permanent review-body like others in the public sector to ensure that this does not happen again.
Finally, although I am afraid that my noble friend who has replied to the debate knows far more about this than anyone in the House—I have no doubt at all about
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her sympathies and wishes—I shall have to be a little sharp and harsh. I do not believe that what the Labour Government have done in the past two years has helped. The academics of tomorrow, who will conduct the research and development which is so essential to the quality of our national life and to our prosperity, are, of course, the students of today. These students, as I am sure one of my noble friends who has already spoken has pointed out, are now leaving university more heavily laden with debt than ever before. The average debt will be at least £15,000. There may be another extra £1.000 in fees, though that is not the main factor. In my judgment the withdrawal of maintenance grants is the more important factor. But still the problem is that the students will be in debt. They will probably select a partner who is also in academia with a similar level of debt. Then they are to be offered lectureships without tenure, at—what?—perhaps £16,000 per year, when all their contemporaries are going to jobs not only in other parts of the public sector, but also in the City and in industry. Those areas pay significantly higher rewards.
This must stop. It must be stopped extremely quickly. We must await the Bett Committee report. But I say to my noble friend, in all friendliness and candour, the Treasury must be shaken. The only solution is a massive increase in the amount of money granted directly from the Chancellor. Money lying around in different universities which can be deployed differently will not solve the problem. We need an increase in public expenditure. Whether or not the Chancellor observes his golden rules, he had better get on to the job quickly. If he does not I shall rely upon my noble friend and her Secretary of State to make sure that the matter is raised in Cabinet and is brought to a satisfactory solution.
3.24 p.m.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: My Lords, I too must declare an interest. I am a member of the AUT. Until the end of September I am employed by the University of Sussex which I joined in 1981 from a Civil Service post where I would now be paid considerably more—even if I had stayed at the same grade in the Civil Service—than I am paid in academia. For a considerable period of time, in the latter part of the 1980s until 1996, I was a member of the executive committee of Save British Science.
This Bill establishes a permanent pay review body for academical-related staff at universities. It directs the Secretary of State to establish a permanent, but independent committee of between five and nine members and it gives the Secretary of State power to refer to that committee on an annual basis issues concerning the employment and remuneration of academics. As the noble Lord, Lord McCarthy, stressed in introducing the Bill, it would be up to the Secretary of State to decide whether and how to implement the recommendations from the pay review body.
We welcome the Bill on these Benches. As we have already heard from my noble friend Lord Wallace, the noble Lord, Lord Shore, and even from the noble Lord., Lord McCarthy, we face a crisis in the academic: profession. There has been an erosion of pay in

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academia in relation to other professions, which is having an effect on the recruitment and retention of high calibre young people.
Towards the end of the 1980s a report was written for Save British Science, based on a survey carried out among its members, on the recruitment of young people into scientific careers as contract researchers. I wrote an article based on the survey. The short research paper was aptly called Neglecting the Seed Corn. That warned, almost 10 years ago, that unless we heeded the problems that such young people faced as contract researchers, not only with regard to uncompetitive pay, but also uncompetitive conditions of employment, the quality of the British academic research base will be badly eroded. Frequently, after fulfilling the requirements of a masters degree and a doctorate, such young people were then expected to spend six years without tenure, moving from one job to another, uncertain whether they would be able to get another job and unable to have mortgages because they had no tenure of contract.
We are in danger of losing those whom we need in our scientific professions, the very best of our scientific brains who are not entering into doctoral studies in this country, but are carrying out their doctoral studies abroad, and, frequently, not returning home. Something like two-thirds of our FRSs are now resident abroad. That shows what is happening to the scientific professions in this country.
In regard to my personal experience, for the past seven years I have been running a research centre—the Science Policy Research Unit—within my unit at the University of Sussex, which has won international acclaim. In that research centre, we have about 20 researchers, most of whom are employed on fixed-term contracts. I am conscious that a number of my colleagues, including myself, will be retiring over the course of the next few years and that it is important for us to nurture young people in specific areas of specialism so that they can take over the mantles we have been holding. Within the past six months, three of those young people have announced their departure because we cannot compete in the terms we can offer and the money we can pay. One is moving into a private sector job, another to a National Health Service job and another to a tenure job elsewhere in the university system.
It is extremely difficult for us to recruit staff of the quality we need at the salaries we can currently offer. All those factors, as the noble Lord, Lord McCarthy, acknowledged in his introduction, were discussed in the Dearing report. As the noble Lord said, the situation in relation to university pay is chaotic. He rightly pointed to Recommendation 50 in the report—that higher education employers should appoint, after consultation with staff representatives, an independent review committee to report by April 1998 on the framework for determining pay and conditions of service. It said that the chairman should be appointed on the nomination of the Government.
That pay review body was appointed, although not as quickly as the Dearing report recommended. The Bett committee's report has been sadly delayed and
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continues to be delayed. As we understand it from newspaper reports, the problem is the cost of implementing the committee's recommendations. As the noble Lord, Lord Shore, pointed out, academic pay has fallen back by 40 per cent in comparison to related professions over the past 18 years. But let us suppose we introduced a 10 per cent increase; it would cost in the region of £360 million, which is a great deal of money and undoubtedly the Treasury is dragging its feet on that sum.
In a sense, the Bett committee illustrates the difficulties of appointing an ad hoc committee to solve a problem, and it is that difficulty that the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord McCarthy, seeks to solve. Ad hoc committees lead to peaks and troughs in pay. First, there may be a catch-up pay rise too large for the Treasury to fund, but perhaps implemented in part or over the course of a number of years. Over the course of those years, increases below or at the level of inflation mean that the problem builds up again. That is followed by another ad hoc committee and another bump in pay rise.
In the public sector it is never easy to know what is a fair rate of pay, particularly where we have, as we have in this case, a monopoly employer in terms of the state. As the noble Lord, Lord McCarthy pointed out, over the course of the years the concept of pay review bodies is probably the most satisfactory way that we have discovered of dealing with this. That is why we on these Benches feel that the setting up of a pay review body is long overdue.
The Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals objects to the proposal. As the university and college employers' association, it puts forward three specific objections. First, that the pay review body would not allow for sufficient local flexibility. But the Bill makes it quite clear that it would only set a minimum and that it would be open to local institutions to decide upon any variations that they wished.
Secondly, the university employers object because such a body would remove from them key employer responsibility for managing staff. I regard that as complete humbug. There are few employers who have been as irresponsible on occasions as have the universities in terms of their broad responsibility for training, conditions of work or, indeed, any aspect of employer relations in universities.
I am delighted to see that this Bill is about academic and academic-related staff pay and conditions. The scandal of the lack of attention to employee relations was brought out in the Dearing report and it is about to be exposed again in the Bett report. We know, because it has leaked out to the press, that the Bett report will address the issue of sex discrimination: the fact that women academics and others in the university area have been systematically underpaid at every level, whether they are academics, administrators or manual staff. There is also the scandal of the fixed-term contract staff who have been expected to sign away their rights to redundancy over the course of the years.
The third objection put forward by the employers is that it may be divisive to have employees on two different scales; in other words, the support staff and the

1725
bureaucrats at universities should be on a different scale from the academic staff. Yes, it may be divisive, but it may not be. I would argue that support staff and bureaucrats in universities have very different functions from the academic staff. Moreover, they are not under the constant pressure to meet performance criteria in relation to teaching and publications. I do not deny that everyone in the academic sector is overworked and overstressed. A colleague of mine mentioned the other day that he carried out a survey among his staff and discovered that 70 per cent of them were on medication for stress.
I believe that we have reached an absurd situation in the academic sector, and in other parts of the public sector, where we are expected to meet the pressures of the market-place and, side by side with that, the full bureaucratic panoply of command economy performance indicators—that means endless time spent filling in forms, counting activities and writing reports justifying one's activities—rather than being able to get on with one's own research writing upon which one is being measured. All that spills over to our bureaucrats who are equally hard-pressed and the butt of many insults; but they do not have to go home at weekends and cope with the marking of hundreds of essay and exam scripts, let alone turn their minds to learned articles in obscure journals, which is necessary to satisfy the demands of the research assessment exercise. I can see no real reason why academics and academic bureaucrats should be on the same pay scale; nor why they should not have two separate pay scales.
As I have made clear, this Bill has the full support of these Benches. Academic pay in this country is currently far too low and wholly uncompetitive with the professions with which it competes for the best minds in our country. Conditions of employment are sometimes scandalous. The record of the universities as employers is appalling and their attitude to successive governments is supine, to say the least. The setting up of a permanent independent review body, which might have a little bit more spunk, is well overdue.
3.38 p.m.
Baroness Seccombe: My Lords, I do not have to declare an interest as I am not involved in academia, but I am the proud mother-in-law of a newly qualified PhD in linguistics. This has been a most interesting, thought-provoking and important debate. However, I shall make only a brief contribution at this stage.
I do question the timing of the Bill. It is common knowledge, as has been expressed on all sides of the Chamber today, that the Bett committee will be publishing the report of the review on higher education staff pay and conditions very soon. Indeed, if rumours are to be believed, I understand that the date of publication is likely to be 23rd June. Therefore, would it not be preferable to consider the report as a whole, and its conclusions, before taking legislative action? The committee will clearly address many issues, including the desirability or otherwise of appointing a pay review body for higher education, differential pay between men and women in higher education, levels of pay, the
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relative treatment of academic staff and support staff, the degree to which short-term contracts are used in higher education, and so on.
Until the Minister responds today we cannot be certain as to the attitude of Her Majesty's Government. This is therefore an opportunity to pose some questions ahead of the report's publication for consideration by the Secretary of State and, if possible, for a preliminary response from the Minister today. Do the Government have any misgivings or objections to a pay review system for university staff? Can the Minister tell the House, in the spirit of open government, whether the Government covered the issue of a pay review body when giving evidence to the Bett committee because it has been reported that the implementation in full of the various recommendations contained in the Bett report can only take place at some cost? If, as has been suggested, the report is likely to recommend increased pay, particularly at the bottom and at the top of the salary scale, and an effort to redress the pay inequalities between male and female staff, the costs could be considerable. A figure of £450 million was mentioned in this week's Times Higher Education Supplement. Will the Minister give a guarantee that the Government will fund these costs in full, and if so will this constitute a real term increase in the total higher education budget, or will an increase in funding to finance the Bat proposals be matched with cuts elsewhere in the higher education budget?
What view is taken by the Government on the level of academic salaries and was it conveyed to the Bett committee? Do the Government accept that pay review bodies operate within the principles of affordability and fairness? If so, in what way do the Government see these principles applying to higher education? Have the Government given any indication to the Bett committee of an alternative system to a pay review body? As we have heard, the Association of University Teachers is particularly concerned that, given the Government's commitment to longer term financial planning and following the comprehensive spending review, the allocations for higher education have still not been announced.
One important point for consideration at this stage, for I am sure there will be other issues to be addressed once we have seen the report, is that of flexibility. There is within the higher education sector considerable diversity of provision and of the nature, style and structure of institutions. Could a single pay review body for the whole sector reflect this diversity and to what extent would it remove flexibility from university employers? This is a point that I know my noble friend Lady Carnegy of Lour would have raised if she had not been unavoidably absent from the House today. She is extremely sorry not to be here as she is much interested in the subject. It is a key point of concern of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals. Therefore I wish to ask for some assurances.
First, is the Minister aware of fears among vice-chancellors that the Bett report may place them in a pay and conditions strait-jacket if, as expected, it recommends a national wages structure? What

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guarantees can the noble Baroness give that the new system will not rob universities of the necessary local flexibility on pay and conditions?
There is much interest in the Bett report which, as noble Lords will know, was commissioned in response to a recommendation from the Dearing report. Many issues will be raised to be considered by government and the higher education sector in addition to Members of Parliament in both Houses. However, I conclude where I started by saying that this is not the time to be considering one aspect of university pay and conditions in isolation from and in advance of the Bett report.
I do not expect detailed answers at this stage. I am sure that noble Lords present would be grateful, however, if the noble Baroness could give some idea of the Government's position on these issues in anticipation of the Bett committee's findings.
3.45 p.m.
The Minister of State, Department for Education and Employment (Baroness Blackstone): My Lords, the terms and conditions of those who work in higher education are of great importance. I have listened to all the points made in the debate with great interest. We all agree that this country's world-class reputation in higher education has been achieved by the quality and excellence of the staff who work in it. There is no question about that. Whether they be academic, non-academic, management or support staff, they all contribute to the maintenance of our enviable position. I disagree with what Martin Wolf said in his article in the Financial Times earlier this week. I do not believe it is the case that the quality of British universities is in terrible decline in terms of research and teaching. I am sure that that position is also taken by the academics who have contributed to the debate. There is still a great deal of wonderful work going on in our universities. I regret that a journalist I much admire should take such a negative position.
I take this opportunity to express the Government's appreciation of the hard work and commitment demonstrated by staff in higher education in recent years. As my noble friend Lord Shore said, they have had to deliver a significant expansion in student numbers and they have done so at a cost the country can afford.
The Government have been clear about the agenda for higher education. There is no doubt that we are committed to ensuring that our higher education system continues to enable those who can benefit to enjoy more and wider opportunities to participate in a high-quality system, especially those groups who traditionally have been under-represented. That will be good for the individuals and for the country.
That is why my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment announced an additional £165 million for higher education in 1998–99. He has also announced more than £750,000,000 extra over the next two years compared with 1998–99. So I am rather more optimistic about the sector than the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire.
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The noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe, asked about the final year of the Comprehensive Spending Review. There will be further announcements later this year about what will be provided for the HE sector. I believe that the announcements will be well received.
Perhaps I should say to my noble friend Lord Shore that the package we have announced allows for greater student numbers, for improving quality, for raising standards, for supporting capital improvements and for boosting research. That is a demanding agenda. It has implications for both the management and staffing of our universities. The systems for determining the terms and conditions of staff in the sector need to be capable of reflecting the importance of greater flexibility and responsiveness in meeting the challenges of the coming years, as the CVCP and SCOP have recognised, and as the noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe, has mentioned.
I turn now to my noble friend's Bill, which attempts to put such systems in place. The Bill proposes the creation of a body, appointed by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State, to examine and report on such matters relating to the remuneration and other terms and conditions of academic and academic-related staff in HE. It also allows for the implementation by secondary legislation of the recommendations of the review body. It is an interesting idea, but it is one on which I have a number of reservations. Perhaps I may explain why.
I know that pay is important. I can recognise that people in the sector want to improve their pay and other terms and conditions of employment. Perhaps I may advise the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, and my noble friend Lord McCarthy, that I know that academics work extremely hard. There is no question about that. I also accept, as nearly all noble Lords have commented, that there was a relative decline in the pay of academics under the previous government. However, I am puzzled by the figure mentioned by my noble friend Lord Shore of a 1.1 per cent increase in real terms since 1981. The previous AUT figures that we have had quoted to us are of a 12 per cent increase in real terms since 1981. I am therefore a little confused as to where the lower figure comes from.
Lord McCarthy: My Lords, the Minister mentioned a figure of 12 per cent. From what source does the figure originate? Who supplies the figures?
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, the figure of 12 per cent comes from the AUT. The Government's figure, which is based on the new earnings survey of male full-time staff only, and therefore is not a complete figure, is of an 18 per cent increase in real terms over the period. I recognise that it compares badly with the increases awarded to many other comparable non-manual workers in the public sector. But I must make clear and remind your Lordships that under current arrangements the question of salaries and indeed other terms and conditions for all staff in higher education is a matter for the employers to determine. The Government play no part in the negotiations between the employers and staff representatives and are not involved in the setting of pay levels in higher

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education. The Bett committee, about which I shall say a little more shortly, was established by the higher education employers, not by the Government. It will report to them and not to Ministers.
My noble friend Lord McCarthy has referred to the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, and his committee looked into the question of the sector's employment framework and considered options for the future determination of pay levels. The Dearing committee looked at a number of possibilities, including national pay bargaining, local pay bargaining, a standing pay review body and a statutory pay review body. The committee discussed the pros and cons of each of those options. When the Dearing committee published its report in July 1997 it did not recommend a change to the arrangements that I outlined earlier. It took the view that questions of remuneration should not be taken in isolation, rather that the whole issue of the terms and conditions of all staff in higher education should be looked at together. As my noble friend said, Dearing therefore recommended that an independent review committee should be established by the HE employers to look at the framework for determining the pay and conditions of service of all staff employed in the sector. The Universities and Colleges Employers' Association took forward that recommendation. It established a committee under the chairmanship of Sir Michael Bett at the beginning of last year.
1 stress again that it is not a government review and that the committee's report and recommendations will not be addressed to the Government; rather it will report to the Universities and Colleges Employers' Association. As I understand it, the Bett committee has been considering a wide range of issues—pay levels, pay structures, terms and conditions of service and possible frameworks for determining pay and conditions. As part of its work, it has commissioned research and invited the views of a great many interested parties.
The noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe, asked about the Government's evidence to the committee. The Government's evidence is a public document. I shall be very happy to send her a copy rather than go through what we said at the time. Incidentally, we made no comment, one way or the other, on a pay review body.
Like other noble Lords, I have seen reports in the press in recent weeks as to the content and conclusions of the committee's report. Like them, I do not think that it would be appropriate for me to comment on what is really speculation. I understand that the committee is due to publish its report in the next two or three weeks. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, that the report has not been delayed because of the views of the Treasury; it is a report to employers. It, will then be for the employers and the representatives of university staff to discuss the committee's recommendations and agree a way forward. It is the Government's hope that the higher education sector will find that the report's conclusions provide a framework for taking forward negotiations on pay and conditions for future years.
But I must stress, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe, and my noble friend Lord Shore, that the report has not yet been published. 'The Government
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believe that it would not be wise to pre-empt the conclusions of the Bett committee and the negotiations on its recommendations by moving to set up a pay review body for academic and academic-related staff as my noble friend proposes. The Bett committee has been considering these important and complex issues for the best part of 14 months. I am sure that the committee has thought long and hard about what is the right way ahead for the sector when it comes to the methods of determining terms and conditions of employment. It does not seem right to me that, in advance of the report being published, we should now be discussing proposed legislation to introduce a pay review body for one section, and one section only, of higher education staff—a proposal that may or may not figure in the Bett report.
The normal method of determining pay is by negotiation between the employer and employees' representatives. The normal pay negotiating process—between the parties directly affected—gives the best opportunity to reach settlements that reflect the circumstances and requirements of the employer and of staff. There does not seem to me to be a compelling reason to override them in this case.
Alternative pay determination procedures, such as a pay review body, need to be considered only if there are factors preventing the proper operation of the collective bargaining process. These might include limitations on the ability of either side to participate in negotiations, or inhibitions placed on the negotiating process by sensitivities to any disputes arising. Those inhibitions would need to be on a scale which justified putting pay issues in the hands of a third party. I do not believe that such considerations apply here.
My noble friend Lord McCarthy mentioned equal opportunities, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe. Like many noble Lords, I have seen recent press reports about the pay of women in universities. The legal position is quite clear. Under the Equal Pay Act 1970, it is illegal for an employer to pay a woman employee less than a man for like work—that is, for work that is the same or of a broadly similar nature; for work rated as equivalent to that of a man, where there has been a job evaluation study; or for work of equal value to that of a man in terms of the demands made on them both under such headings as "effort", "skill" and "decision-making".
That legislation has been in place for many years. I expect individual higher education institutions to be taking action now to address any equal pay issues if necessary. The Equal Opportunities Commission's statutory code of practice on equal pay which was issued in 1997 will be helpful in that respect. Its recommendations give employers information and advice on how to review their pay structures to ensure that they are not discriminatory.
A key issue in determining the levels of pay within the sector is affordability. It is important that pay costs should be met within the resources available to the sector and that institutions should be able to manage and control their pay bills. I thought that the noble Baroness,

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Lady Sharp, was a little hard on the employers given the very severe constraints under which universities have been operating for quite a long time.
I have explained fully the reservations that I have about the Bill. I recognise the wish of some people in the sector for a pay review body of that type. But I am not altogether persuaded that such a body would be right for higher education. I also believe, as I have already made clear, that it would be unwise to pre-empt the conclusions of the Bett committee's report which is due to be published pretty soon. Of course I shall not oppose the Second Reading of the Bill, but I shall have to disappoint speakers in the debate by saying that the Government cannot give it their support.
3.59 p.m.
Lord McCarthy: My Lords, I thank everyone who has participated in an interesting run round the course of this complicated issue. Three out of four speakers supported me, which is not bad. Naturally I agreed with virtually everything they said. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, pointed out the growing shortage of British academics. It is partly pay, but it is also the growing shortage of scholarships for graduate education. In my own college we have no British graduates in economics because they cannot get scholarships, even when they get firsts. Nevertheless, it is a sign of the deterioration in the situation and I am glad that he pointed it out.
I agreed with all four points made by the noble Lord, Lord Shore, about the explosion in size and workload, and the relative loss of pay. As for the 1.1 per cent, my figures come from figures given to me by the NUT. It is simple enough to calculate. Everyone knows the rates of pay of the various categories of academics and all we have to do is put it over the RPI to see what happens. But before we go into Committee, I undertake to look at the figures again. Even if it were 12 per cent, it would be a significant loss, which the Minister does not deny. It would be a loss for which one cannot find many comparable examples in other professional groups.
I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp. I did not know that two-thirds of FRSs now live abroad and I can see why. There is a small number of academics, something like 5 per cent., who still do extremely well. They are distinguished and spend the entire summer at Harvard or somewhere similar. Of course, if they are FRSs, they do even better. If they have Nobel awards, they do better still. But that is not the academic profession. We do not compare what actors earn with what Tony Hopkins earns and most academics are nowhere near that grade of people.
The noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe, mostly asked questions of the Minister so they do not necessitate replies from me. However, she asked whether this was the right time for me to introduce such a Bill. The difficulty for anyone trying to change anything, particularly in this country, is that they have to make the point over and over again. It may well be—though my information is that it is not the case—that Sir Michael will deal with the long-term problem. My
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information is that Sir Michael understandably will deal with the short-term problem. I am talking about the long-term problem. If we are trying to improve the long-term situation in this country, it will take a long time and that is why we are starting this afternoon.
I turn to what the Minister said. I begin with agreement. I agree that we are not in terminal decline. We have not reached the point where the surgeon says, "There's nothing to be done, it's just a question of time. Would you like me to take her off the machine?" We are not in that situation, but we are getting quite close.
There are three broad categories of universities in this country. I will not give names, but there are those at the top, those in the middle and those at the bottom. The ones at the top will survive. They may not be quite as flashy as MIT but they will survive and in comparative terms the academics there are protected. It is in the middle and at the bottom—those universities which have only just gained that status and have expanded most—where morale is lowest, pay is worse and external opportunities are non-existent because of caseload. That is where something must be done; otherwise, we may go into irreversible decline.
The Minister said that some money would be forthcoming. I did not understand her to say that some of that money would be earmarked for pay in any sense. If only the Minister could say—not necessarily this afternoon but later—that some of that new money would be specially directed to correcting these anomalies! More and more of the money has not gone to pay but to other things. The proportion that goes to pay has been in decline. Therefore, to say that there is new money does not really help.
The Minister said that the Bill was an interesting idea. I am glad that the Minister is interested. I very much agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, that we cannot exonerate the vice-chancellors. Quite apart from the fact that they pay themselves twice or three times as much as professors and control their own pay, they have not done as the National Health Service management did. Without making a fuss, the NHS management fought for the implementation of pay review for nurses and other groups. One may say that they had it to fight for. However, I believe that the vice-chancellors of this country have been supine in agreeing with everything the Government have said. They could have sided with their employees and said that the Government should put in more money, because it is the Government who control the total sum.
It is no good saying that the Government play no part in the negotiations when in effect they tell the vice-chancellors that there is no more money in the kitty. That was what Dearing meant when he said that the system was in chaos and there was no negotiation or movement. He said that somebody outside the bargaining arena determined the total sum, not a pay review board but the Secretary of State and, behind him, the Treasury.
The Minister then reviewed the Bett Committee. I only hope that that committee says what we hope it will say in relation to pay review. I remain convinced—I believe that if it reflects upon it the House will also be

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Convinced—that there is nothing to be done but to wait for pay review. If pay review were as interventionist and difficult as the Minister suggested today the Government would seek to abolish teachers' pay review. The Government know very well that that would ruin relationships with teachers. No government abandons and abolishes pay review because it works, and one day it will work for academics. In the meantime, I ask the House to give the Bill a Second Reading.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

Adoption (Intercountry Aspects) Bill
4.9 p.m.
Brought from the Commons; read a first time, and to be printed.

Football (Offences and Disorder) Bill
Brought from the Commons; read a first time, and to be printed.

Road Traffic (Vehicle Testing) Bill
4.10 p.m.
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, I beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time.
This Bill, which was introduced into the other place by my honourable friend the Member for Basingstoke, Mr Hunter, completed its passage through another place without amendment and with the complete agreement of all political parties. I hope that we may continue that.
I make clear that the Bill has nothing to do with the mechanics of MOT testing. It is a Bill to improve the structure of the administration of the testing regime. We are dealing here with some 19,000 test stations and 55,000 testers. Twenty-two million motor cars are tested each year.
Computerisation of MOT testing will happen with or without this Bill. But since the public-private partnership is advancing, the Bill enacted would enable us to benefit fully from the advantages that computerisation will bring. First, it will encourage registered keepers to have a valid MOT certificate because police will be able more readily to check on the police national computer. Secondly, the database will promote the efficiency and fairness of the MOT testing regime. The Vehicle Inspectorate will be able better to control the testing standards that prevail across the 19,000 stations.
Thirdly, the computerisation is motorist friendly. It prepares the way for paperless vehicle relicensing transactions and makes it possible one day to renew our vehicle excise duty payments and obtain the licence without producing pieces of paper.
The measure is cost neutral. The purpose of the provision is to ensure that with the introduction of computerisation the MOT test system continues to be fully financing. The Bill sets out how the Vehicle Inspectorate receives its fundings after computerisation.
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It has another advantage. With the paperless system one of the largest elements of fraud in the sale and purchase of used motor cars will be removed. There will not be a certificate. We all know that many MOT certificates have been stolen, mislaid, counterfeited, and so on. The confirmation of an MOT test will he electronically transmitted.
Notwithstanding the lateness of the hour this Friday afternoon, it would be remiss of me not to run through the main points of each clause. Clause 1 is intended to aid the enforcement and facilitate the option of introducing paperless vehicle relicensing. It also enables information on the database to be sold to help offset the cost of computerising the scheme. The MOT testing of vehicles is governed by the Road Traffic Act 1988 If I refer to "the Act" it will be in that context. The Act does not refer to nominated testers, although in practice that category of person carries out most MOT tests.
Clause 1(1)(a) inserts a new paragraph and thereby puts nominated testers on to a statutory basis. Subsection (1)(b) replaces the existing subsection of the Act and provides for inspectors whose names are put forward by designated councils to be approved by the Secretary of State. The advantage of computerisation testing is that it will enable the Vehicle Inspectorate to monitor testing standards more efficiently.
Subsection (3) adds two new subsections to Section 45 of the Act. It will enable the Secretary of State to provide or to make arrangements for the provision of courses of instruction in connection with MOT testing. He does so under the present administrative arrangements, but it will enable him to charge fees for attendance on such courses. This is a new provision designed to make those who benefit from such courses responsible for paying for them.
New subsection (6)(b) will require the Secretary of State to establish and maintain records relating to MOT tests. The main objective of that element of the project is to establish and maintain a central record of the MOT slip status of every vehicle subject to MOT testing.
Clause 2 is the most lengthy clause. I shall try to be brief, but it is important to acquaint the House with its provisions. It substitutes for Section 46 of the 1988 Act. It re-enacts the existing provisions and adds further. In Section 46(1)(a), the 1988 Act empowers the Secretary of State to make regulations to provide only for the authorisation of the examiners. However, as we all know, other categories of people are involved in MOT testing. New subsection (1)(a) will ensure that those people are treated in exactly the same way.
New subsection (1)(b) will provide that regulations made under Section 46 of the 1988 Act may establish conditions to be complied with by authorised examiners, nominated testers, inspectors and designated councils. The conditions are principally the successful completion of a course of training and the payment of the prescribed fees.
New subsection (1)(e) deals with the supervision of examinations and so forth. New subsection (1)(g) closely follows Section 46(1)(d) of the 1988 Act and enables the Secretary of State to prescribe the form and particulars of the paper test certificates and notices of refusal, but the

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new subsection, also following the 1988 Act, empowers the Secretary of State to provide what the fee should be for duplicated or copied test certificates.
The new proposed subsection (2)(a) will empower the Secretary of State to require that persons connected with MOT testing should successfully complete training courses. The proposed subsection (2)(b) will enable the Secretary of State to require that persons connected with MOT testing should pay such fees as may be prescribed in connection with applications for authorisation.
Subsection (5) relates to access to the MOT database information. This will permit the Secretary of State to make information available from MOT records to prescribed persons on payment of a reasonable fee. The provision will allow the Secretary of State to disclose information from the database in accordance with regulations. It is envisaged that these regulations could, on payment of a reasonable fee, provide for details of a vehicle's MOT history to be issued to people who could demonstrate they have a reasonable cause for wanting such information. The regulations could also provide for the issue to the police of information relating to the MOT status of a vehicle free of charge via the police national computer.
New subsection (6) also relates to the disclosure of information from the proposed database in a rather different circumstance. Regulations made under this provision would enable the Secretary of State to sell anonymised information from the database to such persons and on such terms as he thought fit.
Under the new subsections (5) and (6) there are identifiable markets; for example, manufacturers, retailers, motor associations, research companies, consumers and those who through diverse ways seek to fight crime concerned with stolen and scrap vehicles. To some extent the availability of information may increase, as demand is not absolutely foreseeable.
Clause 3 inserts a new section establishing how the Secretary of State may use records in a proposed MOT database and the database of vehicle records held by the DVLA. It is anticipated that the database held by the Association of British Insurers will to some extent be embraced in this co-relation.
Clause 4 inserts a new Section 46B into the Road Traffic Act 1988. At present a vehicle's MOT test status is usually provided by producing a certificate. In future, it will be possible to use records from the proposed MOT database. The clause makes provision for admitting evidence from those records in court. Legislation to effect that is necessary because such use of information held by a centralised computer database falls outside the provisions of the 1988 Act.
The proposed new subsection (1) provides, therefore, that the database records are an authoritative statement of the test status of a vehicle. The proposed subsection (2) establishes that a document purporting to be part of the database, a copy of a document forming part of the database or a note of information from the database shall be authoritative if it is:
"authenticated by a person authorised to do so by the Secretary of State".
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Clause 5 will add a paragraph to Section 66(2)(a) of the 1988 Act. Under that provision, a vehicle may be re-licensed without necessarily presenting an MOT certificate but by reference to the information held on the database.
Clause 6 enables the Secretary of State to make consequential amendments to the Department of Transport fees order. Subsection (1)(a) and (b) define the terms that feature in the next two subsections. Subsection (2) refers to the Department of Transport fees order, which includes a provision relating to fees chargeable by virtue of Section 46 of the 1988 Act. This will require amendment as a result of the Bill.
Subsection (2)(a) and (b) will enable an order that relates only to Section 46 matters, and which is made within 12 months after Royal Assent, to be made subject to negative procedure. This is perhaps a little unusual but the purpose of the time limit is to ensure that the procedure can be used only for matters that flow from the Bill.
Subsection (3)(a) removes the requirement for the affirmative resolution, and subsection (3)(b) emphasises that it can be subject to negative resolution.
Clause 7 introduces the schedule of consequential amendments and repeals two elements of redundant legislation.
Clause 8 deals with financial provisions, and has been the substance of a money resolution debate in the other place. It does not therefore concern us.
Clause 9 provides that the Bill's provisions that relate to operational matters are subject to commencement by order. Clauses 6 and 8 are not subject to commencement by order because their effect is directly linked to implementation of the Bill's other provisions.
The schedule contains consequential amendments relating to the Transport Act 1982, which remains prospective legislation. That was passed when the possible privatisation of the Vehicle Inspectorate was on the agenda. In the event, that never materialised but the legislation still remains. The passage of this Bill demands amendments to that unused Act.
As regards the disclosure and sale of information, provisions are envisaged to enable a mileage record of vehicles to be made by virtue of that being a requirement of the MOT procedure; that is, to record the mileage shown on the speedometer at the time that the car is presented for checks.
The passage of this Bill will make a considerable improvement to the procedures for checking the mileage of motor cars. It will positively deter the clocking of speedometers which has given rise to such anguish not only on the part of the motor industry but most particularly on the part of consumers.
I have been brief, but that is the substance of what the Bill is about. I commend it to the House.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord Lucas of Chilworth.)
4.25 p.m.
Viscount Simon: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, introduced the Bill comprehensively and clearly. Its enactment will help all DV LA customers, private and commercial; it will improve road safety; and it will assist enforcement.
I shall not delay your Lordships on a Friday afternoon beyond planting a thought which may perhaps, at some stage, form part of a regulation. When a vehicle is subject to recall from a manufacturer, it is the manufacturer who contacts the DVLA for the keepers' details pertaining to the recalled vehicles. The manufacturer then writes to each registered keeper with a notice of recall. It is then up to the motorist to present the vehicle to a franchised garage for any necessary items to be checked and, if necessary, modified. Finally, the garage will confirm to the manufacturer that the required work has been completed.
Because it is intended that MOTs will be computerised, would it not be a small—and I use that word guardedly—matter of programming the computer so that any vehicle subject to a recall cannot be given an MOT certificate until that vehicle has been registered by the manufacturer as having had the appropriate work done? There must be some acknowledgement of responsibility in advising the DVLA and that, surely, must he accepted and acted upon by the vehicle manufacturer. After all, if the manufacturer had no need to implement the recall, the procedure would not be necessary.
This Bill is to be welcomed. It will make life easier for most people and much more difficult for the minority.
4.27 p.m.
Baroness Thomas of Walliswood: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, made a full introduction of the Bill. It does not provide for the computerisation of MOT processes, which is already under way under a public/private partnership scheme, but, as he said, it will enable the widest and most effective use of the new system and in particular, rapid access by the police to MOT records; a movement towards paperless MOT transactions; the use of the information garnered from the central record-keeping of MOT processes for general benefit; and the elimination of theft and forgery of MOT certificates. That was all dealt with very fully by the noble Lord.
There was a very brief discussion of this Bill at Second Reading in another place. As the noble Lord said, there was discussion of a money order and further discussion on Report and Third Reading. Only two items of dispute or discussion emerged from those discussions in another place. The first was the additional cost to motorists for the MOT licence, which amounts to about £1 per licence, to offset the £22 million per annum that it is anticipated the new system will cost once it is under way. The second was the degree of confidentiality which surrounded the ability of the Government to sell to commercial organisations some information that they maintained on their records.
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I heard what the noble Lord said in relation to money matters. Nevertheless, that caused a certain amount of worry in another place. It may be helpful—perhaps the Minister already has it in mind—if the noble Baroness could repeat for the benefit of the House the response of the Minister in another place on these matters. I believe that that was broadly as I have indicated; namely, that the cost would be offset by £1 per MOT certificate and, further, that the sale of that additional information would possibly offset the cost to the motorist of the MOT certificate.
The second matter was the commercial sale of the information. Can the Minister confirm, for the benefit of the House, that neither the names of the keepers nor the places where the MOT certificates were granted will be released when the Government sell information from their central records?
On a lighter note, when discussing this little Bill at lunch today, a cynical Member of your Lordships' House said, "Ah, they are going into computerisation just in time to catch the millennium bug". I notice that the timing, provided to us in a background brief, suggests that the detailed design of the scheme—I suppose that means the software—will not start until the year 2000. Therefore, I hope that that pitfall can be avoided.
This Bill is a useful addition to the legislative provision for MOT tests and everything that surrounds them. It seems an admirable way to go forward. There has been no dispute in the other Chamber, and I do not propose to raise any dispute in this Chamber either.
4.32 p.m.
Baroness Seccombe: My Lords, we on these Benches welcome and support the Bill wholeheartedly. It was conceived during the previous administration, and happily has much cross-party support. I want to congratulate my noble friend Lord Lucas of Chilworth on piloting the Bill through this House and my honourable friend Mr Andrew Hunter, the Member for Basingstoke, for taking it through another place.
My noble friend has stated the aims and objectives of the Bill in detail and with great clarity. The best comment that I can make at this stage is to wish it a speedy passage through the remaining stages, so that it makes its way on to the statute book as soon as possible. It is a good, sensible measure and I commend it to the House.
4.33 p.m.
Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton: My Lords, I want to join other noble Lords in complimenting the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, on his masterly summing up of the main features of the Bi11. The Government welcome the introduction of this Bill and give it their firm support. The Bill is, as he said, all about getting the most out of the proposed modernisation of the MOT testing scheme by computerising many of the administrative processes associated with it.

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I shall seek to deal with the specific points raised. If I fail to cover any, I shall not only write to the noble Lord who raised the point but also to other noble Lords who have taken part in the debate.
The noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Walliswood, raised the issue of additional costs to motorists. There will be an additional cost of around £1 a test involved in introducing computerisation. However, that cost will bring many benefits, as the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, said. If the Government can sell information from the database, any profit will be used to reduce the cost to the motorist.
Concerns have been raised, particularly by the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Walliswood, in relation to the provisions of the Bill which involve disclosure of information. I can confirm that the details of the registered keeper will not be liable to be disclosed because, as Clause 1 indicates, that information will not be on the database. Full information would only be disclosed on a case by case basis when the Secretary of State was satisfied that there was a legitimate and reasonable cause for so doing; for example, an imminent purchase of a vehicle. Where information was being disclosed in bulk, it would he completely anonymous and would not contain any names and addresses. It is true that under the provisions of the Bill more information would be widely available in relation to individual vehicles but, as the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, said, that information would be particularly beneficial to enforcement organisations and those who wished to combat fraud.
My noble friend Lord Simon is concerned about the issue of vehicle safety recall. The procedure for recalling vehicles is subject to a code of practice which is monitored closely by the Vehicle Inspectorate on behalf of Ministers of the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. Those arrangements generally work well, but the Government are interested in developing ways in which the system could be made more effective. It is possible that the project to introduce computerisation into the MOT scheme might be able to help, perhaps by enabling MOT testers to alert vehicle presenters to the fact that their vehicle had been subject to a manufacturer's recall campaign. That is something at which the Government are already looking in the process of drawing up a list of requirements which the computerisation contracts will be expected to fulfil.
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I can assure the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Walliswood, that the scheme will be proof against the millennium bug. However, that is not a matter for this Bill. If the idea turns out to be a good one and if it can be made to work in a practicable way, it may be incorporated into the MOT computerisation project anyway.
In conclusion, I can only reiterate the Government's firm support for this Bill. As I have made clear, relying also on the superb presentation of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, essentially its provisions have only one main objective; that is, to help to ensure that it can deliver the maximum benefit possible from the introduction of computerisation into the MOT scheme. With the benefit of this new legislation, the Government will be able to deliver a modern MOT scheme which will be much easier to enforce. The provisions of this Bill will make it possible to make information widely available from the proposed database of records of MOT testing of 22 million vehicles every year in Great Britain with the safeguards to which I referred. That all amounts to taking a valuable step in a very worthwhile direction. I hope your Lordships agree.
4.38 p.m.
Lord Lucas of Chilworth: My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in this short Second Reading debate and am delighted to have such support.
The noble Viscount, Lord Simon, mentioned the recall of vehicles. It is a serious point because around 15 to 25 per cent of all recalled vehicles are never presented. If we could at some time later devise a scheme within the proposed new infrastructure, it would be enormously helpful and add to the safety element.
I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, was being somewhat amusing in her remarks about the millennium bug, but my understanding is that the contract—the licence—to operate the scheme is unlikely to be let until much later in the year. She will, of course, appreciate that it could be many weeks after the letting of the contract before a computer ever arrives on the scene. I anticipated the support of my noble friend Lady Seccombe and I am grateful for it. I commend the Bill to the House.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
House adjourned at twenty minutes before five o'clock.