Sitting of 21 June 1963

Preamble
The House met at Eleven o'clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

SECURITY (JUDICIAL INQUIRY)
The Prime Minister (Mr. Harold Macmillan): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement.
Since the debate on Monday, I have considered, as promised by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, the form of a further inquiry into the security implications of the events leading to Mr. Profumo's resignation.
I think that it is generally agreed that there should be an investigation in the light of this case into the operation of the Security Service and their relationship with the police in connection with matters of national security.
The Government intend to establish an inquiry for this purpose. But before I describe it there are certain other questions which I must now bring to the attention of the House.
It will be within the knowledge of many hon. Members that in connection with the recent episode, rumours are circulating which affect the honour and integrity of public life in this country and, if they were true, might point to a security risk. Such a situation cannot be tolerated. I have, therefore, decided that the public interest requires us to establish a judicial inquiry.
Lord Denning, the Master of the Rolls, has agreed to conduct this inquiry and to render his report to me as soon as possible. His terms of reference will be as follows:
To examine, in the light of the circumstances leading to the resignation of the former Secretary of State for War, Mr. J. D. Profumo, the operation of the Security Service and the adequacy of their co-operation with the Police in matters of security; to investigate any information or material which may come to his attention in this connection and to consider any evidence there may be for believing that national security has been, or may be, endangered; and to report thereon.
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In the course of the discussion with the Leader of the Opposition I have explained to him the reasons for which the Government believe that, in the circumstances with which we are now confronted, this inquiry should be of a judicial character and should cover a wider field.
When I receive the report I will discuss it with the right hon. Gentleman. The Government will then decide the form in which it should be published, whether in whole or in part.
Mr. H. Wilson: The procedure which has been announced by the Government—I think, on a Cabinet decision—is totally inadequate to allay public anxiety and the impression will persist that the Government are engaged in a bigger and vaster cover-up even than we have had.
Is the Prime Minister aware, first, that the terms of reference are far too narrow to deal with the situation? Is he also aware that the judge, however distinguished, will have no power to compel the attendance of witnesses, or to require the production of papers and other evidence? He will have no power to examine on oath, or to compel truth—and is the Prime Minister aware that in this case some of the evidence required will be collected from some of the most unmitigated liars in the country?
Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in addition to the question of security, there is the whole question of the affront to this House? The House was manifestly not satisfied by the answers we got to the questions about the secret meeting downstairs in March or about the general Government responsibility for this question. This can only be settled by the House of Commons and not by a judge, however distinguished and however learned.
When the right hon. Gentleman refers to the rumours, is he aware that these cannot be dissipated and the men concerned enabled to clear their names, as they have every right to do, from some of these rumours, which not only are circulating in this country, but are being openly printed, with names, in many foreign journals from France, Germany and other countries, to the detriment of the name of this country abroad?
Is the Prime Minister aware in that context that the question of what he

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rightly called the integrity of public life goes far beyond an inquiry limited to security? Is he aware that we would have accepted, if he had proposed it, a tribunal? We did not think that it was the ideal solution. We proposed a Select Committee of this House.
In view of the feeling, which is very widespread in the country and in this House, on more than one side, that there has been over the months an attitude to this whole question more related to preventing the facts coming out than to ensuring that they do, is the right hon. Gentleman aware that he is creating the impression that whereas, last November, he almost fell over himself to set up a tribunal when he thought that he had the Press by the throat, when it is now the Government, and the whole Government, who are causing public anxiety he is running away from the idea of setting up anything that will establish the truth?
The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman appears to be addressing himself to this subject in a somewhat different mood from that which he showed in Monday's debate. He is now purely generating a party attack. I will answer his questions.
A tribunal under the 1921 Act: that is open to us. We, my colleagues and I, considered it seriously. It has this great disadvantage that was shown up in the last and the Bank Rate Tribunal, that although the judge can sit in private he can only do so if there is what one might call absolute security—a question affecting security in its more technical sense; and that means day after day all kinds of statements being made, all kinds of assertions being made, which are highly damaging and terribly hard upon innocent people, and which perhaps, after six weeks or two months, are waved aside in the report—but all the damage has been done. I thought that that was the general view of the House and of the country.
I then suggested the procedure in that debate we had on the Lord Radcliffe Report, which we had on the Vassall case, which I followed. First, there was no question of the Privy Council—I think that there is some misunderstanding—holding an inquiry, but discussion among Privy Councillors as to what was the best
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procedure to follow. That we have had. We had two meetings yesterday. I reported our decision. We did not agree. That is the argument against the tribunal at the start.
Of course, it may be that Lord Denning will have to report that he is unable to get the evidence he wants. Then the House will have to consider whether to clothe him with further powers, so that he becomes, in effect, a tribunal. That has not been the experience of the cases which have been investigated by this machinery. I doubt whether that will apply. Let us see.
Then there was the question of a Select Committee of the House of Commons, and that is certainly a possible procedure. But it is one open to the kind of things which, I fear, are going to come to Lord Denning affecting men in many walks of life. I think that it would be terrible if 24 men, even if kept secret to the end, however much we trust our colleagues to try to deal with that aspect—[Hon. Members: "Shame."] I do not think that hon. Members quite realise some of the things which may be said. There is nothing to prevent, in the form of these trials which we have to face, any statements from being made about any public man of any kind, whether a politician or not, and with no power to refute them at all under the legal procedure.
Mr. Marsh: All whitewash.
The Prime Minister: On the Select Committee, it has had, of course, the disadvantage in the past that they very often have to divide on a party basis. But with regard to the question the right hon. Gentleman raised on the conduct of Ministers in their Ministerial capacity, my handling of the affair, that is a matter for the House of Commons. We debated it on Monday. If he wishes to debate it again there can be a debate, but the House of Commons is the place to debate it, not a Select Committee.
Mr. H. Wilson: What is the point of debating these things when the Prime Minister himself will not answer questions put to him, as he failed to do on Monday? The right hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well that the anxieties which I stated a few minutes ago are anxieties felt all over the country, in all parties, and in all parties in this House. Is the right hon. Gentleman aware, as I have

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indicated to him, that we share some of his anxieties about the tribunal? But only the tribunal or a Select Committee have power to compel witnesses to answer questions; and Lord Denning will not have that power.
I want to put one final question to the right hon. Gentleman and then as far as I am concerned I shall leave it. I ask him to weigh the words of his answer carefully. Last Monday, I asked him a question which he did not answer. I asked him whether he was satisfied that we had had a full disclosure of this business so far as the Government were concerned, or whether we had had only that part of the iceberg which was above the surface of the water. Will he now stand up and tell the House that as a result of his inquiries—because he is responsible, and the Government as a whole are responsible, for the conduct of public affairs—he is satisfied that we have heard—
Sir K. Pickthorn: This is a speech not a question.
Mr. Wilson: —the whole story of this matter?
Sir K. Pickthorn: I quite understand the unusual—[Hon. Members: "Sit down."] I am raising a point of order.
Hon. Members: Then say so.
Mr. Speir: It is obvious.
Sir K. Pickthorn: I quite understand the unusual nature of this occasion and I very much regret having to speak, but it does seem to me that whatever may be said about anything which has happened hitherto this particular question, whether or not it would be to the advantage of the public, of the country, of the House, or either side of the House, cannot possibly be anything like a question supplementary to the statement.
Mr. Marsh: Covering up.
Mr. Speaker: I have listened to the hon. Gentleman the Member for Carlton (Sir K. Pickthorn), as always, with the greatest care. On this occasion, extra ordinarily, I do not wholly agree with him, just on the merits of the proposition.
The Prime Minister: On the question which the right hon. Gentleman has
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asked me, I do not quite know what he means by top of the iceberg, or what lies below. We have investigated so far as lies within our present power, and I told the House on Monday the whole story from beginning to end with every detail, so far as I know it. I am happy to think that, however strongly people may feel, they acquit me of any dishonour, acquit me of any injustice, but perhaps, as they have every right to do, condemn, or wish to criticise, my efficiency in handling all these matters.
But the question the right hon. Gentleman asked me is a matter of honour. I know of no thing which I have not told the House, but I have heard these terrible things being said about all sorts of people which, if allowed to go on, will destroy not only one side of the House of Commons, but the other side of the House of Commons. I do not know whether they are strictly security or not; it is difficult to say, because if people are said to be behaving in a terrible way it is a security risk, in a sense, in the modern world.
I think that the course of sending for Lord Denning and asking anyone who feels himself aggrieved to ask for an inquiry into the rumours about him, apart from the technical side, is the best and, indeed, the only efficient way of getting the matter handled.
Mr. Shinwell: On the question about the terms of reference, which include, according to the right hon. Gentleman's statement, the relations between the security organisation and the police, ought not the terms of reference to include also relations between the security personnel and organisation and the right hon. Gentleman himself? He will recall that in the course of the debate on Monday last he referred to the fact—apparently it is a fact—that he was not informed by the security people about certain events. Ought not that item to be included in the terms of reference?
The Prime Minister: I think that they do cover it. They say "operation of the Security Service"; that is to say, the whole operation throughout the affair.
Mr. Doughty: Is the Prime Minister aware that the very distinguished judge who has been appointed will give great confidence to the whole of the rest of the country? If in any way he feels that he

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lacks power, then the House at any time can grant powers to him, and I am certain that on both sides of the House we shall be pleased to do so.—[Hon. Members: "Give them now."] The result of this tribunal will be to see not only that justice is done, but, what is more important, that justice will be seen to be done.
If a Select Committee of this House is appointed—and I am not criticising any hon. Member from any part of the House who might sit on it, for we all have party affiliations—and someone issues a minority report, it is open to the criticism, however unjust, that the decision is given on party lines and not on the facts and the merits or the demerits of any particular case.
The wide terms of reference of the tribunal cover almost every aspect not only of this matter, but the most unpleasant rumours—which, I hope, are quite wrong—which are circulating about Members in all parts of the House.
Mr. D. Foot: May I, first, ask the right hon. Gentleman why Lord Denning should not be qualified at the outset with the power to summon witnesses and to call for documents and other evidence? Secondly, may I ask whether it is contemplated that the evidence itself, apart from the report this morning, will eventually be published if Lord Denning thinks fit? Thirdly, will the right hon. Gentleman say how and by whom the evidence will be presented to the tribunal?
The Prime Minister: I think that I have covered the first part of the hon. and learned Gentleman's question. As to the second part, it will be a matter for consideration, of course, by Lord Denning. Even there, I think that, when he has taken note of how he should proceed, we would rely on him to suggest how he can best conduct this matter to its conclusion.
Mr. W. Yates: While I welcome Lord Denning to this appointment, may I ask the Prime Minister whether he is aware that the principles of the Conservative Party do not permit the debasing of public or political morality in this country, nor do they permit anything to be done which would attempt to deceive the electorate or the party as a whole for the sake of holding and maintaining personal power?
The Prime Minister: The principle of the Conservative Party, as I understand it, and, I hope, of every party in this House, is that honourable men should be condemned not by rumours—something which I have never accepted—but only by fact.
Mr. Thorpe: May I, first, refer to the question raised by the right hon. Gentleman relating to the terms of reference? Is the Prime Minister aware that the investigation, to quote the terms of reference, is into:
"…the operation of the Security Service and the adequacy of their relationship with the Police?…"
The relationship with the Government is, therefore, by implication excluded. Are we not, therefore, faced with the situation that half the problem here is not merely the efficiency of the security service, but the efficiency and competence of the Government in relationship with the security service?
May I ask the right hon. Gentleman two minor questions of detail? First, are we to take it that the Law Officers will be presenting the evidence before Lord Denning. If so, will he bear in mind that these are two Ministers who proved as gullible as any in the matter? Secondly, will privilege attach to the witnesses giving evidence before Lord Denning?
The Prime Minister: In regard to the first point, I think that—quite unintentionally, I am certain—the hon. Gentleman has misread and misstated the terms of reference. The first part of the terms of reference is:
"…in the light of the circumstances…the operation of the Security Service…"
That is part one. That will include the relationship of the security service with the Government, with the Home Secretary, under whom it is officially, and with me, under whom it is on the whole. The second part is:
"…and the adequacy of their co-operation with the Police…".
That is the second item. I think that covers the whole of it.
The other question is the matter of the witnesses. While they will, of course, have what I believe is called "qualified"—[Hon. Members: "Oh!"] They will be protected from any action unless they are totally malicious, but I am bound

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to say that that is the most that could normally be expected. They will not be attacked by the Crown, and in any action taken by a private person against them, it must be proved not only that they were wrong, but that they were maliciously wrong.
Mr. Emery: May I ask my right hon. Friend—I think that it was clear in his statement, but I ask this so that there shall be absolutely no misunderstanding and so that everybody may be certain about this—whether, if this respected judge should feel at the beginning of his inquiries that he has not the powers to conduct this inquiry as he sees fit, the Government would immediately give him these powers at the outset?
The Prime Minister: Yes, Sir. Of course, Lord Denning has been told, in what short time we have had, of the general position and has studied it, and what is involved and what would probably be the sort of things that he will have to do. It has been made quite clear that if he wishes, if he thinks he cannot conduct the inquiry without the full tribunal procedure, he can ask for it and the House can pass such a Resolution.
The difficulty about it is that under the tribunal procedure the judge of a tribunal cannot sit in private unless a matter of security is concerned, and I think that is often interpreted to mean security in its rather narrow sense. Yet I think that everybody would agree that it would be quite wrong to have some of the things which he would be investigating day by day—statements, or com-
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plaints, or rumours—referred to and to have to wait perhaps several weeks before they could be refuted. That is one of the difficulties. But if Lord Denning finds that he cannot operate without the powers, he will, of course, tell us.
Mr. A. Henderson: May I clarify one point? Are we to understand that the statements which will be made to Lord Denning will be made on oath?
The Prime Minister: I imagine that Lord Denning cannot demand that they should be made on oath, but I think that they can be made on oath. I imagine that there are really three categories of statement. There will be information from the police and the security service which has come to light as a result of these recent events. There will be the statements of Ministers and other people—anybody else—whom I shall inform, against whom, in the course of these inquiries, accusations have been made. There may also be complaints about rumours circulating in regard to them outside.
I do not doubt at all that a judge of this capacity and experience will be able to find the truth, or that, with his high character, if he finds himself prevented in any way, he will immediately inform me and the House of his difficulty.
Several Hon. Members rose—
Mr. Speaker: All this is at the expense of private Members, whose interests have to be in my care. We cannot take this matter further now.

ORDERS OF THE DAY
  LOCAL AUTHORITIES (LAND) BILL
  As amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.
  LOCAL AUTHORITIES (LAND) BILL

    New Clause.—(LOCAL AUTHORITY NOT TO CREATE ANY NUISANCE.)
    A local authority shall so exercise their powers under sections 2 and 5 of this Act as not to create a nuisance.—[Mr. Graham Page.]
    Brought up, and read the First time.
    11.27 a.m.
    Mr. Graham Page: I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
    Clause 12(1) of the Bill as it stands has a bearing on my proposed new Clause. Under Clause 12(1) nothing in the Bill is to give a local authority power to do any act or omission which would be actionable at the suit of any person. There is a particular kind of wrong or tort which is not necessarily actionable at the suit of an individual, and that is the wrong of nuisance, and it is particularly likely to occur under the powers given to local authorities by the Bill.
    In Clause 2, for example, local authorities are given considerable powers to develop land, to erect buildings and to carry out works, and under Clause 5 they are given powers to erect garages, construct hard standings or convert buildings into garages. For example, under Clause 2 a local authority might be constructing or carrying out work on land—demolition work, perhaps, or pile driving. These are the sort of operations which are likely to cause a nuisance to neighbouring land. But the only person who is entitled to take action in the case of such a nuisance is the person who is in possession of the adjoining land.
    Those of us who went through the schoolboy stage of learning our law will recollect the case of Malone v. Laskey, where a lavatory cistern fell on the head of the wife of the tenant of the house by reason of the vibrations from an engine on neighbouring land, and the wife, not being in possession of the house, had no claim against the neighbour. There was undoubtedly a
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    nuisance there, but in law it was not actionable at the suit of the wife, the person who was injured.
    Clause 5, where the local authority is given power to make hard standings for vehicles, is in no way restricted to land off the highway. As I read the Clause, it would be possible for a local authority to set up parking places on the road, which might be an obstruction of the highway or a danger to traffic. If so, it is a public nuisance, but no action would lie at the suit of a person, unless that person could show special damage or particular damage suffered by himself, that is if there is a public nuisance.
    11.30 a.m.
    If there is damage to the public at large, it is actionable by an individual only if he can show that he has suffered some additional damage to that suffered by the public at large. If his injury is of the same kind as that suffered by the general public, he is unable to take action. Therefore, nuisances of that type do not come into Clause 12(1), which is restricted to forbidding a local authority to do an act or omission which is actionable at the suit of a person. By implication, a local authority seems to be allowed to commit a public nuisance, or even a private nuisance, which is actionable only by a person in possession of land.
    By this new Clause I wanted to make it quite certain that the Bill was not authorising local authorities to commit or create a nuisance.
    Sir Godfrey Nicholson: I find myself at a disadvantage in debating with my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page), because I am not a lawyer and I have no legal training. I can rely only upon the expert advice which I am given. My advice is that this new Clause is unnecessary because the Bill gives no power to local authorities to create a nuisance. I do not rely entirely upon Clause 12(1) which, of course, is a part of the case, but upon the plain fact that no power is given to local authorities to create a nuisance or to enable them to override statutory provisions or common law relating to a nuisance. Therefore, I think that the new Clause is completely unnecessary, and I hope that my hon. Friend will withdraw it.
    Dr. Alan Glyn: I am a little muddled about the arguments on this new Clause. I am sure that we are all most anxious to see that any powers which we are giving under the Bill are used correctly and that local authorities in general do not create nuisances, such as have been suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page).
    Like my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham (Sir G. Nicholson), I cannot see how this new Clause is necessary. I should have thought that if there was a general nuisance, the public could take action, and that if it was a private nuisance—and here I concede that it is possible for a nuisance to be caused to adjoining owners—they would have an automatic right of action if they are adjoining owners and suffer damage.
    What I did not understand in the statement of my hon. Friend when he moved the new Clause was that I think he said that it would cover the case where the adjoining owner, particularly in the case of a car park or something of that nature, was suffering only the same damage as the public. If the adjoining owner is given additional power to cover the nuisance or annoyance he is caused by the erection by a local authority of certain works, I think that it would be worth including this new Clause in the Bill. It often happens that local authorities are not conscious, particularly in the case of garages, of the noise and fumes which can possibly depreciate the value of local owners' property, and, indeed, cause a very general nuisance.
    On the other hand, the nuisance that I have in mind may be the type of nuisance which my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby mentioned, where perhaps local property owners are inconvenienced more than the general public by their having to live there all the time and suffer nuisance all the time. It might be that under the existing law the nuisance that they are suffering is the same as that suffered by the public, yet to them it might be more injurious because they are immediately adjacent to it.
    If that is the case, I would suggest that this new Clause is reasonable. It does not in any way take powers from the local authorities, and if it would make them perhaps additionally more careful of what they do, it is merited.
    Mr. James MacColl: The point that I want to make is technical and a matter of construction. I should have thought that we were all agreed about what we should do—that is, that the local authority should be in the same position as the private developer, neither more nor less inhibited in respect of these powers. Therefore, it is a question whether the effect of the Bill without the proposed new Clause meets that object. I do not think that local authorities spend their time dropping lavatory cisterns on people. They are responsible bodies and normally use their land in a responsible and sensible way, more so probably than other people because they are publicly accountable and open to public criticism in council and so on. Therefore, I should have thought that there is no case for putting in a new Clause saying that a local authority must not do anything which would make it liable for a public nuisance because the remedy of a public nuisance would be available against it as against a private individual.
    What rather worries me is having Clause 12(1) in the Bill, on the general principle that if we put something in the Bill we exclude other things. If we say that a local authority, apart from Clause 12(1), can be put in a different position from a private person in regard to ordinary actions and that without this Clause that would be the position, does not that leave as a possible interpretation of the Bill that where no exception is made of public nuisance the position is different. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman has got my point but, if not, I will try again.
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (Mr. F. V. Corfield): With due respect to my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page), I think that the weakness of his argument is to read the word "person" literally and not in its legal interpretation as including the plural and people who are at the same time holding an office and can operate by virtue of that office. I have in mind my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General. The ordinary public nuisance legislation and common law rules can be enforced at the initiative of the Attorney-General.

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    I am advised, and I would certainly accept it from my own reading of the provision, that the Attorney-General is covered by the word "person". I cannot see any good reason for believing that he is not. I cannot think of any form of nuisance, using the word in its legal sense, whether public or private, that cannot give rise to an action by an individual or by a person in this broader sense.
    I do not think that my hon. Friend has made out a case where that occurs. I did not take an exact note, but I think that the case he referred to, in which a person was denied an action because she was not the owner of the house, seemed a matter in contract rather than in tort. But perhaps I might get some support from the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. Fletcher) on this.
    Mr. Eric Fletcher Mr. Eric Fletcher (Islington, East) indicated dissent.
    Mr. Corfield: I thought I saw the hon. Member nod. I cannot see that this Clause can possibly exclude a nuisance as we know it on the ground that there is no person in that particular sense who can initiate an action.
    The hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) made the point that if we left in Clause 12 (1) the inference would be that local authorities could do anything not covered in that subsection. I am sure that that is not so. He will probably remember that, in Committee, the argument for inserting that subsection was that it was desirable to make absolutely certain of the position where any of the possibilities under any of the provisions of the Bill—I think that we were concerned almost solely with Clause 2 in that argument—cut across certain other statutory provisions.
    There are statutory provisions, I believe, controlling slaughterhouses, for instance. It might be within the powers of this Bill for a local authority to erect a slaughterhouse, and we wanted to make it absolutely clear that the Bill would not mean that it could do so without taking into account the provisions of other Acts on the control of erection of slaughterhouses. This was what we had in mind. I am completely satisfied, from the advice I have received, that the Bill achieves this now, and that the insertion of Clause 12 (1)
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    does not have a narrowing effect in the sense that it may be argued that, because it is there, nothing outside it is very important.
    I suggest also that, on the ground of general principle, my hon. Friend is putting forward a fairly dangerous argument, because the logic of it is that, under practically every public Bill which does not contain a specific Clause of this nature, local authorities are free to go around creating nuisances. I do not believe that it has ever been held to be the interpretation of an Act conferring powers on local authorities that, unless nuisance is expressly excluded, they are entitled to do it. That appears to be sense, and I am advised that it is the position.
    My advice is strongly that the Clause is not necessary and that it might cast doubt on a wider principle and give rise to suggestions that other Acts conferring powers on local authorities give them some power to create nuisance because this provision has been inserted in this Bill and not elsewhere. I therefore advise the House not to accept the new Clause.
    Dr. Alan Glyn: If this new Clause were accepted, how much difficulty would local authorities have? Does not my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary consider that, with these wider powers which are being conferred, it would be advisable possibly to have this additional restriction, provided that it does not operate unreasonably and unfairly against local authorities?
    Mr. Corfield: It will not make the slightest difference to the use of the powers conferred by this Bill by the local authorities. My contention, and my advice, is that, under the terms of the Bill as it stands, they are in no way permitted to create nuisances anyhow, and that putting this new Clause in would not be increasing the burden on them. But my objection to the Clause is that it is not necessary, that it might tend to give rise in the courts to the suggestion that, because it was put into this Bill, one has to look at other Acts conferring powers on local authorities, and that, where those Acts do not contain this kind of provision, there would be a danger of the presumption arising that perhaps there is a difference, which it is certainly not our intention to create.
    11.45 a.m.
    Mr. Fletcher: Since the Joint Parliamentary Secretary referred to me just now, perhaps I may say something about this. I agree substantially with everything he said. In my opinion, for what it is worth, the law as he expressed it is exactly correct. That being so, I take the view that this new Clause is not only unnecessary but, because it is unnecessary, that it is undesirable. It is a great mistake to put a provision into a Measure which is not necessary, particularly when, by putting it in, one exposes Parliament to the suggestion that its omission from other Acts creates some effect which would be undesirable.
    Surely the law of the land is quite clear. Local authorities are created by Acts of Parliament. They are juristic persons. What they can or cannot do is limited by Acts of Parliament constituting them, and that is why, from time to time, Parliament has to confer special and additional powers on local authorities. They can only do things for which they have statutory authority. Other things ultra vires the local authority cannot be done.
    Therefore, on every occasion when Parliament desires to give a local authority some new power which it has not had before, a specific Act of Parliament must be passed. But surely it has never been suggested that, because Parliament gives powers to local authorities, that entitles them to create nuisances. As I understand it, in the discharge of their statutory duties, local authorities, like any other subjects of Her Majesty, are subject to common law obligations and are exposable and exposed to any acts of action for damages or otherwise if they invade the rights of other persons.
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary said that there is a difference between action for nuisance and other actions for tort. That may be so. It may be that actions for nuisance are in a special category and that in some cases an action for a nuisance cannot be brought by one or more individuals except in the name of and by the relation of the Attorney-General. I should have thought it perfectly plain that in the sort of action contemplated by the hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page), the words of Clause 12(1) are quite
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    sufficient already. It says that nothing in any provision in Clause 2 or 5
    "…shall be construed as authorising on the part of a local authority any act or omission which, apart from that provision, would be actionable at the suit of any person…"
    That would cover actions brought in the name of the Attorney-General for nuisance of the kind contemplated by the new Clause. For this reason, I hope that the House will reject the Clause.
    Mr. David Renton: It may well be that my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary is right about this, but there is one point I should be grateful if he would consider. It is a practical point which I am prompted to make by the recollection of some actions for nuisance in the past.
    I remember one case in particular—I think that it is reported—in about the middle of the 1930s, when one of the London hotels sued the proprietors of a West End garage in an action for nuisance. An injunction was eventually obtained and substantial damages were awarded before the matter was finally settled by undertakings being given in relation to the use of the garage in future.
    Under Clause 5, a local authority is to be allowed to operate and to manage garages containing a number of vehicles. In future, in this motorised age, that could mean a very large garage containing many vehicles. For example, if a local authority is building a huge block of flats and knows that most of the occupants will want to have somewhere to put the cars, it may build a very large garage. It is conceivable that the local authority could be sued in nuisance for the way in which it operated and managed that garage.
    The point which arises, and I should be grateful if my hon. Friend would address his mind to it, is whether, if the local authority were sued in those circumstances, it could plead as a defence that it had built the garage under statutory powers and was operating the garage under statutory powers. I hope that that would not be a valid defence and it may well be that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary is right about it and it may well be that the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. Fletcher) is right when he says that

    819
    Clause 12(1) would prevent that defence from arising. But the Clause does not specifically say so and I therefore think that my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) is entitled to be assured by the Parliamentary Secretary on that point.
    Mr. Corfield: By leave of the House; as I recollect the law to which my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Huntingdonshire (Mr. Renton) has referred, I understand, and I am certainly strongly advised to this effect, that in this sort of circumstance there is no defence that the statutory powers confer a right to operate the undertaking, whether it be a garage or anything else, in such a way as to cause a nuisance. As I recollect it, this sort of defence arises only when there is a specific statutory power to carry out an undertaking which in itself is a nuisance. Then there is the implied right, but in this case that does not arise.
    Mr. Fletcher: It arises when it cannot be carried out otherwise than by the creation of a nuisance.
    Mr. Corfield: The point I was making was that only when the enterprise itself was inherently a nuisance, however carried out, is there a defence of this nature. I can assure my right hon. and learned Friend that my advice is very strongly to this effect, as well as my own recollection.
    Mr. Graham Page: I accept the Parliamentary Secretary's interpretation of the word "person" as meaning the Attorney-General, who could take action in the case of public nuisance. I hope that the courts will appreciate it in the same way and I therefore beg to ask leave to withdraw the new Clause.
    Motion and Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

    Clause 2.—(POWER OF LOCAL AUTHORITIES TO DEVELOP LAND.)
    Sir G. Nicholson: I beg to move, in page 2, line 9, to leave out "the next subsection" and to insert "this Act".
    This is purely a drafting Amendment consequential upon Clause 12(1). Its practical effect is to make it clear that the exercise of the powers in Clause 2(1)
    820
    is subject to Clause 12(1) as well as to the remaining provisions of Clause 2.
    Amendment agreed to.
    Mr. Graham Page: I beg to move, in page 2, line 13, after "Minister", to insert:
    "given on an application in that behalf made by the local authority".
    If it would be for the convenience of the House, this Amendment goes well with the next.
    Mr. Speaker: If the House so wishes.
    Mr. Page: I am much obliged.
    Clause 2 is very like Section 79 of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1962, which gives rather similar, but perhaps narrower, powers to local authorities to develop land, to construct buildings and carry out works on the land. Section 79 gave power to local authorities to erect, construct or carry out building or work on land which they had acquired or appropriated for planning purposes, and under it the Minister's consent was required before the local authority could carry out these operations. By its subsection (4) the Minister could direct a local authority to advertise as might appear to him necessary in order to reach a decision as to whether he should give his consent.
    Clause 2 goes a little wider and is an extension of the powers of Section 79. However, as drawn, Clause 2 makes no provision for the Minister, when he is asked for his consent, to advertise to see whether there are any objections to the operations being carried out. If Clause 2 is giving wider powers to local authorities than Section 79 did, it is all the more important that the public should have the protection of advertising, of a public notice, of what the local authority is to do so that the public and neighbours where the development is being carried out may know what is intended and may raise objection at the stage when the Minister is asked for his consent.
    These Amendments would provide that when the Minister is asked for his consent for development under Clause 2, he would have the power to direct the local authority to put a public notice in the local papers to advertise the fact of what it is to do, and then he could consider the results arising from that advertisement or public notice before

    821
    giving his consent to that development. This is merely introducing into Clause 2 a procedure which was well recognised in the 1962 Measure, which itself was a repetition of a Section from a Statute many years older which had operated very well over the years.
    Sir G. Nicholson: I am most grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) and I have very much pleasure in accepting the two Amendments. I have consulted my right hon. Friend and I understand that they are agreeable to him and his Department, and I hope that they will be included in the Bill.
    Amendment agreed to.
    Further Amendment made: Page 2, line 18, at end insert:
    (3) Where an application for the consent of the Minister is made under the last foregoing subsection by a local authority, the Minister may direct such advertisement by the authority as appears to him to be requisite for the purpose of enabling him to determine whether he shall give such consent.—[Mr. Graham Page.]
    Sir G. Nicholson: I beg to move, in page 2, line 24, to leave out subsection (4).
    Subsection (4) provides that no development carried out with the consent of the Minister shall be exempt by reason of that consent from the restrictions relating to the use of land which are contained in Section 194(4) of the Law of Property Act, 1925. The subsection is now unnecessary because its purpose is achieved by Clause 12(1), which was introduced in Committee.
    One effect of that subsection is to make it clear, in case there might be any doubt, that the provisions of Clauses 2 and 5 will not enable a local authority to ignore or override any restrictions on carrying out development which may be contained in any other Statute. That will, of course, include restrictions in Section 194 of the Law of Property Act, 1925, and so render subsection (4) of Clause 2 unnecessary.
    Amendment agreed to.
    12 noon.
    Mr. Corfield: I beg to move, in page 2, line 35, to leave out subsection (5)
    The reasons for moving this Amendment are close to the reasons on which
    822
    I based my advice to the House in connection with the first new Clause in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page). We consider that subsection (5) represents a wholly unnecessary provision with all the defects—to which I have referred and to which the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. Fletcher) referred—which the insertion of extraneous matter is likely to have.
    I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby bases some of his concern as to the need for these provisions on a comparison with Section 79 of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1962. The relevant words there are
    "to erect, construct or carry out any building or work on any land",
    whereas the words in Clause 2(1) of this Bill are
    "erect any building and construct or carry out works on land."
    I assure the House that the slight difference in the wording in Clause 2(1) was adopted merely as a drafting improvement on an Act which, although dated 1962, was a consolidating Act. It was adopted as a matter of better grammar, and was, therefore, an improvement.
    There is nothing to suggest that this very slight difference whereby the relevant verbs are next to the corresponding nouns in subsection (1), whereas this is not the case in Section 79, means that the powers are altered in any way, and I certainly cannot conceive how it can be read into that very slight alteration that it confers on local authorities a power to carry on some trade or business which is not present in the implications in the present similar wording of Section 79 of the 1962 Act.
    I hope that my hon. Friend will at least be satisfied that there is nothing in the distinction between these provisions and those of Section 79 which can give rise to the fears that he has. This is my advice, and I hope that what I have said will convince the House that this is so.
    The second matter which I understand concerns my hon. Friend is the fact that this provision appears in some Acts, and one of the recent Private Acts in which it appears is the Devon County Council Act. I was a member of the Committee which considered this Act when it was

    823
    going through the House. The Bill as it then was contained certain powers to operate a garage and matters of that sort. To meet the objections of a petitioner, the sponsors of the Bill inserted a proviso to ensure that the Devon County Council would not be able to carry out commercial activities in relation to the garage, but the original proviso was tied solely to trading operations which might be ancillary to a garage.
    When the Bill came to Committee the worry to which we have referred arose, as to whether this rather narrow prohibition might give rise to the idea that some other form of commercial activity not connected with the running of a garage might, by inference, be permitted. It was thought that wording on the lines of subsection (5) of this Clause was a more prudent form of provision than the narrow provision which was in the Bill. That had been put there by the sponsors and it clearly could not be extracted altogether, because it was only as a result of provisions of this sort that the sponsors had avoided having to face a petition.
    I hope that that helps to explain to my hon. Friend the position in the Devon County Council Bill, and I suggest to him that it shows a considerable distinction with the matter with which we are dealing this morning in this Clause. Basically, the objective of the Amendment is to remove something which I am advised with great force is wholly unnecessary, and because it is unnecessary it has all the objections to which the hon. Member for Islington, East referred, as I did, and to which other hon. Members have referred from time to time in Committee and elsewhere.
    Mr. Graham Page: This is an occasion which is calculated to cause revolution on the back benches, if, indeed, I had an army behind me to revolt. In Standing Committee, I moved the introduction of this subsection to Clause 2, and it was accepted. Now my hon. Friend comes along and steamrollers it out of the Bill.
    I think that my hon. Friend's argument that this is unnecessary is rather defeated by Clause 5(4). That subsection goes to some lengths to say that in connection with the erection of garages and hard standings and that sort of thing local authorities shall not carry on trade.
    824
    It even sets out the trades which they shall not carry on, and I think that Clause 2 needs some such limitation when it speaks of the local authority having power to carry out works. All that I want to do is to make sure, in the Bill, that the local authority is not, by the words "carry out works," entitled to carry on a trade or business, and if it is not so entitled, let us say so clearly in the Bill.
    For a definition of the words "works on land" I need not go outside town planning legislation. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary is aware of the case decided in 1952, the Buckinghamshire County Council v. Callingham, in which the Bekonscot model village, which is a picturesque little village on a scale of 1 inch to a foot, was held to be works on land. It was run as a little model village. People paid to see it. Thus the business of a model village was carried on there, and it was held to be works on land.
    I do not know how far the definition can extend, but I think that it would be wise, in a Bill of this kind, to say that it would not extend to trade or business by the local authority, and to say so quite clearly.
    Mr. MacColl: I was bitterly disappointed with the Parliamentary Secretary's speech. I looked at the Notice Paper and saw the words: "Sir Keith Joseph
    Page 2, line 35 [Clause 2], leave out subsection (5)."
    I then turned to subsection (5) and read:
    "Nothing in this section shall empower a local authority to carry on any trade or business."
    I whooped with delight, because I thought that we had a formidable convert to municipal Socialism and I was prepared to support the right hon. Gentleman to the bitter end. I am sorry that the only reason which the Parliamentary Secretary has for making this proposal is that he thinks these restrictions already exist. I hope that he is wrong and, for the first time in my life in this House, that the hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Page) is right in saying that this power still exists.
    The hon. Member for Crosby talked about his "army". Fifty per cent. of my army consists of Privy Councillors, and it would be impertinent of me to

    825
    speak for that 50 per cent., but as far as the other half is concerned I unequivocally state that we shall support the hon. Member in the Division Lobby if he thinks that he can get the Amendment through.
    Dr. Alan Glyn: I am disappointed that, having got this subsection through in Committee, my hon. Friend is now seeking to take it out. The words are quite clear, and I entirely agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) that they should be left in. I hope that my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary will not press the Amendment. He has already said that this subsection does no harm. His argument is based on the fact that it is unnecessary. I submit that the Committee, in its wisdom, having discussed the matter very fully, wished to include it in the Bill.
    If there is any element of doubt about the question of a local authority carrying on a trade or business, I humbly suggest that on this occasion—in the amicable surroundings of a Friday—this subsection should be left in the Bill.
    Sir G. Nicholson: I want to tell the House what happened in Committee. We were too kind-hearted to my hon. Friend for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page). I pointed out then that the Amendment was not necessary, but I promised that we would consider the matter and, if necessary, introduce an Amendment on Report. My hon. Friend wrung our withers, however, so we let him have his Amendment. I hope that he will now reciprocate and agree that the subsection should be taken out, since he said that he would agree to this if it were found to be unnecessary. It is unnecessary, and I will say why.
    A general power to erect and maintain buildings and carry out works cannot be construed as a power to carry on a trade or business. There is no such saving provision in Section 79 of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1962. Whenever my hon. Friend the Member for Clapham (Dr. Alan Glyn) speaks I always find myself thinking of the man on the Clapham omnibus. My hon. Friend says that if this provision does no harm we ought to stick it in. But that is not the way that we should legislate. Our legislation should be crisp and minimal, and also clear. If that is the only argument
    826
    that my hon. Friend the Member for Clapham relies upon it is not a good one.
    Dr. Glyn: I said that if there were any element of doubt about the matter it would surely be wise to leave the subsection in.
    Sir G. Nicholson: If there were any substantial element of doubt I would agree with my hon. Friend, but the expert advice that I have received—and I am sure that my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary has received similar advice—is that there is no element of doubt.
    I should be sorry if a useful little Bill of this sort, which I have had the honour of introducing, should in any way be taken as a precedent for cluttering up the Statute Book with unnecessary words, and I hope that in the light of what has been said my hon. Friend will not oppose the Amendment.
    Amendment agreed to.

    Clause 5.—(PROVISION OF GARAGE ACCOMMODATION By LOCAL AUTHORITIES.)
    12.15 p.m.
    Mr. Graham Page: I beg to move, in page 4, line 15, at the end to insert "off the street".
    The Clause concerns the provision of garage accommodation by local authorities, according to the marginal note, but it refers also to the construction of hard standings and the conversion of buildings into garages. As the Clause is worded it seems that the construction of hard standings could take place on the highway. There is nothing in the Clause which restricts this operation being carried on upon the highway. The first line in the Clause says:
    "A local authority may within their area provide"
    this accommodation. The roads within a local authority's area are within its area, and we can well imagine that a convenient place to construct a hard standing or a parking place for vehicles would be on the highway. We can imagine that a local authority might cast covetous glances at the pavement in some areas, and wish to use part of it to provide convenient parking places for motor vehicles.
    In other Statutes there are elaborate provisions which apply when a local

    827
    authority intends to turn a street into a parking place. If a local authority wishes to create a parking place in a street it must do so according to elaborate provisions, contained in the Road Traffic Acts, in respect of Ministerial consent, advertisements, public notice, and the holding of public inquiries, if any member of the public so desires. If Clause 5 covers the installation of parking places on the streets it is short-circuiting all those elaborate provisions which the House has already inserted into road traffic Statutes.
    We can easily imagine a local authority deciding that a stretch of residential road should become a parking place for vehicles. When such action is taken it always greatly reduces the value of the adjacent residential property, as has been shown again and again in rating appeals, where the rating assessments of nearby property have been reduced because of parking places having been provided. Under the Road Traffic Acts there are full powers for inquiries to be held and for public notice to be given when such action is contemplated, but under the provisions of this Clause such action could be taken without a public inquiry and without the frontagers knowing that it was about to take place, and therefore without their having any chance of making their case and objecting, if they thought fit.
    The Clause should be clearly restricted to the provision of accommodation off the highway and off the street, and some words such as those in the Amendment should be inserted so to limit this provision.
    Mr. Corfield: I can assure the House that my advice is that, once again, these words are not necessary. On this occasion, however, they do a good deal less harm than some of the other unnecessary words which my hon. Friend has been so anxious to insert. In those circumstances I feel that I can happily leave it to the decision of my hon. Friend whether or not he wishes to press the Amendment. I can assure him that the powers which the Clause purports to confer do not enable parking places to be created on the street, any more than a local authority's housing powers enable it to obstruct a street by building houses in the street. Again, there is the long
    828
    stop, should there be any doubt about it, of Clause 12(1), which ensures that these operations are still covered.
    Mr. MacColl: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether these words are a term of art, and whether they have appeared in other Statutes? They do not seem to be a very happy form of lucid English.
    Mr. Corfield: The words "off the street", yes. As far as I know they are not a term of art. I do not know whether they appear in any of the Orders made under the Road Traffic Act, but certainly I have never come across them before.
    If I may, I will conclude by saying that I am satisfied that they are not necessary but that I do not think passionately that they will do immense harm.
    Sir G. Nicholson: I am perfectly willing to accept this Amendment, and I agree with my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary that it does no harm. Perhaps it makes the matter a little clearer.
    Mr. MacColl: I suffer in another capacity from constantly having my English corrected by the hon. Member for Farnham (Sir G. Nicholson). I do not like to think that a Measure that is going to be known as the "Nicholson Act" for ever should have a really rather shocking piece of English language in it. I think it is undesirable to use a noun and an adjective when one does not have to. The expression "off the street", I think I am correct in saying, is a very ugly phrase and an unnecessarily ugly phrase, and it will be a stain on the Bill. Everyone will look back and say what a terrible man the hon. Member for Farnham was for having put it in his Bill. Knowing how punctillious the hon. Gentleman is about English, I should hate to see his reputation suffer in this way.
    Amendment agreed to.

    Clause 6.—(AMENDMENT OF PROVISIONS OF NATIONAL PARKS AND ACCESS TO THE COUNTRYSIDE ACT 1949 RELATING TO TREATMENT OF DERELICT LAND.)
    Mr. Graham Page: I beg to move, in page 5, line 32, after first "is", to insert:
    "and is likely to continue to be".
    Under Clause 6 the local authority can acquire land which is "derelict, neglected or unsightly." If the local authority cannot acquire it by agreement, then it can

    829
    acquire it compulsorily, but only if it satisfies certain conditions. Those conditions appear in subsection (3). These conditions are that the Minister, before he gives his consent for compulsory acquisition, must be satisfied that the land is derelict, that is, that it has been abandoned, that its ownership has been abandoned, or, alternatively—and here there are three conditions—first, that its previous use has been abandoned; secondly, that it has been neglected, and, thirdly, that its present condition makes it desirable to be acquired in the public interest.
    There may be a case in which previous use of land has been abandoned, where it is in a neglected state and where it is desirable to acquire it for public purposes under certain conditions, but where, at the same time, the owner is about to develop it. That condition would not be covered by the Clause as it stands at present, and my Amendment would provide that the Minister must be satisfied before he gives consent to the local authority acquiring compulsorily that the land is not likely to be put to good use in the near future.
    If the local authority were entitled, as it would be as the subsection stands at the moment, to acquire the land compulsorily without regard to the fact that the owner is about to develop it for a good purpose, then it would be unfair on the owner. Therefore, my Amendment would require the Minister to take into account the genuine intentions of the owner about development. These words are not my own. They are not just taken out of the sky and proposed to be put into the subsection; they are a repetition of the words used in very similar circumstances in the Local Employment Act, 1960, so the House will see that I have a good precedent for them.
    Sir G. Nicholson: I am willing to accept the Amendment.
    Amendment agreed to.

  Title
  Sir G. Nicholson: I beg to move, in line 4, after "to", to insert:
  "make advances for the erection of buildings and to".
  With the permission of the House, I should like to take this and the next Amendment together.
  Mr. Speaker: I see no objection to that.
  Sir G. Nicholson: These two Amendments are purely drafting Amendments rearranging the items of the long Title so that they are in the same order as the provisions of the Bill. This might, perhaps, have been done in Committee, but as we failed to do it there I am doing it now.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Further Amendment made: In line 5, leave out from "vehicles" to "to" in line 6.—[Sir G. Nicholson.]
  Order for Third Reading read.—[Queen's Consent, on behalf of the Crown, signified]
  12.26 p.m.
  Sir G. Nicholson: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
  I do not propose to weary the House with a long speech. I said all that I had to say on Second Reading, and even then I compressed my remarks within six minutes. I recommend the Bill to the House as a useful tidying-up Measure. It has had approval from the local authority associations and from my right hon. Friend and his Department. I hope that as it stands now it has the approval of my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page), to whom I am most grateful for the help which he has given. I content myself with recommending the Bill to the House and hope that it will be given its Third Reading.
  12.27 p.m.
  Dr. Alan Glyn: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham (Sir G. Nicholson) on the Bill and would draw the attention of the House to two things in it which, I think, are of tremendous value. One of them is the ability of local authorities to clear up some of the ghastly derelict sites which certainly in central London constituencies spoil a large number of fine streets in residential areas. I am also very pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham accepted the Amendment of my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) on this point, because I think that the qualifications giving some latitude to owners who may wish to develop in, perhaps, two or

  831
  three years' time when adjoining property falls in is an extremely useful thing.
  The only Clause in the Bill to which I should like to make reference is that which provides for garage accommodation. This again is something which we in central London welcome very much indeed, because the problem of providing sufficient garage accommodation is, in many cases, beyond the capabilities of private developers. I think that in this case we have to look to the local authorities to take an active interest in the provision of proper garage facilities in order that, to some extent, residents in London do not have to litter the streets with their cars and are provided with reasonable accommodation for them.
  I should like once again to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham on getting almost on to the Statute Book a Measure which in itself is a very useful adjunct to the powers which local authorities already possess.
  12.29 p.m.
  Mr. MacColl: The hon. Member for Farnham (Sir G. Nicholson) had a sort of prize giving in which he expressed his good will towards the people who had helped him get his Bill through. He did not include us in the prize giving.
  Sir G. Nicholson: May I now make up for that omission and include hon. Gentlemen opposite?
  Mr. MacColl: I was going to say to the hon. Gentleman that with some Bills it may often be the case that silence or non-appearance is the best contribution which the Opposition can make. Therefore, although I was not a member of the Committee, I think that the hon. Gentleman got his Bill through rather more quickly than he might have done had I been a member.
  I welcome the Bill, I congratulate the hon. Gentleman, and thank him for having used his Parliamentary time for this very useful Measure. I do not share the view of the hon. Member for Clapham (Dr. Alan Glyn) that the Bill has been improved by the hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page). I long ago learned to fear the hon. Member for Crosby, especially when he has
  832
  been moving non-controversial Amendments. I only hope that he has not succeeded in wrecking this Bill in that process, but according to the advice of the Parliamentary Secretary he has pot so succeeded.
  I particularly welcome Clause 6. My emotional interest has rather diminished because my own constituency has very recently become a development district. Until then, I had very strong views on this subject, because although there may not be a strong and close connection between derelict sites and unemployment—they may, but do not always, go together—the cleaning up of these legacies from the past in our industrial towns, and making them look reasonably attractive to business enterprise, is a very important duty for local authorities to undertake.
  The fact that the Bill makes it easier for them to do that in areas that are not development districts is admirable. As I say, my enthusiasm would be the greater had my own constituency not been made a development district, which means that there we can now deal with these matters under the Local Employment Act. This Measure, however, is useful for other local authority areas, and I hope that it will have a quick Third Reading.
  12.32 p.m.
  Mr. Renton: Although I have taken practically no part in the proceedings on this Bill, I feel very strongly about the matters to which it relates. One of the most severe problems that the country has to face in the future is that caused by our enormous population density. It is frightening to think that as the years go by we shall continue to lose agricultural land and a countryside of great natural beauty when we already have one of the highest population densities in the world.
  I know that not only the Ministry of Housing and Local Government, but the Ministry of Agriculture, the Scottish Office, and even the Service Departments are conscious and anxious about this problem, but perhaps I might put forward a proposition that I hope my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary may carry to the right quarters. I feel that if the powers to restore derelict land, whether for development or for

  833
  amenity purposes, or for the resumption of agriculture, are properly used, and local authorities make a determined drive on redevelopment where-ever it is timely and possible, we might in those two ways minimise the amount of land that is year by year lost to agriculture.
  The initiative to use the powers under the Bill depends entirely, as I understand it, upon the local authorities. If they decide not to use them, the magnificent effort of my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham (Sir G. Nicholson) will have been wasted. I therefore hope that the Ministry of Housing and Local Government will draw attention to the opportunity that Parliament is giving to local authorities, and will issue a very strong circular expressing the hope that those powers will be used to the maximum.
  If those thoughts are borne in mind, if a two-pronged thrust is made at the problem, as I suggest, this country can be a very much happier place in the future, although it will become more overcrowded.
  12.35 p.m.
  Mr. Graham Page: I join in most sincerely congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham (Sir G. Nicholson),and all the more so because I have, at the same time, to apologise to him for the trouble I have given him throughout the proceedings. I thank him most earnestly for the courtesy that he has shown, despite my niggling Amendments, if I may call them that.
  I am still a little nervous about the powers that we are giving to local authorities but that does not detract from my admiration of the way in which my hon. Friend has conducted his Measure through its various stages. If some of the powers are properly used, great benefit to the nation can be derived from them. I have always maintained that there are many areas of land within our cities that can be used for the filling-in process; that it is not always necessary when thinking, for example, of housing development, to go to areas outside our cities, within the green belts, and so on.
  There is much to be filled in within our cities, and if it is used for housing, a very useful purpose will be served. We cannot put all our dwellings outside
  834
  the cities—there must be a proportion of dwelling-houses within them—and I think that we shall find areas on which to develop in that way in the small parcels of land that have remained unused, perhaps for years, in some of the big cities.
  I hope that the Bill will be an encouragement to local authorities to look for development by the filling-in process, and particularly to use Clause 3, which gives them power to make advances to those prepared to develop these small parcels of land. The small man needs help. He is not like the big developer, who has a wide area and can employ large sums of money. The small developer who can provide housing on the derelect plots within the cities should be encouraged under the powers given by Clause 3.
  12.37 p.m.
  Mr. Corfield: It only remains for me to add my welcome to the Bill, and to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham (Sir G. Nicholson) both on introducing it and on the manner in which he has piloted it through its various stages. I think that we would all agree, despite the reservations and distrusts of power expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page), that this will be a valuable Bill for local authorities, bearing in mind that we give local authorities powers to enable them the better to serve their public and not for the sake of giving them powers.
  With due respect, the Bill probably represents a useful exercise in easing the burden of work in the House. Many of its provisions are taken out of private legislation, much of which is very time-consuming. I think that as these provisions in legislation of that kind become more and more generally adopted it is sensible to incorporate them in general legislation of this nature, and thereby relieve a degree of duplication of the work in this House.
  I can assure my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Huntingdonshire (Mr. Renton) that the question of making the maximum use of land not otherwise of great value, let alone of any amenity attraction, is very much to the fore. In view of the rather recent circularisation of local authorities—particularly those in the development districts—on the same subject, I hardly

  835
  think there is any need for a further circular. I would remind my right hon. and learned Friend, however, that although basically, the initiative comes from local authorities, there is a degree of supervision in the sense that areas like this are shown on development plans, and that consideration of the best use of land is a matter over which there is a degree of ministerial control, at least in the final stages.
  I again congratulate my hon. Friend, and I know that my right hon. Friend the Minister is most anxious to be associated with our congratulations.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

OATHS AND EVIDENCE (OVERSEAS AUTHORITIES AND COUNTRIES) BILL
As amended (in the Standing Committee considered).
12.40 p.m.
Mr. John Biggs-Davison: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
We had no debate on the Bill on Second Reading and as I am sure that the interest in it is out of all proportion to the number of hon. Members present, the House might like me to explain briefly the contents of the Bill. In so doing, I shall not repeat anything that I said in Standing Committee.
Clause 1 confers the necessary powers to administer an oath on all persons appointed by foreign courts to take evidence in civil proceedings. It is normal and convenient international practice for courts to appoint persons to take evidence in foreign countries. Here, the practice is expressly sanctioned by a number of civil procedure conventions with foreign States, but our present law permits oaths to be administered only by duly authorised persons and this category of persons may not in all cases include a person appointed by a foreign court. This Clause therefore confers the necessary powers to administer oaths on all persons appointed by a foreign court to take evidence in civil proceedings.
836
Clause 2 is designed to meet circumstances which arise when diplomatic relations between this country and another are broken. The House will remember that this happened with certain Middle Eastern States in recent years, and at present there are no diplomatic relations between the United Kingdom, on the one hand, and Albania and Somalia, on the other. When diplomatic relations are broken off it is normal for a protecting Power to be appointed and it is in the British interest that consular officers of the protecting Power should be able to act in place of British officials and be able to administer oaths and perform notarial acts.
In the late war, when our relations were ruptured with enemy Governments, powers were given to consular officers of the protecting Power. This was done under the Evidence and Powers of Attorney Act, 1940, as amended by Section 1 of the Evidence and Powers of Attorney Act, 1943, but this wartime legislation has been repealed. Therefore, Clause 2 would enable powers to be conferred in future by the making of an Order in Council.
Clause 3 simply fills a rather odd gap in the Commissioners for Oaths Act, 1889. The persons who are empowered by Section 6 of that Act include diplomatic officials, senior and junior to counsellors, but not counsellors themselves. The Clause simply enables counsellors to act. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs may think that I am right in thinking that although there are not counsellors at all Her Majesty's missions in foreign countries, 70 counsellors are at present posted abroad.
Clause 4 refers to the Foreign Tribunals Evidence Act, 1856. This Act empowers our courts to comply with requests from foreign courts to obtain evidence in relation to commercial and civil matters which are before them. There is doubt whether this power extends to international tribunals. In any case, I should have thought it desirable that our own Government should be able to distinguish between those international tribunals whose requests ought to be acted upon and others such as, for example, judicial bodies belonging to international associations, such as the Council of Europe, of which the United Kingdom is not a member.

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The Clause removes the ambiguity in the application of Section 1 of the Foreign Tribunals Act, 1856, to international tribunals. It limits the tribunals to which this Section is to apply to those specified in an Order in Council. The Clause would also allow an Order in Council to be made in respect of international commissions of inquiry and arbitrations.
Section 2 of the 1856 Act provides for authentication of the request of a foreign court by a certificate from the diplomatic representative of the country where the court is situated. The Clause provides for authentication by certificate of a person specified in the Order, that is, by persons concerned with the international tribunal. I suppose that, normally, it would be the clerk or the registrar of the tribunal.
Clause 4 has also a subsection which provides against perjury in evidence given before any person authorised to take evidence at the request of an international tribunal. It expressly applies to false statements the appropriate subsection of the Perjury Act, 1911. The Clause covers such statements made in England or Northern Ireland, but I understand that no new provision is required in Scottish law because Section 1 of the False Oaths (Scotland) Act, 1933, will apply and needs no amendment.
The purpose of Clause 5 is further to facilitate the proof of entries in public registers overseas. In the absence of statutory provisions simplifying the process of proof, I am informed, although I am no lawyer, that proof of an entry in a register outside the United Kingdom, for example relating to a birth, marriage or death, is often cumbersome and expensive. The Evidence (Foreign, Dominion and Colonial Documents) Act, 1933, enables Orders in Council to be made whereby copies of entries in overseas registers specified in the Orders and duly authenticated are rendered admissible as evidence of the facts stated in the entries. Under this Act, however, an Order in Council can be made only where the foreign territory concerned affords reciprocity by similarly recognising the public registers of the United Kingdom.
This is of no advantage to this country. Apart from the Colonies, where reciprocity is ensured by the
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Evidence Act, 1851, only a few Orders in Council have been made in relation to certain Commonwealth countries—Australia, New Zealand and Sierra Leone and certain provinces of Canada, and to Belgium and France. The reason is that it is frequently impossible for Her Majesty's Government to be satisfied as to reciprocity, but since the object of this legislation is to assist litigants in the United Kingdom the facilities available in converse circumstances to litigants in foreign courts are irrelevant. What matters is not the recognition accorded to our registers by the foreign country but the reliability of the foreign records.
Clause 5(1) therefore does away with the requirement of reciprocity, which is unnecessary for our purposes. It provides, instead, that the registers must be kept under the authority of the law of the overseas country and recognised by the courts of that country as authentic records, and that they must be properly kept. Subsection (2) makes the appropriate amendments to the Act of 1933.
Clause 6 defines "diplomatic or consular representative", interprets references in the Bill to the administration of oaths and takes power to vary or revoke any orders made under the provisions of the Bill.
Clause 7(3) makes it possible to extend any provisions of the Bill to the Isle of Man or any of the Channel Islands by Order in Council. As a member of the Parliamentary delegation to the States of Guernsey, I am glad to say that there has been no attempt to put anything over on the Channel Islands. The insular Governments have been consulted on this and have agreed.
This Bill has all-party support. Its purpose is to set in order a portion of our law and to further the discharge of our international obligations. I hope that the House will see fit to afford it a Third Reading.
12.51 p.m.
Mr. David Renton: As one of the co-sponsors of the Bill, which is supported from both sides of the House, I should like to say in a few words why I am so glad to support it. It is, of course, by our standards a minor Measure, but it is important as a tidying-up Measure and it is one which will, at the same time, I hope, contribute to the

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growth of international co-operation in the administration of the law.
An example of the tidying up is Clause 1. Where the practice of taking evidence on behalf of a foreign court is covered by a civil procedure convention concluded with the country of that foreign court, the authority for the administering of an oath can in England be found in the Rules of the Supreme Court. Lawyers might be interested to know that it is in Order 37, Rule 19 of the Rules of the Supreme Court, which provides:
"Any officer of the Court, or other person directed to take the examination of any witness or person, or any person nominated or appointed to take the examination of any witness or person pursuant to the provisions of any convention now made or which may hereafter be made with any foreign country, may administer oaths."
That sounds rather broad, but, in practice, the operation of the rule depends upon some very technical requirements which the courts insist upon before allowing that rule to come into operation. In any event, the rule does not extend to oaths administered by people appointed by the courts of countries with whom we have no civil procedure conventions and, surprisingly or not, it does not apply at all to Scotland.
Clause 1, therefore, in a straightforward way confers the power to administer an oath on any person appointed by a court or other judicial authority of any foreign country for the purpose of taking evidence in civil proceedings.
It may be that hon. Members have noticed that the unusual word "jurat" appears in Clause 2(2), and I must confess that I do not remember seeing that word in a Bill or Act of Parliament before. I wonder, therefore, if I may make one or two comments because, strangely enough, the word has some significance in the substance of the Bill.
The word here refers to the statement to be signed by the person before whom the oath is sworn. The facts to be stated in the jurat would be the date and the place of the administration of the oath and the designation of the person before whom it was administered. Therefore, a court in this country considering a document which had been sworn abroad in pursuance of this Bill would have to look very carefully at the jurat and at the facts contained in it in
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order that the court could be satisfied that the matter had been properly validated.
There is another interesting and rather important matter mentioned in Clause 5 which deals with public registers. We normally think of such registers as those relating to births, marriages and deaths. Indeed, the only orders that have ever been made under the Evidence (Foreign, Dominion and Colonial Documents) Act, 1933, have been in relation to those sorts of registers. But there can be other types of foreign register involved, such as registers of patents and trade marks, company registers and various other types of register.
To prove the entry in a foreign register at present is a most complicated business. It is a most tiresome and elaborate procedure. It is often necessary to tender evidence in one of our courts, including that of an expert on the foreign law, to show, first, that the register cannot be removed for production in our courts, that it cannot be brought from the foreign country to this country—it seems strange that that has got to be proved, but it may well have to be; secondly, that it has been personally inspected by the witness and found to contain the particular entry; thirdly, that it is kept in the place where it was inspected abroad by a public authority duly authorised under the law of his own country to keep it; and, fourthly that entries init are recognised in that country as an authentic record by the foreign courts there.
That is a formidable list of matters on which to have to bring evidence in our courts of what may be a very simple fact recorded as a matter of course in the foreign country. I am sure that any Measure such as this designed to simplify the proof of such facts, the proof of simple entries in foreign registers, is to be welcomed, provided of course that there are proper safeguards. Having carefully studied my hon. Friend's Bill, so far as Clause 5 is concerned, it seems to me that the safeguards here are adequate and that there is no real danger of an evil-minded fraudulent person proving with too great ease something which either does not exist or is wrongly stated.
As I say, this is a minor Measure, but I think that hon. Members on both sides of the House will agree that the

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consideration of Measures such as this is just as much part of the functions of this House and, indeed, of legislation by statute, as their deliberations on the larger issues which come before them. My hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison) is, indeed, to be congratulated on his willingness to devote his time and thoughts to the Bill. I must agree that its complications are a little daunting, but it is a Measure which I am sure in many respects will be of some consequence and advantage both to private persons and companies and the business community generally in our country, and to foreign Governments and business people abroad.
In my opinion, international co-operation of this kind is much more likely to bring together the nations upon earth than vague, controversial and premature conventions relating to world government, although I have always respected the intentions of those who apply their minds to such conventions. Let us, by Measures such as this, break down international barriers, and one day our great-grandchildren will find that they matter very little more than our parish boundaries.
1.1 p.m.
Dr. Alan Glyn: In adding my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison), I should like to say that the Bill relieves what I have often regarded as a very great difficulty—the expense for litigants in proving certain very elementary matters simply because in our law no machinery exists.
I asked myself one principal question when I first saw the Bill: does it achieve its object without in any way detracting from the reliability of evidence? I am more than satisfied that the Bill achieves simplicity in producing and proving evidence without in any way detracting from the reliability of that evidence as brought into our courts.
Clause 1 says that a person appointed by a foreign court shall be a competent person. That seems to me a most reasonable and sensible provision, because it is the courts under which the law of the country is administered, and it is a sensible solution that the person or persons appointed by the court should be the person or persons to whom we should look to produce the evidence concerned.
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Clause 2 clears up, as far as can see, an anomaly which was left when certain war-time Measures were taken off the Statute Book.
Clause 5 is one of the most important Clauses. I do not intend to go into it, because my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Huntingdonshire (Mr. Renton) cleared the matter up. I know from practical experience that this question of the public register, to which he referred, has caused considerable difficulty. I remember an occasion on which a friend of mine who had to produce this evidence was not allowed, even if the registrar had been willing—as he was in this case—to produce a certified copy. He had to produce the evidence that one of our consular officials had personally examined the register and was personally prepared to vouch for the veracity of the entry.
This may not seem very harsh, but, in fact, it caused a considerable delay in getting the evidence. It caused the person a large amount of additional and unnecessary expense in order that this procedure should be gone through. Had a copy of the register been admitted, it would have been just as reliable and would have saved the litigant much expense.
This is a little Bill, if I may so describe it, but although it has few pages, it goes a long way. I re-emphasise what was said by my right hon. and learned Friend, that it is this sort of Measure which goes a long way not only to simplifying our own legal procedure in the courts but to making it apparent to other countries that we accept their evidence in the way in which they themselves accept it. In particular, Clause 5, dealing with the register, is very important. If we could expand this type of arrangement I am sure that it would go a long way towards improving judicial processes and towards understanding not only between the legal fraternity, but between the general public in all parts of the world.
1.6 p.m.
Mr. G. R. Mitchison: This is a very limited but useful Bill and I trust that the House will give it an unopposed Third Reading.
When listening to the claims which are made on behalf of a limited Bill of this sort, I feel that there ought to be better machinery for the passing by the House

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of Bills of a technical and non-controversial character such as this. In practice, the Government of the day seem to rely in these matters on the support of private Members, and if private Members are unfortunate or minded in other directions, then small but useful and necessary Measures simply do not get through the House.
That applies to questions of judicial procedure such as this, if I may use a broad term, and also to non-controversial legal Measures which have been recommended by a learned committee or other, which are no doubt required, but which the House does not find time to introduce with any promptitude.
Accordingly, on behalf of my numerous friends on this side of the House, I welcome the Bill and congratulate the hon. Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison), who has used his place in the Ballot to such good purpose.
1.7 p.m.
The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Peter Smithers): I ask the indulgence of the House to say a few words about the Bill, because it received its Second Reading without discussion and the Amendments introduced in Committee were introduced without objection. I dare say, therefore, that a word of welcome and one or two comments from the Government are desirable.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison) on his work upon the Bill and the very lucid way in which he presented it to the House. I thank my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Huntingdonshire (Mr. Renton), who gave an equally lucid exposition of various points in the Bill. This has very much lightened my task.
When the Government considered the Bill we naturally asked ourselves the same question as my hon. Friend the Member for Clapham (Dr. Alan Glyn) asked himself: does it achieve its object without detracting from the reliability of evidence? We took advice and considered the question carefully, and we are satisfied that we can give a satisfactory answer to it. The Bill closes one or two gaps in present legislation, and it also adapts earlier legislative Measures to the needs of our time. I should like to men-
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tion one or two points in it and, in particular, the provisions of Clause 4.
Broadly, they empower Orders in Council to specify international tribunals whose requests for the taking of evidence should be complied with by the courts of this country. The Government have hitherto taken the view that power to take evidence on behalf of such tribunals already existed under Section 1 of the Foreign Tribunals Evidence Act, 1856. We have assumed obligations to comply with such requests in respect of two international tribunals, the Arms Control Agency Tribunal set up under the Convention concerning the Agency for the Control of Armaments under Protocol No. 4 of the Brussels Treaty of 1948, as modified by the Protocols signed in Paris in 1954; and the tribunal set up under the Convention on the Establishment of a Security Control in the Field of Nuclear Energy and its Protocol on the Establishment of a Tribunal signed in Paris on 20th December, 1957.
I understand that no request has so far been received from either of these tribunals. However, the existence of the power to take evidence in this way is not, in fact, altogether beyond doubt, and, in any event, the accompanying provisions of the Act of 1858 as to the authentication of the requests are, as has been said, highly inconvenient. What is more, it does not follow that, because Her Majesty's Government would like to be able to comply with letters of request from some international courts, we should wish to do so in respect of all of them. The case for assisting the court is obviously not so strong if, for instance, it is one set up by an international organisation of which we are not a member. Clause 4 confers a valuable discretion in this matter enabling appropriate foreign tribunals to be specified by Order in Council.
Subsection (2) closes a small lacuna in our present law under which, owing to the wording of the relevant Section of the Perjury Act 1911, it would not at present be any offence to give false evidence on oath in this country for the purpose of proceedings before an international tribunal abroad. I am sure that it will be agreed that it is very desirable to achieve that.
I should like to say a word or two on Clause 2. The need for a means

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of authorising diplomatic and consular representatives of protecting Powers to administer oaths and take affidavits was felt during the war and has been felt occasionally since. This Clause will permit an Order in Council to be made to enable these functions to be performed where the United Kingdom does not maintain direct diplomatic relations with a foreign country but has entrusted the protection of British interests to a friendly power. It might be that, owing to the paucity of British subjects or interests in a country with which we have no relations, the need for making an Order would not be felt. But in other countries the ends of justice and the interests of British nationals might not be capable of being served without the use of the power given under this Clause.
I think that Clause 5—
Mr. Renton: Before my hon. Friend departs from Clause 4, I wonder whether he is in a position to state what are the intentions of the Foreign Secretary with regard to the laying of Orders in Council under Clause 4? Is there any chance of fairly immediate use being made of the power?
Mr. Smithers: I am not sure whether I should be in order in referring to that matter, but I think that it would be premature for me to make any statement about the actual intentions concerning the use of the power at this moment.
I believe that the provisions of Clause 5 will be of real assistance to persons in this country who, in the course of litigation, or for other purposes, need to prove such matters as foreign birth, marriage, or death. At present, unless the strict formalities of the law can be waived, such proof can, in our observation, be a matter of very considerable difficulty and may, indeed, involve the attendance of an expert in the foreign law concerned. Where the fact is reliably recorded in a foreign register of undoubted authenticity, a copy of the extract from the register duly authenticated should, in our view, be all that is necessary, in the way of proof.
The Evidence (Foreign, Dominion and Colonial Documents) Act, 1933, is designed to simplify proof in this way, but it has not proved very effective in practice. As my hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell pointed out, its pro-
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visions can be applied to a foreign country only where reciprocity is provided by the law of that country. Her Majesty's Government are quite clear that there is little interest in some foreign countries in negotiating the necessary conventions affording reciprocity mainly because their rules of evidence are often less strict than ours.
On the other hand, it is clearly in the interest of litigants in this country that they should be able to establish proof of entries in foreign registers of proper authenticity in a simple and inexpensive manner. Reciprocity, therefore, is not a strictly relevant consideration. It is my hope that if the Bill reaches the Statute Book we shall be able to take advantage of Clause 5, which removes the need for reciprocity in these matters, and to extend the benefits of the 1933 Act so that they will cover a considerable number of foreign countries.
There is one small matter under Clause 3 to which I should like to allude and which may, I think, be of interest to the House. My hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell has pointed out what may at first sight seem the curious and anomalous fact that counsellors were not empowered to administer oaths and perform notarial acts by Section 6 of the Commissioners for Oaths Act, 1889, whereas senior and junior diplomatic officers were so empowered. I have been looking into the history of this a little bit and I think that the explanation is worth giving.
My recollection of the records of Queen Anne's reign and of that time is that there was then an official, generally found in a mission of any size, called the secretary of legation and that he performed a number of very important functions in the discharge of the duties of the mission. Under 1st April, 1904, in the Foreign Office List, there is the following entry:
"Counsellors of Embassy. The title of Counsellor with a Commission as Counsellor of Embassy in Her Majesty's Diplomatic Service to be conferred on the eight Secretaries of Embassy, the Secretaries of Legation at Peking, Teheran, Tokyo and Cairo, the Chargé-ďAffaires at Darmstadt and the Consul-General at Budapest, with precedence according to seniority in the new grade. Secretaries of Legation to be discontinued".
I think, therefore, that it is clear that what happened was that a new category

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of official appeared upon the scene at that time, and that this fact was not recognised in our law until my hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell, with extraordinary observation and learning, detected this flaw in our legislation and put it right in the Bill.
Mr. Graham Page: Before my hon. Friend leaves the point, could he tell us how many extra commissioners for oaths are involved in this? I must declare an interest here. He will know that the job of commissioners for oaths is a closed shop, and it seems to me that we may be watering down that closed shop by Clause 3. Some of us earn the enormous sum of 5s. per oath. On occasion I have earned myself five pints of beer by going through the Division Lobby in this House, and I do not want this closed shop to be watered down too much.
Mr. Smithers: From such knowledge of the law and practice in this matter as I have, I think it is correct to say that a counsellor of embassy can exercise his function only within the boundaries of the country to which that embassy or legation is accredited. Therefore, I think that neither my hon. Friend nor those who practise this, I hope, lucrative profession need fear any serious competition.
Finally, I thank the hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) for his support of the Bill, as Her Majesty's Government would very much like to see it pass into law. I also wish to offer to my hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell my personal congratulations on the skill with which he has conducted it.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

STOCK TRANSFER BILL [Lords]
Not amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.
Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
1.20 p.m.
Mr. Graham Page: The Bill has reached this stage in the House without being debated and I hope, therefore, that the House will bear with me if I put on record what it is all about. Briefly,
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the intention of the Bill is to simplify the procedure upon the transfer of shares. The ideas embodied in the Bill have been canvassed for many years. It has long been realised that Section 75 of the Companies Act, 1948, as well as certain other Sections of that Act and certain other statutes relating to companies, have crystallised a process in the transfer of securities which is cumbersome in modern share dealing.
Section 75 of the 1948 Act states:
"Notwithstanding anything in the articles of a company, it shall not be lawful for the company to register a transfer of shares in or debentures of the company unless a proper instrument of transfer has been delivered to the company".
By custom, practice or convenience, a proper instrument of transfer has become fairly well known as one which relates the number of shares passing from the transferor to the transferee, states the consideration, is signed by transferor and transferee, their signatures are witnessed, and so on.
In 1959, a committee was set up under the chairmanship of Lord Ritchie of Dundee, chairman of the London Stock Exchange, to consider whether the process of transfer of securities could be simplified. That committee set up an advisory committee to go into the matter in more detail. Represented on the advisory committee were the Issuing House Association, the Committee of London Clearing Bankers, the Accepting Houses Committee, the Chartered Institute of Secretaries, the Bank of England and the Council of the Stock Exchange.
Thus one had what might be called a high-powered committee representing the issuing, the registration of and the dealing with securities. That advisory committee issued its report in December, 1960. At that moment, I happened to be spending a month or two in hospital, with a certain amount of time on my hands, and while sitting up in bed in hospital I drafted a Bill to embody the recommendations of the advisory committee.
The committee had recommended, and my draft Bill included, a system of transfer by stock transfer forms to which I will refer in more detail presently. Although that Bill received a First Reading in 1961, it was not fortunate in finding Parliamentary time for a Second Reading. Nevertheless, it served a useful purpose

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in that it brought comments from those who were involved in the procedure of share transfer and it was then possible to produce this scheme in the form of a Bill, almost wholly agreed by all those concerned, for the present Session. That is the Bill to which the House is now asked to give a Third Reading.
I express at once my gratitude to my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary to the Treasury and to his Department for the help they have given to ensure that this is a Bill which comes before the House with the approval of all concerned—lawyers, accountants, stockbrokers, the secretaries and registrars of companies, banks, and so on.
The only major alteration from the previous Bill is that in the present Measure power is given to the Treasury to change by order the form of stock transfer, which is set out in Schedule 1 to the Bill. This, I hope, will give a flexibility to the system and allow slight alterations to be made as one sees how the procedure works out in practice. The power for the Treasury to amend the form by order is given in Clause 3(2).
The Bill has already been through another place, where it was so ably piloted by Lord Clitheroe that until this stage it has needed no debate in this House. What emerges as the new form of procedure which the Bill will authorise is shown in Clause 1 and I will endeavour to explain it by means of example.
Let us suppose that the owner of shares desires to sell them. He instructs his broker, who arranges the sale and then completes a stock transfer form, which is set out in Schedule 1 to the Bill. As hon. Members will see, the form of transfer is simple to complete. The first alteration in the law to which I want to call attention is that the transfer will be under hand and not by deed. There will be no need for a transfer of shares to be by deed in future.
At the stage when the selling broker completes the form, he leaves out the purchaser's name, because at that stage, having arranged the sale with the other broker, he would not know the purchaser's name until the accounting day. The seller then signs the transfer. Here, I come to the second reform in the law. The transferor will not need to obtain a witness to his signature. Attestation of
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the signature will no longer be necessary. Therefore, having signed the stock transfer form, the transferor returns it to his broker with the share certificate.
Mr. John Hall: There is one point which worries me a little. Does not this mean that the registrar will have a greater duty to compare the signature of the transferor with the original signatures which used to appear on the old forms of transfer, to make sure that there is no forgery?
Mr. Page: The fact that at present there must be a witness to one's signature does not make it any more authentic. Even with the witnessed signatures, I imagine that if they thought that there was any suspicion about the transfer, registrars would compare them with the previous signatures. There will always be a duty on the registrar of a company, if he suspects anything wrong, to investigate. I do not think that this procedure will make it any more difficult for him to investigate or any more necessary to do so.
At the stage which I have reached in my example, a document signed by the transferor is ready to be dealt with on the accounting date. At that date, the selling broker will learn by ticket who is the purchaser. If the sale is to a single purchaser, the broker will affix his stamp to the stock transfer form; he will insert the consideration and he will put the Inland Revenue Stamp on the transfer. He will have it stamped at that stage. He then delivers it to the buying broker with the ticket to identify the purchaser and with the share certificate. The buying broker will insert the buyer's name, put his stamp on the transfer, and lodge the transfer with the certificate for registration with the company.
Here is the fourth item of reform. That transfer form will not in future require the purchaser's signature. The transferee will not have to sign the form in future. That transaction, as I have described it, can apply to the sale and purchase of shares either on or off the Stock Exchange. It need not be a Stock Exchange transaction when it is done by the stock transfer form alone.
If, however, there is more than one buyer of a block of shares which the

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seller desires to dispose of, the system which I am now going to describe must be restricted to Stock Exchange transactions. Where there is more than one buyer this process is the same up to the accounting date, but then, on the accounting date, when the selling broker learns of the several purchasers, he will cancel the lower half of the stock transfer form which hon. Members will see in the First Schedule and he will turn the form over and complete the list of purchasers on the back of the form.
He then puts his stamp on the transfer form and proceeds to complete the broker's transfer forms, the form of which appears in the Second Schedule to the Bill. He signs in the broker's transfer form the number of shares and the consideration for each purchaser, making a separate broker's transfer form for each purchaser. At that point there is no need for the transferor to sign again. The transferor has his own transfer form and there is no need for him to sign the broker's transfer form or separate transfers to the separate purchasers.
The broker for the seller then signs the stock transfer share certificates and the broker's transfers to the company for certifying by the company. The company will return them. The broker puts his stamp on the broker's transfers and the selling broker will have each transfer stamped. He will put the consideration on the broker's transfer form so it can be stamped with the appropriate Inland Revenue stamp. Having stamped the transfer forms he attaches the tickets to each and delivers them to the buyer's brokers, who lodge them for registration.
When one describes an example of this sort it may sound rather long-winded and perhaps a little complicated, but in action it boils down to a very simple process, and the result of it is that no witnesses will have to sign either for the transferor's signature or the transferee's signature. In future no transferee will have to sign, and no transferor need sign more than once.
Mr. Leslie Hale: I concede at once that I have been trying to look at an exceedingly complicated document, but I am wondering what happens in cases of shares where calls are to be made on the owner of shares. What evidence is there that the transferee has
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assented to the obligation he is undertaking to pay calls in the future?
Mr. Page: The hon. Gentleman has anticipated me by about a sentence. If he will look at Clause 1(4) he will see that the whole process is restricted to fully paid up registered securities.
Mr. Hale: I am much obliged.
Mr. Page: This cannot apply to shares on which there is to be a call. If the transferor is undertaking an obligation he must sign on the transfer. This is the sort of process which the hon. Member will know applies in ordinary conveyancing and has applied for centuries. The purchaser of real property does not need to sign the conveyance unless he is entering into a covenant of some sort, and this principle is now to be applied to the transfer of shares. I personally am delighted that those of us who do conveyancing in solicitors' offices have been vindicated over this, that our old and stodgy conveyancing procedure is now to be applied to the stock form of procedure in the transfer of shares on the Stock Exchange.
Mr. John Hall: This brings up the point I raised earlier. In the future there will be no need for the signature of the buyer on the transfer form, as I understand it. That means that if the registrar at some future date is in some doubt about the authenticity of the signature of the seller he has no specimen to which he can refer to compare the signatures, if he wishes to check a signature or resolve some doubt in his mind as to the authenticity of the signature of the seller.
Mr. Page: This does not prevent, nothing in the Bill prevents, the registrar from requiring specimen signatures, or using the signature on a direction for payment of dividends.
If the registrar feels nervous about this procedure he can require, as many of them do on separate forms already, a specimen signature, but I think there is no real danger through the reduction in the number of signatures in the process of transfer of shares.
I have not calculated exactly how many signatures are to be saved, but I imagine that the number of transfers which occur every year must run into the millions. We are saving at least three signatures on each, those of two witnesses and the

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transferee, and so one can multiply those millions by three, and so we are saving some considerable time in the signing of documents.
Dr. Alan Glyn: I think this is an important point, raised by the hon. Member. Is my hon. Friend suggesting that if a company is worried it should use as a specimen signature that on a dividend allocation? In that case would he go so far as to say that registration would be refused till the purchaser had applied on an entirely different form?
Mr. Page: No. I think that the registrar would be under the obligation to satisfy himself of the authenticity of the transfer before accepting it for registration. If he has any doubt I suggest comparison with the previous signature on the form he may have obtained.
In addition to this simplification there is, as I mentioned, the fact that transfer will no longer have to be by deed. But, as the hon. Gentleman the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) rightly called my attention to just now, this process is limited to fully paid securities and under Clause 1(4) the House will see that is limited to a list of securities there set out in which there are certain exceptions mentioned. For example, Government stock, stock in the Post Office Register, has its own form of transfer. Obviously one cannot use this new form of transfer for Premium Bonds, Tax Reserve Certificates or National Savings Certificates, or, indeed, Defence Bonds, which, again, have their own form of transfer.
I pass to Clause 2 which sets out the supplementary provisions for the simplified form of transfer. Subsection (1, a) preserves the right of a company to refuse to register the transfer in some other cases than the form in which the transfer is made. It also preserves the requisites of a company if indeed a company is a party to the transfer—the requisite as to company execution by use of a seal. Perhaps it is a pity that this Bill is not the appropriate vehicle to do away with some of those formalities of sealing for companies which frequently seem to me to be pure formalities and quite unnecessaryy. At any rate, the Bill preserves those requisites.
Clause 2(2) deals in particular with a Section of the Companies Act, 1948, which speaks of the certification of an
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instrument of transfer. The subsection provides that the new forms—the stock transfer form and the broker's transfer form—are instruments of transfer within Section 79 of the Companies Act, 1948.
Clause 2(3) was inserted to remove any doubts particularly about Stamp Duty. It would perhaps be better if I left any comments on that subsection to my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary.
To turn to Clause 2(4), it is amazing what comes to light under the glare of reforming zeal. One thinks one has a nice, simple, little reform of the law, and then one finds that a Scottish Act of 1896 somehow stands in the way. The Clause is intended to say that the Scottish Act of 1896 which might have the effect of making blank transfers null and void shall not harmfully affect the Bill. It was also discovered that another Scottish Act, the Conveyancing (Scotland) Act, 1924, needed specific mention. That is an Act in which law agents, notaries public and justices of the peace are required to sign on behalf of blind persons. So it is necessary to insert these saving provisions.
I have already referred to Clause 3 as being the one which gives flexibility in the application of these forms. It gives the Treasury power to amend the two Schedules to the Bill and to provide different forms or different parts of the forms from those set out in the Schedule. This, I am sure, is wise. When one is setting up a new process one wants to see how it works out in practice. If minor amendments are needed, it should not be necessary to have to come back to the House to ask for new legislation; it can be done without harm, I should think by the Treasury.
These Orders are, of course, subject to Prayer in this House—subject to negative Resolution procedure—and if it is thought that they go beyond what one reasonably expects in a Bill of this sort, objection can be made to them on the Floor of the House.
The remaining Clauses of the Bill need be mentioned only very briefly. Clause 4 sets out the definitions. Clause 5—and I trust—
Mr. Hale: Before we leave the definitions, I was hoping that the

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moment had come when the hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) was going to convey the glad tidings of the amount that would be saved by the humble buyer or seller of stocks by this considerable reduction in the work to be done by the brokers. As I understand the situation, if I ask my bank to buy some stock for me, the brokers may have to send me half a dozen transfers of odd bits and odd sizes. But we are now saving them that. What will the brokers do about it? By how much will they reduce their commission?
Mr. Page: I hope that, a simplified procedure having been provided, the brokers will respond by reducing the commission and so on.
Mr. Hale: Does the hon. Gentleman expect it?
Mr. Page: I believe that a certain part of their commission is based on the number of transfers, and, therefore, they should be saved that right away. I certainly hope that those who own, sell or buy shares will press their brokers, faced with this simplified procedure, to reduce their charges.
Dr. Alan Glyn: Will my hon. Friend deal with the point raised by the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale), which is whether my hon. Friend's method of transfer includes the type of transfer where shares are bought in packages from a certain person and from different owners?
Mr. Page: If I understand what my hon. Friend is asking me, it is that whether, if there is a seller of a block of shares and there are a number of purchasers buying—
Dr. Glyn: It is the other way round.
Mr. Page: If there are a number of sellers, there will be only the one form, the stock transfer form, which will cover "packets" to the one purchaser. There must also be a transfer from the owner of the shares. There is no new process for that in the Bill. One cannot simplify that process.
To proceed with my summing up of the Bill, Clause 4 gives certain definitions which I do not think need any elaboration from me. Clause 5 also will not, I hope,
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need any elaboration from me. I understand that it is in the common form. It deals with Northern Ireland. Frankly, I have not a clue what it is about, but I am assured that it is in the common form. Clause 6 states when the Bill is to come into operation. I hope that the Economic Secretary will make some comment on this, for the date when the Bill may come into force is put in the hands of the Treasury. I hope that it need not be too long delayed.
I hold the view that a useful function of private Members' legislation is to delegislate rather than to create more law, to remove some of the useless laws which we have, to cut away some of the dead-wood of the Statute Book rather than put more restrictions on it. This Bill, I hope, cuts away a number of unnecessary legal formalities.
I think that in legislating we ought to have in mind the burden which the law places on ordinary commercial practice and on the ordinary individual. In so many cases in legislation we are imposing on the individual some duty which he has to carry out on the part of government, whether it be local government or central government. One of the greatest saboteurs of productive effort, in commerce at any rate, is what I might call the "hidden boss"—the local authority or the central government—which is making the office workers do its job for it, sticking on the receipt stamps, calculating P.A.Y.E., sticking the stamps on the cards. All those things are done by the office worker to carry out the job of government. The more we can cut down the processes which the law requires office workers to undertake, the better.
I apologise for keeping the House so long, but the Bill did not receive any discussion on Second Reading and I felt it right to put on record what it endeavours to do.
Mr. G. R. Mitchison: Before the hon. Member sits down, will he help me on one point? It seems to me that the effect of the Bill will be to decrease the revenue from Stamp Duty to some extent, owing to the way in which the Stamp Act is drawn. Can he make any comment on that?
Mr. Page: In my view, this process will not have that effect. At present,

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it is possible to use blank transfers—transfers without the name or signature of the transferee on them—for certain purposes. The Bill makes no change in that procedure. It makes it possible to use a stock transfer form without the name of the transferee in it. Whether it is a purchase by one purchaser or a transaction where there are several purchasers, the process will be that the seller's broker has the document stamped. That will be the practice as foreseen by this Bill, and I doubt whether the Bill can be carried out unless that practice is observed.
Before passing the stock transfer to the buyer's broker it will be stamped by the seller's broker. Before passing the broker's transfer forms to each of the buyer's brokers they will be stamped by the seller's brokers. The seller's broker can pass them on unstamped in the same way as at present he can pass on blank transfers unstamped. It makes no difference in the law.
On the other hand, my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary and his Department have thought that perhaps there should be some protection over this, and no doubt the hon. and learned Gentleman has seen on the Order Paper in connection with the Finance Bill a provision which makes quite sure that the Treasury will lose no duty over this.
In Committee, I felt rather like the young lady who goes to a party with her music and is not asked to play. I had no opportunity to say anything in Committee, beyond thanking the Chairman for taking the Chair. That is my excuse for using up so much time of the House on this occasion.
1.52 p.m.
Mr. Leslie Hale: I shall not delay the House for more than a few minutes, and I shall certainly not take part in any obstruction because, in the first place, I do not like doing it, and, secondly, because I have an interest to delare later in the list of Orders of the Day.
It is, of course, difficult to get a complicated Measure like this very clearly explained by the hon. Member who moved it, and it would seem to be an eminently sensible Bill. One of the problems is that I imagine that, except for those who were on the Committee,
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there are many hon. Members who have not taken cognisance of the Bill.
I know nothing about the Stock Exchange. Only recently, I got a little money because my life has lasted long enough to enable me to draw some life insurance. I therefore sold some shares a fortnight ago and found that in the slump that followed the shares that I had sold were the only ones that had gone up by 2s. 6d. each in about a week. They were British sugar and authority investments, so I have another loss to regret.
There are problems which may have been explained in Committee and, if so, I apologise for raising them now but, from my point of view, as the hon. Member for Oldham, West, there is a serious problem. It arises from the definition of stock exchange which is contained in Clause 4. Oldham is the only provincial town of its kind which has a recognised, reputable and respectable stock exchange which continues to operate. I would have thought that a recognised stock exchange would have been recognised in the Statute, instead of by the extraordinary provision that only the Stock Exchange in London automatically has the right to operate and that the Treasury, by order, will decide what others are recognised stock exchanges within the meaning of the Bill.
I would have regarded it as almost a fatal defect but for the presence of the Economic Secretary, who, I hope, will say that it is perfectly clear that the Oldham stock exchange will be authorised by the Treasury to act in present circumstances, that an order will be made, and that I need not fear the loss of another industry in Oldham, even if it is less productive than some. I hope that I can have that assurance. Subject to that, I conclude by saying that, once again, we on this side should give benevolence to a Bill produced from the other side on a Friday, and I hope that spirit of conciliation will continue throughout the day.
1.58 p.m.
Mr. John Hall: When I first came into the House to listen to the Bill which preceded this one I had the pleasure of hearing the hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) call upon the support of his

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right hon. and hon. Friends. It so happens that he had no right hon. and hon. Friends present to support him. Since that time the attendance on that side of the House has gone up by 100 per cent., which shows how misleading percentages can be.
I think that the House would wish to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) on bringing this Bill forward so successfully to this point in its procedure. I must congratulate him, too, on having withdrawn his original Bill so that a similar Bill should be introduced in the other place to speed up the procedure and get it on the Statute Book rather quicker than otherwise might have been the case. Greater love has no man than to give up his own Bill to others to present for him. This is a matter for congratulation.
I think that my right hon. Friend will agree that the inspiration for the Bill was given by Lord Ritchie, when he was chairman of the Stock Exchange and set up a committee under the secretary ship of the Shares and Loans Department of the Stock Exchange, Mr. Wells. It is that committee, under the excellent guidance of Mr. Wells, which has done so much valuable work. It is quite remarkable that the report of that committee, which, I think, was published in December, 1960, should have been acted on within two-and-a-half years. It must be almost a record for any report to result in legislation quite so quickly. It shows, perhaps, the need for it.
I have some professional interest in the Bill because I am a chartered secretary myself, although I no longer practise. I started my business career as a junior assistant, assistant secretary in the days of my youth, which, I must say, nowadays are rather like looking at those days through the wrong end of a telescope. During my long course as a junior assistant, assistant secretary I was called upon to undertake most of the registration work for a large public company, at a ludicrous salary—grossly underpaid—but at least I had a great deal of experience in handling registration work of this kind.
I remember only too vividly the amount of detail that I had to watch in checking transfers. I had to check the signatures both of the transferor and
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the transferee, make sure that they were properly witnessed and make certain that no wife witnessed her husband's signature or vice versa. I had to see that all the transfers were properly certificated, and where I had a number of transactions out of one shareholding involving a number of transferees all this work increased tremendously.
I understand that under the Bill—as the hon. Member for Oldham, West Mr. Hale) has said, it is a complicated Bill—all this will be rendered unnecessary, apart from the necessity of watching the transferor's signature. I am a little concerned about this. I can remember many occasions when I was a little doubtful about the authenticity of the transferor's signature, but I had at least available the original transfer form on which his signature had appeared when he first bought the shares, and, therefore, it was possible, by reference to the archives, if they were properly recorded and maintained archives, to compare the two signatures. This will not be possible in future, as I understand it. This will make one slight problem for registrars in future, although much of their work in other respects will be reduced.
Therefore, I welcome the Bill, because it will help the parties to these share transactions and reduce the amount of work carried out by stockbrokers. Incidentally, I doubt whether they will find any way of reducing charges. I think that their answer will be that their expenses are rising so rapidly that this relief will merely enable them to keep the charges at their present level. However, like the hon. Member for Oldham, West, I would like to think that perhaps they might be persuaded to reduce their charges. Above all, I welcome the Bill because it will reduce the burden of work on registrars, always an overworked and underpaid body of men in my experience.
I want also to refer to the form which appears in Schedule 2. As was mentioned in another place, this is a novel form, owing its origins to Mr. Bell, of the Bank of England. The Bank is not an institution notable for being highly original in itself, so that it is interesting to find this particularly acceptable idea emanating from that source.

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One point I wish to raise has been touched on a little already. In Committee, the hon. Member for Gloucester (Mr. Diamond) drew attention to what was said on Third Reading in another place that, under certain circumstances, this might lead to the avoidance of Stamp Duty. There is an Amendment to the Finance Bill on the Notice Paper which, I believe, is designed to avoid this happening, and I would like an assurance from the Economic Secretary that in his view that Amendment will completely meet the point. It is not, perhaps, quite so important as it was when the Bill was introduced, because the Stamp Duty is being reduced from 2 per cent. to 1 per cent. To that extent it is half as important as it was. Nevertheless, it remains quite important.
Another point which is not covered by the Bill is that of the registration fee. This is a very irritating fee charged by companies for registering transfers with them. In many cases it is 2s. 6d. The fee is a nuisance to collect and irritating to pay. With the reduction of work on registrars which will come from this Bill, I hope that the companies will abolish this fee.
The Bill does not extend to overseas companies which have their registrations here. The reasons for this are acceptable but perhaps it will be possible for such companies, by a simple alteration in their articles of association, to permit the adoption of the procedures outlined by the Bill, and I hope that they will do so.
I hope that will also be possible for Commonwealth and Government stocks to be included as well. If I understand it aright, it will be quite simple for registrars, by a change in their regulations, to make it possible for these Government stocks once again to be included within the scope of this Measure. In some cases, it may require legislation by the Commonwealth Governments concerned but I hope that it will not be long before they introduce it.
That brings me to Clause 5, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) referred. If I understand it correctly, Northern Ireland will be excluded from the provisions of the Bill, including securities and companies in that country. Again, by legislation in Northern Ireland, it would be possible to
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bring them within the purview of the Bill, and I hope that that will be done.
I welcome the introduction of the Bill, which has gone through with the minimum amount of trouble.
Mr. Hale: The hon. Gentleman says that he has experience as a chartered secretary. Suppose an elderly and impotent bedridden husband owns £20,000 worth of securities which have been transferred to him and registered in his name, and that certificates have been issued in respect of the transfers which he has not signed. What is there now to prevent his wife from transferring the whole of these to a gigolo, on what would admittedly be a forged and criminal document, for a figure inserted in the transfer which is never paid and which is not intended to be paid? Would not that now be registered, continue to be registered, and, indeed, go on being registered until the husband's death, without any question arising because letters addressed to the husband have been opened by the wife?
Mr. Hall: I do not think that the situation is very much different from that applying today. The only difference is that the signature has to be witnessed and, therefore, there is the possibility of making forgery difficult in that way. But if one set out deliberately to perpetrate a fraud, I do not think that it would be very difficult to get a forged signature witnessed by the gigolo or friend.
Mr. Hale: The company would have no sample of the genuine signature of the original transferee.
Mr. Hall: This is a possible weakness and it was suggested that perhaps company registrars might secure that a purchaser of shares should provide a specimen of his signature, perhaps on a dividend mandate form, or something of that kind, which would give them a signature to compare for future transactions.
Mr. Graham Page: This process is really meant to apply mainly to Stock Exchange transactions. Certainly, where the two forms are used, this is restricted to Stock Exchange transactions. It is an established practice of law that when an agent delivers a transfer to a company for registration he warrants the signatures on it. That is accepted.
Mr. Hale: Subsection (1) of Clause 1 is not linked to Stock Exchange transactions.
Mr. Hall: This point has caused anxiety on both sides of the House. Perhaps my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary will give his views. Subject to that small proviso, I welcome the Bill very much. It will relieve the burden of a great many people engaged in these transactions and in so far as it reduces the amount of paper and the filling of forms it must be welcomed.
2.8 p.m.
Mr. Alan Hopkins: I, too, welcome the Bill. In doing so, I have no wish to obstruct the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) who has a Bill down for consideration later in these proceedings. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page). He said that he gave birth to this Bill in hospital, which is perhaps not an appropriate place so to do. I must confess that it did not occur to me when I was in hospital to dream up Bills. I will bear it in mind for the future, however.
I also pay tribute to Lord Clitheroe who, I believe, was a predecessor of my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary at the Treasury some years ago. Like other hon. Members I feel that it would be right to pay tribute to the report of the Stock Exchange Committee which looked into this matter about three years ago, and particularly the part played by Mr. Wareham. It would be appropriate for me to declare an interest in that I am a director of an issuing house which has a large registrar's department.
Having said that, I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr. John Hall) that this Bill will not alter substantially the amount of work which will fall upon registrars of companies. Having paid heart-felt tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby I wish to make three specific points. The first is that I should like my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary to tell me why this Bill is necessary. The procedure of buying and selling shares is one carried out on the Stock Exchange. Is it not possible for a transfer, which is merely a document intended to pass the ownership of shares, to be altered by agreement with the Stock Exchange?
I appreciate the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe.
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There is a parallel if one takes the definition of a bank. What is a bank? The answer is that it is anything which engages in banking business. Who engages in banking business? The answer is that it is those people whom the Board of Trade decides are engaged in banking business. That problem arises elsewhere, too. Is it really necessary to have the Bill? Could this not be done otherwise?
Secondly, when is it the intention to bring this Bill into force? Having said that this is a good Bill, I should like to see it come into force as soon as possible. The present position is difficult. I do not intend to go over the ground already covered, but in the case of a family trust it is frequently difficult to get the signatures of all the trustees for any purchase of shares. I can well remember an occasion when there were three trustees, of whom I was one, the other two being octogenarians, and it was a question of whether we could get their signatures witnessed in time before one of them passed to the other side. This sort of difficulty would be obviated by a change such as my hon. Friend has proposed.
I should like to reiterate the remarks of the hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) about Stamp Duty, and I hope that my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary will be able to assure us on this point.
Before giving the Bill a welcome push, I should like to assure my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe that the registration fees are a matter for the company and are normally inserted in the company's articles. They are a means of deriving some money from transfers which are themselves extremely expensive to the registrar. If the registration fees were to be abolished by the company, it would mean only that the charge to the company for undertaking this work would be increased. The cost would therefore fall not upon the shareholder, but upon the company. Having said that, I welcome the Bill.
2.13 p.m.
Dr. Alan Glyn: It is right that the Bill should be reasonably aired because this is the first opportunity which we have had of discussing it in

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the House. I should like to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) for the very full way in which he went into the provisions of the Bill, and at the same time I pay my tribute to Lord Clitheroe who has done so much in another place towards making the Bill a possibility, I am sure that the Bill has a general approval, but, as the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale), who made a number of pertinent points, we all have a duty to ask my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary a number of questions about it. In this connection I should like to say how glad I am that my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary is in his place today, because this is a matter in which he is very experienced.
This is an extension of a Bill which we had the other day in which local authorities were at last allowed to simplify their methods with this kind of issue by using the procedure of bonds. I am sure that any method of transfer of shares between individual companies or trusts which is simplified will be welcome not only by the House but by the general public and by stock exchanges and those connected with the laborious process of the transfer of shares.
I am glad that the Bill has been limited to fully paid shares because, as the hon. Member for Oldham, West said, if it were not it would be almost impossible to operate. I am equally glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby has had the foresight to take out of it specifically methods of transfer such as the Post Office Register and various other special procedures for which there are already laid down clear methods of transfer.
I should like to ask my hon. Friend—and I hope that this is not a fast ball and I ask it as a matter of interest—what the Bill represents in the amount of transfers which are not dealt with through the stock exchange as compared with those transactions which go through the stock exchange. I should like immediately to meet the point raised by the hon. Member for Oldham, West and say that I mean not only the London Stock Exchange but all stock exchanges.
I should like further clarification about signatures, a question raised during
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the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby by myself and by my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr. John Hall). As we all know, at the moment when making a transfer the registrar of a company has a specimen signature of the original purchaser. This will not be the case today. My hon. Friend the Member for Crosby reasonably suggested that companies have another method of getting a signature, that is to say, through the dividend mandate. That is perfectly correct and I suppose that any company can reasonably demand that that mandate shall be completed, but it would have to say that it was complete before the further transfer; and normally the dividend mandate would not in practice be sent out until the transfer was complete, so there is a time interval. If the transfer took place very rapidly, the specimen signature would not be available and the company would have one of two alternatives—either to authorise the transfer without the signature, or hold up the transfer until such time as the dividend mandate specimen signature had been obtained. We may be making rather heavy weather of this, but I should like to ask my hon. Friend whether we are running any additional risk of fraud and, if so, whether that risk is not balanced by the simplification of the procedure.
The necessity for the Bill was dictated by a clause in the transfers which said that any transfer had to be effected by the proper instrument. I presume that the old method can be used if it is so desired. That question has not yet been asked, but I think that it is fairly reasonable to assume that that would be the case. The hon. Member for Oldham, West stressed the importance of the other stock exchanges. I agree with him that Oldham is an important and well-established stock exchange, but I remind him that there are also Manchester and Liverpool and other stock exchanges which are well founded. I agree with him that it is now up to my hon. Friend to say which other exchanges can be included. I think that that is fair because others might be created in the future and all my hon. Friend would have to do would be to include them in the list. That would not be a problem because any stock exchange which was recognised by the public and in which dealings were carried out would have no

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difficulty about being recognised by my hon. Friend.
The hon. Member also asked about the position when shares were purchased from a large number of owners. I think that my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby answered this when he said that as they were different vendors each would have to have a separate transfer. I think that that is fairly obvious because they would be individual dealings with the purchaser from whom the blocks of shares were being acquired.
I hope that my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary will also assure us about the revenue, because if the Bill in any way diminished the revenue there would obviously be two methods of transfer, one more attractive to the revenue than the other. I may be wrong, but it struck me that the revenue would not be affected by this process.
I should like to refer to the transfer fee which companies levy. This is rather a matter for the company. Some companies, especially smaller companies, may have to employ a staff which they would have to pay and I have often wondered whether accounts for the sums collected when the fee is only 1s. do not offset the financial advantage given by the charge. The answer is for the companies themselves to consider the matter. As the hon. Member for Oldham, West suggested, this charge for transfers is a vexatious one and perhaps in the future many companies will think that it is not only economic but helpful to abolish this fee. It is entirely within the purview of a company to charge what it thinks fit.
This Bill accords with a view to which many of us on this side of the House strongly adhere. We hope that members of the public in all walks of life will continue to take an interest in all forms of security. We hope that as time goes on the public will become not only property owners, but owners of property in the true sense of the word, by owning their own shares.
It would not be out of order to say that the simplification which this Bill introduces will attract people from all walks of life to become share owners. This is one of the most democratic processes which can take place, particularly if the person concerned happens to be the
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owner of shares in the company in which he works, and I hope that this Measure will enable many ordinary members of the public to buy shares in small denominations and thus become part of our property-owning democracy. The Bill is simplicity, security, and simplification, with, I hope, security and safety, and I welcome it and congratulate my hon. Friend on introducing it.
2.22 p.m.
Mr. Peter Walker: I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Clapham (Dr. Alan Glyn). I very much welcome the Bill and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) on all that he has done in connection with it. I am delighted to see my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary to the Treasury in his place, because I know that over the years he has in many ways supported the theme of a property-owning democracy and the passing of this Bill will bring great pleasure to him.
Although, in terms of legislation and of improving and simplifying the process of stock transfers, this Bill is important, it will have no great impact and importance unless those connected with making available the services to enable people to purchase shares take advantage of the simplification which has been brought about by it. There is, unfortunately, in existence the situation that the City of London has shrouded itself in a mystique with lots of jargon and words which the normal person does not come across in every-day life. As a result there is a basic fear of the unknown when the ordinary family man living in the provinces contemplates the possibility of purchasing some shares.
One of the best things which I welcome in the Bill is the fact that the actual stock transfer form is in modern English and in languge which the ordinary man can comprehend. When confronted with the previous forms, I think that there are many occasions when the stockbroker or the bank manager concerned has to assist in the filling in of the form, partly because the person concerned is not quite certain as to what the various pieces of jargon and certain words and terms mean; and I very much welcome the easily understood wording of these new forms.
I suggest, however, that there has now to be a process of educating the

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public as to what actually physically happens when a share changes hands. This is a task
for the London and provincial stock exchanges. It is absurd that at this time when there is a need to encourage investment in the private sector of industry—and I think that both sides of the House will agree that there is this need—this investment should be confined basically to persons who happen to have contact with a stockbroker or with a bank manager who is not prejudiced against equity investments—and we all know that certain bank managers are so prejudiced.
It is, therefore, important that the stock exchanges see that there is created a system whereby the small investor is able to constantly make contact with persons who are able to buy and sell shares on his behalf, and I hope that as a result of the step which I trust the House will take later in supporting the Bill stock exchanges will take action to see that there are very few provincial towns lacking all the facilities and services of a branch of a stockbroker's office.
It is absurd that the process of purchasing shares should be handicapped by the fact that it is against the regulations of the London Stock Exchange for branch offices to be opened in other parts of the country. I think that much more expenditure has to be encouraged to advertise the facilities of stockbrokers in selling shares, to outline how simple it is, particularly after the passing of this Bill, and to make the ordinary member of the public feel convinced that the purchase of shares in a company which provides him with employment, or perhaps a company whose goods he admires and considers are typical of a progressive company, is as simple a process as going to the Post Office and investing a small amount in a Post Office Savings Bank or buying a National Savings Certificate.
I am sure that this is what my hon. Friend envisages and hopes he will achieve by the contribution that he has made to simplifying the administrative process of purchasing shares. I hope that the initiative he has taken will be followed by a similar initiative by men of responsibility and power in this sphere to see that their services are readily available to the British public.
2.28 p.m.
Mr. Alan Brown: I support the Bill because I believe that in the short term its provisions will prove advantageous to the small investor—and it is on his behalf that I am taking part in this debate—and, in the long term, will prove advantageous to the nation.
As my hon. Friends have said, this new system will unquestionably save a great deal of time and correspondence with stockbrokers, but the important thing is the simplification which the Bill introduces. This simplified system will be readily understood by the man in the street, and I am sure that this will be of great benefit to everyone.
I think that hon. Members on both sides of the House will agree that for far too long the average citizen has tended to avoid investing his money in stock exchange securities because of the difficulties, under the present system, of buying and selling shares. Reference has been made to the obscure terms used, such as bulls and bears, and, of course, this jargon, as with the system, has not been readily understood by the average citizen.
It is essential that we should do everything we can to encourage the spread of ownership of industrial shares over as wide a range of the population as possible. It is vitally important that employees in our industrial undertakings should be encouraged to become shareholders. It gives them a real stake in their business—and who can deny the incentive of the pride of ownership? Compared with the United States, Western Germany and certain other prosperous countries, Britain lags far behind in the matter of the spread of ownership of industrial shares.
I am sorry that the Bill does not go further. The 2 per cent. Stamp Duty has been mentioned. This imposition is just as great a deterrent to the average citizen who is considering investing part or whole of his savings in industrial shares as is the present difficulty of doing so. The ownership of industrial shares is an essential part of any plan directed towards the development of a property-owning democracy, and I sincerely hope that the House will give the Bill a Third Reading.
2.31 p.m.
Mr. G. R. Mitchison: This, again, is a rather limited Bill. On its Third Reading we are now apparently discussing the principles of a property-owning democracy. However that may be, I have never quite understood what the phrase means. The party opposite seem very fond of it, but whenever the democracy has got any property the Government take the necessary legislative and administrative steps to take it away from the democracy and hand it over to their friends in the City. However, that argument is perhaps beyond the scope of the Bill. I want to confine my remaining remarks to the Bill.
One of its substantial objects is to avoid the practical nuisance of a large number of small transfers when there is a seller of a large block of shares and a considerable number of buyers of small parcels, making up the total amount of that block. Another thing that has gone by the board is the necessity to face the difficult problem of describing ourselves. A lady of my acquaintance, faced with the task of signing a number of these transfers, and called upon to describe herself on each one, went through a number of quite correct descriptions. She started off by describing herself as a married woman—and, incidentally, I can never understand why "married man" is never considered to be a sufficient description—and then as an authoress, and after that one thing and another, finally becoming so impatient with the possibilities that she wrote under "Description" the words "You know what". That description was rejected by the people who had to deal with the transfer. The requirement was a trifle absurd, and I am glad that it has now disappeared.
There is one small but serious point that I should like to mention concerning Stamp Duty. I hope that the Economic Secretary will be able to deal with it. It may be that I am slightly anticipating matters by referring to a table in the Finance Bill, but it is convenient to do so. Let us suppose that we have a single transaction, effected on one form, by which a seller sells to six buyers a similar parcel of shares in each case, amounting to £81, making £486 in all, and another block worth £14 to a seventh buyer. The total sum involved
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is £500, but if it is to be treated as a transaction dealing with a consideration of £500—and that is the total consideration—the amount of Stamp Duty charge able is considerably less, in this instance, than it would be if the transaction were carried through by way of seven separate transfers. That is due to the way in which the Stamp Act table and the present table in the Finance Bill are prepared. I can give the House the figures if necessary, but the point is clear enough.
No great principle is involved; it is not the sort of thing that would cause one to reject the Bill. Nevertheless, I should like to know what the position is, and what the Treasury thinks about it.
Mr. Graham Page: Surely, under the present procedure, the transaction given as an example by the hon. and learned Gentleman would be carried out by separate transfers from transferor to transferee, and the same result would come about in respect of Stamp Duty. I cannot see that the present Bill alters the position.
Mr. Mitchison: With respect to the hon. Member—I may have misunderstood his Bill—I doubt whether that is so. Taking, for the sake of convenience, what I hope is a pardonable anticipation on a Friday, the ordinary rates of Stamp Duty under Schedule 9 of the Finance Bill, it is clear that a consideration of £500 will attract a duty of ten times 10s., or £5, and that each of the £81 transfers, of which there were six, will attract a duty of £1, making £6, besides the 3s. attracted by the other £14. If that is the way it works the duty payable appears to be definitely less than what would be paid if the same transaction were effected by a number of transfers.
I mention the point not as a vital objection to the Bill—I would not wish to reject a useful Bill for that reason—but since the Treasury deals with these matters, and no doubt has done so in this case, I should like to hear what steps have been taken or are being taken to ensure that there is no substantial Joss of revenue.
Mr. Hale: The Treasury has been collecting revenue in this way for years from the unfortunate buyer. If I instruct my broker to buy £1,000 worth of shares I have no option as to whom he buys

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them from. I am spending £1,000, and I pay duty on £1,000. He writes to me and says, "I have bought £70 from one person, £72 from somebody else, and £47 from somebody else" and so on. I then sign, say, 15 transfers, and have to pay the duty, and the Treasury gets the money because the transaction is split up. Surely that is being put right.
Mr. Mitchison: I think that my hon. Friend and I can at any rate agree that the Treasury must have gone wrong somewhere, whether in the past or in the present. Perhaps, on a Friday, I may be relieved from speculating about the intentions of the Stamp Act. They are a little difficult to ascertain.
On broader points I welcome the Bill. I notice that the Bill is supposed
"to amend the law with respect to the transfer of securities."
But it does not repeal anything. That makes me wonder how far his hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-East (Mr. Hopkins) was correct in suggesting that all this could be done without legislation. The hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) has his uses. He reminds us of very welcome little points that the public at large have often forgotten. His Cheques Act certainly had that effect. It reminded people that they could do things, which they have been doing ever since, because those things appeared in the Statute. Perhaps this Bill is similar. No doubt the Economic Secretary will tell us how far the Bill is necessary and how far it is a convenient way of making arrangements, in a statutory form, which will undoubtedly be an improvement on the present ones.
I hope that I shall not be considered ungenerous in the comments that I have made, because I sincerely welcome the Bill on behalf of hon. Members on this side of the House. It removes a number of inconvenient and sometimes rather absurd things that have grown up in the past. It will make life simpler for people in this respect, and, therefore, it is surely a Bill which we ought to welcome. Again I would say I am very glad that the Bill has come forward, but I hope that it will not be necessary for hon. Members to fall ill and to go into hospital and draft Bills there in order
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to get the Government to attend to matters of this sort which are really their business.
2.40 p.m.
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Edward du Cann): I am glad to have the opportunity to say a few words about the Bill. I should like, shortly, to describe the Government's attitude to it and to refer, in particular, as appropriate, to the Government's intentions towards the matters raised by the Bill. I will, of course, do my best to answer the several questions that my hon. Friends and others have asked me during the course of our most interesting debate.
First, I would say as clearly as possible that I am convinced that the Bill is a worthwhile Measure and that there are substantial benefits to be gained from simplifying transfer procedure. There is no doubt that the present system is extremely laborious. It often causes delay, not only because one has to deal with several transfers when one only is necessary. The hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale), the hon. Member for Clapham (Dr. Alan Glyn) and the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. John Hall), who, apparently, had a great deal of experience of these matters as a young man, all said something on this point, and, indeed, they were entirely right.
I was interested in the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr. Walker), who explained that he could not be here to listen to the winding-up speeches this afternoon, when he approved of the fact that the new transfer forms are written in English as opposed to jargon, a point on which my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Graham Page) also commented. But having given my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby full marks for his knowledge and command of simple English, my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester then went on to split an infinitive in a most appalling way. I hope that Hansard will record it and that my hon. Friend will take note of the opprobrium of the House on the point.
I was interested, too, about the point of description which the hon. and

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learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) made in his example of the married woman. I have always thought that an even more fatuous description was that of "gentleman" which is open to all sorts of people in all sorts of circumstances and often seems to be severely misplaced. But today we have been agreeing on all sides that there are substantial benefits to be gained from a new system.
The old system can perfectly well continue, but the legal obligation is upon persons using the old forms only to complete them to the extent that the new system requires. They can volunteer more information and more signatures if they think that appropriate, but there is no legal requirement now, or will not be if the Bill receives the Royal Assent, to do so.
We are not considering the reform of a process which is a rare thing. Quite the reverse. Markings on the London Stock Exchange have varied in recent years between 3½ million and 4¼ million in a year, and as the House knows very well much business takes place on the Floor of the London Stock Exchange which is not marked at all. So perhaps we can express the hope that we shall before very long have complete figures of turnover. I think that they would be useful and desirable, when it is possible to obtain them.
But in addition, as the hon. Member for Oldham, West very rightly reminded us by inference, there are all the transactions on the more than 20 other stock exchanges in the United Kingdom. Most of our great cities have their own stock exchanges—Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Bristol and many other cities. And, of course, last but by no means least there is the somewhat independent and thoroughly effective Stock Exchange in the ancient and fine old Borough of Oldham.
In addition still, there are, of course, certain associations, in particular, the Provincial Brokers' Stock Exchange, which cover many more and much smaller towns on the whole throughout the United Kingdom. Furthermore, endeavouring to catalogue those transactions, those institutions, those persons, those professional people to whom this Bill will be of use and of benefit, a large number of
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transfers, of course, never come through the stock exchanges at all. There are all those entered into by solicitors, by executors and so on—a great mass of transfers that involve, for example, private and non-quoted companies.
In sum, therefore, the overall saving of time and trouble to people concerned with the transfer of securities which will result from the introduction of this new procedure is bound to be considerable. The particular point which has a bearing on the subject raised by a number of my hon. Friends including my hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr. A. Brown) is that it must have a similarly beneficial effect in the future, and an increasingly beneficial effect.
Let us take the position today. There are, we understand from surveys, between 3½ million and 4 million shareholders. Lord Ritchie, to whom tribute has very rightly been paid during the debate, estimates that another ½million potential shareholders are on the threshold of investment. The Inland Revenue's 105th Report of January, 1963, stated that the number of ordinary shareholders rose between 1960 and 1961 by 130,000 and that the number is growing at the rate of about 10,000 a month.
There are remarkable new developments, the sort of "Do-it-Yourself" or unit trust clubs. There are about 1,200 of them today. Five years ago, I believe, there were about 100. There are now about 1 million unit trust holders, all of whom will benefit; and the potential, I suggest, is even greater. I will not go into the detail of the direct side. There is also the indirect side. So many today, of course, invest through insurance companies, through pension funds and through the trade unions—and how wise the unions are in this regard. The indirect investors will also benefit.
I hope that I have said enough to indicate the sound reason why the Government should be anxious to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby and to welcome the introduction of this Measure. Indeed, I think it most appropriate that it should have been introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby, for this reason particularly. Its whole purpose, as my hon. Friend the Member for Clapham and my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester pointed out, is

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simplification. It is in the tradition of other Measures in which my hon. Friend has taken a leading part.
On the Third Reading of the Cheques Bill, in 1957, my hon. Friend said that if that Bill was, in fact, accepted it would result in the saving of the time spent in making no less than 630 million signatures a year. My hon. Friend the Member for Clapham asked if I could do some precise calculations of the numbers of transfers that go through in the course of a year. I am sorry that I cannot; I do not have this information, and I cannot conceive of any way of getting it. All one can do is to make an estimate. My estimate is that my hon. Friend must have saved a further 20 million signatures a year by the introduction of his Bill, if the House sees fit to give it its Third Reading and if it receives the Royal Assent. So I think that it adds not insubstantially to a score which was itself not insubstantial. But, quite apart from that, perhaps it is not an inappropriate Measure for National Productivity Year. I hope that I may be allowed to make one comment in passing. It is sometimes said by learned commentators who watch our Parliamentary affairs and write and speak about them that the day of the private Member is over, that he has no contribution to offer and that he is mere Lobby fodder. I believe that my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby has quite clearly indicated that there is much that any hon. Member on the back benches can do to bring about reforms and appropriate progress which are both desirable and necessary.
I have been specifically asked by the hon. and learned Member for Kettering and by my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-East (Mr. Hopkins) why this legislation is necessary for what might be regarded as purely a change in administrative practice. The answer is, as the hon. and learned Member himself said, that there as both practical and legal reasons for legislating on this subject of a new system of transfer. From the practical point of view, it is necessary, if there is not to be confusion on the stock exchanges, that the new system should come into operation in relation to as great a number of securities as possible at one single time.
The Bill, by over-riding provisions in articles of association and similar instru-
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ments, will save companies time and trouble in which they would otherwise be involved in changing the instruments governing their operations—changes which a few companies might be unwilling to make or dilatory in making. In a rather similar way, this legislation has the effect of over-riding much subsidiary legislation in relation to the transfer of Government and local and public authority stocks. If investors and stock exchanges are to get the full benefit of the new system, it is obvious that it should come into operation over as wide an area as possible at a given date.
Even, however, if companies have been left to amend their own articles of association, and so on, the legal validity of the new system might still have been in some doubt because of the provisions in various older statutes. I am told that there are examples of that in the Company Clauses Act, 1845, and certain sections of the Companies Act, 1948 and the Finance Act, 1946. In relation to Scotland, it has also been necessary to over-ride the old provisions of an Act of the Scottish Parliament which might have had the effect of making a blank transfer null.
The Bill makes it clear that any contrary provisions relating to transfers of registered securities in other Statutes are over-ridden. It also contains provisions which remove uncertainties arising from the use of two transfer documents—for example, in deciding by reference to which document the date of lodgment is ascertainable. It is one thing to decide how a system should be reformed, but another to put those proposals into a suitable legislative framework—although, if I may say so, my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby has succeeded very well in doing this. I think, however, that it is clear from the discussion—or, to cap what my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby said, perhaps the absence of discussion—in earlier stages that this Bill, which implements the Report of Lord Ritchie's Committee, has commanded general support.
I should like to pay tribute here to Lord Ritchie. I have not always agreed with everything that he has said on all occasions, but I believe that he and his Committee—and some of his officials, like Mr. Wareham, and other distinguished names—have done a great service by sorting the matter out, considering it with

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great care, and by making the clear and wise recommendations which this Measure follows.
I was asked particularly by the hon. Member for Oldham, West—for what, I am sure, are very good reasons, he is not now in his place, but no doubt he will read my words in Hansard—why we gave London a particular place in the Bill and neglected to mention specifically by name other stock exchanges about which I have already spoken. I would assume that the reason is that my hon. Friend has followed word for word the provisions of the Prevention of Fraud Act, 1958.
It is clear, as was stated by my hon. Friend the Member for Clapham, that new stock exchanges can appear and that old stock exchanges can, perhaps, die. At any rate, there may well be changes, and the present provisions would enable the Treasury to incorporate, if it was thought appropriate, associations of brokers—as, for instance, the Provincial Brokers' Stock Exchange. I can tell the hon. Member very clearly that it would be our intention to include Oldham.
Another point raised by my hon. Friends the Members for Wycombe and Crosby related to the considerable number of operations begun on one stock exchange and completed on another. This is very often the case in transactions that are routed to London through the provincial stock exchanges. In this connection, I have been very interested to see that the Northern Ireland Parliament has introduced a Measure of similar intent to this Bill. Assuming that that Measure becomes law in Northern Ireland and that this Bill is enacted here, transactions between the Belfast and London stock exchanges, or those relating to purchases or sales by residents in Northern Ireland where the register is in Great Britain, or vice versa, will operate under the new system.
Perhaps I can now also answer an ancillary point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe on the subject of Commonwealth Government stocks. Commonwealth Governments and their registrars will certainly be invited to bring their stocks under the new transfer procedures. I am sure that would be right.
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There are four other matters about which I have been asked and to which I have to refer. The first is the protection of investors generally, and the avoidance of fraud. The hon. Member for Oldham, and my hon. Friends the Members for Wycombe and Clapham asked particularly about this, and I thought that my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby spoke some wise words in answer. My hon. Friend the Member for Clapham asked whether we were not making rather heavy weather of this point. There is, perhaps, something in that comment. On the other hand, it is right to give serious consideration to a matter as important as this.
The first point I want to make, additional to the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby, is that, as I understand it, company secretaries and registrars have seen this Bill, and have thoroughly approved it. I am very content to leave judgment in such a matter to the experts. Many other bodies have seen this Bill besides company registrars and secretaries—the people whom my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe indicated from his own experience are so much concerned with the practical aspect of the matter.
The point has already been made that much information is in any case available to company registrars and secretaries but, even if that were not so, they are free—they may even think it necessary and desirable in certain cases—to obtain further information if they wish; for example, through protection letters which, although not sent out as much as they once were, can still be sent out to establish the bona fides of an apparent transferor. Of course, nothing in the Bill in any way affects the civil rights, so to speak, of people engaged in such transactions.
Then there is the question of the powers given to the Treasury under Clause 3 to amend the specimen forms—to which my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby made some reference—either by alterations in the forms themselves or by the substitution and introduction of new forms. The general object of the Clause is to give some discretion to the Treasury and, in other words, to introduce a degree of flexibility into the Bill.
I certainly agree that we must have regard to the possibility of new means

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of handling documents becoming available in future. In the short time during which I have been concerned in the past with registration work, I have been astonished at the enormous development and changes which have come about. One can foresee further changes, particularly through the introduction of computing and transferring machinery of the most modern kind, and in the immediate future. We therefore must have regard to the possibility of new means becoming available which will make it desirable perhaps to change the forms which are set out in the Schedule without changing the formalities.
This is a wise safeguard in present circumstances though the new forms should serve well enough in the immediately foreseeable future. The Treasury will not have to approve every tiny alteration made. Clause 3(1), in any case, will give stock exchanges the opportunity of using forms larger in size than those scheduled in the printed Bill.
This has a bearing on what my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester said. He was kind enough to say that the forms were clear. They will be clearer when printed in a different size and when different kinds of type are used. I also understand that it will be the intention of the Stock Exchange that the brokers transfer forms specified in Schedule 2 will be printed on blue paper so that registrars may readily distinguish them from stock transfer forms. That is obviously sensible and an example of the sort of small improvements which can be made without reference to the Treasury—and a very good thing too.
The third matter is perhaps much more important. It was raised in Committee by the hon. Member for Gloucester (Mr. Diamond) and the hon. Member for Westhoughton (Mr. J. T. Price). It was also raised very clearly today by the hon. and learned Member for Kettering and my hon. Friends the Members for Clapham, Wycombe and Tottenham. This is the question of safeguarding the Revenue. The point which we were considering in Committee was the fundamental question of those who, because they are naughty people, might attempt to avoid Stamp Duty altogether. In Committee, I said it was necessary to make provision which
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would have the effect of preventing the circulation of blank transfers with consequent loss of Stamp Duty revenue.
I also said that if the Committee thought fit to approve the Bill a new Clause would be tabled for the Report stage of the Finance Bill. This has now been done and I hope that it will be generally welcomed when we discuss it next week. I might mention to the hon. and learned Member for Kettering, in reply to something I was asked in Committee, that not only has this been done but I hope that he and the hon. Member for Gloucester will think that it has been done in good time with plenty of notice.
I cannot now go into all the reasons why we thought it appropriate to put the new Clause down for the Finance Bill rather than at the time of the passage of this Bill, since I have already discussed the matter earlier. On the other hand, we now come to an entirely fresh subject which was raised by the hon. and learned Member for Kettering when he asked, "Do not we have a position here where although it may be the intention of the Government to block up, so to speak, an avenue through which ad valorem transfer duty might be avoided altogether yet less duty might be paid if a series of transactions were dealt with than if there were a single transaction?"
The hon. and learned Member was interrupted by the hon. Member for Oldham, West, who complained of the earlier system. He said that the Treasury had been behaving outrageously in the past and taking more duty than it was entitled to take. He said, by inference, that it was good that the position was being regulated. Therefore, the new is wrong, and the old is wrong, which makes me fancy that at the Treasury, for once, we have it about right. To be serious on the subject, you, Mr. Speaker, would not wish me to pursue now that matter of Schedule 9 of the Finance Bill, but I will pay strict attention to what the hon. and learned Member for Kettering said. I should like to check the figures which he gave, not that I suspect them of being incorrect, but to see how they compare over a wide range of examples.
The fourth and final matter was the question of Clause 6, raised by my hon.

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Friend the Member for Crosby and my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-East. Subsection (2) puts the responsibility on the Treasury to decide the date on which the main provisions of the Bill will come into force. It is quite clear that stock exchanges, their members and staffs will have to undertake a considerable amount of preparatory work. Forms must be printed. The new procedures must be studied and understood by those who will have the practical management of them, and the general arrangements for the handling of transfer documents will have to be reviewed. I am given to understand that attention has already been given to these matters and, indeed, I have seen some of the very good and clear notes prepared by the London Stock Exchange in that connection.
I see no reason to revise the estimate I gave during the Committee stage to the effect that we would envisage a period of three months from the Royal Assent as being appropriate. One would, therefore, perhaps expect to see the Bill come into effect in October or November.
I was not asked specific questions, but none the less many comments were made, on the subject of company registration work in general. My hon. Friend the Member for Worcester made a powerful plea to the effect that those concerned—company registrars and others—should take full advantage of this simplification by simplifying their own procedures. My hon. Friends the Members for Clapham, Wycombe and Bristol, North-East all similarly referred to the point.
I do not think there is any doubt at all that the length of time which many companies allow to elapse between the lodgment of the transfer and the issue of a new share certificate causes general inconvenience and additional work. I hope very much that when the Bill reaches the Statute Book companies in general will re-examine their internal arrangements for the issue of certificates and, in particular, audit procedure.
There is the question of sealing. Often sealing does not take place at sufficiently frequent intervals, and it seems in these days that it may well be appropriate for companies to dispense with some of the
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formalities of signing certificates which may have been appropriate and desirable in the past, but which now, with modern techniques, machinery and protection systems, might be dispensed with.
We have heard a lot about registration fees. This is a matter for the companies themselves. Many companies have already abolished them. But whether or not it is appropriate to do so in individual cases, I think that the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester was entirely valid. The more that companies can do to take advantage of these improvements in the law, so much the better, because then it will be a case of following up the work that has been done in the introduction of this Bill by my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby.
A great deal has been said on the subject of brokers' charges. I would not wish to comment on that; my hon. Friend said some wise words on the subject. But, of course, brokers' charges are not only made to pay for transfer work. They are also made in order to provide for all the research and effort which go into advising their clients. My hon. Friend the Member for Worcester is only too anxious that brokers should spend much more money on expanding, and so on. It is a matter for them to decide.
It is true that one can make comparisons with other international centres, and it is essential that those who wish to see London developing as an international capital market—a process which I hope will be assisted by this Bill—should keep their eyes on this point. I do not doubt that this matter frequently engages the attention of the Stock Exchange Council. I am sure, too, that the Council will heed some of the things which have been said during this debate.
The object of the Bill is not to prevent anyone doing anything. On the contrary, as I see it, its essential object is to enable companies and other bodies issuing securities to take advantage of the simplified arrangements for their transfer and to enable those simplified arrangements to be introduced in the most efficient manner. I am sure the House owes my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby and Lord Clitheroe, a former Financial Secretary to the Treasury, who introduced the Bill in another place, a deep measure of gratitude for the part they have played in bringing it forward

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and, I hope, finally onto the Statute Book.
The changes which the Bill makes may appear unexciting, but they are not without their legal interest, as the hon. and learned Member for Kettering said, nor, I am sure, was the drafting of the Bill without its legal complications. I agree with the hon. and learned Member; I hope that we do not all find that the only place in which legislation can be drafted is in hospital.
Speaking for the Government, I join in the general welcome which has been given to the Bill and express again the hope that all who can will take advantage of its provisions. I express the hope particularly, as I said a moment ago, that the Bill may assist London to obtain an increasing share of international stock transfer business. I am sure that that is very much in the general national interest, besides the fact that the more that stock transfer procedures are simplified, the more it is possible for people more readily to comprehend them and thus to take part in processes of stock ownership which I have always believed, and which I know many of my hon. Friends have always believed, to be thoroughly desirable.
Question put and agreed to
Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed, without Amendment.

WILLS BILL
As amended (n the Standing Committee), considered.
3.5 p.m.
Mr. Michael Clark Hutchison: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
The Bill was fairly well considered in Standing Committee, but I think that it would be right for me to say a few words about it on Third Reading. The object of the Bill is to implement the recommendations of the Report of the Lord Chancellor's Private International Law Committee and to enable the United Kingdom to ratify The Hague Convention on Testamentary Dispositions. I am sure that hon. Members on both sides of the House will agree with me when I extend thanks to the members who sat on that Committee and produced the Report.
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Clearly, a major aim of the law relating to wills is that documents should be accepted as valid only when it can be said with reasonable certainty that they were executed by the testator with the intention of disposing of his assets after death or revoking previous dispositions of that nature. Equally, a document which fulfils these conditions ought to be regarded as valid, and it is a defect in the law if the document is excluded because of some technical imperfection of which the testator might not reasonably have been aware.
If a testator executing his will complies with the formal requirements of any system of law which he might assume to apply to his case, the will should be treated as valid. Equally, it is desirable that a will treated as valid in one country should be treated as valid in another, as a testator may have assets in more than one territory.
As I understand, at common law the form of a will was governed by the testator's domicile at the time of his death. But a major statutory change took place in 1861, when the Wills Act was passed. Under it, a will disposing of personal property is valid if made in accordance with the formal requirements of the law of the place in which it was executed or his domicile at the time of execution or his domicile of origin—if within Her Majesty's Dominions—in force at that time.
There were two defects in this situation. First, a distinction is made between real and personal property which is no longer necessary since the property legislation of 1925. Secondly, the Act makes a distinction between British subjects and others. As the Act became law in several Commonwealth countries it has become difficult to apply as the concept of British nationality has become much more complex over the years.
Accordingly, the Private International Law Committee recommended, and those attending The Hague Convention agreed, that a will will be held to be validly executed as regards form if it meets with the requirements of the internal law of the following: the place where it was made; the place of the testator's domicile; the country of the testator's nationality; the place where he had his

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habitual residence; or, so far as it disposes of land, the place where the land is situated.
Those are the short general principles and ideas underlying the Bill. If passed, as I hope it will be, the Bill will enable the United Kingdom to ratify the Convention, which I believe the Government are anxious to do, and, for those reasons, I very much hope that it will receive the support of hon. Members on both sides.
3.17 p.m.
Mr. Leslie Hale: This is obviously a very sensible and very desirable Measure, but there are one or two points which I should like to make. I think that I am right in saying that the Bill still has to go to another place and certainly I have no desire to stop its progress. If relevance is found in any of the observations which I have to make, there is a chance that they will be dealt with there.
I know that there is always a passion on the part of all reformers, when they introduce a useful Measure, to make it of almost universal application. I think that the provision introduced by Amendment in Committee in Clause 2(1, a) is a highly controversial and somewhat difficult provision which the courts will have very great difficulty in interpreting, applying or an understanding. One of the reasons for this is the insertion of the words "or other relevant circumstances", which have no definition at all. What is being said is that, if any man makes a will on board ship, it shall be valid if it is made in accordance with the law relating to that ship and that the law relating to that ship shall be ascertained, not only by reference to its country of registration, which in about four cases out of ten is Liberia, but by any "other relevant circumstances."
What "relevant circumstances" are I do not know. I do not know whether they are the nationality of the captain, the nationality of the owning company or the nationality of the flag of convenience; or whether in the case of the "Nancy" brig the fact that only one person remained and the rest of the crew were consumed by him and therefore their nationality had been absorbed in the process of mastication and became consolidated in that of the survivor. These are all matters which might
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have to be determined by a court, and I should have thought that Her Majesty's judges would express surprise on being called upon to say what was a relevant circumstance in connection with a voyage of Mr. Onassis' yacht in the Mediterranean, possibly under Liberian registration, with a French captain and a crew of international entertainers.
The words in Clause 2(1,b) were "real estate". The phrase has now become "immovable property", because, we are told, that is fully understood on the Continent, although it is not understood here. As I read the Clause, it means that if I as an Englishman make a will which is invalid in England and which attempts to dispose of real estate in Nigeria, if it is not executed according to English law it is invalid but that if it is executed in accordance with Nigerian law it shall be valid only in relation to the disposition of the property in Nigeria. That seems to be what it means and it raises some problems. If we are passing an Act to say that an invalid will can be valid in relation to one clause only because that one clause only, disposing of property outside the jurisdiction of the court determining the validity of the will, would operate to be an effective disposition of that property although all the rest of the Clauses were invalid, we are raising some problems.
My third point concerns Clause 4 There is no definition of "construction". I can well understand that "construction" in its normal meaning would mean the rules which a court would have to apply in ascertaining its meaning, and its meaning only, but in this sense one does not have to go very far to wonder whether "construction" also includes the application of our general laws, in particular provisions like the old Thelusson Act, the statute against perpetuities, and so on. Is it now possible under Clause 4 for someone to avoid all our laws against perpetuities and our restrictions on the disposition of estate to people who go a generation beyond the youngest descendant of the late Queen Victoria, which was the standard clause which was used in my time?
Will this make valid dispositions made by a well-to-do Englishman who has gone

889
on a yacht for the purpose in accordance with Clause 2(1, a), or on a liner or an aircraft, so that he can avoid some of the provisions of our law which restrict the disposition of property over a long period?
Clause 6(1) states:
" ' internal law' in relation to any territory or state means the law which would apply in a case where no question of the law in force in any other territory or state arose".
There is no provision about soldiers' wills, which are a case in point. The hon. Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Clark Hutchison) knows perfectly well that we have always had special provisions for testamentary dispositions by soldiers on active service.
I should have thought that a soldier on active service who was making a will in France in the course of a war against some other State was in a situation in which a question of the law of the territory in which he is stationed might arise and that, therefore, it would be desirable, proper and suitable to add words to say that nothing in this Bill should adversely affect our own provisions, because I do not see why a soldier's will should not have the benefit of the Bill. I do not want to be restricted by the Act in relation to the execution of a will made by a soldier on active service.
Subject to these small points, I am happy to give the Bill my individual blessing.
3.23 p.m.
Mr. Martin Maddan: I intervene on this rather technical and legal subject only to express shortly a few views by a non-lawyer. I was interested to hear that the Bill will take consequential action to bring provisions into line with something that was enacted in 1925. As a layman in these matters, I suggest that thirty-eight years is not too long a period to elapse to enable the lawyers fully to consider these matters. I say this to indicate that in my view the Bill is timely and, perhaps, in some senses overdue.
The hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) raised some interesting and, perhaps, important detailed points and I am sure that he will forgive me if I do not try to answer them. The hon. Member would not be very interested in my opinions. I hope, however, that my right hon. and
890
learned Friend the Attorney-General will answer them, or that my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Clark Hutchison) will deal with these points, some of which were of importance.
Underlying some of the points made by the hon. Member, however, was the view that British law in respect of wills is superior to that elsewhere. He seemed to fear that some of our provisions might be overthrown in bringing them into line with what is going on elsewhere. I think that we must beware of having too nationalistic, too proud, a view of our own excellence, because, after all, the legal systems of other countries have also had to face many difficult problems, and although they may have quite different ways of dealing with these matters, they may be just as good. I do not think that we should assume, if we have to change our methods of dealing with these problems, that we are necessarily going to be worse off. I hope that my right hon. and learned Friend, in replying to the debate, may confirm that.
I rose specially for this reason that, as I think is probably well known, I personally very much favour the broadening of national outlooks and attitudes into more international outlooks and attitudes and I think it is the duty of this House and of the Government to support and subscribe to The Hague Convention. I myself would be very pleased if the citizenship of live people were not too strictly determined within national boundaries, but at least I think that people who are dead should be internationalised and given international citizenship through the passage of the Bill.
Perhaps for that wider reason more than any other I welcome the Bill, and congratulate my hon. Friend on bringing it forward.
3.26 p.m.
Dr. Alan Glyn: I also wish to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Clark Hutchison). This is the second occasion today in private Members' time when we have been able, through the foresight of private Members, to implement international agreements and integrate them into our law.
I welcome the Bill from that point of view. It remedies certain anomalies, and by amending legal process enables the

891
wishes of testators not to be frustrated. For that reason, I particularly welcome the Bill. It will make very much simpler the making of wills and testaments by those people who live abroad and who are habitually resident abroad. I gather that one thing made clear by the Bill is that those habitually resident abroad are being brought in for the first time. I welcome that. I should like the Attorney-General to comment on that.
I noted with interest what the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) said, and I would just say to him that it is not necessary to travel in a ship or aircraft to make a will in order to travel in the company of entertainers. We have our entertainers here.
3.27 p.m.
Mr. G. R. Mitchison: I too, welcome the Bill, which has the support of both sides of the House.
I should like to take the opportunity also to welcome the right hon. and learned Gentleman on the Front Bench in the matter of this Bill which was originally introduced by an hon. Member on the other side of the House whose name is not on the Bill and who knew no more about it than what he read out shortly before four o'clock one Friday, and I talked it out. It has now reappeared.
But, really, the Government ought to take these matters a little more seriously. This is, after all, an international convention to which they are parties, and this is, in substance, their Bill. Personally, I think that it is entirely wrong that private Members should be called upon to give up private Members' time on a Friday to carry through things which the Government themselves ought to be able to put through. It is not as though this were a contentious matter, or one likely to take up much of the time of the House; but it is not the only one today.
I trust that those responsible for arranging the Government's timetables, to whatever party they belong, will pay a little more attention in future to enabling Her Majesty's Government to carry out their international obligations, and also to enable this House to put through non-contentious Measures of law reform which it seems incredibly
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difficult to find time for, except by asking private Members to provide it.
3.30 p.m.
The Attorney-General (Sir John Hobson): This is, of course, a private Member's Bill, and I should like to add my congratulations to those uttered by the other hon. Gentlemen who have spoken and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Clark Hutchison) upon having brought the Bill to this stage. The Government were represented by my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General during the Committee stage when some points were raised from the other side on this matter. Some improvements were made in the Bill during the Committee stage, when the Government gave their assistance to my hon. Friend, the promoter of the Bill.
So fair a wind has this Bill been given that it would be ungracious not to acknowledge the Government's gratitude to the pilot and give him their good wishes. The whole House will, I am sure, admire the facility and expedition with which he has managed the voyage, and its successful conclusion in this House is a matter of particular pleasure to all of us, because we understand that at the very outset of the voyage my hon. Friend had some difficulty in mustering a crew to carry the Bill through at that stage. Those little staffing difficulties were successfully overcome at the end, however, and with support from both sides of the House, not least from the hon. and learned Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hector Hughes), who took a part in the Committee, my hon. Friend's Measure is now well on its way towards the Statute Book without any of the disasters of the "Nancy" brig. I can see, Mr. Speaker, that if I pursue this metaphor further I may get into very deep water indeed.
I think the House would wish me, as there was no suitable opportunity on Second Reading for the courtesies common on these occasions, to thank also the Private International Law Committee of my noble Friend the Lord Chancellor, whose Fourth Report forms the basis of more than one of the provisions of the Bill. The fact that it reported as long ago as 1958 is not a cause of reproach to the Government and still less to my hon. Friend, since its recommendations

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involved negotiations with foreign countries which in due course were considered by the Hague Conference on Private International Law.
This seems to me a suitable opportunity to pay a tribute to the work of that Committee in general and to the members who produced the Fourth Report in particular. It may be of some interest to note that although it reported only five years ago, no fewer than three of its members have subsequently become High Court judges, one a judge of the International Court of Justice, and one Counsel to Mr. Speaker in this House. We congratulate them on their advancement. The Private International Law Committee seems to be a royal road to advancement. We regret their departure from it, but thank them once more for their labours in that respect.
Although for a number of reasons, one of them being quite conclusive, my hon. Friend was not able on Second Reading to expound to the House the essential object of the Bill and the effect of its detailed provisions, the House will not, I think, expect me to remedy the position now, and, indeed, I might well be thought to be out of order if I did so. But I think I ought to say that, as has been mentioned, the passing of the Bill will enable the United Kingdom to ratify The Hague Convention on the Conflict of Laws relating to the form of Testamentary Dispositions. This, I am sure, is a welcome advance, and it is something which this country ought to do, and we are very glad that the Bill will enable us to do so.
I am sure that the House will rejoice to see a Measure which is designed to preserve wills which might otherwise fail for a technical defect, because the Bill is dealing with the formalities of wills and not with the substance of them. I think that all lawyers, and many lay men, too, are familiar with a remark made by a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary when he said that as a result of a decision of the other place in its judicial capacity:
"I anticipate with satisfaction that henceforth the group of ghosts of dissatisfied testators, who, according to a late Chancery judge, wait on the other bank of the styx to receive the judicial personages who have misconstrued their wills, may be considerably diminished."
The hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) touched upon a very difficult point in connection with the Bill, and that is the question of wills which are made in aircraft and on ships. I know
894
not why anybody should ever want to make a will in an aircraft or on a ship, but some people may wish to do so. I should have thought that wise testators would have done so before they embarked on the journey; but should they wish to do so the position will be covered by the Bill.
This raises a very difficult problem in addition to those mentioned by the hon. Gentleman. People are travelling in space ships nowadays, and the exact nationality of a particular space ship might well raise a very nice question. It is, I concede, an extraordinarily difficult problem for the draftsmen. The solution that has been adopted is to make it a question of fact for the court to decide what country the vessel or aircraft ought to be taken to have been most closely connected with. I think we can leave it to the courts to determine that upon the basis of not only the registration of the vessel but any other circumstances which will assist the court in determining that particular question of fact.
Mr. Hale: The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that he did not know why people wanted to make a will in an aircraft. I had the privilege of flying in Western Australia with a gentleman called George in a two-engined aircraft and it was recorded that one of his passengers said on being informed that one engine was out of order "What happens when the other goes out of order?" George said "This is when we find out whether that fellow Newton was right. That is when you want to scribble a will".
The Attorney-General: I am astonished that the hon. Gentleman, with his professional experience and skill, should embark on journeys of that sort without making provision beforehand, or at least without having taken the sensible decision to die intestate.
One other point that the hon. Gentleman raised was the question of soldier's wills. I can assure him that soldier's wills will not be affected in any way. The provisions for soldier's wills will remain as they are. This Bill deals only with formalities and does not touch that question.
The other questions that he has raised I have no doubt will be considered by

895
my hon. Friend who is promoting this Bill and by others to see whether it is necessary as a result of the points he raised that some improvement should or ought to be made.
Finally, although as an English lawyer I do not pretend to understand the subtleties of Scottish law that are dealt with in Clause 5, the Scottish element in my blood is warmed by the knowledge that we find in this Bill, whose promoter and all its supporters represent constituencies north of the Border, some small room for a provision dealing specifically with Scotland, which will, I am informed by the Lord Advocate, be of use in that country. With those few words, I commend my hon. Friend's Measure to the House and congratulate him again on his efforts thus far.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

PERFORMERS' PROTECTION BILL [Lords]
3.38 p.m.
Not amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.
Mr. Ronald Bell: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I have to confess—I use the word in the light of what has been said—that this is a Bill the purpose of which is to allow Her Majesty's Government to ratify an international convention. I hope that this Bill will bring no sorrow to the mind of the hon. and learned Gentleman for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison). I confess to him that this is the second time that I have done this, although not actually in this Session of Parliament.
However, I would suggest to him that we ought not to accept too readily the assumption, which is assiduously encouraged by executive Governments these days, that the function of initiating legislation in Parliament somehow belongs especially to the Executive and that no Bill of any major significance ought to be introduced by a private Member. I think that is a dangerous heresy. Whether we should allow Governments to introduce Bills into the legislature at all, I do not know. It is a point that we
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might consider one day, but I am sure that they ought not to have a monopoly.
This Bill was introduced in another place by my noble Friend Lord Mancroft, who piloted it through there with his usual skill, and in looking after its progress in this House I have found myself immersed in a subject of enormous complexity, a branch of the law in which I am happy to think that I am not normally called upon to offer opinions to anybody.
It is, however, a modest Bill in its scope, although the subject with which it deals is complicated. The law of international copyright is primarily regulated by two international conventions. The first is the extremely well-known Berne Convention of 1886, which forms the substratum of this subject but of which the United States was never a signatory. The second is the more recent Universal Copyright Convention of 1952, which provided a bridge between the United States and countries signatory to the Berne Convention.
But these conventions deal only with the rights of authors, an expression which for this purpose includes writers, composers of music, film makers and artists. But they do not include such people as performers, makers of gramophone records and broadcasting organisations. The copyright for these ancillary persons—performers—has not been adequately protected in the past by the two main copyright conventions.
In order to deal with this gap, a diplomatic convention was held in Rome in October, 1961, to draw up a new agreement upon the subject, and this resulted in the International Convention for the Protection of Performers, Producers of Phonograms and Broadcasting Organisations. That splended word "phonogram" is fortunately defined in Article III of the Convention as meaning
"…any exclusively aural fixation of sounds of a performance or of other sounds…"
which I am sure makes the whole thing extremely clear, and "producer of phonograms" means
"…person who or legal entity which first fixes the sound of a performance or other sound".
This again carries the matter one stage further. The House will perhaps be relieved to know that in English law we have not found it necessary to use the expression "phonogram" at all, and that it does not appear in this Bill.

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The scale of the Rome Convention is, therefore, fairly ample. It covers a considerable branch of the law. Hon. Members may wonder how we can fulfil our obligations under the Convention by so short and modest a Bill. The explanation is one which is rather satisfactory and pleasing to us. It is that the Convention very largely reflects the English law on the subject and that the English participants played a very considerable part in drawing it up.
Accordingly, while the other signatories—it was signed by 25 countries—may have substantial alterations to make in their domestic law in order to be able to ratify the Convention, we have to make only a very few marginal adjustments in our legal provisions.
We mainly rely on the Copyright Act, 1956, for the regulation of copyright, a system under which we give to the author or producer of a work of art a kind of industrial property in his production. Performers, as distinct from authors, are not protected in that way by the grant of a property right or copyright but by an Act known as the Dramatic and Musical Performers Protection Act, 1958, which makes it a criminal offence to record or broadcast a performance of a performer without his written consent.
The performer does not have a copy-right, but it is made a criminal offence to pirate his performance, and that, of course, puts him in a bargaining position in relation to broadcasting organisations or gramophone record makers so that he can strike his bargain by contract with them. Unless they get his consent by contract, they would be guilty of a criminal offence if they pirated his performance.
Mr. Graham Page: Are Members of Parliament performers and thus protected?
Mr. Bell: My experience of my colleagues on both sides of the House is that they are not terribly anxious to restrict the reproduction of any of their artistic efforts. However, I hope that my hon. Friend will not ask me any too difficult questions on this subject, because, although I shall do my best, in this highly specialised branch of the law, it would be best if I confined myself to an exposition of what the Con-
898
vention and the Bill do rather than why they do it.
That is a method of using the criminal law. The 1958 Act is a consolidation Act. It was in 1925 that the main provisions were introduced. They were amended in the 1950s and consolidated in 1958. The 1958 Act is the principal Act referred to in the Bill, whose provisions take the form of minor changes in the wording of the 1958 Act.
Perhaps I may refer to the Bill because it passed Second Reading on the nod and inevitably the Committee stage had to be rather formal, because one cannot amend in any material particular a Bill which is to enable one to ratify an international convention. In a way, therefore, this is the first chance which I have had to explain the Bill's purport to the House.
In Clause 1(1) the definition of the Dramatic and Musical Performers Protection Act, 1958, is extended. The principal Act refers to a performance of dramatic or musical work, but the Bill replaces that by references to the
"performance of any actors, singers, musicians, dancers or other persons who act, sing deliver, declaim, play in or otherwise perform, literary, dramatic, musical or artistic works…"
The House will see that that is a wide definition.
Mr. Leslie Hale: Can the hon. Gentleman tell me whether this international convention is available in the Vote Office, because these words include everything? They include a weather report. They would apparently include the noble Lord, whose recent television appearance was the subject of some comment, in almost every possible capacity—declaiming and acting, drama and the theatre and everything. Is there anything left out? Is not every word ever said on the B.B.C. covered by it? Is there any reproduction, other than by Hertzian waves, which is not included in the definition?
Mr. Bell: If the hon. Member will listen to me, I was coming to Hertzian waves in a moment. I can reassure him because nearly all the words are common to the Bill and the Act. The material difference is that in the principal Act it is

899
"dramatic or musical work" and in the Bill it is
"literary, dramatic, musical or artistic".
All this business about singers or people who sing—an interesting distinction—and, even more damaging, actors or persons who act, with the slur which appears to be implied in those distinctions, is common both to the Bill and the Act, and at ten minutes to four on a Friday I do not think that we need to inquire further into them. There it is. It is the difference between dramatic or musical, and literary, dramatic, musical or artistic. That is Clause 1, to carry out the Rome Convention.
I turn now to Clause 2 which fills a small gap in our English law, which is covered by the Convention, because by English law it is only an offence to make a record without the written consent of the performer in this country. By this Clause it will be an offence to sell or distribute in this country a record made without the permission of the performer in some other country where it has been made in contravention of either the civil or criminal law of that country. That is the short point, and I hope that I need not amplify it.
I come next to the matter which is of particular interest to the hon. Member for Oldham, East (Mr. Hale), this question of Hertzian waves. Clause 3 extends the protection which at the moment applies only to broadcasts by Hertzian waves to cases where the pirating is carried out by line transmission. This does not apply to re-transmission by line of a broadcast performance, but to an original pirating by line transmission. I confess that it is difficult to imagine circumstances in which a performer's performance would be reproduced without his permission by line transmission without ever having been part of a broadcast first, but this is the sort of thing which the law has to cover.
Mr. Martin Maddan: After the introduction of pay-T.V. it would be very applicable, and I think that the provision is most timely.
Mr. Bell: I do not want to get involved in a controversy about pay-television, but I see the point about the applicability of that to Clause 3.
900
Clause 4 is an Amendment added to the Bill in another place just to make doubly sure, though it is perhaps scarcely necessary, that if permission purports to be given by somebody who has no right to give it, and therefore purports, fraudulently, to give it, that is a criminal offence.
Those are the only four provisions in the Bill. They are modest provisions to enable this country to ratify an international Convention. The reason for this is that the other 24 countries who have to make the changes are basically adopting the English law on the subject. We have been pioneers in this sphere, and I think that we can derive some degree of satisfaction from this fact. It would be nothing more than an act of courtesy to the other countries who have ratified the Convention on that basis to take a legislative step which will enable us to ratify the Convention.
Mr. Eric Lubbock: Will the hon. Gentleman say whether the record made by "Private Eye" last year of the Prime Minister singing rock and roll would be within the law under this Bill?
Mr. Bell: I did not hear that record, but it sounds as though it must have been a phonogram.
3.54 p.m.
Mr. Leslie Hale: I thought that the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade was going to rise to help the House with an explanation of the Bill. I waited for him to do that, because I do not understand this Measure.
The hon. Member for Buckinghamshire, South (Mr. Ronald Bell), who has introduced this interesting Bill, has been foremost among those who have demanded that on Fridays no Bill should be passed without adequate consideration. His action in taking14 minutes out of the 20 which were allotted for the discussion of this Bill places us in a difficulty. I regard it as a most worrying Measure, and I had hoped to hear the Minister speak before I did so, because I do not profess to understand the details of this Bill.
When the whole question of performing rights was discussed during the term of office of the Labour Government from 1945 to 1951, I am on record as saying that the Performing Right Society, which may be an estimable one, used to use the

901
heavy club of litigation very cruelly against people who played gramophones in public places, or who invited friends in to listen to the gramophone. These rights were enforced by the issue of writs in the Chancery Division, by the claim of a modest sum and very large costs.
This is a very arbitrary right, which can operate very severely, and in respect of which anyone transgressing has virtually no possibility of explanation or reply. When one receives a writ from the Chancery Division, claiming two guineas as a copyright fee for having transmitted a gramophone record in the bar of a public house, it is obvious that any solicitor whom one consults will say, "You may have a defence, but by the time that you have established it it will cost you a great deal more than this. You had perhaps better pay the money and be done with it."
Now we are asked to ratify an international convention which is not in the Vote Office—
Mr. Bell: The hon. Member is wrong about that. It is Cmnd. 1635, and has been in the Vote Office for fifteen months.
Mr. Hale: That may be so, but it should be available for today. Those of us who do not take part in international meetings or conventions hear of these matters only when we arrive at Westminster on a Friday. The principal Act which was passed in 1958 itself seemed open to objection. I did not take part in the discussion on it.
Mr. Bell: I realise that there is little time, but it is my task to explain the Bill. I must point out that this is a Bill which gives the performer rights against the gramophone or broadcasting company. It does not affect the public. Members of the public have to get their permission to rebroadcast from the gramophone or wireless company. The Bill protects the performer as against the company.
Mr. Hale: It creates two criminal offences, one of which is a very surprising one, and it provides for an astonishing state of the law in the matter of the giving of written consent for a public performance. It also provides for the prosecution of a person who gives a public performance. I do not wish to obstruct the Bill, if there is adequate time to discuss it, but we have
902
reached a situation in which the Minister has not made any observations on behalf of the Government; my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) has not yet made any observations, and in which there are only two or three minutes left. I do not think that it is possible for the House to let this Measure go through today after this limited discussion, when we do not know what is the full significance of the Convention or of the implication of the use of these tremendously wide-ranging words.
I notice the word "declaim". Is that in the Act of 1958? I have never noticed the use of that word in previous legislation in respect of a limit upon the right of reproduction. The hon. Member said that we could not imagine line transmission of anything except through a broadcasting company, but every factory has line transmission and radio-communication—and most offices have. We can disseminate things over any form of radio-telephone. The hon. Member says that this applies only to gramophone companies.
I must be frank; I object to obstruction, and I am not obstructing, but this is too complex a Measure altogether. My hon. and learned Friend made the point, which is a fair one, that the use of Fridays for the ratification of international conventions, by way of Bills introduced by private Members on behalf of the Government, results in private Members who have their own Measures being deprived of their time and of a chance of having those Measures discussed. It is a method by which controversial Measures can be shelved and discussion can be shelved. I have assisted in the passage of two Measures today, one of which ratified an international convention, but I say sincerely that this Measure strikes me as being of very great complexity and as raising issues which need full discussion.
I submit that on another Friday we shall have the opportunity of discussing it. I will do no more, on any other Friday, than try to discover what are the implications of the Bill and how far it relates—
It being Four o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.
Debate to be resumed upon Monday next.

PUBLIC LAVATORIES (TURNSTILES) BILL
As amended (in the Standing Committee), considered; read the Third time and passed.

TRAVEL AGENCIES (REGISTRATION) BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Mr. Speaker: What day? No instruction.

GIPSY CAMPS (COMPENSATION) BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Mr. Speaker: What day? No instruction.

SERVICE DISABILITY PENSIONS BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Second Reading deferred till Friday, 5th July.

INDUSTRIAL DISEASES (BYSSINOSIS) BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Second Reading deferred till Friday, 5th July.

NATIONAL INSURANCE ACT 1957 (AMENDMENT) BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Second Reading deferred till Friday, 5th July.

HIRE-PURCHASE (LIMITATION OF PAYMENTS) BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Second Reading deferred till Friday next.

PRIVATE HOUSE OWNERS PROTECTION (BILL)
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Mr. Speaker: What day? No instruction.

PUBLIC ORDER ACT 1936 (AMENDMENT) BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Mr. Speaker: What day? No instruction.

REDUNDANT WORKERS (SEVERANCE PAY) BILL
Order read for resuming adjourned debate on Second Reading [3rd May.]
Hon. Members: Object.
Mr. Speaker: What day? No instruction.

PUBLIC SERVICE VEHICLES (TRAVEL CONCESSIONS) ACT 1955 (AMENDMENT) BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Mr. Speaker: What day? No instruction.

PUBLIC HEALTH ACT 1961 (AMENDMENT) BILL
Order for Second Reading read.
Hon. Members: Object.
Mr. Speaker: What day? No instruction.

DRUGS ADVISORY BOARD BILL
Order read for resuming adjourned debate on Second Reading [17th May].
Hon. Members: Object.
Mr. Speaker: What day? No instructions.

TRANSPORT (BIRMINGHAM DIPPED LIGHTS EXPERIMENT)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. F. Pearson.]
4.2 p.m.
Mr. Leonard Cleaver: I wish to draw the attention of the House to the success of the City of Birmingham's dipped headlights experiment, and I will explain how it came to be made, describe it and then draw one or two conclusions from the result thereof.
With the object of endeavouring to take some action to reduce the appalling accident rate in the City of Birmingham as shown by the figures for the year 1961, it was decided that for a fortnight motorists should be asked to drive with their headlights on and dipped, and not with their sidelights on only. This scheme resulted in such a fall in the casualty rate and there was such cooperation from motorists—and it was welcomed so wholeheartedly by pedestrians—that it was decided to hold a much longer experiment for five months from the end of October, 1962.
This pilot scheme had shown that the discomfort of being followed by dipped headlights or meeting opposed dipped headlights was not sufficient to prevent their use by the majority of road users. It had clearly intimated that the use of dipped headlights would reduce the accident and casualty rates, but it was felt that the short period of the experiment and the good weather which had attended it did not allow the scheme to prove conclusively that dipped headlights would save lives in all weather conditions. It was decided, therefore, to carry out a long winter experiment from October, 1962, to March, 1963.
The scheme was supported by the R.A.C., the Automobile Association, the Pedestrians' Association, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, the police, the city authorities, the Road Research Laboratory and also the Traffic Department of the Birmingham University. Moreover, publicity was given to it by the Press and on television and notices were erected on all radial roads leading into Birmingham.
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As a result of this propaganda—and, more important, the co-operation of motorists—whereas before the scheme was introduced less than 5 per cent. were using dipped headlights on well-lit roads and about 10 per cent. on badly-lit roads, these figures increased to 50 per cent. using dipped headlights on well-lit roads and 70 per cent. on badly-lit roads by the end of the experiment. At the same time, the flashing of headlights in retaliation to dipped headlights became a thing of the past, and very soon after the campaign had commenced, and as motorists began to appreciate the advantages of driving in this way—in fact, the longer the campaign continued—the greater became the number of motorists co-operating.
The results were absolutely remarkable. During the experiment, there were 138 fewer accidents—a reduction of 16·9 per cent.; 19 fewer fatalities—a reduction of 49 per cent.;. 84 fewer injuries—a reduction of 8·5 per cent.; 16 fewer pedestrians killed—a reduction of 66 per cent.—and a reduction of 63 per cent. among those over 60; 28 fewer pedestrians injured—a reduction of 9·2 per cent. All those figures are in comparison with the figures for the same period in the year 1961–62. There is no doubt that a large proportion of these reductions was made possible through the use of dipped headlights.
There are three factors on which the success of the experiment must be judged: first, the overall reduction of accidents relative to previous years, and to other cities; secondly, the specific cause of accidents; and, thirdly, the possible deterioration of driving due to alleged glare. On all these counts, the experiment was a success. The reduction of accidents was 16·9 per cent., and of pedestrians killed at night, 55 per cent. In only three out of 677 accidents was glare alleged to be a contributing factor.
A comparison with four other major cities—Glasgow, Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds—shows that night accidents per 100,000 registered vehicles for the same period of 22 weeks were: Birmingham, 312; Leeds, 518; Manchester, 683; Liverpool, 783; and Glasgow, 765. The only city to carry out a dipped headlight campaign was Birmingham, with that excellent record of 312.
The opinion of the public was also sought during the experiment. The

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Highways and Traffic Engineering School of Birmingham University asked members of the public to complete a questionnaire. A report compiled from the answers showed that in answer to the question:
"Do you feel that dipped headlights give you a better warning of the approach of a vehicle?"
93 per cent. of motorists and 92 per cent. of pedestrians were of the opinion that dipped headlights did give them a better warning of the approach of a vehicle. In addition, 60 per cent. of motorists and cyclists and about 80 per cent. of pedestrians expressed themselves in favour of all moving vehicles using dipped headlights at night on well-lit streets.
Some people are afraid that driving on dipped headlights will cause a lot of discomfort because of dazzle. The plain fact is that there will be no dazzle provided one's headlights are aimed properly, so that the beam does not strike the driver of the oncoming car. In view of this, it was considered important to ascertain whether motorists' headlights were aimed properly, and whether their electrical equipment was in an efficient condition.
For this purpose, 72 garages co-operated in carrying out checks on headlight aim during the campaign, and about 1,000 cars were checked in this way. Unfortunately, only 35 per cent. were found to be aimed correctly; 19 per cent. were found to be aimed too high, and 40 per cent. were found to be aimed too low.
To sum up, the experiment has been a complete success, as is shown by the reduction in all types of accidents. The lessons that have been learned are these. It is a great advantage, particularly to old people, to be able to see clearly a vehicle when it is approaching. Sidelights alone cannot be seen and when they can be seen it is extremely difficult to judge the distance they are away and decide whether the vehicle is moving and if so at what speed. The driver gets a better view of the road. He is able to see pedestrians more easily, as the majority wear dark clothing and cannot be seen easily with the use of sidelights only. He will be able to pick up the reflectors of other traffic on the road, such as bicycles and lorries, whereas reflectors do not reflect from sidelights.
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It is an interesting fact that a reflector can then be seen as much as five times further away when headlights are used. Motorists also get better vision, enabling them to see all cyclists and parked cars. They can also see better in dark shadows between pools of light, and particularly when pedestrians step into the road. Dipped headlights help too at cross-roads and give warning of the approach of another vehicle.
Finally, the experiment has shown that the essential point to remember is that by using dipped headlights motorists can see and can be seen by other road users. The sponsors of this scheme would like this method to be adopted over the whole country, so that it would be known that when one saw a vehicle with its headlights on it was a moving vehicle and that when one saw a vehicle with its sidelights on only one would know that it was stationary. If this could happen it could contribute immensely to the safety of our roads.
The imposition of the 50 m.p.h. speed limit resulted in a reduction in the number of fatalities by 34 per cent. The Birmingham dipped headlights scheme resulted in a fall of 49 per cent. in the death rate. Therefore, if the speed limit is worthy of regulation, how much more is the use of dipped headlights which have proved themselves over 22 weeks and not just over a few weekends. Inquiries have shown that 60 per cent. of pedestrians favour the use of dipped headlights on all vehicles, even in well-lit streets, and over 90 per cent. of all classes of road users feel that dipped headlights give them better warning of the approach of a vehicle.
I ask the Minister, therefore, to make the use of dipped headlights at night compulsory in the United Kingdom next winter, either by temporary regulation or by a voluntary national campaign sponsored by the Ministry. I estimate that a national campaign would save at least 950 lives and prevent 15,000 injuries. These figures have been compiled by applying the Birmingham reductions to the national casualty figures for 1961–62. I hope that we can have an early decision on this matter. These experiments take some time to organise, and if we have to wait until August it might well be too late for anything to be done this winter.
Not only are Birmingham citizens convinced that this method of driving is the

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safest but many coroners and judges, whose duty it is to deal with the aftermath of the carnage on our roads, are constantly advocating the use of dipped headlights. For example, the coroner at Middleton in June last, when bringing in a verdict of "Accidental Death" on a motor cyclist said:
"Here again is an example where dipped headlights might have saved a life."
Again, the deputy coroner of Leicester said in May that a motorist might have seen a man lying in the road had he been driving on dipped headlights. Unfortunately, he was not, with tragic results.
Mr. Justice Glyn Jones said in the High Court:
"With street lights, shop windows and advertisements, little sidelights on an approaching car are missed over and over again. That is why I think it is quite a good thing for motorists to drive on dipped headlights, not for their own benefit but so that they are more clearly visible."
I understand the Minister to be waiting for a report from the Road Research Laboratory. I should have thought the information given by the Birmingham experiment was quite sufficient to justify him taking action straight away. It is really remarkable that when 80 million out of 125 million motorists in the world already drive on dipped headlights, we have to experiment about it.
This method of driving with dipped headlights on has proved over an extended period to have reduced the death and casualty rates on the streets of the City of Birmingham. If applied nationally it could do the same thing. We cannot afford to ignore any means whereby we can make our roads safer for motorist and pedestrian alike. The remedy to many accidents is at the motorist's finger tips. He should put his headlights on. I ask the Minister to make it compulsory for him to do so.
4.16 p.m.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport (Vice-Admiral John Hughes Hallett): I wish, first, to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Mr. Cleaver) for the interest which he has taken in the safety of road users at night. It was in pursuit of this interest that he played a leading part in organising the first experiment which was carried out in Birmingham last year between 12th and
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25th March. Although that experiment was too short to provide any conclusive results, all concerned were agreed that a further experiment should be held lasting throughout the winter months.
My hon. Friend has given us a most interesting and informative account of this further experiment. May I say on behalf of my right hon. Friend that we are grateful to him for what he has done, and also to the other authorities and bodies which helped in making the arrangements. In this connection, I should like to mention the then Lord Mayor of Birmingham, Alderman Ernest Horton, and the chief constable, Mr. Dodd. Their work in support of the experiment has been invaluable.
The Highway and Traffic Engineering School of Birmingham University also made a very valuable contribution by collecting the material for a report on public opinion about the experiment. I should also like to mention the work done by Messrs. Joseph Lucas who, incidentally, I understand, arranged a free service of headlamp adjustment to prevent dazzle by dipped headlights.
Before going on to talk about the experiment itself there is one point that I must make. There is no substitute for good night vision and constant alertness to ensure safety on the roads at night. We in the Ministry of Transport do what we can by helping to improve street lighting and by making regulations about the lighting that vehicles must carry, but these do not relieve anyone using the roads at night, be he pedestrian, cyclist or driver, of his individual responsibility.
In considering the Birmingham experiment I want to make it clear to the House what my right hon. Friend hopes will be gained by it. He hopes that it will help him to decide what use to make of his new powers under the Road Traffic Act, 1962, so as to promote greater safety on our roads.
Perhaps I could say a word about the present position. At present the only condition imposed on drivers at night is to use their sidelights. There is as yet no requirement for any vehicle to carry headlamps in any circumstances. The only regulations about headlamps are those laying down the conditions they must comply with if they are used, including the prevention of dazzle which is, of course, very important.

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The present practice which drivers should follow at night in city streets is set out in Rule 50 of the Highway Code which advises the use of dipped headlamps at night in built-up areas unless the street lighting is good. In practice, not many drivers use headlights when there is any street lighting. There is, of course, something to be said for leaving the matter to individual judgment where street lighting is good because the standard of night vision varies so greatly from one person to another. Nevertheless, we do not think these provisions go far enough.
My right hon. Friend therefore obtained additional powers in the Road Traffic Act, 1962. These new powers are contained in Section 15 of that Act. They enable my right hon. Friend to require vehicles to carry headlamps; to prescribe the conditions with which they must comply; and the circumstances in which they must be used. My right hon. Friend is, as I have said, looking to the results of the Birmingham experiment to help him in the exercise of these powers. He attaches great importance to this question of controlling the use of headlamps. It is too early to forecast what regulations will be made under these powers. I can, however, say that there is certainly a case for requiring the use of headlamps on unlit roads. In deciding what regulations are desirable in towns we shall certainly be assisted by the results of the experiment which has been conducted in Birmingham.
May I say a word about pedestrians? One thing I think is clear: the use of headlamps often helps pedestrians. It has been pointed out that it is difficult for them to judge the speed of an approaching vehicle at night when all they can see is two points of light from its side lamps. A moving patch of light thrown on the roadway by dipped headlights is much more helpful. Yet even here a word of caution is necessary, since a pedestrian, after seeing a mass of headlamps, might perhaps fail to notice a bicycle.
As my hon. Friend stated, the Lord Mayor of Birmingham has sent a most interesting interim report to my right hon. Friend giving considerable detailed information about what happened in Birmingham during the period of the experiment. Some of the figures in that report are most encouraging. We have heard them from my hon. Friend. But
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we must be careful about making an appreciation of the actual results. It is probable that the mere fact of the experiment taking place had some effect. It may be that the publicity which it was given and the safety consciousness which the experiment inspired in both the public and the police played a part in reducing the accident figures. Another difficulty lies in the fact that on average only about 60 per cent. of the drivers in Birmingham used their headlamps. It has unfortunately not been possible in every case to distinguish between cars which used their headlamps and those which did not.
To arrive at an objective assessment we need to know how the experience in Birmingham compares with what happened in other districts. I know that certain comparative figures are contained in the report. The Road Research Laboratory has been asked to make an investigation of accident statistics both for Birmingham itself and for selected control areas. The Laboratory is also analysing the accident figures by reference to the standard of street lighting in various Birmingham streets. We hope to have its report very soon, and that it will be possible for it to be published during the Summer Recess. We are grateful to the Road Research Laboratory for undertaking this task with dispatch.
Until we have the Laboratory's report it would clearly be wrong for me to express any views to the House about the results of the experiment. What I can say is that the decrease in casualties, and particularly in fatal casualties, during the experiment is most welcome. However, work already done by the Road Research Laboratory shows that the fall in night-time accidents was accompanied by an almost identical fall in day-time accidents. This is just one reason for awaiting the Laboratory's full report before we attempt to form conclusions.
My right hon. Friend suggested that if the evidence of the Birmingham experiment does not prove to be conclusive we should have a nation-wide experiment, making the use of dipped headlamps at night compulsory throughout the country next winter. Similarly, it is being suggested that an experiment should be

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carried out covering the whole of the Metropolitan Police District. I do not wish to pre-judge the Road Research Laboratory's conclusions, but I must say that if further experiment is shown to be necessary, I do not think that this would be the best form in which to carry it out. To obtain the best results we should probably need a carefully controlled experiment covering an area small enough to permit more detailed study. Other similar areas where conditions were normal would then have to be selected for study so that a true comparison could be made. In any case, it is premature to consider a further experiment until we have a full evalution of the Birmingham one.
I must, however, add a word of caution. Even if it were proved conclusively that accidents were substantially reduced as a direct result of using dipped headlights, we should still have to think carefully before making their use compulsory everywhere. It would be a major departure from existing policy to make dipped headlamps compulsory on all roads after lighting-up time regardless of the standard of street lighting. But
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anything short of that would involve yet another classification of roads within built-up areas, together with suitable signs to indicate where dipped headlamps would be required. We should also have to consider the adequacy of batteries and electrical equipment if vehicles had to be used in urban traffic with their headlamps switched on all the time.
We hear much nowadays of the harrying of the motorist and we really would have to be convinced of the necessity for such action before imposing additional burdens upon him, both, perhaps, financially and by adding yet one more to the list of offences for which he can be punished. But, as I have said, before we go further we must await the report of the Road Research Laboratory. At this stage, therefore, I can only repeat our appreciation of the valuable work which has been done in Birmingham and thank my hon. Friend again for raising this interesting and important subject today.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at twenty-six minutes past Four o'clock.

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

MR. PROFUMO'S RESIGNATION: SECURITY SERVICE INQUIRY
11.5 a.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD DILHORNE): My Lords, it may be convenient to the House if I repeat a statement which is now being made by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister in another place. I will use his own words, and they are as follows:
"With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement.
"Since the debate on Monday, I have considered, as promised by my right honourable friend the Leader of the House, the form of a further inquiry into the security implications of the events leading to Mr. Profumo's resignation. I think it is generally agreed that there should be an investigation in the light of this case into the operation of the security service and their relationship with the police in connection with matters of national security. The Government intend to establish an inquiry for this purpose. But before I describe it there are certain other questions which I must now bring to the attention of the House.
"It will be within the knowledge of many honourable Members that, in connection with the recent episode, rumours are circulating which affect the honour and integrity of public life in this country and, if they were true, might point to a security risk. Such a situation cannot be tolerated. I have therefore decided that the public interest requires us to establish a Judicial inquiry.
"Lord Denning, the Master of the Rolls, has agreed to conduct this inquiry and to render his report to me as soon as possible. His terms of reference will be as follows:
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"'To examine in the light of the circumstances leading to the resignation of the former Secretary of State for War, Mr. J. D. Profumo, the operation of the security service and the adequacy of their co-operation with the police in matters of security; to investigate any information or material which may come to his attention in this connection and to consider any evidence there may be for believing that national security has been, or may be, endangered; and to report thereon.'
"In the course of the discussion with the Leader of the Opposition I have explained to him the reasons for which the Government believe that in the circumstances with which we are now confronted this inquiry should be of a Judicial character and should cover a wider field.
"When I receive the report I will discuss it with the right honourable gentleman. The Government will then decide the form in which it should be published, whether in whole or in part."
My Lords, that concludes the statement.
EARL ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble and learned Lord who sits on the Woolsack for having given the Government's statement. Obviously, there is no blame upon him or anybody else because it was only a few minutes ago that I knew the statement was going to be made in this House, but I have not had time to have adequate consultation upon its very important contents. The need for clearing up the facts which have arisen in the course of recent events is generally accepted. I gather that there has been considerable discussion between the Leader of the Opposition in another place and the Prime Minister, to which of course I was not a party and I do not know anything about it; they were all private conversations. But I should imagine, from what I have been able to ascertain in the course of a few minutes only, that there is bound to be some criticism on the part of my Leader in another place, with regard to both the narrowness of the terms of reference and the difficulties that will attend upon any single judge in this matter, although, of course, in this House we have very full and great confidence in the Master of the Rolls, the noble Lord, Lord Denning. Generally speaking, I am

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not in a position this morning to offer any detailed comment and something further may have to be raised later on, perhaps some time before the actual inquiry commences. So, if the noble and learned Lord will excuse me, I should like to hold open the possibility that I may raise the matter at some other time.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, may I just say this in reply to the noble Earl the Leader of the Opposition? I am sorry not to have been able to give him more notice of this statement and its contents, and I appreciate his difficulty in dealing with it at such short notice. I think when he comes to examine carefully the terms of reference that I have read out, he will agree it would not be right to describe them as narrow. Of course, if the noble Earl wishes to raise any further points with me about this matter, I shall be only too glad to answer him in regard to them.
LORD REA: My Lords, I naturally find myself in a very similar position to that of the noble Earl who leads the Opposition. I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack for what he said, and grateful for his last remarks, which I take it may apply to me as well as to the noble Earl.
Perhaps I might ask one or two questions, not for immediate answer but to indicate what is in some of our minds. Towards the end of the statement I believe the noble and learned Lord said that the inquiry should be of a judicial character and covering a wider field. I am not quite clear what the word "wider" refers to and what is narrower than the field it proposes to cover.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I can answer that. First of all, I can assure the noble Lord that most careful consideration has been given to the form this inquiry should take. The Government have come to the conclusion that it must be in all the circumstances, which I will not expand now, a judicial inquiry. The reference to the wider form of inquiry really means this. At the end of the debate in another place the statement was made that an inquiry would be held into the purely security aspect. The noble Lord will see when he examines the terms of reference that the first part of them deals with that, and then they continue:
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"To investigate any information or material which may come to his attention in this connection, and to consider any evidence there may be for believing that national security has been or may be endangered, and to report thereon."
It is that part to which the adjective "wider" is applied, and I think perhaps I have now said enough to indicate and to support my statement that that particular part of the terms of reference really cannot be described as "narrow".
LORD REA: My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble and learned Lord for his kind explanation, which answers my query. I agree with the noble Earl that we cannot possibly enter into a debate on it. But might I suggest to the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack just one or two small points which may arise? I think all of us want to know whether this judicial court of inquiry will have power to subpoena witnesses; whether it can call for documents; whether the evidence and the witnesses giving that evidence will be privileged in the normal sense, and also, perhaps more particularly, those who are conducting what might be called the prosecution (if that is the right word) in the judicial inquiry, who would normally he the Law Officers of the Crown. In the circumstances of this matter, which has been going on for the last week, these gentlemen appear in a certain light which certainly all of us would like to be cleared up; and I wonder whether it is quite suitable that they should be involved in the prosecuting side of an inquiry rather than as witnesses in the normal way.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, with regard to the last question, the noble Lord has in mind, of course, an inquiry set up under the Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act, 1921. This judicial inquiry will not, certainly at its outset, be under that Act, and there is, so far as I am aware, no intention of the Law Officers of the Crown taking part in the investigation, which will be conducted by Lord Denning. With regard to the other questions which the noble Lord raised, at an inquiry of this kind at the outset the learned Judge presiding, the Master of the Rolls, will not have power to compel the attendance of witnesses or the production of documents. But the position is this: that if he finds

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that he has difficulty in getting what he wants, he will report to the Prime Minister and the question will be considered. I think, in the light of comments that have been made in relation to recent inquiries under the Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act, it is right that we should, initially at any rate, start upon the new procedure which was outlined and suggested by my right honourable friend in the course of the debate on the Vassall Inquiry and see how that goes. But if the learned Judge, the Master of the Rolls, has any difficulty in conducting a proper investigation through lack of powers, I have no doubt that he will report to my right honourable friend and the position will be reconsidered.
LORD REA: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble and learned Lord for his clarifying, and to some extent reassuring, remarks.
EARL ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I must say that the more I listened to that explanation the more am I anxious to find out what is the exact position in another place. I think we shall know within an hour or two, and then perhaps I may have something more to say about it. Perhaps I could approach the Lord Chancellor.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I fully appreciate that, and of course I will do my best to deal with, and answer, any paints that the noble Earl, or indeed anyone else, wishes to raise with regard to this matter.
THE EARL OF SANDWICH: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend the Lord Chancellor to explain a little more, if he can, the phrase "national security" referred to in the terms of reference? Is it to carry, in this instance, the ordinary meaning of the word in relation to external dangers—the question of Communist subversion from overseas—or has it, on this occasion, some internal content: the maintenance and the coherence of our society, public morale, and so on?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I do not think that it really falls upon me to define the content of the words "national security". I think it requires to be given the widest content that those words possibly carry.

STATUTE LAW REVISION (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to revise the Statute Law of Scotland by repealing obsolete, spent, unnecessary, or superseded enactments, and to facilitate the citation of Statutes. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill he now read 1a.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 1a, and to be printed.

CONTRACTS OF EMPLOYMENT BILL
11.18 a.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (LORD CARRINGTON): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be read a second time. It is a Bill with two objects: to establish for employees minimum rights to notice of termination of employment, and to require employers to inform their workpeople in writing of the main terms of their employment. Thus the underlying purpose of the Bill is to give greater security to workers. In this it forms part of the Government's wider plans for encouraging an atmosphere in industry helpful to economic change and growth. If we are to keep our economy competitive and bear our share of responsibility for helping the developing countries, our industry must be efficient, flexible and ready to adopt new and better techniques.
This means constant changes in the pattern of employment as some firms and industries expand and others decline. But at any particular point of time this process of economic change and expansion may mean for thousands of our fellow citizens a serious upheaval in their personal lives. It may mean finding a new job; it may mean uprooting home and family; it may mean that a man's skill, learnt over many years, has become outdated and that he must look to a fresh occupation for his livelihood. I do not think we have any right to expect that the workers affected will cooperate in bringing about economic changes or even acquiesce in them, if

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we leave them to face consequences such as these without adequate protection and help. Indeed the fear of change and what it may bring can breed resistance and be a powerful brake upon economic progress. The need for change will therefore be understood and accepted only if those concerned are helped to face the consequences. This problem of generating a sense of security, of helping the worker to meet change with confidence, is fundamental to our industrial efficiency.
The Government's plans for dealing with this problem include the proposals already announced for re-casting our industrial training system. We aim to secure a general improvement in apprenticeship and other training of young people, and also a substantial increase in facilities for training adults, so that our working population will be better equipped to meet the changing requirements of industry. The number of training places in Government centres is to be doubled and up to £10 million allocated for the establishment of industrial training boards. The Government are also determined to secure a general improvement in arrangements for dealing with the problems of redundancy and, as has already been announced, will if necessary introduce legislation for this purpose.
As I have explained, the Contracts of Employment Bill has a place in the Government's plans for dealing with this problem of security. It has a two-fold contribution to make. It gives the worker an entitlement to a minimum period of notice if his services are to be dispensed with. It also ensures that he will be given a clear understanding of his basic terms and conditions of employment.
My Lords, legislation on these matters is a radical step for the Government of this country. Hitherto length of notice and connected matters have been left to voluntary negotiation between the two sides of industry or have been settled individually between the employer and employee. It is not surprising, therefore, that the Bill in its early stages had a somewhat critical reception. The British Employers' Confederation, while not opposed in principle to longer notice, had a marked preference for leaving these matters to voluntary negotiation and was opposed to legislation. This view was
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very understandable. It was entirely in keeping with our traditional approach to these matters. Nevertheless, the Government could not accept it because we took the view that we needed a general and rapid advance, and this could be brought about only by legislation. But the British Employers' Confederation and other organisations consulted about the Bill also made a number of constructive suggestions which have contributed a good deal to improving it.
The Trades Union Congress had certain criticisms of the Bill as originally drafted. They considered that it was unfair to place on employees as well as employers an obligation to give extended notice. This point is no longer relevant. The statutory obligation on the employee to give not less than a week's notice after he has been with the employer for 26 weeks does not increase with longer service. The T.U.C. also said that the Bill did little for workers whose employment was less secure, in the main those connected with the construction industries, shipyards and shipbuilding. As I shall explain in dealing with the main provisions of the Bill, this point has been largely met.
My Lords, I return now to the Bill's main provisions. Clause 1 lays down the minimum periods of notice. When an employer gives notice the minimum is one week for an employee who has worked for him for at least 26 weeks but less than 2 years; 2 weeks if the employment has lasted between 2 and 5 years; and 4 weeks if it has lasted 5 years or more. When the employee gives notice, it is one week if the employment has lasted 26 weeks or more. This period does not increase with longer service. The period of employment must be continuous and is counted in weeks. The rules for reckoning it up are given in Schedule I. It is made clear in the Bill that these provisions do nothing to prevent either employee or employer waiving his rights to notice on any occasion or to prevent them from agreeing on a payment in lieu of notice. Nor do they affect the right of either party to terminate employment without notice in the sort of circumstances which would at present justify such action—such as serious misconduct.
I should like to draw attention to three main changes which have been made in the notice provisions since the Bill was

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introduced. First, a right to one week's notice after 26 weeks' employment has been introduced. Originally, the Bill gave no rights to notice to employees who had worked for their employer for less than 2 years. This left a gap. Although many workers qualify under their contract for a week's notice after their probationary period, there are important exceptions. In the shipyards and in building, for example—although in this latter industry a change is pending—workers may be discharged under their contracts with virtually no notice. Moreover, for many workers in these industries frequent changes of employer are customary, and they would be unlikely to satisfy a qualifying period of 2 years' employment with one employer. The two sides of the building industry have recently agreed to introduce in August provisions for one week's notice after six months' employment. This progress is most welcome. Nevertheless, for workers in shipyards and other employments, who are still liable to dismissal with little or no notice, the right to one week's notice after 26 weeks' work will be a real advance.
The second important change is that the notice to be given by the employee now remains at one week and does not increase with longer service. Without this change, long-service employees might have been held in the event of redundancy, while those with less service would have been free to leave before them and get the pick of the available jobs.
Thirdly, the rules in Schedule 1 about the effect of a strike on continuity of service have been changed. The Bill is not an anti-strike measure, but it cannot ignore the problem of laying down how a strike should affect continuity of employment. The rule proposed in the Bill respects the right to strike. A strike will affect continuity of employment only if it is in breach of contract. Since the Bill writes into the worker's contract important new rights to notice, it is only reasonable that these should be conditional on the worker's honouring his obligations under the contract.
My Lords, I should also like to mention another provision of Schedule 1 which has attracted some comment. To qualify for rights to notice, the worker must be employed under a contract which normally involves at least 21 hours' employment a week. The same
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dividing line is used to govern entitlement to a written statement of terms of employment. It seems to me right that the Bill should benefit those who depend on their employment for a substantial part of their livelihood and that inconsiderable and spare-time employment should be excluded. The precise number of hours to be chosen as the dividing line is clearly a nice matter of judgment. Twenty-one hours is half the normal working week common among industrial workers and seems a reasonable dividing line. The Government have, however, undertaken to consider, and we are considering, whether, in order to enable any adjustment to be made which experience shows to be necessary, they should seek powers to vary the limit.
The right to notice might mean little in itself unless the employee's right to payment during notice is defined. This is dealt with in Clause 2 and Schedule 2. The objective is clear: to safeguard the employee against a serious drop in pay when he is under notice. It has proved most difficult to find a formula which would apply satisfactorily in all employments. The original proposal—for payment based on average earnings over the previous 26 weeks—was criticised on the ground that it would give rise to serious anomalies and would place an undue administrative burden on employers. The new rules which are set out in Schedule 2 should be much simpler to operate. They distinguish between employees who have normal working hours under their contracts (and the vast majority of employees are in this category) and those who have not.
A man who has normal working hours and works for at least those hours during notice will be paid according to his contract. This, as I say, will cover most of the employees under notice. In these circumstances, the contract will be a sufficient safeguard, and no special calculation will be necessary. But protection is needed for those workers who do not work their normal hours during notice because of sickness, short-time working and other reasons. Time workers in this group are to be paid during notice not less than they would have received for their full normal hours of work. Piece workers are to be paid for each hour not worked at a rate not less than their

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average for the preceding 4 weeks. Protection is also needed for those with no normal hours. They are to be paid their average earnings, but the average will be struck over 12 weeks instead of 26. These new provisions stick more closely to the contract than the original formula. I think, too, that as a result of this the possibility of anomalies and misunderstandings will be greatly reduced. In most cases no special calculations will be needed.
Clause 2 of the Bill gives scope for alternative arrangements governing pay during notice where these would suit individual circumstances. Under subsection (3), the parties concerned can agree on a contract containing different provisions for pay during notice, provided that the notice which the employer must give is at least one week longer than that required by the Bill. Thus, the employer has to offer substantially longer notice before he can seek to vary the requirements of the Bill as regards payment during notice. It will always, of course, be open to the employee and his trade union to consider what is offered in the light of the statutory rights under the Bill.
Clause 4 of the Bill requires employers to give their employees written particulars of the main terms of employment. Terms concerning pay, hours of work, holidays and holiday pay, sickness and sick pay, pensions schemes and length of notice are to be included. With the exception of notice, the Bill does not lay down minimum terms to be included under these heads, but if under any of these heads no provision is made, then the statement must say so. The purpose of this provision is, of course, to let the employee know clearly on what terms he is employed. The clause also empowers the Minister of Labour by order to add to the list of particulars which are to be given. This will enable the requirements to be adjusted as and if circumstances change. The statement must be given to the employee within thirteen weeks of starting work. Originally the period of grace was five weeks but this has been extended to thirteen weeks to exclude seasonal, temporary and casual work, as it would be unreasonable to impose the obligation on employers in respect of such workers.
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The preparation of the statement required by Clause 4 will mean some additional paper work for employers, but efforts have been made to keep this as little as possible. The employer may refer the employer for particulars to any reasonably accessible document without re-stating them. Changes in the terms of employment must be notified within a month by one of three methods: by individual notification; by circular or notice, provided a copy remains reasonably accessible or, where the original statement referred to any document, by keeping that document up to date.
My Lords, under Clause 5 registered dock workers, merchant seamen and fishermen are excluded from the Bill. The employment of registered dock workers is regulated by separate legislation, and it would not be appropriate to deal with it in this Bill. The Bill's provisions cannot be applied to the special circumstances of sea-going employment. Subsections (5) and (6) empower the Minister of Labour by order to vary these categories should circumstances change. Because of its importance this power is exercised only subject to Affirmative Resolution of both Houses of Parliament.
These then are the main provisions of this short but important Bill. Broadly speaking, they reflect existing practice in progressive firms. The Bill will thus raise the general standard in these matters, and will be generally welcomed as a reasonable measure, of benefit to many millions of workers. The Bill is an integral part of the Government's measures to increase security of work. It should help to create throughout the whole employment field an atmosphere in which co-operation, acceptance of necessary change, and efficiency will flourish. I commend it wholeheartedly to your Lordships. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Carrington)
11.35 a.m.
LORD WILLIAMSON: My Lords, first of all I think I ought to congratulate the noble Lord opposite on the manner in which he has introduced this Bill. He almost brought me to believe that this Bill is likely to bestow great benefits on the workers, which of course is not the case. I think I ought to confess at the outset that I am instinctively

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opposed to this Bill, because I have a sincere belief and faith in the British system of voluntary negotiation and agreements between employers and organised labour. I believe that our industrial relations will be all the better for reliance on and confidence in the voluntary system; and that in the long run we shall continue to encourage in industry an increasing sense of responsibility.
Over the last forty years or so we have built up a splendid system of national and regional joint industrial councils, and other negotiating bodies, covering the broad field of British industry and commerce. Only a very small part is subject to statutory wages councils carrying legal enforcement—mainly in unorganised trades where voluntary machinery is not practical. The British system of wages and conditions fixation, with all its defects, has been praised and admired, and indeed has been accepted as the model for less developed and emerging democracies. It is admired for the universal acceptance of voluntary agreements between managements and labour requiring little or no legal compulsions. I remember a delegation of young German workers coming over here shortly after the war, to study our system of wages and conditions fixation, and the voluntary system was explained to them in detail. During the questions they asked persistently: "How are these agreements enforced? What do the Government do to enforce them?" We tried to explain patiently that there was not any enforcement, and that it was not necessary. But I am perfectly certain that they went away and thought we were misleading them.
My Lords, in a democracy nothing is perfect, and democracy will work, and will survive, only if there is a social consciousness and willingness to make it work. In our industrial relations we have gone a long way towards making the voluntary system a success. As a nation we are very advanced in these matters, and that is why I deprecate the superimposing of legal enactments, particularly when they do not appear to be necessary. The survival of our democratic system will ultimately depend on the confidence placed in, and the success of, democratic principles and procedures, and it is in this direction that encouragement and support at all times ought to be given.
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Throughout the vast field of industrial and commercial activity, with the exception of that small section covered by wages councils, men and women go to work, and employers meet the obligation of wages, salaries and conditions, not with legal enactments carrying penalties for non-compliance, but on ordinary man-to-man agreements; and, very often, simply on decisions of joint meetings, probably backed by nothing more than the minute of a meeting. I do not believe that it will do any good to bring into the field of politics the delicate and complex matters of wages and conditions fixation. Experience has shown that they are better dealt with by those within and close to the various industries. The employees concerned—and, indeed, the employers, too—have greater confidence in decisions so reached than they can have in legal enactments drawn up without the intimate knowledge of the various industries affected. There are already too many unions, and it would be a pity if we had the addition of another—the Parliamentary union. It is for these reasons that I profoundly dislike the Bill.
The Government, through the Ministry of Labour, have constantly pleaded for more and more and closer joint consultation between management and labour, and this exhortation to industry has been very well canalised through the Ministry of Labour's National Joint Advisory Council. This admirable body, on which I was privileged to serve for some twelve years or so, has been a source of strength to the Ministry of Labour on industrial matters. But, on the formulation of the provisions of this Bill, I understand that no prior consultation took place with the Advisory Council, which probably accounts for the very ragged Bill which was originally submitted to another place. Now the British Employers' Confederation made a statement in Bulletin No. 199, and this is what they said:
"In any event, the legalistic approach to industrial relation problems creates entirely the wrong atmosphere. It now appears that the Government considers that progress towards longer notice has been too slow. In the Confederation's view, the proper course is for the Government to say so, and give employers and workers an opportunity of adjusting their agreements."
The British Employers' Confederation is right in this, because if it is construed that employers have been too niggardly and trade unions too weak or lackadaisical

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in pressing for longer notice, we cannot blame the unions, and particularly the more militant ones, for adopting in the future a more aggressive and militant policy in the prosecution of their demands. It is fallacious to argue that trade unions should condition their demands and approach in negotiations on increased productivity and industrial efficiency, and the capacity of industry to meet these demands, if, without any regard to these concepts, Parliament concedes them. Trade unionists will be quite justified, if this Bill becomes an Act, in saying to the unions, "Why haven't you secured those conditions in the normal way? Why should Parliament have to step in? You are too easy going; you are too weak; you are not sufficiently militant ". And, my Lords, this can be very dangerous.
It is now suggested that the employers or the unions have failed in this matter of adequate notice, and that therefore Parliament must act. During debates on this Bill in another place it was suggested strongly that there are other matters which the right honourable gentleman the Minister of Labour should tackle. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, in his speech introducing the Bill, mentioned that there was to be another Bill on redundancy payments. There are many other matters which arise in negotiations in British industry that might also be the subject of future Bills: adequate holidays, shorter hours, sickness and accident payments, pension schemes, rest periods and low average earnings in some industries. Is it the intention to bring in Bills to deal with matters of this description? If so, whatever confidence there may be in the voluntary system will have been completely undermined.
It is claimed that this Bill gives some idea of security to the majority of the workers. This is an extraordinary interpretation. It does nothing of the sort. All it does is to provide for the bad news of dismissal to be given in advance. It is claimed that a worker receiving one, two or four weeks' notice will have so much time to look round for another job. But he has to work out his notice. How can he look round for another job? He will be working all day, so far as he is a day worker, and his free time will be in the evening,
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when other works are closed. If the employee working out his notice asks for a day or half-day off to seek other employment, the Bill specifies that, although the employer grants the employee permisison to be off for this excellent purpose, the employer is not liable, and need not make any payment for that time off. What security is there in this?
I think it would have been a much better Schedule 2, and a much better Bill, if it had provided for some minimum time off with pay—say, a day a week—so that the employee could seek other employment or keep an appointment with another employer for another job. The noble Lord opposite, I know, said that, notwithstanding the provisions of this Bill, employers could grant time off with pay; and of course, the progressive employers will do so. But this Bill is not directed against the progressive employers: it is directed against the backward employers who will not by voluntary negotiations concede longer notice.
The purpose of the Bill, as the noble Lord opposite has said, is to do two things: to provide for longer notice and to give the employee the terms of employment. These are two simple requirements for which any joint industrial council could provide in two or three simple clauses. Yet we have a complicated Bill of thirteen pages, parts of which are so complicated as to be capable of different interpretations, even by lawyers. For the life of me I do not know how a worker is going to understand the provisions of the Bill. I suppose he will go along to his trade union official to find out, and the trade union official will have to go to the union's lawyer. Then, the union's lawyer will say, "I can only give you an opinion. The final interpretation can be laid down only by the courts". My Lords, if one examines the conditions of wages councils, one sees how complicated must be legal enactments on this question of wages and conditions.
There is just one other matter in the Bill on which I should like to comment, and that is the provision to the employee of the terms of employment. Why on earth should an employee have to wait for thirteen weeks before he is told of the wages and conditions under which he has to work? How can there be a

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contract between an employer and a worker if the worker does not know for thirteen weeks the wages and conditions that are going to operate? I am perfectly certain myself that almost any employer could have a simple, cyclostyled statement of wages and conditions which could be handed to the employee when he commenced work, or that the wages and conditions could be posted in a notice inside the works on the notice board which is there for that and similar purposes. The time is limited this morning for discussion on this Bill and there is much more I could say about its shortcomings. I do not think that, if this Bill becomes an Act, it will do very much harm; but I certainly think it will not do very much good.
11.51 a.m.
LORD LAYTON: My Lords, I welcome this Bill because it breaks into a new field of economic relationships in which the Government are co-operating with both sides of industry to compile a legal status for the workmen. But it touches only one relatively small aspect of these relationships; and I agree with the remarks of the preceding speaker who said that it will not do a lot of good but that it will not do a lot of harm. In particular, it does not go far to improve the security of the workman—a fact which has been pointed out by the employers' organisation's memorandum to which the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, referred.
I should like to say a word about my personal relationship to the matters raised in this Bill. In recent years the Daily News has had many cases of redundancy and, as some of your Lordships will know, I have been associated with the Daily News for quite a while. When the copyright and the London assets of both newspapers were sold to Associated Newspapers, letters were exchanged between the chairmen of both groups saying that it was the intention of the board to devote the whole of the proceeds to pensions and compensation to the staff. In the event, although the Daily News was allowed to set aside a fund for continuing existing pensions, and to make certain payments in lieu of notice, a few of which were lower than the figures mentioned in this Bill but most of which were very much higher, it was
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prevented by the High Court, on the initiative of a shareholder, from carrying out its intention of paying compensation of one week's pay per year of service to all unpensioned members of the staff; and we were in a position to do that largely because the majority shareholder of the Daily News, Ltd., is the Daily News Trust, which specifically lays down that the property, profits, and so on of the Trust are payable for the benefit of the staff and may be so used. But, of course, that cannot always be the case.
Our experience disclosed a serious gap in the protection of our employees. Some other company which is prepared to close down may not be able to find, as we were, legal means of getting compensation into the hands of its dismissed employees, who may find themselves thrown out on to the streets. This problem is not seriously tackled at all in the present Bill. A year ago the Prime Minister, speaking at Luton Hoo, said:
"We must devise measures relating to the status and security of the whole working population whether on the floor of the factory, in the office or in the shop."
It was impossible for me to refer to anything on that subject so long as the issue involving the Daily News was sub judice; but that is now out of the way and the employees have had their compensation. As the head of the Government made this very important announcement, that they were going to take steps to enlarge the security of the employees, it was clearly right then to say nothing about it but to leave it to the Government to do so.
But I confess that I was very disappointed when I saw, at the start of the current Session, that the gracious Speech from the Throne referred merely to this very modest little Bill. Revolutionary developments are taking place in man's control of nature which, for better or worse, are going to alter the conditions of life on this planet. All the Government have so far contributed to that is that the employer must write out the terms of employment and that there will be a time fixed for giving notice of breaking the contract on either side. I am not going to cover the details of that argument, because they have already been well covered by preceding speakers. But it was certainly given a bad reception in

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another place; and the employers' association and the speakers in another place on the Bill have all, with one consent, said that the number of people who will have greater security of employment is extremely limited.
I should like here to interpolate just this comment: I sympathise with the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, in attaching great importance to building up personal relationships between the two sides of industry, but I think that, when they come to deal with redundancy, the Minister or Ministers in charge must never forget that redundancy unemployment affects much more the elderly employee, who cannot get started again in industry, than the people who are much younger. I feel that there is a danger in attaching so much importance to the personal relationships of trade unions and employers, from the fact that it is the strong trade unions who will get the good schemes. It is for the Government to take care of the unorganised or poorly organised workpeople; because, as I have said, they are the people who will suffer from unemployment when it arises. Therefore, while this Bills talks of notice, and writing out terms of agreement, it is all right when it applies to compensation in lieu of notice, and payment in lieu of notice; but when you get down to real protection for security you must have great flexibility, and cover age, period of service and income bracket. We cannot just keep people going, if they have been thrown out of work in large numbers, whether it be from the railways or coal mines or any other industry. Nor can we treat them all alike. Therefore, this must be very flexible.
I am not going fully into the question of what the Government are going to do. Many statements have been made and a certain amount of information is leaking out as to the form their action may take. It was suggested in the Budget speech that, when the Government had looked more fully into the whole question of redundancy, there might be legislation in the later part of this year. I think that it is a very optimistic hope that they will be able to do that this year, but obviously that is now the intention of the Government. I think that until the Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Labour have reported, it is too soon to make any serious comment or suggestion.
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However, I think that it is relevant to say at this stage that our ideas are fat behind those of France, to quote only one other country in Europe. I mention this because we have paid compensation to a Frenchman in our Paris office on the basis of the French code, which gives a legal right of compensation in the event of an employee losing his job through no fault of his own, not on a basis of one week's pay per year of service but of one month's pay per year of service, and this is done automatically for fifteen years, a rate which is four times as large as the rate that we propose to pay to our unpensioned employees. And if a Frenchman's claim to compensation is not fully covered on that basis, he can take his case before a standing committee of employers and workers appointed by the Government and they may add to the amount of compensation paid, with no ceiling attached.
If the Government are going to take an increasing part in directing, expediting and keeping up to date the processes of change in the economy, this will become one of their major social services. It will not be so large or so expensive as, for example, the health service or education, but it will be one of the major social services, which covers a great area of activity. I do not think that the cost would be crippling, if considered in comparison with the total national income and, if it succeeds in removing the burden from the individual, it should tend to weaken his resistance to change. If it does that, it will be cheap at the price, because then we shall get more rapid growth as the result of good relations which will develop.
Finance is only one aspect of the problem. There are also different tasks, which have been mentioned by the noble Lord in moving the Second Reading of the Bill, including retraining, rehousing, planning how to make use of manpower as it comes from schools and so on. The Government will have some say in the use of the nation's manpower. Intensive study of these matters has been going on at Strasbourg by the Council of Europe, as well as by the Six, and many pages are devoted to this subject as a whole in the Treaty of Rome.
I regard this as a very urgent matter. Though at the moment negotiations on the Common Market are in suspense, I see no reason at all why we should not

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continue to try to harmonise social and working conditions between Britain and Europe. It is also an urgent matter for us in its own right for, unless we keep in the vanguard of progress—and your Lordships will appreciate that in making these comments I am thinking of the whole area through which we can give greater security to the employee—we cannot hope to retain our great position in the fields of industry and commerce.
12.8 p.m.
LORD MCCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: My Lords, first of all I would join with the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, on the clarity with which he explained this Bill and the skill with which he put the best possible gloss on it. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, that this measure alone is a very small contribution. I think that it will do now more good than harm, but I wholeheartedly agree with the noble Lord in what he said about voluntary negotiation. Voluntary negotiation is always better, if we can manage it. My colleagues on the British Employers' Confederation, in their statement, emphasised how much better all this would be if it were carried out by voluntary negotiation, such as we know in this country, and I hope that this Bill will do nothing to hinder the forward march of voluntary negotiation between the parties in industry. Before I come to the Bill itself, I should also like to say how pleased many of us are to see my noble friend Lord Layton here and to hear his wise words on this subject.
May I say one word on the complexity of the Bill, a point to which the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, referred? I think that the legal department of the Ministry of Labour must have sat up night after night struggling to put into legal language, without making more anomalies than they seek to remove, what we in industry are accustomed to write in half a dozen sentences. May I suggest that, if possible, some simple leaflet should be issued at a suitable time which could give the many millions who come under the ambit of this Bill a clear insight into what it means? Because I challenge anybody to understand, by reading the Bill, what it is all about. May I also apologise at this stage to the Minister and the House in
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that I have a longstanding engagement, whereby I have to speak at a hospital luncheon, which I entered into long before the horrid idea of your Lordships sitting on Fridays was ever mooted abroad?
As I have said, I rise to give a modified welcome to this Bill in its present form, and I emphasise "in its present form". The original Bill was introduced in the other place in somewhat of a hurry at the beginning of the year, and some of my friends, notably those in the Employers' Confederation, to which I belong, felt that there had been far too little consultation in the matter between the Ministry and the two sides of industry. I would say that, in general, the Ministry of Labour are most circumspect and careful to consult with the different associations—the T.U.C., the B.E.C. and other organisations—before they plunge into intricacies of this sort. In this case, this did not happen; and it was a great pity. My colleagues had serious misgivings about the way the intentions of the Bill were to be carried out, and we issued a very critical statement on the Bill, as it then stood. I hasten to add that the employers' organisations welcome the intentions of the Bill, as I believe everybody will, which are to give some measure of security to the worker, albeit a very small one, to which he has not any statutory right at the present time, and also to see that the employee knows fully his position and his contractual relations with his employer. I do not think anybody can object to those intentions.
The Bill was introduced with the laudable object of improving industrial relations, but we on the employers' side—and from comments made by leaders in another place from the Labour Benches it was quite obvious that the workers' organisations had the same view—felt that the original proposals were likely to have exactly the opposite effect, and would harm, rather than improve, industrial relations. One of the worst enemies of good industrial relations, both on the workshop floor and in higher negotiation, is to get into a state where anomalies abound and where friction can easily be engendered. Indeed, I would say that one of the principal duties of a good personnel manager—in fact of any manager in industry—is to eliminate, so

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far as possible, causes of friction and misunderstanding. We feared that this Bill, as it was introduced, would have rather the opposite effect.
There are many situations in which the thoughts both of the T.U.C. and of the employers' organisations run on parallel lines. People who suppose that the two sides in industry are always, or even mainly, at loggerheads could not be further from the truth. The curious thing is, though, that everybody urges, when talking about industrial relations, that the two sides in industry (as they are called) should be closer together; but when we do get closer together, we come under serious criticism for "ganging up" together. I sometimes regret that. In this case, the minds of the T.U.C. and of the employers' organisations run very much on parallel lines; and I would refer to the admirable speech made in another place by Mr. Gunter on the Second Reading of the Bill, as it was then introduced. After what was said yesterday on quite another subject about quoting from speeches in another place, I will not quote what Mr. Gunter said; but perhaps I may paraphrase without overstepping the Rules of Order. It was evident from Mr. Gunter's speech that he thought the Bill might raise difficulties in industry which might outweigh any advantages that would be gained. He quoted the fact that the T.U.C. and the British employers' organisations were thinking alike in the matter, and that there are all sorts of nuances and small matters which happen on the workshop floor which can be quite easily dealt with in the industrial council, but which cannot be put into a Bill of this sort.
I am glad to note that the Government themselves regarded this rather novel Bill as one which could be, and must be, improved. They put down a whole range of Amendments to meet some of the criticism which both the T.U.C. and we had advanced, and they accepted other Amendments in Committee. I should like to pay tribute to the Parliamentary Secretary in another place for making himself complete master of this rather complicated measure, and for helping me personally, and I know many others, in considering the Bill. I think that nearly all the anomalies and the causes of friction have now been eliminated. I
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believe that we have a good little Bill before us, and one which will bring some positive benefits to our workpeople. It will take its place, as I said before, with what I regard (and this, I think, is generally accepted) as the much more important proposals with regard to training and redundancy which are now being fully discussed with both sides of industry. I believe that, with this trio of the training proposals, the redundancy proposals and this Bill on the Statute Book, some advance may reasonably be claimed. It seems to me that we should pay tribute to the initiative of the Minister of Labour in embarking on this difficult task, and wish him success. I am sure that all of us hope that whatever comes out will increase the happiness of all those engaged in industry.
My Lords, I am not proposing this morning, although it is tempting, to engage in any dissertation upon methods of improving our industrial relations in general. I believe that we should notify everybody in writing of what his or her rights are. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, has a serious point when he asks why we should wait for a period of thirteen weeks. There are, I understand, great difficulties about doing this in certain casual employments, but I should have thought that it might be possible to eliminate this casual section, and to give to the worker, whether in private or industrial occupation, on arrival a statement saying what his terms of employment are. I hope that this may be considered. I would say that, in general, I wish this liberal Bill well; though there are one or two points that I hope we can improve still further on the Committee stage.
I wish at this stage to refer to one small, although rather important, anomaly which I hope we shall be able to consider. As I interpret Schedule 2, it appears that it would be to an employee's considerable financial advantage if he were to be away sick during the period of notice rather than to be at work. Paragraph 2(5) provides that any payments made to the employee by his employer in respect of the relevant part of the period of notice, whether by way of sick pay, holiday pay or otherwise, shall go towards meeting the employer's liability to payment during that period of notice; but no mention is made of the

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employer's liability being reduced by any benefits being received by the employee under National Insurance or sickness benefits.
A man who is away sick during the period of notice would, therefore, apparently receive both the wages to which he is entitled under the Bill and, in addition, any National Insurance or Industrial Injuries benefits to which he is entitled. He would also be excused from paying any contributions under the schemes and would, therefore, be quite considerably better off if he were away sick during the period of notice than if he were working it out. The Bill might therefore provide an incentive to an employee to go sick during the period of notice, which is obviously undesirable. He would, of course, normally have to prove to his employer that he was incapable of work due to sickness or injury (which I believe is the right phrase), but it is certainly not unknown in industry for people to obtain medical certificates which might be regarded by some as on totally inadequate grounds. As the provision stands, it might also give a financial incentive to an employee who is genuinely sick to give notice in order to obtain those extra benefits as well, although that is only a minor point.
It may be argued, on the other side—and I quite realise it—that, since an employee has contributed to the National Insurance scheme, he is entitled to the benefits of this scheme. The employer and the State have also contributed, and the employer is paying his wages and, if he is sick, is of course getting no advantage. It would therefore seem to me to be reasonable for an employer to be able to claim that his liability under Clause 2 of the Bill with regard to payment of wages should be such that the payment of the wages and the sick benefit together should be equal to the wages the man would get if he were in work.
An increasing number of employers, I am glad to say, are introducing contributory or non-contributory sick pay schemes for their employees, and, so far as I can make out, in these schemes, and in the schemes which provide for full wages while sickness occurs, in practically every case it is a fact that if the man receives full wages he forfeits his National Health benefits. I suggest that this is, although a small point, one
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which is worthy of consideration, and I hope to put down an Amendment at a suitable time so that we can discuss the matter further. I say that now only so as to give the Ministry warning. In conclusion, I would say, as I started, that this is a small Bill. I think that it will help. I give the Government full credit for accepting the many Amendments which were proposed on both sides of industry, and I trust that to the small section of the community, the employers, who do feel grateful, this statutory benefit may prove of assistance.
12.26 p.m.
LORD ROBERTSON OF OAKRIDGE: My Lords, we have had a speech this morning from the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, whom we all recognised to be pre-eminently qualified to speak for the great trade union movement. We have had a speech just now from the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, whose qualifications and credentials for speaking on behalf of employers are probably unrivalled. I do not propose to follow either of these noble Lords over the ground which they have trod. I have been associated with the employers' side of industry before the war and since the war, and less executively I still am. But it is not at all as an employer that I wish to speak, and I should like to try to present to your Lordships, as briefly as possible, what I would call the case for the third party in this matter.
The noble Lord, Lord Williamson, castigated the Government for intervening in this affair. I hope that I shall not be accused of ignorance about the importance and value of direct negotiations between the parties in industry. I certainly do not feel that I am ignorant, and I believe that I understand its value fully. But what I would say is that in these days industrial relations concern the third party in the matter, that is, the ordinary member of the community. They affect his standard of living and his pocket. They affect the whole nation, its prosperity and prestige. Industrial unrest is not a sort of private fight that other people cannot get into.
The interests of the community are very much involved and, surely, the custodian of the interests of the community is the Government, and if the Government feel, as I believe that they have every right to feel, that over this

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whole field covered by the Bill and the other Bills which are to follow there has been insufficient advance during the recent years, then they have the right and duty to intervene. I honestly believe, with great respect, that in view of the situation as it exists in the country, the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, is on weak grounds to castigate the Government in this way.
As the noble Lord, Lord Layton, has pointed out, we are very much behind other nations here. He mentioned France. I am a director of a company that has workers in other European countries, and I know full well we are very much behind other nations in the arrangements we have for security of employment and looking after men when they have to change their jobs and so on. In parenthesis, I should like to qualify that with this statement. Some of these countries legislate far too much, and the result is that they have completely depersonalised industrial relations, and that is something I would not advocate.
However, it cannot be right that we have fallen so far behind them, as anyone knows who has knowledge of what is going on, and I think we are not being particularly helpful in the discussions which are going on in international bodies such as that at Strasbourg and in the International Labour Organisation. The situation which we have allowed to continue in this country is a drag on the progress towards prosperity. That has been said in other words already this morning, and it has been said by no less an authority than the N.E.D.C. "It is an affront to our conscience"—that has been said, not by me but by the Church of England in a pamphlet which was issued last year, headed "Redundancy", and I expect your Lordships are familiar with it. This pamphlet advocated legislation exactly on the lines of this Bill.
Then there is the effect that our position has on other nations. The noble Lord, Lord Williamson, said that after the war parties of young Germans came over here to study our industrial relations. Certainly they did. As a matter of fact, I sent them here under the authority given me at that time by the noble and gallant Field Marshal Lord Montgomery
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of Alamein. They learned a lot, I think, which has been of great value to them. Many of the younger nations of the Commonwealth also look to us for an example and guide in these matters, and I think that it is a pity that in this particular field we are not setting a better example than we are doing. So I find this Bill not a little Bill, but a very good and important Bill.
After all, is it not true that it at least breaks precedent in three important respects? In the first place, as was pointed out by the noble Lord who opened this debate, it introduces a drastic change and departure from tradition in that it recognises that industrial relations are not solely of concern to employers and to workers, but are also a concern of the community and therefore, maybe, of the Government. In the second place, it offers the worker a legal contract of employment, something he has never had before. Of course, many employers give their employees a contract and some measure of security. All employers, however, are not good employers. And, in any case, it is a new thing that they are now legally entitled to a contract which sets out not merely the period of notice but conditions relating to holidays, sick pay, pension rights and many other things, one of which I am going to deal with. In the third place, the Bill accepts the principle that the worker not only has rights but also has responsibilities, and this point, rather to my surprise, has not been touched on by any of the previous speakers.
Like the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, I feel after yesterday that I have to be very careful about referring to anything that was said in another place, but perhaps like him also I might paraphrase what was said by one speaker, which was roughly this: the people who drafted this Bill did not understand the mentality of the worker. If Bill Jones hears there is a better job going across the road he is not interested in a complicated Bill about periods of notice; all he is interested in is walking across the road and getting the other job. That may be so. But Bill Jones's interests, and indeed his employer's interests, are not the only interests involved. The interests of the community also are involved. As the Bill was originally drafted too long a period of notice was required from the

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worker. That has been conceded. But whether one week is enough to protect the interests of the community without any other qualifications, I am not entirely sure.
I will be very plain as to what I mean by that. In certain sections of industry, including one with which I am familiar, the contract of employment includes the provision that a man shall not withdraw his labour over a dispute while that dispute is still under discussion in the agreed machinery. That is a provision which, it seems to me, should be regarded as a good one by both employers and trade unions and one which should be made of general application. I hope that when the time comes for employers and trade unions to agree upon the terms of these contracts of employment they will think of that. I know quite well that I am putting my neck out a bit in speaking of this, but I do not think I shall be accused of being a strike breaker. Indeed, I once stood up for the right to strike to the extent of tendering my resignation. It was not accepted, and it seemed my offer was not even treated very seriously, but it was meant. And, moreover, the amusing thing about it is that the resignation was tendered to no less a person than the late and very lamented Mr. Ernest Bevin. I say that to excuse myself, as it were, for referring to this matter. Of course, the right to withdraw labour is a precious right and should never be withdrawn, but it is a right that should be exercised, surely, with responsibility and without wanton peril to the interests of the community.
There is just one other aspect of this matter which concerns not the worker but the employer. I have heard it said that provisions of this sort which seem to aim at limiting lightning or unofficial strikes are not any good; that you cannot legislate about these things. If there is a strike, when it is over the employer will be under great pressure and "No victimisation" will be the cry. Well, my Lords, why should the victim be the community? If this Bill becomes law, would it be right for an employer to flout the obvious will of Parliament and sacrifice the interests of the community by giving way to pressure of this kind? It does not seem to me it would be right.
The Bill was described by the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, as having been
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a very ragged Bill. It has perhaps a few ragged edges still. My attention has been drawn to two, one of which has already been mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, namely, that the Bill apparently proposes to pay a man under notice more money for being sick and idle than for being fit and working. The other provision which seems to me a little dangerous is that in Clause 2(3). If an employer offers his workers more notice than he is required to do by the minimum laid down in the Bill he is apparently excused from the provisions of Schedule 2 as regards the level of payment he must make. This may be a matter for interpretation only, but it has been pointed out to me, and the Government may like to look at it, as being a loophole for an unscrupulous employer.
That is all I wanted to say to your Lordships on this subject. I think the Bill is a very important one and a very good Bill from the point of view of the community, and I think that is essentially so because it encourages the concept of responsibility towards the community, both among employers and among workers. I hope your Lordships will give it not only a modified welcome but a very warm welcome, as I do myself.
12.37 p.m.
LORD JESSEL: My Lords, my welcome to this Bill is somewhat lukewarm, as was that of the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, and my noble friend Lord McCorquodale of Newton, so I am in good company. I also agree with them that if the Minister of Labour had had more consultations with both sides of industry he would not have had to accept so many Amendments in another place. But it is only fair to say that he did accept them, and the result is a very much better Bill. Whether the overt acceptance of the right to strike is a good thing, I think is open to doubt. Of course, the idea is that it will result in a great diminution in the number of unofficial strikes; but that remains to be seen.
The general ground has been covered very thoroughly already and I want to deal with only one point, and that is a problem which has been pointed out to me by the engineering industry. Let us suppose that there is a strike in one factory which results in a shortage of material in other factories—and, as your

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Lordships know, this frequently happens in the motor industry. It is then often necessary for employers in the other factories to put their work people on short time or to lay them off completely. At present when this happens in the engineering industry there exists an agreement under which the workpeople affected are guaranteed either four days employment each week, or, if production ceases entirely, 34 hours at their basic consolidated time rate. I believe similar agreements exist in several other industries.
But if the employer takes the view that owing to shortages of material there will be no work at all for his people for many weeks, what is he going to do? At present, in those circumstances, he can give his work people one week's notice or one week's pay in lieu of notice, and terminate their employment. Under the terms of the Second Schedule of this Bill, this will no longer be possible in every case, because employees covered by the Bill are entitled to the statutory period of notice prescribed in Clause 1, and they will have to be given two weeks' notice or four weeks' notice according to their length of service. It is only in respect of employees with less than two years' service that one week's notice will be possible.
I can, of course, think of other situations, apart from strikes in factories supplying materials—for example, transport strikes, or a strike in an electricity supply industry—which can result in factories having to cease or curtail production. Here an employer would be in exactly the same position. Only those employees with less than two years' service could he get rid of with a week's notice. I thought I would mention this on Second Reading so that the Minister should have time to consider it, because I propose putting down an Amendment on the Committee stage.
12.42 p.m.
LORD AMPTHILL: My Lords, I rise to support the Second Reading of this small Bill. I have listened with the greatest possible interest this morning to the speeches made by noble Lords, and there is really nothing much that I can add. I may say that I found much to agree with in the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Williamson; I found much to agree with in the speech of my noble
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friend Lord McCorquodale of Newton; but, most of all, did I find myself in sympathy with the speech made by the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Oakridge. Therefore my support of this Bill, like his, is largely unqualified. I believe the Bill will do something—perhaps only a little, but something—to improve human relations in industry for the working people and, as Lord Robertson of Oak-ridge has said, in the community.
As a member of the Council of the Industrial Welfare Society, I am much aware not only of what our own Society is doing but of what others are doing in this field. I am also much aware of the number of inquiries which the Industrial Welfare Society receive, particularly from the smaller firms but even from some of the bigger and more progressive firms, asking the advice of the Society on how to handle this or that problem of human relations. Also, as Lord Robertson of Oakridge mentioned, the Industrial Welfare Society is doing a great deal to spread sound ideas which we believe in, in this country, far afield in the Commonwealth and even elsewhere. From all these sources one can read much and study much on this subject of human relations in industry and the community at large, but, by and large, I believe that it really boils down to two words: courtesy and consideration.
When I think of the word "consideration" I remember my early naval training, fifty years ago, at the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth, when we were taught "The men must have their dinner hour". I will not pursue this intriguing theme because it is approaching the time when your Lordships must have your dinner hour. I had hoped that my noble and gallant friend the First Lord would perhaps pipe us to dinner, but unfortunately, if I read my papers aright, he is abolishing the bosun's call and we are going to rely on loud speakers. I do not know what happens if the fuzes blow.
To return to the Bill, the main principle embodied in it is the right of both employer and employee to a minimum period of notice. Courtesy and consideration apart, we all know, probably only too well, the feelings of insecurity caused by the fear of the "sack" at literally minutes' notice. These feelings can, and should, be alleviated by the giving of adequate notice to an individual. Of course, nowadays dismissals arise often

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from redundancy for one reason or another. I must say that I regret that this Bill does not also deal with the question of redundancy. Similarly, the employee has to give seven days' notice. I think that is a good provision to embody in the Bill. It is part of the "courtesy and consideration" and, after all, the withdrawal of labour for any reason is not merely a question of profit or loss to the employer. The employer in his enterprise has undertaken wide commitments and contract; and all sorts of responsibilities to the community at large, and I think, therefore, he is entitled to some notice. I believe that the minimum periods laid down in the Bill are fair and reasonable.
In many cases progressive firms are already approaching that sort of point, and I do not think this statutory adoption will present any special difficulties in most industries—gat any rate not those with which I am familar. In my own industry a year ago we agreed with the trade unions an increased period of notice for people with 20 years' service or more. I must say that I have great sympathy with the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, in preferring direct negotiations with the trade unions and keeping the Government out, whichever Government it may be.
However. I should like to point out that this Bill is silent about the minimum period of notice to be given to or by employees with less than 26 weeks' service. My own company's rule on the subject is as follows—perhaps your Lordships will permit me to read it:
"Your engagement during the first month of employment will be from day to day, and may he terminated by the company or by you at the end of any day. After one month's employment you must give the company one week's notice, to run from any day, before leaving the company's employment, and similarly the company will give you one week's notice before discharge."
It occurs to me that the silence of the Bill on this particular question could give rise to the wrong impression among employees with less than 26 weeks' service—namely, that the contract that they had entered into at the time of their engagement (that is, to give seven days' notice of resignation) was invalid if it goes beyond statutory requirements. Clause 1(3) provides that either party can waive his right to notice on any occasion. It also provides that the clause shall not be taken to prevent either party
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from accepting a payment in lieu of notice.
I have always understood that an employer has the right at present, without committing any breach of contract, to pay wages in lieu of notice, and I think that this right should be specifically reserved in Clause 1(3). We all know that in most cases where an employee is dismissed, or even has given notice, it is infinitely preferable for all parties that the notice should not be worked out. I am a little doubtful about subsection (6) of Clause 1 where the employer's right to summary dismissal for gross breach of factory rules is preserved, but I am even more concerned that the right of suspension should be preserved. Many employers prefer suspension from work for a very short period where there has been a breach of factory rules or misconduct to using the much more serious practice of dismissal.
I should like now to refer to Clause 4. My friends and I interpret the phrases "terms of employment" and "terms and conditions of employment" as relating solely to contractual terms of employment. I think it is very important that there should be no room for misinterpretation of this clause. To the layman, at least, "terms and conditions of employment" might seem to embrace benefits that are received not of right but as privileges over and above the contractual terms of employment. In a sense, these are Committee points, and I will not waste further time on them, but I think I have given enough examples.
I should like now to turn to Schedule 1 and Schedule 2, in which there are some rather loose drafting examples—for instance, "by arrangement or custom ". What is "custom"? It is not the custom to sit in this House on a Friday, but we are here; and there are one or two things like that which will have to be dealt with on Committee stage. If this Bill is to be a success there must be no room for dispute or for the necessity to bring in lawyers. The noble Lord, Lord Williamson, mentioned his own fear in regard to this matter. My friends and I have discussed it, and we have real fears that there are still points in the Bill which need tidying up if we are to avoid these ghastly disputes which aggravate and disturb otherwise good relations in our factories.
12.55 p.m.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, all our debates on industrial affairs in this House are, I think, good ones, and I say that having listened to most of them and heard noble Lords like Lord McCorquodale of Newton, Lord Ampthill and Lord Robertson of Oakridge on other occasions. We expect a degree of agreement between us that we should like to think existed in industry; and it is quite clear that my noble friend Lord Williamson and the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, are very close together. Unfortunately, however, industry in practice does not reflect what I would frankly call the progressive views of noble Lords in this House on these matters. I intend to speak briefly. This has been a good debate, and we always enjoy hearing the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, who introduces anything with which he has to deal with rapidity, clarity, efficiency and all the desirable qualities. Of course, I disagree fundamentally with him when he says that it is a short but important Bill. It is a short but unimportant Bill. Nor does it reflect the practice in the most progressive firms. In fact it fails to do this.
I wish to deal with two main points, because some other interesting points I feel will be more efficiently dealt with in Committee. First of all, the proposals are clearly not good enough as a standard for a progressive firm, and what one is always afraid of in legislation of this kind is that people will tend to regard a minimum as a ceiling. It is also a little difficult to discuss the Bill without going into the redundancy question, and I was very interested in the remarks by Lord Layton and the interesting reference he made to the European situation. In many respects we are sadly falling behind European standards, not only in this matter but in other aspects of welfare.
If I may touch on redundancy, I would say that most progressive firms in this country give one week's notice for every year of service, and if it is a good contract—and this is the case in my firm, where anybody with over five years' service can have a six months' contract—it will add up to over a year. But even that will not make up for the really shattering disaster this represents to long-service employees. This is unavoidable, to some extent, in industry, because technological changes
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take place and individual firms or nationalised bodies must have regard at some stage to profitability. Until we have proper transferred pension arrangements—this is not relevant to the Bill, but it is relevant to the subject—and a much wider understanding of this matter, we are not going very far.
I understand, however, that this Bill is not to be regarded as the last word on redundancy. If it is to apply to the conditions that should be enforced by good employers, it is again not good enough. I and a number of employers think that once a man has been employed, say, for five years it ought to be virtually contrary to fundamental policy to terminate his services. It may be that it is necessary to establish some degree of review or control, and this calls for greater refinement of management than is yet possible; but the time ought to come—and there are firms that apply this—when, after a period, employment is permanent, unless there is some really serious falling-off. If there is serious falling-off, then the highest authority in the firm ought to be sought before termination of service. I also feel that after five years a longer notice period than a month is desirable. One other point is that many firms make redundancy payments in a way in which the payment does not rank for tax, and therefore the week's pay may well be higher in this respect, especially if it is an ex gratia arrangement. I suppose when we have formal redundancy arrangements such payments will be taxable. That is a point of some interest.
I should like to turn to the position of the employer. There is no doubt that this Bill adds once again to the troubles of the employer in interpreting legislation. I handed this Bill over to one or two bright people in my office and said, "How will this affect my firm?", and I found they made a number of misinterpretations. I may say that I have the advantage, as has any large organisation, of expert legal advice in the firm, and we shall no doubt eventually get it right, but I think a large number of people will not realise for a long time that the piece of paper that is handed to them is not a written contract, but is merely a statement of terms and does not have any contractual significance. I hope the Government will give some attention to advice on interpretation, though here

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again bodies of employment associations, trade associations and trade unions will undoubtedly bear the main burden of interpreting these particular clauses.
There is one small point. I see that in a latter clause of the Bill the Conservative Government's curious prejudice on the subject of families comes in again, as it did in the Shops and Offices Bill. I really do not see why, when people employ members of their own family, ordinary protective provisions of this sort should not apply to them. It was only two days ago that the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, had some encouragement from the Government about making the statutory position of married women in regard to property rather better. If the Government are prepared to see that it is necessary there—and all history teaches that it is necessary—I cannot see why we must have this ridiculous clause always excluding husbands, wives, sons arid daughters.
My Lords, I cannot say that I am too enthusiastic about the Bill. There is an interesting conflict which has arisen, which it is suitable to discuss, and that is the point of view of my noble friend Lord Williamson, as compared with that of the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Oakridge. Doubtless we shall have more opportunities to discuss the rôle of Government and the rôle of the outsider. There is no doubt that most progressive employers and trade union leaders prefer to settle their problems themselves. How far the Government might have proceeded in this legislation, in relation only to particular industries—those industries, for instance, in which wages councils exist—and might have sought to do this through wages council-type legislation, I do not know. My Lords, certainly we shall not hold up this Bill. If there is time, we hope to improve it a little further.
1.3 p.m.
LORD CARRINGTON: My Lords, as your Lordships know, there is another important debate due to take place at two o'clock, and I think your Lordships will forgive me if I do not answer in great detail all the points which have been made, though, of course, I will look into them very carefully. On the whole, I do not think I can complain about the reception this Bill has received, although the temperature varied a little
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from one side to the other; I should have put on a light summer overcoat in the case of the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, and a Palm Beach suit in the case of the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Oakridge. But, on the whole, I think your Lordships agreed that this will be a useful Bill.
The noble Lord, Lord Williamson, and others of your Lordships, complained that there has been inadequate consultation. But, of course, both the T.U.C. and the British Employers' Confederation were consulted in the summer of 1962 about the general principles that might be incorporated in a Bill of this kind. Since then there have been many further discussions with these bodies as well as with outside interests, although, of course, it is perfectly true that they were not consulted jointly on the National Joint Advisory Council. Of course, when introducing legislation no Government can ever win, because if you introduce a Bill which is so perfect that you cannot amend it in any detail then the Opposition complain that you are rigid and will not take their advice about anything, but if you introduce a Bill on which you are prepared to accept Amendments from both sides of the House you are told that the legislation which you have introduced was insufficiently conceived and badly drafted, and that you should not have brought forward legislation of that kind. So you cannot win. But I think it would be true to say, as my noble friends Lord Jessel and Lord McCorquodale of Newton said, that the Minister of Labour and his Parliamentary Secretary were prepared to accept Amendments on the Committee and Report stages of the Bill in another place.
My Lords, I, too, was very glad to see once again the noble Lord, Lord Layton, taking part in debates in this House. He said—and I was glad he said it—that he thought the Bill would do good. He largely confined his remarks to the problem of redundancy, and he will, I am sure, have heard what I said in my original speech, which was that the Government are contemplating measures to improve measures to meet the problems of redundancy. The Minister of Labour is at the moment discussing with representatives of employers and workers in both the public and private sectors of industry on his National Joint Advisory

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Council, what measures we can take to deal with these problems; and, as I have said, it is quite on the cards that legislation will be introduced later on.
I noticed what my noble friend Lord McCorquodale of Newton said about the introduction of a simple leaflet. I think the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, opposite, also took the view that this was a complicated Bill and that there might be some advantage in introducing a simple leaflet explaining its provisions. I can, of course, give no undertaking of that kind without consultation with my right honourable friend, but I certainly will look into the suggestion, as I will look into the anomaly which both he and the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Oakridge, raised about the question of sickness benefits. Perhaps we might leave these matters to a later stage of the Bill.
My noble friend Lord Jessel was good enough to tell me before the Second Reading that he was going to raise a point about laying off workers in a factory affected by strike action taken by other workers. The preliminary view—and we can discuss this again at a later stage—is that collective agreements very commonly provide for guaranteed wages for workers who have to go on to short time or have to be laid off for any reason. These agreements usually provide for the guaranteed wage to be suspended if the short time or laying off is due to certain specified circumstances, including, almost invariably, strike action by other workers in the same establishment or, in some cases, anywhere else. The notice provisions of the Bill will not affect the right of employers to lay off workers temporarily without notice in circumstances where the contract of employment permits. A temporary lay-off of this kind can be distinguished from termination of employment, and the Bill applies only where termination is concerned. But this is only a preliminary view and, as I say, perhaps we might discuss this question at a later stage.
My noble friend Lord Ampthill, in his interesting speech, made one point in which he suggested that, because the Bill was silent on the question of notice after a month's employment, it might be considered that the Bill itself made the contract void. But, of course, all the Bill is doing, as I understand it, is to lay
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down certain minima, and in no circumstances would the sort of contract that he has outlined be void. As regards his other points, perhaps it would be better if I waited until the next stage of the Bill, when we can clear these smaller points up.
Finally the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, in his speech made one or two interesting observations, and ended up with his usual speech about families and the attitude of Her Majesty's Government to families and family businesses. My noble friend Lord Newton, who, I am glad to say, is to assist me on the Committee stage of this Bill, is the expert on the Government's case on families, and I feel that it would be most unfair if, at this stage, and at ten minutes past one, I were to make his speech for him. So perhaps there again we might wait until the next stage of the Bill. I agree very much with what the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Oak-ridge, said in the course of his speech. I think it is the duty and the right of the Government to legislate in this sort of field. I believe that this Bill, short though it is, will bring our national practice up to the better standards of the good employers. I therefore commend it to your Lordships and ask that you give it a Second Reading.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
[The Sitting was suspended at 10 minutes past one and resumed at 2 o'clock.]

MATRIMONIAL CAUSES AND RECONCILIATION BILL
2.0 p.m.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
Moved. That the House do now resolve itself into Committee—(Lord Shackleton.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The LORD AIREDALE in the Chair.]
LORD SILKIN LORD SILKIN moved, to insert as a new Clause 1:
Additional grounds for divorce
".—(1) A petition for divorce may be presented to the court either by the husband

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or by the wife on the ground that the parties to the marriage have separated and thereafter have lived apart for a continuous period of at least seven years immediately preceding the presentation of the petition, and there is no reasonable probability of cohabitation being resumed.
(2) A petition may be presented on the ground aforesaid (in this section referred to as the ground of separation') notwithstanding that the separation was brought about by the action or conduct of one of the parties, whether constituting desertion or not, and notwithstanding that there was in force between them at any material time a decree of judicial separation or an order having effect as such a decree or an agreement to live apart.
(3) A decree of divorce shall not be pronounced on the ground of separation if it appears to the court that by reason of the conduct of the petitioner, whether before or after separation began, or for any other reason it would in the particular circumstances of the case be harsh and oppressive to the respondent or contrary to the public interest to pronounce a decree on that ground.
(4) Without prejudice to subsection (3) above, the court may refuse to pronounce a decree on any petition on the ground of separation until the petitioner has made such provision (if any) for the maintenance or benefit of the respondent and any child to which section 26 of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1950 applies as the court thinks proper in the circumstances of the case.
(5) Where petitions for divorce presented by both parties to a marriage are before the court, the court shall not, upon either of those petitions, pronounce a decree on the ground of separation if it can properly pronounce a decree upon the other petition on any other ground; and for the purposes of this subsection an answer praying for divorce shall be treated as if it were a petition for divorce.
(6) Subject to the provisions of this section the court, if satisfied on the evidence that the case for a petition presented on the ground of separation is proved, shall pronounce a decree of divorce, and if not so satisfied shall dismiss the petition; and section 4 of the said Act of 1950 (except so much of subsection (1) as requires the court to inquire into the facts alleged and any counter charge) shall not apply to such a petition."
The noble Lord said: I beg to move the Amendment standing in my name on the Paper. This is a matter of very great importance, and one which, judging by the unusual attendance that we shall presently see in this House, has aroused a good deal of interest. It is a matter on which this House is always at its best—when discussing moral, equitable subjects. We are particularly pleased to see a very full Bench of right reverend Prelates, including the most reverend
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Primate—an unusually full Bench—although I would imagine that they have come much more to bury me than to praise me. Nevertheless, I welcome their being here, and I will certainly listen with the greatest interest and attention to what they have to say, because I think we shall all agree, whether we are in accord or not, that they have a point of view which ought to be expressed in a debate of this kind.
We are all in agreement about one thing: that we wish to maintain the sanctity of marriage, and that we desire the happiness of our people in married life. I imagine that there are quite a number of people who will not agree with what I am going to put forward, but I would ask them to accept the fact that, in putting forward these views—and this also applies, of course, to those who support me—we are quite as sincere in our view as those who are opposed to us. I hope we can discuss this subject on that level, without impugning the sincerity or the motives of either side. My Lords, with that introduction I am afraid I am going to ask for your indulgence, because I toyed with the idea of making a very short speech—
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: Hear, hear!
LORD SILKIN: I know my noble friend would prefer that—but I came to the conclusion that this is an important matter, it is a long and complicated Amendment, and that I ought to deal with it fairly fully.
This conception of a marriage being voidable at the end of seven years of separation is, of course, not a new one. It was, so far as Parliament is concerned, introduced in a Bill by Mrs. Einene White in 1951, but she subsequently withdrew the Bill on the assurance that a Royal Commission would be set up to look into the whole question. This Commission has in fact sat—it sat for four years—and reported. The Report is available, and I imagine a great number of your Lordships have read it. Then there was a Bill introduced some months ago in another place by Mr. Abse, the Matrimonial Causes Bill, which included a provision similar to the one I have put down. I think he agreed, as the Bill proceeded, that his own language was not entirely satisfactory, and there was incorporated

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on the Second Reading an Amendment to his provision, which was very similar to the one that was down, and is in identical terms, I think, to the one I have down as an Amendment. On the Report stage of the Bill, Mr. Abse appears to have got cold feet, because he withdrew this clause with a view to getting agreement on the rest of his Bill. The rest of the Bill, with which we are not concerned at this moment, provides, broadly, for reconciliation, and for enabling parties to get together again for a short time without prejudice to their rights. I am not dealing with that at this stage: but, in the hope of saving the rest of his Bill, Mr. Abse withdrew this, I think, important and vital clause.
I come now to the Amendment. It is a long Amendment with a considerable number of subsections; but, broadly speaking, it provides that where a husband and wife have been separated and thereafter have lived apart for a continuous period of seven years or more, and where there is no reasonable probability of their ever coming together again, then either party may petition for a divorce.
LORD BOOTHBY: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord for one moment on a point of clarification? It is clear, is it not, that the court must satisfy itself that there is no reasonable chance of reconciliation?
LORD SILKIN: Yes, of course, that is so; but the Amendment itself contains a considerable number of restrictions on that, and I want to say a word about them. Of course the court has to be satisfied, as the noble Lord, Lord Boothby, has said, that there is no reasonable possibility of their coming together again, just as it has to be satisfied that they have been separated continuously for seven years or more.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord to clarify a matter there? The court has to satisfy itself upon some future action of two parties. It presumably can only take their own word for it, There is no other method.
LORD SILKIN: This is no different from any other matter that comes before a court. The court hears evidence and the court makes up its mind on the evidence presented to it. The petitioner
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will make his case, and if he does not make his case then, of course, the court has the right to reject it. But these are among several safeguards that I have put down. For instance, in subsection (3) the conduct of the petitioner can be questioned. A decree will not be pronounced
"if it appears to the court that by reason of the conduct of the petitioner, whether before or after separation began, or for any other reason it would … be harsh and oppressive to the respondent or contrary to the public interest to pronounce a decree on that ground".
So there would be no question of a person acting in an improper way with a view to getting a divorce without the judge having an opportunity of expressing his view.
Then there is subsection (4) of the Amendment, which provides that no decree shall be made until provisions satisfactory to the court for the maintenance of the respondent or child of the marriage have been made. That applies particularly, of course, in the case of a husband petitioner against a wife. Further, where the petitioner has been guilty of adultery he or she (because we have to recognise that it is not only the husband who commits adultery) will have to ask for the discretion of the court after a full disclosure; and it must be obtained. I submit that it will not be easy to surmount all these conditions and that a divorce will not be granted as a matter of course. The judge will have to be satisfied on all these matters before he grants a decree.
In view of what has been said I would suggest that no sane person would embark on marriage in the expectation of getting an easy release at the end of seven years by instituting proceedings. I do not think we need fear that this particular fact will loosen the marriage ties. Indeed, it would be much easier for a person who wanted to get a divorce not to wait seven years but to embark on a process of cruelty, desertion or misconduct and virtually force the other side to take the proceedings.
BARONESS HORSBRUGH: Would the noble Lord allow me to interrupt him?—I did not follow him. If the other person, say, in this case, the wife, disapproves altogether of divorce, is not the whole point of this that the husband might be cruel and he might desert her, but still—and this is the point of difference over

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this particular Amendment—having said she is not in favour of divorce, she is compelled to be divorced?
LORD SILKIN: That is a very pertinent remark; but I would ask the Committee to let me make my case. Obviously, I have not overlooked this point; it is a pertinent one and in due course I shall reach it. I am at the moment in the course of putting my case to the Committee. Later I will deal with some of the difficulties and objections that may arise.
This clause would give a chance to hundreds of thousands of couples, who are at present living in a state of "unmarriage", to start a new married life, and would thus help to stabilise the marriage institution and reduce the number of unmarried people living this kind of life. It would, particularly, enable husband and wife to remarry where they have separated by mutual agreement. In cases where individuals have been separated for seven years or more, they are, as the Committee knows, barred from taking proceedings for divorce because the separation has been by mutual agreement; and they are barred for all time. Moreover, there is the question of illegitimacy. I know that some noble Lords do riot like this argument, but it is a fact that some 40,000 children are born every year to parents who are cohabiting but are not married. It has been estimated that there are something like 200,000 children to-day under 16 years of age who are the result of these unions. If this Amendment were carried it would enable the parents, where the divorce is granted, to marry and to legitimise their children; and this' I think is a very important object of the Amendment.
Now I should like to come to the aspect with which the noble Baroness wants me to deal. What are the objections to what seems a sensible and sane principle in the public interest if we believe in the institution of marriage? The first is that this Amendment introduces a new and undesirable principle: that a petition may be presented by the guilty party; that divorce may be obtained against the wishes of the innocent party. I think that is the point that the noble Baroness was making: that we are creating a new principle by departing from the idea of the matrimonial offence which, at present, is supposed to be the
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sole ground for divorce; and that this will have a serious effect on the institution of marriage. All these objections, in my view, come logically and understandably from those who, on religious or other moral grounds, are completely opposed to divorce. But I find it difficult to understand such objections from people who accept the principle of divorce. And it has been the law in this country for three quarters of a century, and is now an accepted factor in our social life.
I would ask the Committee to realise that divorce is not merely a matter of a guilty party and an innocent party. That may be so in law; but in general, where a marriage has broken down, I would ask the Committee to consider whether there is necessarily an innocent and a guilty party. Is it always that one party is black and the other white? It is generally conceded that something like 75 per cent. of the divorces are in fact collusive. I know that should not be so and, in the presence of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hodson, I should hesitate to say that he has any knowledge of it—of course he has not. But it is the fact; and I can assure him that the majority of divorces are, in fact, collusive, in the sense that both parties agree to it. If there is a defence, the respondent does not put it up, because he or she wants the divorce as much as the other party.
Moreover, since this is going to be partly a question of femininity, I would say that at least half the divorces are instituted by women—by wives against husbands. It is not the other way. Then where the petition is on the grounds of adultery, it is the fact that in a great many cases (I hesitate to say the majority) the petitioner has to go to the court and ask for discretion on the grounds of his or her own misconduct; and that plea is generally granted. They have to make a full disclosure and the court, before granting the divorce, must take into account the fact that the petitioner has himself or herself been guilty of misconduct. I would ask the Committee to say who is the guilty party in such cases, in which both parties have to accept the fact that they themselves have committed misconduct.
There is another ground for divorce. A husband or wife may bring a divorce petition against his or her spouse on

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the ground of incurable insanity. Is that a matrimonial offence? I hope that no one would argue that becoming insane is an offence. Nevertheless, it is a ground for divorce. Broadly speaking, on all these grounds for divorce it is the view of the community that the marriage has broken down. There can be no real marriage where one party is cruel to the other, or one party becomes insane, or where there is desertion.
Then there is the question of the imposing of divorce on an unwilling spouse after seven years' separation. A spouse may be unwilling for a variety of reasons. He may have a conscientious objection to divorce. That is recognised and accepted in my Amendment. Subsection (3) provides that that is a factor which a judge can take into account. My Amendment also recognises that the conduct of the petitioner may be so bad in all respects that it would not be right to give him a divorce.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend, for clarification, where it is recognised that a religious scruple, for example, should be taken into account?
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, there are no words about religious scruples, but there are these words
"…. it would in the particular circumstances of the case be harsh and oppresive to the respondent or contrary to the public interest …."
As the noble Earl knows, this is a matter which was discussed a great deal in another place and it was generally recognised that this was a factor which should be taken into account. It was a matter of finding the appropriate language, and I understand that the Solicitor General in another place accepted that these words covered religious scruple. If there are no legitimate grounds for a respondent's objection to a divorce, why should not a divorce be granted on these grounds? After all, we recognise that there are spouses who are spiteful, dog-in-the-manger-ish, who want to get their own back, vindictive; and if there are no grounds of conscience for objecting to a divorce—and the hardship point is dealt with in subsection (4) of my Amendment—why should not the other party, however he has acted in the past, unless he has acted very badly in the opinion of the judge, have an opportunity
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of happiness by marrying again in the future? Is it so much worse to have been separated for seven years than to have committed one act of misconduct upon which a divorce is obtainable?
Even if this is a new principle, I would remind your Lordships that a number of new principles were accepted in the 1932 Act—it is usually called the Alan Herbert Act. Parliament accepted the principle that in future divorce would be available on entirely new grounds—for example, on grounds of desertion and cruelty. The law of divorce has had to be changed with the times, and it will continue to have to be changed. If it is desirable that this particular form of Change should be made, then I would submit to the Committee that the fact that this is a new principle should not deter us from agreeing to it.
There is an Amendment on the Marshalled List in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hodson, and of my noble friend Lady Summerskill. The purpose of that Amendment is that a divorce should not be granted on these grounds except with the consent of both parties. On the face of it, that would seem to me to be accepting the principle of my proposed clause—that is, that there should be divorce on the ground of permanent separation for a period of seven years—and that if my Amendment were accepted, that would be acceptable. That is how it appears to me in form. I would only say about the Amendment that, if the noble and learned Lord were prepared to add to his Amendment that such consent is not to be unreasonably withheld, then I think we should all be in complete agreement on the matter. But I gather that we are not going to discuss his Amendment to my Amendment to-day; that there will be a straight vote on the question of whether or not this Committee is in favour of the clause as it stands, and that the noble and learned Lord's Amendment will be moved at a later stage if it becomes necessary. I would say that subsection (3) deals with the question of unreasonably withheld consent, because, if all the conditions of the subsection are satisfied, there would be no reasonable ground left for objection.
I am far from saying that there will not be a few cases which will be hard cases and which cannot be dealt with by

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my Amendment, but they will be very few indeed, and they will be far outnumbered by the persons who will benefit if the Amendment is accepted. I move this Amendment, sincerely believing that it will strengthen and enhance the marriage institution, and that it will give new hope and life to many thousands of men, women and children and will remove the stigma of illegitimacy from a large number of completely innocent people. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Before Clause 1, insert the said new clause—(Lord Silkin.)
THE DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES: I understand that the Amendment to the Amendment is not moved.
LORD SHACKLETON: As Member in charge of the Bill, may I say that it is our hope to-day to complete the debate on the new clause only and that we should not expect to take any further stages of the Bill. After discussions between the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hodson, my noble friend Lady Summerskill and myself, it was agreed that it would be for the convenience of the Committee to have a straight debate on the clause as it stands. This, of course, will not deny the noble and learned Lord the opportunity either of speaking, to any particular argument he may have on his Amendment or, if the clause remains on the Bill after to-day's debate, of moving his Amendment. Of course, if the clause is out, he will not want to proceed further with it.
THE DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES: That may be so, but my duty is to call Amendment No. 2 at this stage.
2.30 p.m.
LORD HODSON: After consultation with the noble Baroness, Lady Summer-skill, who is my staunch ally in this battle, and also with other Members of your Lordships' House who are of other opinion, I have decided not to go further with the Amendment to the Amendment, because I think, and we all think, that this would really confuse the issue. The issue is a straight one. We all understand where we are. If we may take it that the Amendment to the Amendment is withdrawn, I will, if I may proceed, with my speech.
THE DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES: Then Amendment No. 2 is not moved, and the question before the Committee is that Amendment No. 1 be agreed to.
LORD HODSON: The issue, as I said just now, is a simple one, and sooner or later we shall have to come down to earth. I think that a good many words have been used—with all respect to my noble friend Lord Silkin—which really do not help very much. The real issue in this case is: are we going to accept the finding of the Royal Commission, which sat and laboured for about four years and at the end of it all came to the conclusion that if we are to have divorce the basis upon which divorce should be granted should be the matrimonial offence? That decision was arrived at by a majority of eighteen to one. I should like to take this oportunity to pay tribute to my noble and learned friend Lord Morton of Henryton, who for those long, and perhaps dreary, years presided over the deliberations of that Commission. The members were men and women drawn from all sorts and conditions of life; they heard evidence from all sorts of people, and that was the conclusion they reached.
I should, in order to be honest, say that after they had done that they considered the opposite theory. For, after all, there are only two theories alive on this problem—namely, are we going to act on the matrimonial offence, or are we going to act on the breakdown of marriage theory? That is the fight. On the breakdown of marriage theory, notwithstanding the conclusion which the Royal Commission had reached by eighteen to one in favour of the matrimonial offence, they were divided. That strikes me, on the face of it, as rather inconsistent; but that is the position so far as the Royal Commission left it.
The grounds for divorce which are material are adultery, cruelty and desertion. I have to accept the point made by my noble friend Lord Silkin that that principle has been broken into by this: that since 1937 it has been open to a spouse to get a divorce on the ground of the incurable insanity of the other spouse. But that is really because the other spouse is incurably ill in a particular way, and you can divorce her. That, I think, is contrary to the principle that

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I have stated, but it is the only inroad upon that principle which has so far been made. I, and those who think like me, are anxious that no further inroad should be made. We say, having, I hope, the same ideals as those who have an opposite opinion, that the institution of marriage should, so far as possible, be maintained. In my opinion, this proposal would involve a further great blow on that institution—and I say "further great blow" because each increase in the grounds of divorce not only increases the number of divorces but, contrary to the expectations of those who advocate more grounds, increases the number of legal separations as well; and the number of illegitimate children has increased, too. One would have thought, if the argument put forward on the other side were correct, that easing the situation in favour of those who wanted divorce would produce a smaller number of legal separations in magistrates' courts and a lesser number of illegitimate children.
Having made those assertions, I should try to justify them by statistics, though I am as well aware as all your Lordships are that with statistics one can cheat, and I do not want to do that. I take them from the speech of the President, who is a man whom I think we all respect. He is an experienced politician as well as being the head of the Division which now has to deal with these cases; he has access to the relevant figures and would be the last man in the world unfairly to select them. One has to keep clear of periods when exceptional factors are at work. A great war will increase the number of divorces; changes in legislation will increase the number; and an addition to the number of Judges will also increase the number. So statistics have to be carefully chosen. But this is what the President said:
"In every one of the five years 1958 to 1962 there was an increase in the number of divorce petitions filed. They rose from 25,584 in 1958 to 33,818 in 1962."
These figures are not quite the same as those given by the Solicitor General in another place, but I am afraid I am unable to explain the differences. This year, the President said, the figures are up again on the comparable period last year. In the years 1955 to 1962 (except for one when a special procedural factor was at work) there was a steady increase
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in the divorce decrees made absolute. They rose from 22,000-odd in 1958 to 28,000-odd in 1962.
Then I come on to the argument that is sometimes put forward that separations will decrease as divorce increases. The figures show that after 1923, when women first were enabled to get a divorce on the ground of adultery alone, there was a rise, not a fall, in the number of new maintenance and separation orders, both in absolute numbers and expressed as a percentage of married couples. The same is true of the period corresponding to the rapid rise in divorce petitions to which I have already referred.
Then there is the argument from bastardy. No doubt there are some cases where children born of extra-marital unions could be legitimated, but, viewing society as a whole, greater facilities for divorce have been accompanied by more illegitimacy. Here I must quote from the Registrar General's Report of 1960. He said:
"In recent years there has been a noticeable increase in the number of illegitimate and premaritally conceived legitimate maternities"—
I apologise for the long words—
"and also of the relevant rates…while the legitimate maternity rate for all ages under 45 was 14 per cent. higher in 1960 than in 1952 … the illegitimate maternity rate has risen by 50 per cent. between 1952 and 1960"
and
"the rate for 1960 exhibits a sharp rise above the 1959 rates."
The figures were 28,000-odd in 1959 and 43,000-odd in 1960. In 1961 this rise was sharper, there being 49,000-odd illegitimate births in that year. These figures, the President pointed out, are the more startling when one bears in mind the increasing knowledge and practice of contraception. So much for statistics.
LORD SHACKLETON: Before the noble Lord leaves the statistics, can he give us the actual figures of judicial separations?
LORD HODSON: I should have thought that the judicial separations were very few. The separation orders I was speaking about I have in the speech of the President, but I have not copied them out. I have seen them, and the figures showed a rise which is rather surprising. It is surprising that there should be a rise in separation orders—and I do not mean

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separation orders in the technical sense, but the maintenance orders made in magistrates' courts over the years.
Where does the opposite view lead? Does it not lead first to this: that logically there is absolutely no necessity for any judicial intervention in divorce at all? If you are going to talk about the criterion being the breakdown of marriage, who is better able to decide that than the spouses themselves? Why is a Judge a better man for that than the spouses themselves? Or if it be said that we must have somebody, why select a Judge to determine whether or not the marriage has hopelessly broken down? I know it is said, "Oh, well, we are not going quite so far as that. We are only talking about seven years' separation." But the objective, surely, is to substitute the criterion of the breakdown of the marriage for the matrimonial offence. And this is only the beginning. In conversation with those who hold the opposite view to myself, I think that they are quite prepared to admit this: that all this stuff about matrimonial offences is, if I may borrow a word which was used very effectively in this House by the noble and gallant Field Marshal (who I see in his place), Lord Montgomery of Alamein, all poppycock. We do not need to bother with that; just find out if the marriage is broken down and that is good enough.
The Russians are a logical people, and in the early days after the Revolution I remember a Russian lawyer giving evidence in our courts to the effect that marriage, like birth and death, was just a fact of life, like other facts, and there was no particular formality required for its beginning or its ending. But I believe that they have found since then that that was an unfortunate way of running their country, and that the family require protection by, at any rate, registration, and that some restriction on the de-registration of marriages was found necessary.
I have already, on Second Reading, expressed my objection, to which I think I ought to come at once, to this particular proposal, but it is not necessary to say very much. The point was very sharply and shortly put by the noble Baroness, Lady Horsbrugh, this afternoon, and, indeed, by the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, at Second Reading: that this is really a rich man's charter.
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It is a husband's clause and it is going to be available only to well-to-do husbands. These so-called safeguards are quite illusory. How is the woman who is the wife of a poor man to be compensated financially for the loss which she has to suffer by enabling the husband to go off with another woman and start a new marriage with her?
And why, I ask, apart altogether from financial considerations, which have already been emphasised, and will no doubt be emphasised again, should a woman be dragooned into divorcing her husband? I do not mind whether she has religious objections or other objections, but I am supposing that she married the man when they were both young and that she intended to stick to him. He is ageing—and I speak of anybody over 45 as ageing; he leaves his faded wife and goes off with a younger woman. I am being laughed at; but while that is, of course, a special case, it is not an unusual one; and it is a case which I think was envisaged also by the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, in her speech on Second Reading. That is what very often happens. Why should this wretched woman be told that she has to divorce her husband? Or, indeed, why should she be told that she has to go to court and explain why she will not divorce him? People do not like coming to court; and least of all do they like coming to the divorce court—they hate it. Yet these unfortunate women are to be told that they must come and explain why they will not divorce their husbands. Moreover, according to this Amendment which the noble Lords have put forward, they are told that if they can satisfy the court that it was all the other person's fault then they must get a divorce. So the judge is going to be asked to try something which happened seven years ago, which is a little rough on the judge and on the parties who are supposed to dig up in their memories the quarrels they had seven years before the proceedings.
I do not want to delay your Lordships, because I know that there are a great many others who wish to speak; but I feel that I ought to say something about the illegitimate child. I must accept that in this country—though not I think so much in other countries—there is some

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stigma attached to illegitimacy. The absence of a father is, of course, a handicap; but none but a fool could possibly cast stones at a man because he was born a bastard, any more than because he had red hair, since he could not have had anything to do with the circumstances of his birth. It does not seem to have troubled William the Conqueror much. I know that he put out the eyes of citizens whom he took at Alençon because they hung hides of beasts on the walls of the town, thereby indicating the humble birth of his mother, the daughter of a tanner. But what annoyed him in this action was the reference to the humble birth of his mother and not his own bastardy.
Attention must, I agree, be paid to the argument that some children may get legitimated and may have formal parents allied in matrimony who will not be so allied to-day. I know very little about this from a sociological point of view. I have made such inquiries as I can among adoption societies and organisations of that kind, and perhaps I may quote from a book by Miss Virginia Wimperis, a lady who is a qualified sociologist and knows a great deal about this subject. In her book, The Unmarried Mother and her Child she has written:
"Divorce could be made easier, so that more of the parents who now set up unofficial families could marry and have legitimate children instead. It is quite possible that this would do more than any other single factor to reduce the illegitimacy rate…. If, however, divorce were made easier or allowed at the instance of one partner, whatever the other wished, the stability of many marriages would be undermined and the happiness of many other children—the existing and future children of marriage—imperilled. Nearly every marriage has at least some moment of stress when for a brief while the partners rely almost solely on their vow and intention of permanence and society's insistence that marriage should endure. Many good marriages would founder in the absence of this support."
I ask your Lordships to vote against this Amendment.
2.46 p.m.
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: My Lords, it is known to everyone that the Churches have definite beliefs about marriage and divorce, and it has been suggested (though not here to-day) that there is a wish on the part of churchmen to impose those beliefs upon the law
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of the country. The truth is this. While the Churches have their beliefs and standards which they urge their members to follow, and teach that they can follow with the help of God's grace, they accept the fact that a great many citizens do not share their beliefs and that this is reflected in the divorce laws of the country. However, the Churches are concerned with what is likely to be good and right for the country as a whole, and it is from that concern that I, for one, express my views about the new clause now before us.
We have the problem before us now, the problem concerning divorce: because there is something very wrong in the country, and this has been growing. Too many marriages break down. There are too many strains in families; too many illicit unions, both before and after marriage. Why is this? It is largely because of the many tensions about sex and marriage to which so many people, especially, perhaps, young people, are liable. I welcome wholeheartedly the greater openness about sex which exists to-day; for sex can be a good and beautiful thing, and the wrong kind of hush-hush attitude about it can do harm. Yet there is in much of the population a preoccupation with sex, a lack of discipline about it and so many temptations to incontinence on all sides, especially as the physical dangers of incontinence seem not to be so great as they once were. Hence, the background from which marriage is approached by many people is a confused one, and too many couples enter marriage with the scales already weighted against their making a lifelong success of it. The status of marriage is undermined in the minds of so many of the people, and because its status is undermined the tendency increases for couples to approach it without enough understanding and dedication to its true meaning. That is the background to our questions about divorce. I would urge that, while we should view this question with great sympathy for those in hardship through broken marriages, we should also view it from the angle of the status of marriage for those who approach it.
So I come to the new clause moved by the noble Lord, Lord Silkin. The plea is made that it will remove hardship from many whose marriages have broken down, and that it will remove hardship from children at present illegitimate.

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These are important pleas, and I will come back to them, because it is impossible not to have great sympathy with distress of any sort. But I would plead that we consider this other question: what effect will the clause have upon the status of marriage, its essential meaning and definition for those who approach it or are trained for it? And this is a grave question. Divorce after seven years separation, if there is no consent, can involve injustice; and if it is a matter of consent it alters, by reflex implication, the meaning of the marriage covenant. It makes the words "till death us do part" mean in effect "until we ourselves decide that we are tired of one another and agree to end it". At present both the church marriage and the registry marriage are one in stating and implying the intention by the parties to enter a lifelong covenant. It will be very hard to say this is really so if the principle of this new clause is established.
But, my Lords, what is being said on the other side? It is said that at present people whose marriages are broken down are driven to commit a matrimonial offence in order to get a divorce. This is sometimes true, and it is an evil state of affairs. But I think the alternative proposal is a greater evil; that is, that with the necessity of specific offences put on one side there is created an honourable respectable way of ending a marriage—namely by separation or consent. I agree with the nine members of the Royal Commission who said:
"There can be no more subtle temptation to divorce than the belief that there is a wholely blameless way of ending a marriage".
Again, it is said that the passing of this clause will bring to an end the number of illicit unions. It will indeed turn a number of what are now illicit unions into second marriages; and happy ones, too. I appreciate that. But will it reduce the number of illicit unions which come into existence? No, my Lords; that would seem very improbable. The availability of this new ground for divorce will not deter people from entering into illicit unions, for people will be encouraged to do so, secure in the knowledge that after the statutory number of years they will be free to marry. It would also facilitate the designs of a person who had no scruple about breaking up someone else's marriage. If a
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woman wanted to entice a husband away from his wife she would be in a stronger position to do so under this new clause, as she would know that eventually a divorce could be forced upon the innocent wife. And that is perhaps the most alarming of the new possibilities which the clause would create. I believe that these considerations weigh very heavily against the rightness of this clause.
I refer now to the plea on behalf of illegitimate children who, if the clause were passed, would have a chance of becoming the legitimate children of a married home through their father marrying their mother. It would do that. But it would be at the expense of the father's first partner and the children of the first and married union. The easier it is made for the second woman to get regularly married to a man, the more likely she is to take the risk of living with that man until she can get married to him. It is therefore not at all unlikely that more people would be injured by the operation of this new ground for divorce than would be helped by it. Ts it right to try to legitimise children by divorcing someone else?
I have set out the case against this clause, as I see it, with, I hope, due and real sympathy to the motives and feelings behind it. In a letter to The Times yesterday it was asked whether the case of the churchmen who oppose the clause was based only on dogma or on sociological considerations. I would say that the considerations which I have been putting to your Lordships are indeed sociological considerations concerning the deep wellbeing of society. But as to dogma, this is a word which arouses prejudice so let me use the word "belief". In this matter the Churches are not asking to impose their belief on those who do not accept it, for churchmen have already accepted that there is a divergence between their belief and the State's law on divorce. But other people besides Churches have beliefs, and there is still a common ground between them; and it is a gain for this country that wherever a marriage is conducted it is affirmed to be a lifelong covenant. And we have our terrible problems largely because the status of marriage is weakened and the approach of so many people to it is wrong. Do not, my Lords, weaken this status further. Let me put

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it thus: do not, out of motives of compassion, which all of us must feel, cut at the ground of compassion itself. Do not try to meet the hardship of some in such a way as to weaken the security of the many.
My Lords, this is not to say that I am content with the present law on divorce and the operation of the divorce courts. When the recent statement by a number of Church leaders in this country ended with the words:
"We are anxious to examine any measures for reducing the hardships which would not sap the foundations of marriage"
we meant what we said. It is very difficult to see what can be done, but I am concerned that we should try. Is it not, for instance, worth while asking for further examination of the word "illegitimate"? Is it necessary for all purposes—for instance, for the purpose of bequests—that there should be the present distinction at all?
Again, if it were possible to find a principle at law of breakdown of marriage which was free from any trace of the idea of consent, which conserved the point that offences and not only wishes are the basis of the breakdown, and which was protected by a far more thorough insistence on reconciliation procedure first, then I would wish to consider it. Indeed, I am asking some of my fellow churchmen to see whether it is possible to work at this idea, sociolologically as well as doctrinally, to discover if anything can be produced. In Belgium there is a provision for what the law of that country calls divorce by mutual consent. I have been studying the Belgian law, but the procedure in the Belgian law is so hedged about by stage upon stage of reconciliation procedure that it is far removed from divorce by mutual consent as we understand it in our discussions in this country. Indeed, I wonder whether, for our purpose, the title of the Belgian procedure does not rather mislead. Let us examine every possibility of helping the legitimate and, if we can, of improving our divorce laws. But do not let us undermine what is not only the belief of the Churches, but the meaning of marriage as one of the bases of our society.
3.1 p.m.
LORD MORTON OF HENRYTON: My Lords, I seldom address your Lordships and I shall be brief; but as I was the Chairman of the Royal Commission on Marriage and Divorce I thought that, in fairness to my colleagues, I ought to state their views and arguments shortly by way of summary. The Commission had wide terms of reference, but in fact it considered fully the matters arising on this Amendment, and we heard evidence from many responsible bodies and from people with special knowledge of the circumstances, either from social workers or otherwise. I am not, of course, suggesting that we necessarily arrived at the right conclusions, but we did take a good deal of trouble. The Commission were by no means against changes in the law, because we made many suggestions, and no fewer than 69 of them are, I think, part of the law now, wholly or in part. But the Commission firmly rejected by 14 votes to 4 the proposal which is now before this Committee.
I hope I may be forgiven for quoting just three short paragraphs from the Report—I cannot suppose that your Lordships have all read them—which will put the point, in a few words, much better than I can put it at this stage
"To vest in a husband or wife the right to divorce a spouse who ex hypothesi had committed no recognised matrimonial offence and who did not want a divorce would result in great injustice. It would, for example, allow a man who had committed adultery or had been cruel to his wife to leave her and subsequently to divorce her against her will. This would violate a principle which has been long-established in the law—namely, that a man shall not be allowed ' to take advantage of his own wrong'."
That is exactly what is being suggested under this proposal.
The paragraph continues:
"The wife would have a divorce forced upon her. She might have religious or conscientious objections to divorce. In any case, whatever her objection might be, whether more or less reputable, she had married on the footing that, provided she did not give her husband ground to divorce her, she would retain the status of wife for life, with all that implies "—
LORD CHORLEY: Might I intervene, to ask the noble and learned Lord whether he would not agree with me that subsection (3) of the proposed Amendment covers the point that he has just made, and was probably put there for that reason?
LORD MORTON OF HENRYTON: I do not agree with that at all, and I propose to turn to that subsection in good time. Paragraph (xviii) says:
"Nor can we agree that it would be possible to ensure that adequate financial provision was made for the first wife and family. They would usually be bound to suffer if the husband married again, since there are very few men who can afford to support two families, and the man's natural impulse would be to look after the wife and family with whom he was living. It is not easy to make sure that the wife and children are supported when the husband is merely living with another woman and when the wife's claim is at least paramount in law; but their position is much less secure if a divorce has given the husband a second wife and family with a legal right to maintenance. In such cases the court is usually faced with the situation that there is not enough money to go round …"
Paragraph (xix) says:
"The strength of this objection was recognised by a metropolitan magistrate of wide experience who was very sympathetic to a ground of this type, in the interests of the children of illicit unions. He said ' when I was thinking this over last night I wrote … these words: "This is probably too idealistic and divorced from reality". In other words, having thought it over for twelve months and bearing in mind, so far as my own court is concerned, that most of the husbands cannot afford to keep one wife and rely on national assistance, this proposal, I think, would only he applicable to people of substance'."
I come now to subsection (3). If a wife is going to rely upon this subsection as a safeguard, the burden is on her to prove by evidence either evil conduct on the part of the husband (putting it shortly), or certain circumstances which render it harsh and oppressive to her, or contrary to the public interest, to pronounce a decree. If one looks at it from the practical point of view, the wife is required to go through the ordeal of giving evidence. That may cover private and personal matters extending over a large part of the married life. Further, there is the uncertainty that in each case the matter rests on the discretion of the judge. I am sure that the discretion would always be exercised with great care, but it is quite clear to anybody, I think, that it depends on the way the judge happens to look at the particular circumstances. It is not a matter of law: it is a matter of seeing what the facts are and of deciding upon them. I submit that for the wife to be put through the ordeal and to have to submit to this uncertainty is unfair. She
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wants the husband only to abide by a lifelong contract which he has made and which he is now trying to break.
3.8 p.m.
LORD GLADWYN: I speak with the greatest diffidence, and it was with the greatest diffidence that I yielded to the request of the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, to become one of the sponsors of this new clause. I suppose, therefore, that I ought, so to speak, to declare my interest—in other words, to tell you why I dare to intervene at all in this debate. In the first place, I am a complete layman: I am not a lawyer, and I am not particularly versed in divorce or any other law. I am the child of a broken marriage, however, and my personal experience suggests that it would certainly have been in the interests of the family, and, I should have thought, in the general interest too, if the clause which we are putting forward to-day became the law of the land. I am also a humble, but a sincere, member of the Church of England.
Therefore, it is with the greatest reluctance that I say anything to-day which may perhaps be taken as departing in any way from what has just been said by the most reverend Primate as the leader of the Church to which I belong. But though, of course, the Church has the right and the duty to pay the greatest attention to the institution of marriage, on which our whole social system largely rests—that is indisputable—and though monogamy is rightly, as I think, prescribed both by our Church and our State, I doubt whether the rules governing the conduct of monogamy in our modern society should be approached altogether from a religious point of view. I rather think that in that particular assertion I have the support of the most reverend Primate himself—in his remarks about dogma, for instance. I think we ought, therefore, to regard divorce primarily as a social problem on which all who have thought about the matter at all are fully entitled to express a view—some more entitled than others, like the noble Lord who has spoken last—but all entitled to express a view in the light of their own experience.
The Emperor Justin II at the end of the 5th century, we are told by Gibbon:
"yielded to the prayers of his unhappy subjects and restored the liberty of divorce by mutual

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consent; the civilians were unanimous; the theologians were divided; and the ambiguous word which contains the precept of Christ is flexible to any interpretation that the wisdom of the legislature can demand."
That seems to me to be the point, if I may respectfully say so. Parliament, as the supreme expression of the national will, should from time to time examine our social laws in order to see whether they truly respond to the needs of an ever-changing society.
It seems to me to be no accident at all that, not long after the convulsions of the Napoleonic wars and the industrialisation of this country, the first great Divorce Act was passed in 1857. What may have been well adapted to an agricultural nation of conservative habits was not necessarily well adapted to the age of steamships and trains. Nor, I think, was it an accident that the next important advance on the question of divorce was after the First World War, in 1937, with the passage of the great Herbert Bill. The Second World War has perhaps changed our society, rightly or wrongly, even more than the first, and now is no doubt the moment to bring our law into harmony with what I am persuaded the bulk of our population, if it were clearly explained to them, would regard as simple equity.
Therefore, I should like my congratulations to Mr. Abse to be added to those expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Silkin. It seems to me that Mr. Abse has deserved well of the community in piloting the Bill under discussion to-day through another place, but, as we all know, this was at the cost of having to abandon what I regard as the central feature of his Bill—namely, the clause regarding seven years' separation, the substance of which my colleagues and I urge your Lordships to reinstate in the Bill. In common with them, I believe that this clause, if it ever becomes law, will rectify—or partially rectify—a great social injustice: namely, the labelling as illegitimate of what are estimated to be some 200,000 children, the offspring of what are, in effect, second marriages, though they cannot be so regarded by the law as it now stands.
It is quite true that adoption of this clause will mean a slight departure from the alleged basic principle of the present law, namely, that (apart from madness, non-consummation of the marriage
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and one or two other special cases) divorce can be obtained only as a result of the commission by one spouse or the other of a so-called "matrimonial offence"—that is, adultery, cruelty, desertion and so on; and then only if the offended party wishes to petition and does not decide to condone the offence. But, as we all know, the great majority of present-day divorces in practice rest on that very mutual consent which the law expressly debars. Thus, the present law, as it seems to me, is a mockery and a sham, and whether in these circumstances it really safeguards the holy state of matrimony is open, I believe, to considerable doubt. I therefore suggest that a small departure—it may be said that it may lead to other departures, but this is not necessarily so—from the principles of the present law is not necessarily a bad thing in itself.
The idea that its adoption will open the floodgates and result in a stream of divorces among people who would otherwise not separate seems to me to be an extraordinary delusion. All the adoption of the present clause would do would be to permit, subject to many safeguards, some of which were put forward by Lord Silkin, the legal divorce of people who for many years, often for as long as forty years, have in fact been divorced. The plain fact is that in modern conditions you cannot force people to live together against their will and that in most cases, rightly or wrongly, no moral stigma nowadays any longer attaches to them if they find, for one reason or another, that they cannot do so.
At the same time the Church and the law both assert, rightly, that monogamy is desirable. It is right that one should take this view if one gets married, and that the institution of monogamy should as far as possible be defended. I would not for one moment dispute that. It must not, therefore, be made easy for either spouse to leave the other merely because of incompatibility—though, admittedly, it is very easy to do exactly that to-day if only the feeling is mutual. But to the layman it seems rather curious to assert that if it is shown to the satisfaction of a court (and we must assume that our courts are presided over by learned and responsible men) that the couple have not lived together for no less than seven years—in other words, when it is clear

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beyond all reasonable doubt that they will never reunite, whatever may be said or done—legal validity should not, if it is desired by one party, be granted to a new and what may perhaps be called a de facto marriage.
Apart from anything else, if the deserted spouse—usually, I think, the wife—is supported by her husband, as she should be, the mere conclusion of a second marriage of the husband after a separation of at least seven years will not lessen his liability, or indeed his ability, to continue such support. Nor will the court, under our present clause, be entitled to grant a divorce unless it is satisfied that such support will be forthcoming. If it is not satisfied, the man will not get divorce. Thus the economic position of the deserted spouse cannot be worse under the present clause, and might even be better, since the errant spouse, faced with the possibility of obtaining his freedom, might be persuaded by the court to give more than he had so far been giving—if, indeed, he had been giving anything at all. I know that there may be certain technical difficulties in certain rather special circumstances as regards pensions, but I am assured—and I myself am not an expert—that these can be overcome.
Neither would the moral position of a deserted wife be unfavourably affected. That has been asserted, and I cannot see why it should be. For if, as she very well might be, she is deeply religious and believes in the indissolubility of marriage she could continue to believe in it; there would, after all, be no obligation on her to remarry. Her position would be the same. All she would lose would be the right (and this was mentioned by Lord Silkin) to veto the happiness of her erstwhile partner by insisting that the marriage-breaker shall never be able to confer his name, or title, on the lady who has succeeded her in his affections. On the whole, this possible disadvantage would hardly seem to correspond to the social disadvantage of preserving 200,000 technical bastards, with all the incentive to delinquency which this necessarily involves.
The notion that a divorce imposed on a faithful but abandoned wife would reduce her social status by conferring on her that of a "divorced person" seems to me to be irrelevant in our society. I
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cannot believe that any such "innocent party" would be likely in such circumstances to be struck off the list on any major social occasion. As I said at the beginning, I am not a lawyer, nor, I fear, am I especially devout. I myself believe, however, strongly in monogamy, even though men are frail and there are perhaps only a few of us who have been so fortunate as never to be tempted to err, which, if we may believe our Saviour, is scarcely different from erring. But I am profoundly convinced that it is by example rather than by law that we can best secure the married state, and indeed the family. Nevertheless, the law is necessary, and it is very desirable that it should be fair and known to be fair. It is also desirable that it should if possible, on balance, advance the sum total of human happiness.
By voting for our Amendment this afternoon your Lordships will be securing both of these admirable ends. Nor need you have any apprehension that existing marriages in future will be ruined by the additional proviso which is urged. On the contrary, a number of marriages which are now permanently and irreparably ruined, whatever we may say or do, will be balanced by an almost equal number of marriages which are not now allowed to have any legal existence. One would certainly have thought that, from the general point of view of marriage, this was not a debit but a positive gain.
For all these reasons, I trust that, having consulted your consciences which in this matter should be your sole inspirer, your Lordships will vote for something which, apart from any other consideration, is, I think, calculated to bring self-respect and happiness to many British families while not seriously adding—even if adding a little—to the miseries occasioned by broken marriages which, unfortunately, will always be with us, however much we may improve or try to improve the present law.
3.22 p.m.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: I propose to oppose this Amendment. I have listened to my noble friend Lord Silkin and the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, who support this Amendment, and I think that those of us who have listened carefully have realised the grave weakness of

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both of their arguments; and that is, that they have not given sufficient thought to the matter. Both of them have adopted an absolutely superficial approach and have not recognised the fundamental problem which is involved in this matter. In the first place, my noble friend Lord Silkin made a naive assumption when he asked why, if Members did not approach this on a theological basis and at the same time supported marriage, they were opposing this Amendment? He said that he could not understand people who supported divorce opposing this Amendment. I stand here knowing very little of theological dogma, and I am certainly not opposing the Amendment on theological grounds. I oppose it, as I shall explain in a minute, on grounds which I believe are so fundamental that any Parliamentarian here, who is proud of our form of civilisation, who believes in a stable marriage, who believes that the family unit is the very foundation of our State, should certainly oppose this Amendment.
I say this about the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn—and I say it with all respect. He rose here in a very brave way, I thought, and said something which very few men would have said. I have never heard of a man saying it before in either House. He said, "I come to support this Amendment; first, because I am a layman and, secondly, because I am a child of a broken family." I would just say this to him. The first thing that a Parliamentarian learns is that hard cases make bad laws. One should never try to argue a case from a special problem.
LORD GLADWYN: The noble Baroness must admit, however, that, since I have had that experience, it is perhaps my right, and even my duty, to express my view.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: I agree. I realise that he has this point which has prompted him. Probably if he had not had that experience he would not have yielded (that was another of his words) to the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, in speaking on it. I realise that that is what prompted him. But I also have a right to say, as a Parliamentarian, that the fact that one has had an unfortunate experience in life, which makes it difficult to be objective, is no reason why one should
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support a measure which may have very far-reaching effects. I would also say this to him: when he talked about the advance in divorce, that was surely a misnomer. In this context should one use the word "advance"?
On the question of illegitimate children, he appealed to noble Lords to help the illegitimate children. I propose to prove to this House that, if this measure is introduced, the number of illegitimate children in this country will probably increase, rather than decrease. I believe that, just as my noble friend Lord Silkin and the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, have taken rather a superficial view, many others have taken a limited view. They have believed that by compelling a husband or wife to submit to divorce, they would, as I have already said, relieve the lot of an illegitimate child.
LORD SILKIN: I do not want to interrupt the noble Lady, although I was interrupted a good deal. But I should like to assure her that I have given a great deal of thought to this subject; and I have had long professional experience of this matter. I have given my views, and, however imperfect they may be—and I am sure they are in the eyes of the noble Lady—they are at any rate not superficial.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: I should have thought that, in a debate where we are exchanging views, a Member of this House had the right to sit back and form an opinion after a speech had been made. I find that a debate does not serve a useful purpose if one sits back and does not criticise the opponent. Surely my noble friend must realise that we are on different sides. He has put an Amendment on the Order Paper and I am opposing it. Therefore he must not expect me to stand up here and say what a nice man he is. The noble Lord, whenever I criticise his judgment, becomes quite personal about it. But he must not. I am saying—and it is very difficult if one is interrupted just when one is opening one's case—that in my opinion this superficial view is wrong; and I am opposing this Amendment because of the more serious far-reaching effects.
If it is established (this has already been said, but I want to develop this point) that a divorce can be secured after seven years of marriage, come what may,

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the stability of marriage itself must suffer. In my opinion, if this point of view were accepted it would gradually effect a change in attitude, the attitude of our teenagers and our young people, towards the institution of marriage. The next generation could well argue, "Why seven years? Those old fogies established seven years. Why not five years? Why not three years?".
I would say—and I am hesitant about doing so, because my noble friend at the back may criticise me—that there is an entirely different attitude by a man and a woman towards marriage. I agree with my noble friend Lord Hodson, whom I have the honour to support, that this is a man's Bill. This is a difficult thing for me to say in a House of this kind, because one almost might think I was trying simply to put the woman's point of view. The case I am going to put now is not simply that of a woman who is trying to hold her man for economic reasons. I am not saying this because it pays a woman to oppose this Bill—because, after all, the man is her breadwinner, and to allow a younger woman to seize him and take him away is against her interests.
For that reason I am hesitant in emphasising the woman's point of view, but I must say this—and in this House there are many men who will agree with me—in the institution of marriage there are 50 per cent. men and 50 per cent. of women, and the approach of the two sexes to marriage is entirely different. The word "stability" is very easily bandied about, but may I just say what stability means to a mother in marriage?—and my case here, which I am going to develop, is the case of the mothers of this country. A woman experiences complete biological fulfilment when she becomes a mother, and her maternal instincts dominate her thinking and dominate her actions and her attitude to marriage. Her urge is to protect her offspring; and I do not need to remind noble Lords that the instinct of self-preservation, which is the strongest instinct in us all, when there arises a matter of danger to a woman's children is forgotten by the mother. We saw it in the war: we saw it during the bombing; we see it in any fire in the country where children are involved. A mother's instinct to protect her children is so great that her first instinct, that of
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self-preservation, disappears, and she is there to protect her off-spring.
Now she does not need to be advised by a psychologist to know that a threat to her marriage and to her home will jeopardise the wellbeing of her children: and that is why she is like a tigress in protecting her home. She will tolerate persistent ill-treatment from her husband rather than risk the break-up of her home. Have noble Lords ever read of any case in the newspapers where a man has tolerated the most appalling ill-treatment by his wife rather than leave his children? Therefore, this seven-year clause, this compulsion clause, as I call it, if it imperils in the smallest degree the institution of marriage, is totally opposed to the interests of mothers. If noble Lords will go with me so far, and if they will say that something which is opposed to the interests of the mothers is opposed to the interests of the State, and if we believe that the security of the family unit forms the very foundation of our civilisation, then I ask the Committee to oppose this Amendment to-day.
The bond of family may be strongly or very lightly felt by a man. I am not judging him by that: this is a biological matter. We are all subject to our ductless glands. It is not his fault: it is his approach to marriage. In exactly the same way, his approach to other things is different from that of a woman because his instincts are different. Therefore, we must recognise that the bond may be less strong in a man. Surely, it is primarily for the benefit of the children that men and women live together. I agree a man may feel he wants a change, but, nevertheless, the woman, whatever she begins to look like, is as strongly intent upon keeping her family together as if she were newly-married.
Now I come to the question of illegitimate children, because time after time we have read in the newspapers that this Bill must be supported for the sake of the illegitimate children of the country. But what of the children born in wedlock? I am not talking, of course, of the children of the family where the man has gone off to live with another woman. But what of the children in wedlock, and their happiness? Have we no responsibility to them? Why have those who keep talking about illegitimate children not talked about children

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in wedlock? To amend the law in this manner is to make a separation of seven year tantamount to divorce, and it would encourage the irresponsible man, after some years of marriage, to seek another woman. He has improved his financial position, with the help of his first wife, and, therefore, his eligibility to some women has increased. Henry VIII, as he grew older, felt entirely the same. I mention Henry VIII because two or three noble Lords have already gone back in history. He felt entirely the same: a spoilt king; a spoilt play-boy. Why should he be faithful? Anyhow, family meant nothing to him. He was not a practitioner of divorce. Marriages of which he grew tired were brought to an end by annulment, or by the swifter method of execution. He did not have to worry about a Bill of this kind: he knew how to deal with his women. He looked around and said, "I want that one; I like the look of her. Off with the other's head!"
This clause will remove the detriments which might prevent a woman from having a liaison with a married man, because this clause will ensure her respectability and her legal safeguards. It will put the hallmark on her respectability in a number of years. It will enable a married man to propose marriage to another woman with the only reservation that the engagement will be prolonged. I am told that in some cases in America a married man and a married woman, neither of whom have obtained divorces from their respective spouses, get engaged, anticipating a divorce in a short time. Are we going to establish the same standard of behaviour here? This clause proposes to establish not polygamy, but successive monogamy, without there having to be given any reason but a change of mind when taking a fresh partner.
Surely, far from making it easier for a man or woman to flout their obligations, consideration should be given to strengthening the bonds for a number of years after the arrival of children. Children need a mother and father because they are inexperienced and need protection, and now that we are considering extending the school-leaving age the longer will they need protection. Marriage is not an institution which concerns simply the likes or dislikes of two
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people. Who of us here does not at times quarrel with our partner? Do we then say, "How much nicer if we had somebody to agree with us"? Why should the desires of one partner of a marriage be satisfied at the expense of the other partner and the children? All efforts made to remove a parent from a child mean a deprived child.
The promoters of this Bill, as I have already said, express great concern for children of illicit unions, but I think one should be permitted to show even greater concern for the children of legal marriages. After all, it is regrettable that illegitimate children have to face this obloquy, but the acceptance of this clause will encourage more men to father such children. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, who spoke with such sincerity, and who has been convinced that this will almost solve the problem of illegitimate children, realises that, far from that, this clause will give much greater opportunities to people to have illegitimate children.
LORD GLADWYN: I did not say, with all respect to the noble Baroness, that it would solve the problem of illegitimacy: I said it would help to rectify a great social wrong.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: I appreciate that, but the great social wrong is illegitimacy. My point is that this will increase the rate. The illegitimate children he is thinking about may have their problems solved, but, by introducing this clause, more illegitimate children are going to be born.
Now on this subject of children it is well known that the children of divorced parents are brought to psychiatrists or come before the courts emotionally unstable, a misery to themselves and to the community. Let us remember also, when we are thinking of illegitimate children, the emotional and unstable men and women who can never adapt themselves to their environments during the whole of their lives because their parents have separated and they have felt insecure. The fact is that the divorce rate is increasing. The publicity given to divorces of the middle and upper classes in this country tends to encourage others to live "down to the Joneses". It seems that after a divorce the community, the divorce courts and everybody become concerned about what should happen to

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the children of the marriage. This is the time to show concern—in Parliament—to ensure that legislation should not be introduced which is liable to undermine marriage. You increase the divorce rate and you increase the number of illegitimate children. And I want to emphasise that.
My final point is on the economics of the problem. I would say to the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, that he has been misinformed about this point. Perhaps he is a little out of touch with the economics of the woman who is separated or, indeed, divorced. We are told that the divorced wife, he innocent party, will receive maintenance. How many men can support two families? That is precisely why my noble and learned friend Lord Hodson said that this is a rich man's Bill. If a man cannot support two families, the wife and children of the first marriage will suffer. The noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, spoke about maintenance. Does he not realise that an irresponsible man can take a second wife, as is suggested in this Amendment, and for the first month or two he will be paying maintenance to the first wife; then he finds that he no longer has the money to pay at that rate? Then he is hauled before the judiciary, and the judge or magistrate must ask himself, "What shall I do? Shall I send this man to prison? If I send him to prison he is not working, he is not making any money. He can neither pay his second wife or her children nor give even a small contribution to the first wife".
LORD GLADWYN: Really, the point is what has been happening for several years. Let us say the man has been unofficially married to another woman. Presumably he has been supporting the first wife all that time. The mere fact that he is legitimising the second union does not alter the position. He must go on supporting his first wife. He has already had to do so; otherwise he does net get the divorce. The situation is not changed.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: I speak more in sorrow than in anger. This is the psychology of the thing I would say. When a man lives with a woman, and his first wife may well be in the same neighbourhood, he pays the first wife maintenance because the last thing he
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wants is trouble; and the woman he is living with does not want trouble either. The situation changes entirely when he is married to the second woman and she is in possession; and the first woman (of whom she has no doubt been jealous and on whom she is anxious to vent her spite) has to beg for her maintenance allowance. Then the serious things happen that I have described. The first wife does not want to make trouble; she does not want to see the affair in a local paper. But, finally, because he has no money, she goes to court; and the magistrate then has to ask himself, "Shall I send the man to prison? Because if I do he is not working and is not making money." That is the economics of the problem.
LORD KENNET: May I ask the noble Baroness whether she has never known such a situation arise during separation with regard to alimony?
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: I am talking about this as a doctor who has worked among the poor. I was qualified in 1924, and I have seen many women in this position and heard their difficulties, told to me in consulting rooms where, of course, one always observes their confidences. I speak with some authority; and that is my authority.
On the economic problem I do want to remind noble Lords that the innocent woman who is divorced loses her national insurance benefits. She loses her Service pension if there is one; she loses any pension attached to her husband's work; she loses everything; and, of course, during the years she has helped to establish her husband the law has not permitted her to save one penny in her own right when he goes off to the next woman. I am going to introduce a Bill later to change that position. This is the woman who is divorced without her consent. I hope your Lordships will not hastily vote for this Amendment; but seek to help the small minority where the husband or wife do refuse consent to divorce. We may otherwise be causing untold damage. Finally, my I say what I said in the beginning: to those of your Lordships who are here because you know of a hard case I say: do not be moved by that; remember, as I said, that a hard case makes a bad law.
3.46 p.m.
LORD BOOTHBY: I shall not detain your Lordships very long, and far be it from me in this House to appear as a defender of Henry VIII; but I should like the noble Lady who has just spoken to remember that if, in fact, Henry VIII had not got "fed up" with Catherine of Aragon we should not have had the benefit of Queen Elizabeth I. So history certainly takes strange turns. I had prepared what I thought myself was an able and powerful speech, but, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, I decided after listening to your Lordships, to curtail it right down to the bone. The speeches I have heard have been so good on both sides and so cogent and, if I may say so, in the case of the most reverend Primate, so imbued with sympathy and compassion, that I find it difficult to make up my mind; and I am sure all the arguments have been put now as clearly as they can be on both sides. I was also much impressed by the economic case made out by the noble Baroness who has just sat down.
I come back to the fact that this Bill is, by design, concerned primarily and rightly with the welfare of children. Mr. Abse made that perfectly clear from the beginning. There are, as the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, said, 200,000 illegitimate children under the age of 16 who are being brought up at the present time in the homes of parents who are unmarried—but these are, nevertheless, homes; and that is what "gets me a bit". I cannot think that this is a desirable state of affairs. I believe that the answer is to legitimise as many children as possible and, therefore, to allow many more marriages to take place; and, despite all the statistics that can be brought—and most of them are hypothetical—I still believe the passage of this clause would bring benefit to more people than those who would be penalised. I cannot help feeling that. I think it is desirable that in the case of those many homes—and there are thousands of them in this country—where there are what we call illicit unions but with children, it would be wise to recognise that they are homes, they are families.
The noble Lady spoke a great deal about the family unit and the danger of families no longer being together but
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separated. But, in fact, in these cases—cases that will be covered by this clause—they are no longer family units. They are no longer together. They are, in fact, separated and have been for seven years—for seven long years. It is a long time; and on top of that the judge must be satisfied—and the noble Lord made that quite clear—that there is no hope of reconciliation.
I think the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hodson, summed up the whole of this argument. What we have to decide about, when it comes to the vote, is whether the breakdown of marriage or matrimonial offences should be the cause of divorce. That is the issue and that is the final decision we have to take. A matrimonial offence involves an innocent and a guilty party. We all know in our hearts that many, many cases of divorce—I should say the majority—have now become a charade. They are absolutely make-believe. I have a friend who was divorced some years ago for a very good reason—I shall not give his name to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hodson. He obtained his divorce by obtaining the services of a lady, and for the payment of an extra £2 above the normal charge he obtained the services of a lady who played bezique. He told me somewhat mournfully some time afterwards that, despite the fact that they played bezique, it was the longest night. A divorce can be obtained by these methods and it is done every day. In many of the cruelty cases, by agreement, the cruelty can be invented.
BARONESS HORSBRUGH: Suppose the wife of the noble Lord's friend, who played bezique at the cost of an extra £2, did not want to divorce him. At the present moment she can tell him, "You can go on playing bezique if you like, but I won't divorce you."
LORD BOOTHBY: I agree with the noble Lady that that is the fact, but in this case the lady wanted the divorce, so all was well. The game of bezique, though long, had a satisfactory conclusion from both their points of view. But this is a real point of principle. I want to emphasise that what we have to decide is whether divorce can come about as the result of the breakdown of marriage—and can it be said after seven years of

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separation, with no chance of reconciliation, that a marriage has not broken down?—or must it come about solely by means of a matrimonial offence committed by one side or the other? On balance, after great thought and not entirely superficially, I assure the noble Lady, I have come to the conclusion, reluctantly, that the breakdown of a marriage is an even greater cause, and certainly a more valid one, than a casual offence by one or other party to a marriage.
3.54 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I should like, if I may, to say a few words in this important debate. I should like to make clear at the outset, as did my right honourable and learned friend the Solicitor General in another place, that I am not seeking to express any views on behalf of Her Majesty's Government. I would say a few words about some of the issues that have been raised and, in particular, on some of the observations of the noble Lord, Lord Boothby. He has drawn attention to the case of his bezique-playing friend. I simply reject out of hand his allegation that that type of false case comes frequently before Her Majesty's Judges in the Divorce Court. However, as my noble friend Lady Horsbrugh pointed out, that is beside the point in relation to the proposed clause, because there obviously there would be no suit for divorce unless the other party had wanted it.
The real issue raised by the Amendment is whether, without there being any matrimonial offence, after a period of time, stipulated in this clause as seven years, an innocent party, who does not wish to be divorced and who wants to preserve the sanctity of the marriage contract, can be divorced against his or her will and wish. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hodson, in his powerful speech, said, and I think rightly, that the real issue here lies between the proposal that divorce should be granted only on the establishment of a matrimonial offence and the proposal that it should be granted where a marriage had broken down in fact, without any prospect of a reconciliation. I agree that that is the real issue behind this Amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Boothby, also expressed this view.
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While it is true to say that our divorce laws are based on the principle that divorce should be granted only on the establishment of a matrimonial offence (to which there is one exception at the present time, in relation to insanity) it may be—I do not know—that it would be possible to devise another system where divorce would not be dependent upon the establishment of a matrimonial offence but upon the fact of the breakdown of the marriage. But that is not our system. That is not the system which this Amendment proposes. What this Amendment proposes is to graft upon our existing law a proposition based upon the fact of the breakdown of marriage. I must say that I think the result would be very illogical and difficult to defend, for this reason: there might so easily be a case where a man seeks to obtain a divorce on the ground of adultery or cruelty, or something of that sort, and after a long-fought-out case his petition fails. He knows that he has only to wait, and at the end of seven years, under this clause, he will get a divorce. I am speaking personally in expressing this view.
If the real reasoning behind the Amendment is that a divorce should be granted on the basis of the breakdown of marriage, why seven years? If that is the basis on which our law should depend, why should a divorce not be obtainable when it is somehow established that a marriage is permanently broken? I think that there is a great deal of force in the argument, which has been put forward in this debate, that if this Amendment is carried, the seven-year period will not last for very long.
Attention has been drawn to what are called the safeguards in subsection (3). On these I should like just to make these observations. A great deal is left to the discretion of the judge. He has to consider whether, in the particular circumstances of the case, it would be harsh and oppressive to the respondent. The respondent who does not wish to be divorced, and in respect of whom there is no ground for a divorce, would have to come forward and establish that, but there is no guidance given to the court as to the basis on which it should operate in determining whether, in the particular circumstances, it would be harsh and oppressive or contrary to the public interest. There is no indication of the

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factors which would be taken into account in considering what is the public interest in this particular connection, and of what guidance should be given to the courts when the respondent to a petition under this clause says that she will not consent on religious grounds, which are sincerely held. Ought not guidance to be given by the proposers of this clause about whether the judges who have to deal with this matter will take that kind of objection into account in determining whether or not, in the circumstances of the case, it would be harsh and oppressive to the respondent or contrary to the public interest to pronounce a decree?
It has also been put forward that there is the safeguard of the provision made in subsection (4) for the maintenance of the wife who will be divorced under this new clause. We can argue about that a great deal. I think that there is great force in the argument that only people with considerable means would be able to avail themselves of this clause.
LORD SHEPHERD: In the event of a man's obtaining a divorce under the proposed Amendment, and if he marries again, where does his responsibility in law lie? Must he provide for the maintenance of his first wife, even though it is at the expense of the woman he has married after divorce?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I am not going to give an answer to that at such short notice, except that I would point out that it does not really relate to this, because, if the noble Lord looks at subsection (4), he will see that
"the court may refuse to pronounce a decree on any petition on the ground of separation until the petitioner has made such provision (if any) for the maintenance or benefit of the respondent and any child to which section 26 of the Matrimonial Causes Act, 1950 applies as the court thinks proper in the circumstances of the case."
I am on that broad point. One does not know, of course, quite how the court would interpret that subsection, but it would appear probable that the court would say that they were concerned to see that the first wife should continue to get adequate maintenance. But the point made by my noble and learned friend Lord Hodson was this: that whereas a rich man might be able to meet the requirements of the court on one or more
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occasions, a man of little means would not be able to do so.
The point I want to draw attention to is this: that, whatever is done by the court there (and this relates to the economic grounds on which the noble Baroness touched at the end of her speech), I do not see how in any way under that subsection provision could be made for the woman who may survive her husband, and who would, if this petition had not been presented and succeeded, have been entitled on his death to a widow's pension, either under the National Insurance scheme or under a private pensions scheme. That she would lose inevitably on the decree being made under this clause. But that is an economic view. I would say, if I may, to the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, that you cannot brush these difficulties aside by just describing them as technical. They are very real problems which we ought to consider if this clause is added to the Bill.
LORD GLADWYN: Is it not a fact that the law in Australia, which is substantially the same as the present Amendment, has been satisfactorily applied there without any difficulty at all?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I am not sure how they apply it in relation to pensions and particular pensions of this kind. But the real argument put forward is whether there should be, first, a matrimonial offence, or whether the law of divorce should be based on the breakdown of the marriage. The argument put forward on the latter has been based largely on the sad situation of those whose marriages have broken up, and have been broken for a long time, and who want to regularise their position and, if possible, the position of their progeny. It is an appealing case, and one which must be regarded with great sympathy. At the same time, one cannot ignore, and perhaps at present one cannot accurately assess, the consequential effects of a provision of this kind on existing marriages and the existing tendencies which are now current among our population.
I have thought it right—I hope your Lordships will not think I have spoken for too long—to make a few observations in relation to this clause. We are not

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confronted here with a clear-cut issue: should we reject divorce based upon matrimonial offence and go over to a system, if one could be devised, of saying there could be a divorce on the fact of the breakdown of marriage without any prospect of reconciliation? But what we are being asked to do is to graft part of the latter system after seven years have elapsed on to the existing inconsistent system of the law of divorce based on matrimonial offence.
LORD CHORLEY: I should like to make one or two observations in reply, particularly, to the speech of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. He made two points to which he attached particular importance. First of all, he said that it was illogical to deal with this problem by going over, so to speak, to the breakdown of marriage theory, because the whole of the divorce law otherwise was based upon the penal doctrine. That, no doubt, is illogical up to a point. But law reform proceeds largely by illogical steps of this kind. The introduction into our law of the insanity point, which, after all, is within his recollection as it is within mine, was a step of exactly that kind, and I think everybody has agreed this afternoon that that was a very salutary reform.
The other point he made was that the safeguarding subsection, subsection (3), gives no guidance to the Judges as to how they are to operate it. The noble and learned Lord must know quite well that there are literally dozens of Acts of Parliament which give the Judges general powers of this kind. They proceed in the typical British way by empirical methods, building up a doctrine by means of which they deal with matters of this kind. I could give many instances. Take the case of the suspending of a motorist's driving licence: it is to be suspended unless for good cause the court decides otherwise. What could be more vague than that? Yet the Queen's Bench Division over the years since this provision was introduced has developed clear doctrines which enable it to be administered by the courts. That can be done perfectly well in this case by the able Judges who administer the law.
There are many things that one could say about this matter, and I would say them, even at the risk of being described
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as superficial by the noble Baroness who sits in front of me, but I appreciate that your Lordships are anxious to get to a Division, and I will add only this. It seems to me that the present system is a thoroughly dishonest one, and it is absurd to suggest that there is not a great deal of collusion going on. The parties know perfectly well that by collusion they can get a divorce. Is not this one of those fundamental dishonesties which is at the bottom of all the trouble with which our society is confronted at the present time? We have a case like the Profumo case, and we say that the morals of the country are crumbling. But if you bring the community up on this sort of basis that is exactly the way in which you get the situation in society in which cases like the Profumo case can happen. I suggest it is up to us this afternoon to sweep this away and to establish an honest doctrine.
LORD MESTON: I should like to say a word or two on this important matter. I am not taking an easy view of marriage at all: in fact, I think that every divorce is a tragedy, especially if there are children. There are two aspects of marriage. One is the religious aspect which is the dominant one and which I trust will always remain dominant. The other is a purely factual aspect. If you have two people who have not been living together for seven years and who never intend to live together again, then, from the common-sense points of view, the marriage has actually broken down and the religious aspect has entirely disappeared. I am sorry to say such a thing and I have no doubt that the most reverend Primate will not agree with me, but I cannot help it. I have said worse things in my life and I am still alive.
What distresses me is that no one seems to consider what actually happens in practice in these cases. You have two people who have been living apart for seven years. In a large number of cases they have formed other unions and have created numerous illegitimate children. In my view, illegitimacy is one of the most terrible misfortunes that can befall anyone. It is much worse even than the tragedy of divorce. And if only these two people were allowed to be divorced by taking advantage of this proposed Amendment, then you would find, after they had married the parties

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with whom they had been living, that the illegitimate children would be legitimated. I understand that is the position to-day.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: Would the noble Lord press that argument very much? Would the amended clause say that the guilty party would get a divorce against the wishes of the innocent party only if he proved that he had illegitimate children?
LORD MESTON: I would not restrict this clause at all. I quite appreciate that the noble Earl, Lord Longford, is opposed to me and, quite frankly, I am opposed to him on this matter, although I have great admiration for his work in other fields.
The question which must always arise is: what about the widow's pension. The Lord Chancellor will throw me out if I say that he has been ventilating a canard. But, upon my soul! obviously, one of the very first things a Judge in the High Court would have to do would be to get into touch with the administrative power and see what they could do about the pension. There is not the slightest reason why a wife who is divorced under this clause should not obtain 75 per cent. or 100 per cent. of the widow's pension should the man predecease her. These are very simple matters which can all be considered in due course, and I hope that we shall all take a different view of this matter and put an end to marriages which have broken down and which are, in fact, in many cases, the cause of illegitimate children and a matter of public odium and contempt.
4.13 p.m.
THE EARL OF IDDESLEIGH: I sit on a county children's committee, and among my charges are many children, both illegitimate and legitimate. I have no knowledge that the illegitimate children among my charges are any less happy or do any less well than the legitimate children in county care. But I do know that all children deprived of a normal home life are profoundly to be pitied and I do know that the legitimate children who come into our care arrive there because their parents have disregarded the obligations of matrimony.
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I am opposed to this clause not only on the doctrinal grounds which have been so well expressed by the most reverend Primate, and which at this late hour I will not repeat, but also on the practical grounds that, as divorce is made easier, so the people, very often young people, who are to-day getting married will get married without that intention of forming a permanent union which is necessary to a true marriage. Day by day the bride and bridegroom read in our papers of the divorce of this or that famous or glamorous figure in national or international life. It must inevitably affect their view of the permanence of marriage. To-morrow, I suppose, a large number of young people will go to the altar. What will be the effect on the marriage of those young persons if they read the headline, "Lords approve easier divorce"? It is easy enough to see their comment: "What! even these stuffy old Peers! It cannot be wrong." It is because these easy divorce laws are undermining the very foundations of marriage that I am opposing this new proposal. What would happen under this clause? Up to now a man could not be certain of getting a divorce, whatever he did, unless his wife would co-operate and help him. Under the clause, if it were adopted, he could be reasonably certain of getting a divorce after seven years. And do not think that those seven years will be spent in celibacy.
THE LORD BISHOP OF EXETER: I have no argument to advance in opposition to this proposed new clause, but I should like to say a word or two to indicate that the arguments advanced by the most reverend Primate are arguments with which all of us on these Benches are in complete agreement. I should like also to underline three of them. The first is that there is, and must be, an element of injustice in this compulsory divorce. I do not see how it can be denied, and I see no reason to elaborate the argument further. The second is that we believe that although it is the intention and desire of those who promote this clause to cure unhappiness, it is our conviction that the way in which they propose to cure that unhappiness will, in the end, produce much more unhappiness.
We believe that, because we believe that once it is established by law that

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a marriage can be brought to an end either by mutual consent of both the parties, or even by a single unilateral act of will of one, you strike a grave blow at the stability of marriage and thereby run the risk of creating far more unhappiness than this clause would cure. You will strike at the happiness of ordinary marriages for the reason so skilfully deployed by the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill. It is an argument which I call the fear of the ageing wife. Women age more quickly than men, and lose their sexual attractiveness sooner; and wives, as they age, are subjected to the fear that they may not be able to retain their husbands. If this clause were approved their fears would be immeasurably increased. That is our main argument.
I was glad that the noble Earl, Lord Iddesleigh, said something about these illegitimate children whose unhappiness has promoted this clause. I thought that I had a blind spot about illegitimacy and that I was the only person in England who never quite understood why it is held to be such a hardship. In spite of these illicit unions with which this clause is concerned, do children under sixteen, in fact, before they have to apply for a birth certificate for some job, know that they are illegitimate? I have no reason to suppose that my own parents were not married, but I never saw their marriage lines. Is the situation really so desperate for these illegitimate children as is made out? Except for that, I reiterate that we on these Benches are wholeheartedly in opposition to this proposed clause though fully recognising the sincerity with which it has been moved.
LORD KENNET: I wish to take two minutes of your Lordships' time to try to adduce doubts about two statistical statements which have been made in the debate. The first was from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hodson, who said that each easing of the grounds of divorce increases the number of divorces in this country. It is certainly true to say that the grounds have been eased, and that the numbers have been increased. But there is another possible cause, and that is the fact that the financial burden of obtaining a divorce has been successively lowered. It is very hard to decide whether the increase in the total number is more due to the easing of the grounds or the lessening of the financial burden.
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Secondly, my noble friend Lady Summerskill made great play with the fact that children of divorced parents go to psychiatrists and come up in court, and generally turn out to be incapable of leading their lives without help. But this, I think, is to bias the matter. If I am right—and there is a great deal of evidence to show that I am—it is the children of separated parents, which includes divorced parents, who are affected in this way. The factor which predisposes to delinquency, or any other sort of personal or social disorder, is the sheer absence of one parent or the other, not the presence or absence of a state of marriage between them.
That brings me to my main point. I am perplexed. I have listened carefully to this debate, and I have tried to make up my mind what it is that this ageing woman, mother of several children, loses if we agree to this Amendment. She does not lose her husband—she lost him seven years before. She does not lose her children: for, obviously, in any such divorce custody of the children would be given to the innocent party over whose objections the divorce is granted. Her property and money? Well, the man in the case is as rich or as poor as he was before. If he was able to support a legitimate wife and mistress he would also be able to support a legitimate second wife and first wife. It is true, as the Lord Chancellor told us, that the first wife would lose his pension rights, and it certainly seems to me that some cure should be found for this situation, in which a woman may be tempted to bastardise her husband's children for the sake of his pension. And I am sure many do it. I should welcome subsidiary legislation following this Bill, if the Amendment were passed, but I do not think that that gap in it is sufficient cause to reject the Amendment.
Then there is the wife's belief. I do not believe that she would lose her belief in such a case. If she believes that marriage is absolutely indissoluble by any human agency, it does not matter to her whether the court decrees the marriage at an end or whether it does not. If the marriage resides solely or principally in her intimate conscience and relationship with God it will continue, and in her eyes the second wife, though acknowledged by the State, will never be more than the husband's mistress.

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Lastly, what is it becoming for us to do in this House? We have this Amendment before us, and to a certain extent, the eyes of the country, I suppose one may assume, are on what we dc. What proportion of us are divorced? I have the figures here: Lords of Appeal, none; Barons, 15 per cent.; Viscounts, 21 per cent.; Earls, 22 per cent.; Marquesses, 26 per cent.; Dukes, 30 per cent. They were the lucky ones. Life Peers, Macmillan creation, 3 per cent.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: Baronesses?
LORD KENNET: I believe none. No distinction was made by the un-sex-conscious investigator who produced these figures. As I say, they were the lucky ones; they were not held back by a spouse who refused to brim: suits when required, if that was the way round it was. I think that it would not become a House composed in this manner to resist any rational proposal for a slight widening of the grounds of divorce.
THE EARL OF PERTH: I know that your Lordships are most anxious to divide on this clause, and I will keep you only one minute or two. But I feel strongly, after listening to all the arguments, that what we are really discussing to-day, as the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor said, is whether this Amendment would not make a complete mockery of marriage. My reason for saying that is that what would be introduced would be an entirely new principle, which is that you carry on with the marriage for as long as you desire it. It is true that it is disguised at the start by the reference to seven years, but that is really the heart of it.
On theological grounds, clearly this is bad or wholly objectionable. But let us look at it from the social angle. In fact we should not think of it in terms of what happens after seven years, but what happens at the start. For young people who are going to come together, the marriage ceremony could go something like this: "Will you live together for as long as you desire it?" That is what it would come to, in essence, if we passed this Amendment. And the sequel to that would be the end of our social system, great unhappiness, more divorces, more
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broken marriages, more illegitimate children. If you want to see an example of that you have only to look at what happened in cases like the Scandinavian countries, where illegitimacy, I understand, is up by some 500 per cent. I hope we shall not be thinking in technical terms, but let us look at the heart of it and turn down the Amendment.
THE EARL OF GOSFORD: May I ask the noble Earl to look back to his own marriage? Does he sincerely think young people go into marriage—remembering what was in one's mind at that time—thinking, "I can get out of it after seven years".
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: I am afraid I disagree with the noble Earl. I suppose 30 per cent. of Dukes went into marriage in a fairly light-hearted spirit. But one point is, if marriage was going to be undermined in this way people would go in with a less solemn spirit. It is the long-term effect with which we are concerned; that is the point the noble Earl must grasp. We are gravely concerned how people will go into marriage if, in future, they know they can get out of it whether they are the guilty party or not.
Reference has been made to the theological point of view. Certainly with many religious leaders present I am not qualified to discuss that. But I should like to say this: that many of us of various denominations believe that when we marry we are entering into a contract sanctified by God and indissoluble. That view is very widely held. There are others who do not hold that point of view. The long-term, practical consequences of what you might call divorce by consent have been stressed by many speakers. But I cannot understand anybody with a heart to feel—and that applies to all my colleagues and I imagine all noble Lords, certainly someone like the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, and other speakers—can seriously justify, on reflection, one aspect of this clause, the aspect that will enable a guilty man to dispose of an innocent wife. That is what is going to be permitted. It would be opposed to any sort of ethical code, whatever you like to call it, utilitarian, humanist or Christian. This is something to me positively disgusting, to confer this power on a guilty man who will come forward and claim, because he

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has got illegitimate children, or might have some at some time or other, that he must be allowed to put away this woman. I cannot tell the noble Lord how revolted I am by this aspect, if we pass the clause: we pass it with that aspect very prominently in our minds. I must not say more but I really cannot say less.
LORD MESTON: Can the noble Earl, Lord Longford, tell us, instead of being revolted, what is the factual position of two people who have not lived together for seven years and never intend to live together again?
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: The answer to that is fairly obvious; they are living in a state of separation.
LORD SHACKLETON: I think the time has come when we should divide, would only say, very quickly, that I personally, as the Member in charge of this Bill, am very grateful to the Committee for the moderation it has shown. I should like only to correct two points. First of all, I would dispute Lord Hodson's statistics on divorce. I have figures which could tell a different story, but I do not think either set of figures is significant to the argument.
The second point I must make clear—because there seems to be an impression that in rejecting the idea of grounds for
divorce other than for matrimonial offence the Royal Commission were against this proposal—is that it was, in fact, the proposal of half the members of the Royal Commission, nine, who suggested what the Lord Chancellor was objecting to, which was that in addition to the matrimonial offence the fact that the marriage had broken up should also be grounds for divorce. Admittedly, they added certain conditions, such as the consent of one of the parties; and I would suggest to the Committee that they should, if they in fact are inclined to this view, pass this Amendment to-day. We can then consider the noble Lord's Amendment to it on Report stage, to give the right of consent, which was what aroused the anger particularly of my noble friend Lord Longford. We shall then achieve what those of us, I am sure we are all agreed, sincerely believe to be an important means of easing great unhappiness and sorrow—we shall be able to advance towards that. But I will not advance any further argument. I think the time has come to vote, and I hope that we shall at least keep this matter open by passing this Amendment to-day.
4.36 p.m.
On Question, Whether the proposed new clause shall be there inserted?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 31; Not-Contents, 52.

CONTENTS

Archibald, L.

Grantchester, L.

Lucan, E.

Boothby, L.

Harmsworth, L.

Margesson, V.

Burton of Coventry, B.

Harvey of Tasburgh, L.

Meston, L.

Chorley, L.

Huntingdon, E. [Teller.]

Monson, L.

Cranbrook, E.

Jellicoe, E.

Moyne, L.

Effingham, E.

Jessel, L.

Sainsbury, L.

Francis-Williams, L.

Kennet, L.

Shackleton, L.

Fraser of North Cape, L.

Latham, L.

Silkin, L.

Gladwyn, L.

Layton, L.

Strang, L.

Gosford, E. [Teller.]

Listowel, E.

Stuart of Findhorn, V.

Williams, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Albemarle, E.

Dilhorne, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Lichfield, L. Bp.

Ampthill, L.

Douglas of Barloch, L.

Longford, E.

Auckland, L.

Ebbisham, L.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Brain, L.

Exeter, L. Bp.

MacAndrew, L.

Canterbury, L. Abp.

Forstor of Harraby, L.

McNair, L.

Carnock, L.

Furness, V.

Milverton, L.

Chichester, L. Bp.

Hailsham, V. (L. President)

Monsell, V.

Clwyd, L.

Hawke, L.

Montgomery of Alamein, V.

Cohen, L.

Henderson, L.

Morton of Henryton, L.

Cowley, E.

Hodson, L.

Ogmore, L.

Craigmyle, L.

Horsbrugh, B.

Perth, E.

Craven, E.

Howard of Glossop, L.

Rathcreedan, L.

Cromartie, E.

Iddesleigh, E. [Teller.]

Robertson of Oakridge, L.

Denham, L.

Ilford, L.

St. Aldwyn, E.

St. Edmundsbury and Ipswich, L. Bp.

Sandford, L.

Soulbury, V.

Shepherd, L.

Summerskill, B. [Teller.]

St. Just, L.

Shuttleworth, L.

Winchester, L. Bp.

Samuel, V.

Somers, L.

Resolved in the negative, and clause disagreed to accordingly.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resume.
Moved, That the House do now resume.—(Lord Shackleton.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and House resumed accordingly.

MARRIED WOMEN'S SAVINGS BILL [H.L.]
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, if I may detain your Lordships for one moment, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to give to a wife half of what she saves on housekeeping. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, that the Bill be now read 1a.—(Baroness Summerskill.)
On Question, Bill read 1a, and to be printed.
House adjourned at nineteen minutes before five o'clock.