Sitting of 1 July 1964

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]
PRIVATE BUSINESS
  PIER AND HARBOUR PROVISIONAL ORDER (BIDEFORD HARBOUR) BILL
  Read the Third time and passed.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  ROADS

    Darlington Bypass
    Mr. Kitsonasked the Minister of Transport whether the work on the Darlington bypass is up to schedule; and when it is hoped the by-pass will be in operation.
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport (Mr. T. G. D. Galbraith): The three major bridges which were started in 1962 have been completed. The roadworks were started as planned in April, 1963, but progress was hampered by the weather. Given reasonable conditions this summer the bypass should be in use by the spring of 1965, as planned.
    Mr. Kitson: Can my hon. Friend say how long the bypass will be when it is completed, and what plans the Government have for the second phase of the northern end of it?
    Mr. Galbraith: The bypass will be about 10 miles long when it is completed. With regard to the north, a line has been fixed as far as Chester-le-Street, and, subject to statutory processes, we hope to start work on the bridges in the winter, and on the roadworks in 1965 after the bypass is completed.

    M.4 (Langley-Maidenhead Section)
    Mr. Brockwayasked the Minister of Transport what plans he has to extend the three-lane traffic on each of the dual
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    roads used by traffic in one direction only on the M.4 between Langley and Maidenhead.
    Mr. Galbraith: We have no plans for widening to three lanes the present two-lane carriageways on the Slough and Maidenhead bypass sections of the M.4.
    Mr. Brockway: Is the hon. Gentleman aware of the danger caused by cars overtaking lorries in the outside lane? In view of the fact that the rest of the M.4 is to have a three-lane roadway in each direction, why cannot he, as part of this construction, apply that to this sector where there is very heavy traffic as it is a by-pass to Slough?
    Mr. Galbraith: The answer is that traffic where there are two lanes is not as heavy as where there are three lanes. In the three-lane part east of Langley we expect that at least 20 per cent. of the traffic will leave for other destinations and not come on to the two-lane part in which the hon. Gentleman is interested.
    Mr. Brockway: Is not the Minister quite wrong? He says that traffic on other sections will not be so great, but the other sections have not yet been built, and he is talking about expectations.
    Mr. Galbraith: The hon. Gentleman must realise that before we build roads, we estimate what we think will be the amount of traffic. That is why we build certain sections of a road to a three-lane dimension and other parts such as that in which the hon. Gentleman is interested, as a two-lane road.

    Three-Lane Roads
    Mr. Brockwayasked the Minister of Transport what plans he has in order to remove the danger caused by three-lane traffic on a single road used by vehicles in both directions.
    Mr. Galbraith: We do not accept that three-lane roads are inherently dangerous—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."]—but any road may be dangerous if it is overloaded beyond its design capacity. Those three-lane roads which are seriously overloaded are being improved to dual carriageways as quickly as possible within the limits of the funds available and competing claims of other improvements. We are also pressing ahead with trials of

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    offset double white lines to give alternately two traffic lanes in one direction and one in the other.
    Mr. Brockway: Does not the reception given to the hon. Gentleman's Answer from hon. Members on both sides of the House show that the Ministry of Transport is completely out of touch with the minds of motorists on this matter? May I ask whether he will look particularly at the section of the A.4 in the green belt, which is necessarily dimly lighted and across which shadows sweep, between London Airport and Slough, and realise the dangers that there are in that section of the road?
    Mr. Galbraith: I am quite willing to look at the section of road to which the hon. Gentleman refers, but I must say that he and his hon. Friends and a great many motorists are wrong in their belief that three-lane roads are inherently dangerous. The Road Research Laboratory recently carried out a study which revealed that the number of accidents is not unduly high and that only 2½ per cent. of the accidents involved vehicles overtaking and travelling in opposite directions.
    Mr. Strauss: Is the Minister aware that sometimes his Ministry builds new roads for three lines of traffic and then, a few years later, decides that a mistake has been made and widens the road, at great expense, into a double roadway? Is he aware that the Gatwick by-pass is an example and that it is the inability of the Government to estimate the amount of traffic which will use the roads that they build which in the end causes not only accidents but a great waste of money?
    Mr. Galbraith: The right hon. Gentleman is wrongly informed. We have only 5½ miles of trunk road to be built over the next four years with a capacity for three lines of traffic.

    West Hartlepool—A.1 (Road Conditions)
    Commander Keransasked the Minister of Transport what steps he is taking to improve the road conditions from West Hartlepool via Greatham to the A.1.
    Mr. Galbraith: We hope to issue grant later this year on a scheme for by-passing Greatham. When this is completed the
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    A.689 link to the A.19 trunk road will be a reasonably good road.
    The improvement of A.19 as far as A.1 at Dishforth is included in the Government's special programme for the North-East and we aim to start work on all sections within the next five years. This programme also includes improvement of other east-west links between A.19 and A.1.
    Commander Kerans: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his remarks. Surely we have been nibbling at the problem of communications to the A.1 via Greatham for a long time? Will he do all in his power to speed this up, otherwise we shall not get any industry into the area?
    Mr. Galbraith: That is exactly what we are doing. We are speeding it up.
    Mr. Shinwell: What does the hon. Gentleman mean when he says that work on the A.19, along with other links, will be commenced within the next five years? Does that mean one year, or two, or three years hence, or four and a half years hence? May we have some clear indication about how this work is proceeding? Has he any idea of the effect on the industrial development of the area?
    Mr. Galbraith: I said that work would start on all sections within the next five years. The work on some sections will start earlier than five years.

    Tax-free Toll Bridges
    Mr. W. Hamiltonasked the Minister of Transport if he will indicate the sources from which he obtained his information concerning the ownership of certain tax-free toll bridges.
    The Minister of Transport (Mr. Ernest Marples): In most cases from the highway authority for the road leading up to the bridge.
    Mr. Hamilton: Whatever the source, it is not a very good one. Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that of the five bridges and their ownership to which he referred in an Answer which he gave in April the information about two of them was incorrect? Is he aware that Swynford Bridge is not owned by the Earl of Abingdon, and Aldwark Bridge is not owned by the Yorkshire Farmers

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    Ltd. It was sold two years ago? Can he take steps to see that his information is accurate in future; and, when he gets the information, will he let me know who are the owners of the bridges?
    Mr. Marples: The hon. Member has not been wholly accurate in some of his remarks about toll bridges. I am bound to tell him that these private bridges have nothing to do with my statutory duties except in a most general sense, and therefore I could easily say to the hon. Gentleman or to any hon. Member that it is not my job and I am not providing the information. Because the hon. Gentleman is such a fair chaser of statistics, I thought that I would do my best to give him some information.
    Mr. Hamilton: On a point of order. In view of the very unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.

    Off-Street Parking Facilities
    Mr. Channonasked the Minister of Transport if he will take powers to require local authorities to provide adequate off-street parking facilities where these do not at present exist.
    Mr. Marples: No, Sir. Though there is, in my opinion, an urgent need for greatly expanded off-street parking facilities in this country generally, local authorities will, I hope, take action on their own initiative and in their own interests and those of the motoring public.
    Mr. Channon: Will my right hon. Friend keep this closely under consideration, because there is a tremendous lack of off-street parking facilities? If local authorities are not prepared to provide them, will he consider at a later stage taking powers to make sure that they do so?
    Mr. Marples: We shall see where we get to at a later stage, but some local authorities have not yet planned for the future for car parks as they should. I intend to send out a planning bulletin on parking giving general instructions and guidance to local authorities, and we shall see where we go from there.
    Mr. Harold Davies: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that while it would be unfair to blame him for this problem of
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    living with the motor car—and I should have nothing to do with that foolish suggestion—nevertheless it is of definite importance that in these days of pressure on local authorities the Government should have the courage to do something about compulsory powers of land purchase in order to find parking places off the roads which are overloaded with cars at the price of life and limb?
    Mr. Marples: The powers are there if local authorities wish to use them. The point is that a county or county borough must decide how much parking space is available in relation to the other uses of land. County and district councils must decide how space is to be provided and controlled. There are adequate powers for that. The difficulty is to get some local authorities interested in the subject.

    Parking Control
    Mr. John Hallasked the Minister of Transport what percentage of the local authorities which in 1961 had decided to install parking meters have now decided to introduce instead other forms of parking control.
    Mr. Marples: By the end of 1961, 13 local authorities had applied for designation orders, thereby showing a definite intention to install parking meters. All these have parking meters now.
    Mr. Hall: Would not my right hon. Friend agree that a certain number of authorities are departing from their original intention to install parking meters? Does not this show that these authorities are very far-sighted? Will my right hon. Friend, as a very far-sighted Minister, give encouragement to other forms of parking control?
    Mr. Marples: I have tried to do my best to give encouragement to other forms of control. That is why we introduced, in the 1962 Act, provisions for discs if a local authority wished to take the initiative and bring forward a disc scheme. I am at present looking informally at one such scheme from Cheltenham. But each local area has its own special problems. In some cases, meters are necessary—in the heart of London, for example. In other, smaller, towns they may not be necessary. Each local authority should deal with its problems on their merits. I would inform my hon.

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    Friend that in 1961 we had 8,000 parking meters in London. In 1963 the number went up to 15,000, in 1964 another 1,000 have been added and a further 2,900 are under consideration. It is, therefore, clear that in the centre of London people have not departed from the idea of parking meters.
    Mr. John Hallasked the Minister of Transport how many metropolitan boroughs are now considering parking control by means of discs or traffic wardens.
    Mr. Marples: As far as I know, only two metropolitan boroughs are considering the possibilities of parking control with discs. I am studying proposals which they have put to me informally. No formal proposals have been made.
    I have not received any proposals from metropolitan boroughs for the control of short-term parking solely by means of waiting restrictions enforced by traffic wardens.
    Mr. Hall: Would not my right hon. Friend agree that the disc system makes far more economical use of available road space than does the meter system? Would he not also agree that by and large the proliferation of these hideous meters throughout a city pleases no one except the dog population?
    Mr. Marples: I am not responsible for the dog population. It is very difficult in question and answer to discuss the merits of various restrictions upon cars in the streets, but I am certain that, while meters have some disadvantages, they have a great many advantages. They show clearly and accurately the passage of time and when a given period has expired. What is important is that they give rise to fewer offences. Paris has about 15 times the number of tickets issued in a comparable area of London—that is, 3 million a year as against 200,000. Parking meters allow for more flexible control and they have great merit. At the same time, I recognise that they have disadvantages. But on balance I think that they are the right thing for London.

    South Orbital Road
    Mr. Lubbockasked the Minister of Transport if he will now publish the proposed route of the Farnborough to
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    Croydon link of the South Orbital Road, and of the South Orbital Road itself.
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport (Vice-Admiral John Hughes Hallett): My right hon. Friend has already published the proposed route of the South Orbital Road from the Dartford Tunnel to the A.20 trunk road and will publish proposals for further sections of the road as the preparatory work is completed.
    The Farnborough to Croydon link is a potential classified road for which Kent County Council and Croydon County Borough Council are the responsible highway authorities.
    Mr. Lubbock: Is the hon. and gallant Gentleman aware that the Minister wrote to me on 13th March to say that the investigations which were being carried out on his behalf by the Kent County Council on a number of alternative routes had already been completed and were under consideration by his Department? What, therefore, is the reason for this further three months' delay? Does the hon. and gallant Gentleman appreciate that until a decision is made, consideration of planning applications all along the alternative routes which might be selected must be deferred and that great anxiety will be caused to local residents along any one of the possible alternatives? In view of this, will the Minister consider publishing a map showing all the alternatives which are under consideration by the Department?
    Thirdly, does the Minister realise that one of the proposed alternative routes passes through the municipal golf course which the Orpington Urban District Council was hoping to start constructing this summer? As this is an amenity which is very much desired by the people of Orpington, will the Minister come to a decision quickly?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: We appreciate the importance of avoiding unnecessary anxiety. That is why we must be satisfied that the best line has been chosen before the proposals are advertised. I cannot agree with the hon. Member that it would be wise to publish all the alternative suggestions which are put forward. That would merely multiply anxiety, in many cases quite needlessly.

    Traffic Signs (Worboys Committee's Report)
    Mr. Clive Bossomasked the Minister of Transport when it is proposed to lay before Parliament the new traffic signs regulations implementing the Worboys Report and to publish the Traffic Signs and Markings Manual.
    Sir J. Langford-Holtasked the Minister of Transport what are the reasons for the delay in implementing his acceptance of the Report of the Worboys Committee.
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: My right hon. Friend said on 2nd March in reply to the hon. Member for Romford (Mr. Ledger) that, because the necessary consultations with representative organisations were taking longer than expected, it was unlikely that the regulations to give effect to the recommendations of the Worboys Committee would be ready before September. Those recommendations were of a fundamental character and involve a change over to a completely new system of signs. Many of them too, were, of necessity, in broad terms which have to be developed to cover many points of detail. I cannot yet give a precise date for the laying of the regulations or the publication of the Manual, but work on both is proceeding as rapidly as possible.
    Mr. Bossom: Is it not humanly possible to hurry this up? Could not my right hon. Friend the Minister bring in a crash programme, because local authorities and the sign manufacturers are marking time? In the meantime no signs are being replaced.
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: No, Sir. A crash programme would be an unwise thing and, indeed, would lead to crashes of another kind. We are giving special authority for the erection of the new type of directional signs on new roads and where road improvements make this necessary. Other types of signs, though, cannot be introduced in advance of the release of widespread publicity as to their meaning. We are also giving consideration to permitting a go-ahead on the erection of directional signs on primary roads—that is, trunk roads and some Class I roads.
    Mr. Gower: Is my hon. and gallant Friend quite satisfied that throughout the consideration of this matter enough has been done to achieve a large amount of uniformity, both in this country and with countries on the Continent, since so many of our motorists drive on the Continent now and so many Continental drivers come here?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: I again emphasise that that was the purpose of the recommendations made by the Worboys Committee.

    Trunk and Classified Roads (Lighting)
    Mr. Clive Bossomasked the Minister of Transport what reply he has made to the further representations received this year from the County Councils Association in regard to the improvement of lighting of trunk roads, and urging the introduction of legislation to enable highway authorities to provide street lighting on classified roads.
    Mr. Marples: We have told the Association that we accept that some reform is needed. But the problem is a complicated one. Grants for street lighting cannot be considered apart from the review, which is now proceeding, of the financial relationship between central and local government. Moreover, any revision of the administrative structure, which dates back to the last century, would involve legislation which obviously could not be enacted by this Parliament. But my Department is preparing proposals for discussion with the local authority associations.
    Mr. Bossom: As lighting is a major contributor to road safety, could not my right hon. Friend look into this and allow perhaps a limited expansion of lighting in danger stretches? Does he not agree that, where adequate lighting has been erected, accidents have been reduced by 30 per cent.? These are figures from his own research officials.
    Mr. Marples: I honestly think that this is a problem which ought not to be tackled in a piecemeal fashion, because one of the difficulties is to work out an objective test of the circumstances in which a high standard of lighting is needed, and such an exercise cannot be confined to trunk roads in isolation.

    Accidents, Parliament Square
    Mr. Rankinasked the Minister of Transport (1) if he will make a statement on the causes of the accident which occurred at 11 p.m. on Monday 7th June at the junction of Bridge Street and Whitehall involving three persons, one of whom was killed;
    (2) how many accidents have occurred at the junction of Parliament Street, Bridge Street, and Parliament Square, during the past two years; how many were fatal; how many involved diplomats and their staff who claimed diplomatic privilege; and what new signs and precautions, such as speed limits, he has in view to prevent these accidents.
    Mr. Marples: With permission—
    Mr. Rankin: On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. Would the right hon. Gentleman care to answer Questions Nos. 33 and 37 together, with my permission?
    Mr. Marples: Mr. Speaker, I am always so anxious to oblige the hon. Gentleman that I will certainly do so. I will answer Questions Nos. 33 and 37 together.
    There was an accident on Monday, 8th June at 10.50 p.m. in Parliament Square just south of its junction with Parliament Street, when a collision occurred between a motor van emerging from Parliament Street and two vehicles, one a private car and the other a motor scooter, moving from Great George Street towards Bridge Street. Fortunately no one was killed, but the driver of the scooter and his passenger were seriously injured.
    During the past two years there have been 25 personal injury accidents at this junction. None was fatal. There were two cases of serious injury and 23 of slight injury. In no case was diplomatic immunity claimed.
    This accident record is a great improvement over that for the previous two years and is not exceptional for so busy a junction. The junction is controlled at all times by traffic signals or by the police, and I see no other traffic measures I could usefully introduce.
    Mr. Rankin: I am pleased to hear that the cyclist was not killed. My information was that he was projected into the air to a sufficient height to kill most men when they returned again to earth.
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    Can the Minister say whether the cyclist has now recovered from his injuries? Does the Minister realise that there is a great deal of concern about the number of accidents that have occurred at this corner, and also about the speed at which motor car drivers come down and go up Whitehall? Not only are road users and pedestrians gravely concerned about this matter, but those charged with the duty of controlling traffic speed are also concerned. Would not the Minister consider the suggestion that I made that he should take some special precautions with regard to this particular crossing?
    Mr. Marples: I am afraid I cannot give any information about the health of the person who was injured. I think that the less I say about this the better, because I understand that court proceedings are at any rate being considered. In 1961 we took certain measures which reduced the number of accidents at this junction, which had been 50 in the preceding two years, to 25 in the last two years. So we have halved the number of accidents by the measures we have taken. The accidents that have occurred in the last two years have been mostly of the nose-to-tail collision type, which, unfortunately, are not uncommon at signals.
    Mr. Robert Cooke: Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that, if the House chooses to accept the recommendation of the Committee on Accommodation, this dangerous crossroads at Bridge Street will be removed altogether?

    Sale-Altrincham Bypass
    Sir S. Storeyasked the Minister of Transport when he intends to authorise the length of the proposed Sale-Altrincham bypass from M.62 to Carrington Lane B.5166.
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: It is too early to say. The joint committee of local highway authorities in the South-East Lancashire and North-East Cheshire conurbation gave higher priority to other schemes in the area and did not include this bypass in their recommended programme of works up to 1972. The situation will be reassessed in the light of the more comprehensive transport survey which the local highway authorities are now carrying out.
    Sir S. Storey: Is my hon. and gallant Friend aware that the development of the oil terminal at Partington and of Petrochemicals at Carrington is causing very heavy tanker traffic through Urmston seeking to gain access to the M.62? Is he also aware that Urmston is a residential district and its roads are totally unsuited to this traffic? Therefore, will he give urgent consideration to an earlier start on this link, which would enable such traffic to reach M.62 quickly?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: As I said, we will look at this again when we have the result of the forthcoming transport survey.
    Mr. Mapp: Is the hon. and gallant Gentleman aware that access to Manchester from the south and to the south through the M.6, which is concerned with this road, has turned out differently from the forecasts of his advisers and that the trunk road into Manchester through Altrincham, Sale and Stretford is completely overburdened? Will he look at this problem again, because the forecasts have not been vindicated by the facts, as drivers are choosing the Manchester direction via Knutsford, rather than via Holmes Chapel?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: These are some of the reasons for the further transport survey which is being carried out.

    London-South Wales Motorway
    Mr. Awdryasked the Minister of Transport whether he will expedite the construction of that part of the proposed M.4 motorway which will run from Liddington westwards to the Severn Bridge in view of the increased traffic congestion which will arise on Wiltshire roads as a result of the opening of the bridge.
    Sir A. Hurdasked the Minister of Transport whether he has now obtained from surveys all the information he requires to reach a conclusion on the line he will recommend for the M.4 motorway through Berkshire; and when he expects to make a detailed statement.
    Mr. C. Morrisonasked the Minister of Transport when he intends to publish the draft scheme for the remaining section of the London to South Wales
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    motorway M.4; and when construction work will begin.
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: My right hon. Friend has now received the report of the consulting engineers who have surveyed the possible alternative routes between Maidenhead and the Gloucestershire boundary. It will take some time to study it and to consult the major local authorities and other interested parties. We do not expect to be able to publish a draft scheme before the autumn of this year at the earliest. It is unlikely that construction could begin for at least a further three years. We certainly wish to press on with this motorway and my right hon. Friend will consider whether it would be possible to give priority to the construction of the western section. But we cannot reach a decision on this point until we have completed our study of the report and the necessary consultations.
    Mr. Awdry: Will my hon. and gallant Friend reach a conclusion as quickly as he can in view of the fact that the Wiltshire authorities are agreed among themselves where the road should run?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: We will certainly proceed as quickly as we can.
    Sir A. Hurd: May I take it that the Ministry will resume consultations with the local authorities in Berkshire and Wiltshire, so far as that may be necessary, so that we may get a better meeting of minds than we have been able to achieve so far?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: Yes, Sir. That is what we hope to achieve.

  TRANSPORT

    Concessionary Fares
    Mr. Shortasked the Minister of Transport what reply he has sent to the National League of the Blind in reply to its letter dated 5th May regarding concessionary fares for the blind, the disabled and retirement pensioners.
    Mr. Galbraith: We have sent the hon. Member a copy of the reply.
    Mr. Short: But is the hon. Gentleman aware that as it has taken so long to

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    get this reply I have seen the letter, and that it is based on a completely invalid argument? Is the hon. Gentleman aware that many of us do not accept the argument that this involves the principle of assisting people with concessions rather than with finance, which the Government propose doing, because this does not involve public funds in any way? Is the hon. Gentleman aware that my Bill would not even allow the rate fund to make a contribution to this, so it cannot be argued that it would affect assessments of general grant? How can the Government argue that this involves some kind of public expenditure?
    Mr. Galbraith: If the hon. Gentleman has already had the reply, I am surprised that he did not withdraw the Question. However, the hon. Gentleman's view on this matter is clearly different from that of the Government. As has been explained on many occasions, we believe in paying people in cash and not in kind so that old-age pensioners have freedom to use the money in their own way. We realise that freedom is a quality to which hon. Gentlemen opposite pay very little attention.
    Mr. G. Johnson Smith: Will my hon. Friend point out to retirement pensioners who may be stimulated by Socialist agitation to ask for concessionary fares that the National Federation of Old-Age Pensioners, in its magazine "Pensioners' Voice", has come out firmly against ad hoc concessions of this kind?
    Mr. Galbraith: I think that that puts the matter in its proper perspective. Old-age pensioners would much prefer to have cash than to be paid in kind.
    Mr. Mellish: Is it not a fact that some local authorities give this concession, and some of them are not necessarily Labour-controlled? In other words, the Minister is saying that they are wrong in principle. Is he aware that the majority of old-age pensioners have to go to the National Assistance Board to have their incomes supplemented, and the Board would not pay concessionary fares?
    Mr. Galbraith: Old-age pensioners are very much better off today than they were when the hon. Gentleman's party was in power.
    Mr. Short: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of that reply, I shall raise this matter on the Adjournment at the earliest opportunity.

    Heavy Lorries (Examination)
    Sir B. Jannerasked the Minister of Transport whether, in view of the fact that a large number of lorries of over 30 cwt. carrying capacity on the roads are mechanically unsound, he will now introduce legislation for all vehicles of such carrying capacity to be periodically examined.
    Mr. Galbraith: I dealt with this problem in my speech on the Motion for the Adournment on 23rd June and at the moment I cannot say more.
    Sir B. Janner: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that his statement on that occasion was entirely unsatisfactory? How on earth can he, in all conscience, allow these heavy lorries to be on the road without a regular test, rather than a check-up as at present? Does the hon. Gentleman realise that there are about 750,000 of these vehicles on the road, and that there are only 12 teams dealing with them? Why does he not have a test for these vehicles in the same way as he has a test for a much less vulnerable kind of machine which also does damage? Will he realise that the public will not stand for this kind of thing, and that something should be done very rapidly?
    Mr. Galbraith: I am glad that the hon. Member read what I said in the Adjournment debate. I still think that he is exaggerating. The safety record of these vehicles is better than that of any other class, and that is the important thing. However, this summer my right hon. Friend is stepping up the checks on these vehicles on the roads, and having a blitz on them in certain areas.
    Mr. Webster: Is it not understandable that the owners of commercial vehicles are reluctant to bring their fleets up to date when they run the risk of having them nationalised, or put completely off the road, with no compensation, if the Labour Party gets into office?
    Mr. Galbraith: I certainly think that the policy of the party opposite—in so far as we know what it is—is responsible for undermining the excellent spirit of the road hauliers.
    Mr. Mellish: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that it has always been assumed in this House that road safety was above party matters? Is it now being said that it does not matter what the community thinks and that it is fair for any section of it to put unsafe vehicles on the road? Is he aware that it is admitted that we have not got the inspectors to carry out these checks? In one year only 12½ per cent. of these vehicles can be checked, which means that it will take over eight years for them all to be checked. What about increasing the number of inspectors?
    Mr. Galbraith: The hon. Member keeps forgetting that the safety record of these vehicles is better than that of any other class. Nevertheless, my right hon. Friend is not content to rest there, and is instituting these special spot checks this summer, in the hope of even further improving the safety record of these vehicles.

    Road Accidents
    Mr. Dudley Smithasked the Minister of Transport if he will arrange for comprehensive data and expert assessments of every serious road accident to be collated and studied by a special branch of his Department, with a view to obtaining more accurate information as to the pattern and main and contributory causes of deaths and serious injuries on the roads.
    Mr. Marples: Detailed reports of the circumstances of every accident causing death or serious injury are supplied by the police. Other inquiries into particular features of accidents are carried out by various agencies. All this information is already studied by those concerned with road safety both in my Department and the Road Research Laboratory; but my Department is undertaking a review of the present machinery to see how effort in this field can best be deployed.
    Mr. Smith: I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply, but does not he agree that the more advances we make in pinpointing the exact causes of accidents the greater chance there is of reducing the high level of death and serious injury on the roads? Does not he get the impression that there is a great danger that unless there is evidence for a clear-cut prosecution, or an inquest
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    is involved, in the end there tends to be a haphazard method of gathering evidence, and that this does not come through to his Department as it should?
    Mr. Marples: That is why we set up the inquiry within my Department. This will involve a lot of complicated organisational and statistical problems, but I hope that we shall get somewhere with our review. Most accidents result from a number of causes acting simultaneously, and are rarely due to one cause, but if we examine a number of accidents it may be possible to establish some factor which is common to them all, and we can take remedial measures in respect of it.
    Mr. Callaghan: Is the Minister aware that a young woman in my constituency recently lost her life because of an accident which involved a lorry which was overloaded, had inefficient brakes and was badly driven, and that as a result the driver was fined a derisory sum? Why should this lorry not have been examined during the previous 12 months by his examiner? On the basis of the statistics with which the Minister has been kind enough to furnish me, I understand that it would be eight years, on average, before the lorry would be examined. Why should lorries escape examination in this way when private cars, once they have reached five years of age, have to be examined every year? Is the Minister aware that this is a growing scandal, and that there is considerable anger about the way in which some of these heavy lorries are maintained on the roads? I ask the Minister to divert some of his enthusiasm and energy into building up a proper inspection staff.
    Mr. Marples: That is exactly what we are doing with these heavy vehicles. We are stepping up this summer our on-the-spot road inspections in all my divisional road engineers' areas. In addition, we are discussing with the manufacturers all sorts of ideas, including the question of power-to-weight ratio, so that they will be able to build to a better specification in the future. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we have taken quite a number of steps.
    Mr. Wingfield Digby: What progress is being made in ensuring that the police always give full reports of serious accidents to the local road engineers who are

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    responsible for the relevant stretch of road? In many cases in the past these engineers have not received proper reports.
    Mr. Marples: Investigation into certain aspects of road accidents is carried out by a number of agencies. The Road Research Laboratory carries out some, and so do my own vehicle examiners, local authority highway engineers and my Ministry's road engineers. We have area road safety units in Hampshire and Warwickshire, and these units are experimenting with new methods of collecting accident statistics and studying the whole problem. If we require assistance from the police we find that they are always willing to give it.
    Mrs. Braddock: Does the additional information in this survey include the requirement to supply to the courts the date upon which the person concerned obtained a driving licence, and for how long he has driven? Is the Minister aware that magistrates dealing with these cases—and I am one—are handicapped because they have no knowledge of the length of time a person has been driving, and that that can have a great effect on the cause of accidents?
    Mr. Marples: We are reviewing this. It will be some time before it is finalised. We will certainly take the hon. Lady's point into account in our review.
    Mr. Callaghan: Is the Minister setting himself a programme to ensure that these heavy lorries are examined at least on the same basis as private cars so that there will come a time—we hope in the near future—when we shall know that every lorry on the road has been examined within a reasonable period?
    Mr. Marples: I did not say so. I said that at the present time we have checks which take place on the roadside for the testing of brakes and other things, and I am stepping these up. At the same time, we are looking after the new vehicles; and when it becomes necessary to have other tests, we shall look into that, too.

    Yellow Box Crossings
    Mr. Costainasked the Minister of Transport whether the recent experiment with yellow box crossings has
    1340
    resulted in speeding the flow of traffic in the West End of London.
    Mr. Galbraith: Preliminary reports indicate that the boxes have been helpful, with best results at the busier junctions.
    My right hon. Friend announced on 29th June that he had proposed to the local authorities concerned an extension of the experiment to 16 other junctions in London. Observations at these junctions will augment the information being obtained about the first six.
    Mr. Costain: Would it be possible, by rewriting the Highway Code, to make this the general procedure at crossings?
    Mr. Galbraith: Before doing that we must see whether these experiments turn out to be as successful as they look like being.
    Sir J. Maitland: Can my hon. Friend say how many prosecutions there have been since this experiment was inaugurated?
    Mr. Galbraith: I regret that I cannot give those figures without notice.

    Cars (Seat Belts)
    Mr. Channonasked the Minister of Transport if he will now propose legislation to make the fitting of seat belts in all new cars compulsory.
    Mr. Galbraith: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply given to my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, South (Mr. Pounder) on 24th June.
    Mr. Channon: Would not my hon. Friend agree that all the evidence goes to show that when safety belts are worn the effect of accidents is very much less severe than when they are not worn? Does he not agree that in the end we shall have to come to some system like this? Would it not be a good idea to see that at least all new cars are fitted with safety belts?
    Mr. Galbraith: My hon. Friend is perfectly right when he says that the effect of accidents is reduced very substantially by the use of seat belts, but the first thing to do is to wait until the British

    1341
    Standards Institute has prepared a specification for anchorage points, because until this is done—and my right hon. Friend expects to hear very shortly from the Institute—there would be no purpose in doing what my hon. Friend suggests.
    Mr. Strauss: How long is it since the request went to the British Standards Institute to produce a design of this sort? Is it not some years ago that the Minister asked the Institute to design some anchorage the mechanism of which would be really effective?
    Mr. Galbraith: It is a very difficult matter, as I am sure the right hon. Member appreciates, to get an anchorage point suitable for all types of motor cars, but my right hon. Friend is expecting to hear from the Institute within the next month.
    Mr. Costain: To help the motorist appreciate the effect of safety belts, will the Minister when issuing statistics of fatal accidents state those in which safety belts were not used?
    Mr. Galbraith: That is certainly something which my right hon. Friend will consider.

    Private Cars (Passengers)
    Mr. Holtasked the Minister of Transport whether he will introduce legislation amending the Road Traffic Act, 1960, to permit car owners who take passengers to work by car on an expense-sharing basis, to do so without having to obtain a licence as a public service vehicle.
    Mr. Galbraith: No, Sir. We have no present evidence to justify such a measure. But in connection with rural transport problems this idea, along with others, will no doubt be looked at by the local rural transport inquiries now in progress.
    Mr. Holt: Is not that a rather astonishing Answer? The hon. Gentleman must know that there are many people who take their neighbours to work on a paying basis. Is not this both good-neighbourly and commonsense? Is it not absurd that in so helping their neighbours they should be in fact breaking the law? Should not this be altered?
    Mr. Galbraith: I do not know that that is necessarily true. The purpose of the law is to safeguard the bus services. If the practice to which the hon. Member has referred grew, it might endanger the bus service; which is required for those people who have not got private cars, and who have to rely on public transport.
    Mr. Webster: Is there not an insurance problem here, because anyone taking a passenger in his motor car as an act of courtesy is in difficulty with the insurance company should there be an accident?
    Mr. Galbraith: My hon. Friend is perfectly right. There are insurance difficulties, but I was going to the heart of the matter in my answer to the hon. Member for Bolton, West (Mr. Holt).
    Mr. Holt: The Minister must be aware that there are many new firms which have started on the peripheries of towns where the bus services are quite inadequate to take workpeople from an area all around the works. Many of those people can get to work only by private transport.

    Bus Services
    Mr. Ellis Smithasked the Minister of Transport what action he intends to take to see that there are adequate bus services in all industrial areas and in cases where railway lines or stations have been closed.
    Mr. Galbraith: After my right hon. Friend has decided that extra buses are needed following a rail passenger closure, he makes it a condition of his consent that they must be provided when it takes place. In regard to bus services in industrial areas generally, I should be happy to look into any particular cases which the hon. Member likes to bring to my attention.
    Mr. Ellis Smith: Is that good enough? Does the Minister agree that in areas where we are catering for the export trade it is necessary to have the maximum efficiency? If so, should not that also apply to the transport service for the workpeople?
    Mr. Galbraith: The hon. Member has stated something with which, in general, I am in perfect agreement. If he will

    1343
    give particular instances where that is not happening I shall be delighted to look into them.
    Sir J. Maitland: People come from all parts of the country to seaside resorts. How can we arrange to provide buses to transport people from all over the country, thousands of them, to a seaside resort if the railway station there is closed?
    Mr. Galbraith: This question refers to industrial areas, but I am willing to answer my hon. Friend the Member for Horncastle (Sir J. Maitland). The answer is that the buses run from the nearest railway terminus wherever that may be.
    Mr. Popplewell: When the Minister makes his final decision in favour of a closure there should be adequate bus services. If a bus company, because of a loss on those services, is not renewing its licences, what steps does the Minister take to ensure that the Railways Board continues to run a road service to cater for those needs? According to the Minister himself, it is the job of the Railways Board when the need is proved to provide a service.
    Mr. Galbraith: I thought that the hon. Member would know that my right hon. Friend lays it down as a condition that when a railway service is withdrawn a bus service should be supplied in its place. The railways cannot remove that bus service without getting my right hon. Friend's permission.

    London and Gatwick Airports (Monorail Service)
    Sir B. Jannerasked the Minister of Transport whether, in view of the desirability of providing more rapid and efficient transport services between London and Gatwick Airports, he will study the possibility of a monorail service for the purpose.
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: My right hon. Friend is ready to consider, in so far as his Departmental responsibilities are involved, any proposals for monorail services that may be put to him in sufficient detail.
    Sir B. Janner: Why is not the Minister prepared to consider the matter without having it put to him? Is he not aware
    1344
    that the monorail would really provide an answer to the appalling delays and difficulties which are experienced by people who are transported to and from Gatwick to London Airport? Will the Minister consider some kind of research in his own Department? Why wait for others? The monorail is being used elsewhere. Why cannot it be used here?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: The monorail is being used elsewhere hardly at all. There is, I think, one monorail in the world, which has been in service for a great many years. In any event, our information is that there is nothing like enough traffic between these two airports to justify this form of transport.

    C Licence Holders
    Mr. Wingfield Digbyasked the Minister of Transport how many C licence holders are now registered; and in respect of how many vehicles in all they hold licences.
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: The latest available figures show that at 31st December, 1962, there were 569,000 C licence holders in respect of 1,226,000 vehicles.
    Mr. Digby: Will my hon. and gallant Friend bear in mind that many of these 500,000 and more are men with small businesses who depend for their livelihood upon C licences? Will he approach the future of C licences with no preconceived ideas and approach the result of the Geddes Report in the same way and not buoy it up with any doctrinaire ideas of bolstering up the nationalised lorries, like the party opposite?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: As my hon. Friend has indicated, this is a matter on which the Geddes Committee may well make a recommendation. As to the matter being determined by doctrinaire views, I can only say that the licence holders will have an opportunity of protecting themselves against this later in the year.
    Mr. Mellish: Is the Minister able to say how many C licence holders are doing A and B licence work?
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: I should imagine, very few indeed. We

    1345
    think that there are very few breaches of that part of the regulations.
    Mr. Mellish: The Minister should find out more about it.

    A.4 Road, Chippenham (Abnormal Load)
    Mr. Awdryasked the Minister of Transport whether he authorised a journey along the A.4 of a prefabricated cylinder having an overall length of over 120 feet which passed through Chippenham on its market day, Friday 29th May, causing widespread congestion and inconvenience.
    Mr. Marples: I approved the journey. The date and timing were matters for the haulier and the police.
    Mr. Awdry: Is my right hon. Friend aware that this gigantic load caused havoc in Chippenham? Will he ensure that in future these very heavy loads go by sea?
    Mr. Marples: The difficulty in this case was that the journey by sea was expensive and, if the load had gone by sea, it is likely that a manufacturer in another country would have got the order and not this particular manufacturer.
    Mr. F. Noel-Baker: Is the Minister aware that traffic conditions in Wiltshire will get steadily worse until he gets on with building the M.4 and stops closing local railway lines? In view of the congestion, will he veto the suggestion of the Railways Board to close intermediate stations between Swindon and Gloucester, particularly in view of the recently published South-East Study, under which it is planned to expand Swindon to a town of 250,000?
    Mr. Marples: I shall not go into the merits of any individual closure until the proposal has been examined in great detail. Rail closures do not affect this case, because this load could not have gone by rail anyhow; it was too large.
    Deciding the line of M.4 has not been an easy task, and if the people in Wiltshire had been a little more accommodating we should have got on with it a little more quickly.

    Channel Tunnel (Geological Survey)
    Sir W. Teelingasked the Minister of Transport if he will make a statement on the position concerning the Channel Tunnel as at the end of June; and what arrangements have been made about financing the geological study.
    Mr. Marples: With permission, I should like to answer this Question at the end of Questions.

  RAILWAYS

    Main Line Stations (Car Parks)
    Mr. Worsleyasked the Minister of Transport how many main line stations have car-parking facilities provided by the Railways Board; and how many new car parks of this type have been provided in the past five years.
    Mr. Galbraith: The Railways Board tells us that 784 of the main line stations have car parks provided by British Railways; 27,075 parking spaces are available at these. Thirty-two of these parks, providing 1,428 parking spaces, were established within the five years up to April, 1964. During the same period existing car parks at about 130 stations, including main line stations, were enlarged, providing accommodation for some 4,800 cars.
    Mr. Worsley: Is my hon. Friend aware that this considerable improvement which he records seems to have missed out both the West Riding of Yorkshire and the London stations serving it? Will he point out to the Railways Board that nothing would do more to bring back traffic to the railways than adequate parking facilities at main line stations?
    Mr. Galbraith: As I am sure my hon. Friend appreciates, this is a management matter for the Railways Board. But I have no doubt that it will pay attention to what my hon. Friend has said.
    Mr. Worsleyasked the Minister of Transport whether he will issue a general direction, in the public interest, to the British Railways Board to provide adequate car parking facilities next to all major railway stations.
    Mr. Marples: No, Sir. It is for the Board to decide, as a matter of management, where car parks might be provided and whether provision would be justified. I have no reason to doubt that the Board is giving due attention to this matter.
    Mr. Worsley: Will my right hon. Friend himself impress upon the Board the tremendous importance of this provision, if he does not think it right to give a general direction?
    Mr. Marples: I know that the Board is aware of the problem. In certain places in the last five years it has provided an extra 56 parks, dealing with several thousand motor cars. Where this is possible the Board will do it. But I believe that it is a matter for each local authority to try to decide the extent and distribution of car parks in its area. It is better to deal with an area as a whole and to co-ordinate it with the Railways Board.

    August Bank Holiday (Services)
    Mr. Miscampbellasked the Minister of Transport, in view of the proposed experiment of moving August Bank Holiday, if he will give a general direction, in the public interest, to the British Railways Board to give consideration to the provision of public transport facilities on the first and last Mondays in August 1965 and 1966.
    Mr. Marples: No, Sir. I have no doubt that British Railways will do all that is necessary about providing the services for which they are responsible.
    Mr. Miscampbell: I thank my right hon. Friend for that assurance. Will he bear in mind that at a number of resorts, such as Blackpool, holidays generally will have been taken before August, and it seems likely that people will continue to take the traditional holiday which will include the first Monday in August?
    Mr. Marples: It is not for me to bear that in mind but for the Railways Board. It is a question of management. It will estimate the number of trains required for a particular date and during the revised August Bank Holiday supply the correct number of trains to meet the demand.

    Proposed Closure, Elgin-Lossiemouth Line
    Mr. Hector Hughesasked the Minister of Transport in view of the errors, details of which have been sent to him, made in the figures produced by the British Railways Board with regard to the proposal to close the Elgin-Lossiemouth line, if he will reconsider his agreement to the closure.
    Mr. Galbraith: My right hon. Friend has received no such details and he sees no need to review his decision.
    Mr. Hughes: Will the Minister get in touch with the Postmaster-General to find out what is wrong with the postal service? Is he aware that I posted the letter to him and it is very important that he should understand these figures which affect large areas of Aberdeenshire, the City of Aberdeen and trade, industry, commerce and employment in that area? Will he get in touch with his fellow Ministers with a view to rectifying this shocking failure on the part of his Ministry?
    Mr. Galbraith: I object to the hon. and learned Gentleman saying that. There has been no shocking failure on the part of my right hon. Friend or myself. Nor can I see how what happens to the railway between Elgin and Lossiemouth can have any effect at all on the City of Aberdeen.

    Disused Railway Lines
    Mr. Pounderasked the Minister of Transport if he will give a general direction, in the public interest, to the Railways Board to prevent disused railway lines from becoming unsightly and overgrown with weeds.
    Mr. Galbraith: No, Sir. The Railways Board is subject to the normal legislation governing owners of vacant land.
    Mr. Pounder: While not asking my right hon. Friend to convert these tracks into rhododendron glades or anything like that, may I ask if nothing can be done in this respect because the state of many of the railways tracks makes a nonsense of the notice "Keep Britain Tidy" and encourages litter louts, which

    1349
    is something we all deplore? Can nothing be done to encourage the Board to take this matter more seriously and to prevent weeds growing and buildings continuing to decay?
    Mr. Galbraith: Local authorities have adequate powers to deal with nuisance on vacant land which is injurious both to health and amenity. I do not see why railway vacant land should be dealt with differently from other vacant land. I hope that what my hon. Friend has said will be noted by the local authorities.

    Stations, North Staffordshire (Modernisation)
    Mr. Ellis Smithasked the Minister of Transport what applications for capital investment have now been made to him for the modernisation of Stoke-on-Trent station; for what other stations of the North Staffordshire railway line similar applications have been made; and what information he has been given about expected completion dates.
    Mr. Marples: The British Railways Board has not put to me specific proposals for capital investment at stations on this line. But I understand that, within the Board's general investment programmes, improvements have been carried out at a number of stations, and others are planned for completion between now and the end of 1965. The works proposed at Stoke station will be completed during 1965.
    Mr. Ellis Smith: Does that also include the electrification of the line between Stoke and Crewe? Is the Minister aware that those of us who have worked on electrical equipment to be supplied all over the world are now getting satisfaction that, thanks to nationalisation, Britain's railways are being electrified and brought up to the maximum efficiency?
    Mr. Marples: I would not go the whole way in agreeing with the hon. Member's supplementary question. There is a lot of work connected with electrification, the lengthening of platforms, track remodelling, relighting, signalling works, and so on, costing about £1¾ million; and there is no doubt that quite a sum of money is being spent in this area.

  SHIPPING

    Foreign Shipbuilders (Subsidies)
    Mr. McMasterasked the Minister of Transport (1) what information he has obtained regarding the reduction in the past 12 months in the level of subsidies, direct and indirect, paid to foreign shipbuilders by their respective Governments;
    (2) what change there has been in the last 12 months in the amount of subsidies paid by foreign Governments to assist their shipbuilding industries; and how this has affected the international competitiveness of British shipyards.
    Mr. Marples: There have been no significant changes in subsidies paid in major shipbuilding countries in the past 12 months.
    Mr. McMaster: Is my right hon. Friend aware how welcome the Shipbuilding Credit Act has been in assisting the shipbuilding industry to meet unfair competition from abroad? Will he reconsider his decision not to extend this credit further, in view of the continuance of subsidisation abroad and the difficulties that this is bound to create in the future for our shipbuilding industry?
    Mr. Marples: No, Sir. There will be no extension of that Measure. It was brought in as a once-for-all Measure, in order to give the shipbuilding industry a breathing space in which to reorganise itself and become competitive. That I hope it is doing. I know that it is considering a number of measures which, so far, it has not announced.
    Sir Knox Cunningham: Is not the position today much more favourable with regard to orders placed with United Kingdom shipyards?
    Mr. Marples: Yes. There has been a great improvement not only as a result of the Act but because of other circumstances. Our yards received a large number of orders in the early part of this year.

    Docks, Aberdeen
    Mr. Hector Hughesasked the Minister of Transport if he is aware of the need for more dry and floating

    1351
    docks in Aberdeen harbour for the purposes of the shipbuilding and ship-repairing industry, and that this was considered by the working party set up by Her Majesty's Government, which recommended that Her Majesty's Government should provide finance to provide more such docks; when finance will be forthcoming; and when work will begin.
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: I am aware that a working party was convened in 1960 to consider this matter. But it was convened by the Aberdeen Harbour Board, not by the Government, and it recommended the replacement of two pontoon docks for which the Board is responsible. The Board has not submitted to the Government any request for financial assistance for replacement of these docks.
    Mr. Hughes: Does not the hon. and gallant Gentleman realise that this is a longstanding obligation upon the Government and that the last two sentences of my Question ask when the finance will be forthcoming and when the work will begin? That is the essential part of the Question. Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman answer it? This is a matter which vitally affects the trade, industry, commerce and employment, not only of the City of Aberdeen, but also of the workers in the county, as well.
    Vice-Admiral Hughes Hallett: It is not for me to answer the Question. It is for the Aberdeen Harbour Board, whose responsibility it is to take the initiative in this matter. The Board is empowered, if it wishes, to borrow for these purposes. It also lies with the Board, if it wishes, to apply to the Government, but it has not done so.

  QUESTIONS TO MINISTERS
  Miss Herbison: On a point of order. Has the Minister of Transport asked you for permission to answer Question No. 104, Mr. Speaker? If not, but if he now asks for permission, would you give it to him, or has the right hon. Gentleman decided to keep silent on proposed railway closures until the Recess?
  Mr. Speaker: I cannot answer for what the Minister has decided. I do
  1352
  not know what he has decided, but he has not made a request to me.
  Mr. Strauss: On a point of order. There are 113 Questions down to the Minister of Transport today. I believe that that is a record number for any Minister. That may or may not be a reflection of the dissatisfaction of the House at the right hon. Gentleman's conduct, but the fact remains that the House will have no further opportunity of questioning the Minister before the Recess, in August.
  About 70 hon. Members are dissatisfied because they have not had Oral Answers to their Questions, and although I know that it is not your personal responsibility, Mr. Speaker, in the circumstances would it not be obviously in the interests of the House, or certainly of a large section of it, if special arrangements were made to enable hon. Members who have not been able to ask Oral Questions today to have some other opportunity to ask them before the Recess?
  Mr. Speaker: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for recognising that it is not my personal responsibility. That involves the fact that it does not raise a point of order for me. If some rearrangement of Question Time is desired, no doubt that is a matter which could be discussed through the usual channels.

CHANNEL TUNNEL (GEOLOGICAL SURVEY)
The Minister of Transport (Mr. Ernest Marples): With permission, I will now answer Question No. 36.
The British and French Governments have decided that the further geological survey for the Channel Tunnel should begin this summer. Arrangements are being made for the Channel Tunnel Study Group to conduct the survey on an agency basis under the general supervision of the British and French Governments, who are to appoint a Joint Commission of Surveillance for this purpose. Half the cost will be met by Her Majesty's Government and half by the French Railways which, at the instance of the French Government, are participating in the contractual arrangements with the Study Group for this purpose.

1353
The survey is expected to cost about £1¼ million. I shall shortly be asking the House to make provision for the British share by way of Supplementary Estimate. Meanwhile, any expenditure on the British side would fall to be met by an advance from the Civil Contingencies Fund. The survey arrangements are entirely without prejudice to decisions yet to be made by the British and French Governments on the organisation and financing of the Channel Tunnel project; but the present intention of both Governments is that eventually, the cost of the survey shall be charged to whatever organisation may be set up for the tunnel itself.
Copies of the texts of an exchange of notes between the British and French Governments on these matters will be placed in the Library of the House.
Sir W. Teeling: Is my right hon. Friend aware how pleased everybody will be at the success so far achieved—
Mr. Ellis Smith: Not the people in the North.
Sir W. Teeling: —how pleased everybody who is keen on the idea will be at the success that he has so far achieved in the negotiations and discussions with the French Government and also at the fact that my right hon. Friend should have given the work for the time being to the Channel Tunnel Study Group, which has spent much money, energy and risk in the past on this matter?
However, since my right hon. Friend told us when he last spoke on this subject that there was quite a possibility that private enterprise and the Study Group would not be allowed to have anything to do with this, will he give the reasons why the Group is now being allowed to deal with it for the time being?
Mr. Marples: I am grateful for the way in which my hon. Friend received my statement and to the Channel Tunnel Study Group, which carried out the first feasibility borings of the soil. That Group has the "know-how" to continue with this trial bore, which is now wanted because the previous one was a feasibility study while this one is necessary to decide what line the tunnel should take and whether it will be an immersed of
1354
a bored tunnel. We gave it to the Group for that reason. The Group has compiled a list of international contractors, in consultation with its advisers, and has put the survey out to tender. We must get on with this work as quickly as possible. This is the first of many studies which will have to be undertaken before the tunnel is built.
Mr. E. L. Mallalieu: Can the Minister say what is the best season in which to make this survey and whether the survey will cover the possible route for a tunnel in the form of an immersed tube?
Mr. Marples: The answer to the second part of that supplementary question is "Yes". The answer to the first part is that, naturally, all civil engineering work is better done in the summer than in the winter. That is why we have done our best to get the majority of the work, which these international contractors may have to do, done in the summer.
Mr. N. Pannell: May I repeat the request I have made before, that before the Government are irrevocably committed to this scheme there should be a full debate in the House? Is this not a matter of sufficient controversy and magnitude to justify a full debate, so that all views may be expressed on this very important project?
Mr. Marples: That could well follow this survey, but I will convey my hon. Friend's idea to my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House.
Mr. Snow: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to give an undertaking that when the contract is eventually placed it will go to a British engineering firm and not to an American one, which, it is understood, is already trying to "muscle in" on this?
Mr. Marples: We are quite a long way from that stage, but at this stage I do not think that I should give such an undertaking.
Mr. Costain: My constituents will welcome my right hon. Friend's announcement. Will he give an assurance that this survey will proceed with the minimum of delay, since it is already late, seasonally, in being put into operation?
Mr. Marples: There will be no delay at all. It will start as soon as they have assessed the merits of the tenders. I am glad that my hon. Friend's constituents will be pleased.
Mr. Ross: Did I understand the Minister to say that he will consult one of his colleagues about whether or not a debate should take place in the House? How does he propose to get a Supplementary Estimate of £1¼ million without the consent of the House?
Mr. Marples: That is a different matter. My hon. Friend asked for a general debate on the merits
Mr. Lubbock: While my hon. Friends and I are pleased to hear that some progress is to be made on this project, may I ask the Minister to let us have more information about the make-up of the £1¼ million, because it sounds rather a lot for a purely preparatory geological survey?
Mr. Marples: I can assure the hon. Member that a great number of technical considerations must be taken into account in an undertaking of such magnitude as this to find out what the soil is like under the Channel and to make certain that there is no fault in the line chosen for the tunnel.
Mr. P. Noel-Baker: I recognise that there are many technical questions to be considered, but would it not be reasonable for the Minister to let the House have a White Paper before he asks for this money, so that we may debate the matter properly?
Mr. Marples: As I say, I will ask my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House whether time can be provided for a debate.

BILL PRESENTED
  ZAMBIA INDEPENDENCE
  Bill to make provision for, and in connection with, the establishment of Northern Rhodesia, under the name of Zambia, as an independent republic within the Commonwealth, presented by Mr. Sandys; supported by Mr. Selwyn Lloyd, The Attorney General, and Mr. Tilney; read the First time; to be read a Second time tomorrow and to be printed. [Bill 179.]

PRIVATE MEMBER'S BILL
Mr. Monslow: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May I ask, through you, why the Motion of the hon. Member for Louth (Sir C. Osborne) for a Bill to deal with immigration has not been moved? Is it as a result of an order from the Tory Whips? Is the hon. Member making sure of a baronetcy in the Dissolution Honours List?
Mr. Speaker: I do not, for the moment, understand what point of order arises. Perhaps the hon. Member wishes to explain himself further.
Mr. A. Lewis: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. You will be aware that for over a week there has been on the Order Paper a notice that a Bill would be presented today. Some of my hon. Friends from the North had arranged important meetings in their constituences, which they cancelled. Last night, many of them came back by sleeper train only to find, at the last moment—[Laughter.] This is not a laughing matter—that the hon. Member for Louth (Sir C. Osborne) had withdrawn his Motion.
May I ask you, Sir, whether, in future, if such a thing as this is to be done, Members may be given some idea, perhaps the night before, that the Bill is not to be proceeded with? Could it be arranged, with your help and assistance, that, as with notices of what Amendments, and so on, are to be called, a notice is put on the board in the Division Lobby the previous evening advising hon. Members that a Bill has been withdrawn? That would save the inconvenience that many of my hon. Friends have suffered today.
Mr. Robert Cooke: Further to that point of order—
Mr. Speaker: Order. I would prefer to deal with this point first.
It would not be within my power to deprive an hon. Member of the right to withdraw a Bill up to the last moment of time. I could not change the rule about that. I regret when inconvenience occurs to hon. Members in any way.
Mr. Ronald Bell: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. Perhaps I may draw the attention of the hon

1357
Member opposite to the fact that any hon. Member who took the trouble to read the Order Book of the House last Monday would have seen that my hon. Friend's, notice of Motion had already been withdrawn.
Mr. Speaker: I am grateful, but I am not an enthusiast of the practice of passing information from one hon. Member to another across the Floor of the House through the person of the Chair. It creates inconvenience.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

  DIPLOMATIC PRIVILEGES BILL [Lords]
  Order for Second Reading read.
  3.42 p.m.
  The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Robert Mathew): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  This Bill gives effect to those provisions of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations which relate to legal privileges and immunities. It will enable us to ratify that Convention, and will also, for the first time, provide a comprehensive code of diplomatic privileges and immunities in this country.
  The main provisions of the Bill are in Clauses 1 and 2, which provide for the replacement of the existing law and the application of the relevant articles of the Vienna Convention. The other Clauses of the Bill make changes in our law that are, broadly speaking, consequential. The Bill provides a single statement of the relevant rules, and does this on the basis of the Vienna Convention. The rules to be applied will be the rules of the Convention itself. For the greater part, these rules will be the same as those now applying in our law or practice, but there will be some changes. But the tendency of the Bill is to reduce the extent of immunities from our jurisdiction, while making comparatively minor changes in privileges.
  The Convention was the result of studies and proposals made by the International Law Commission of the United Nations. The Commission was established under a Resolution of the United Nations General Assembly of November, 1947, and chose as one of its first topics a study of the law of diplomatic relations. The Commission appointed a rapporteur, who made an exhaustive study of existing law and practice, and in 1958 the Commission adopted draft Articles for a Convention that were then submitted to Governments for their comment.
  In 1961, a conference of 81 countries assembled in Vienna under the auspices of the United Nations, and considered the draft Articles and the comments and proposals of Governments. On 14th April, 1961, the conference adopted the

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  Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. That Convention came into force on 24th April of this year, and 28 States are now parties to it. It is worth stressing that this work was achieved through the United Nations.
  International law governing diplomatic relations developed through many centuries of the practice of States. Out of this practice, rules of law developed, but on many matters there were significant differences of practice. In such cases, it was never easy to say with certainty what international law required. Numerous attempts to resolve these differences and reduce the mass of practice to coherent rules have been made.
  That the rules of international law on diplomatic relations are now to be found in a concise formulation is thanks in large measure to the machinery for study and discussion within the United Nations, as well as to the spirit of co-operation and compromise which the United Nations can engender. There is now every prospect that the Convention will achieve universal acceptance by the nations of the world. Her Majesty's Government have consistently supported the work of the United Nations in the sphere of international law, and we are now glad to be able to welcome this Convention as one of its most valuable contributions to the development of the international rule of law.
  As I have said, there were many points on which the Vienna Convention had to resolve differences of State practice. The decisions adopted by the conference were in some cases in favour of a practice and a view of international law that has not been that of the British Government. As a result, certain changes in our law will follow from the ratification of the Convention and the passing of the Bill.
  The most significant changes are in relation to immunity from suit and legal process. The key to any consideration of the whole problem of diplomatic privileges and immunities is the need to strike the right balance between our interests as a receiving State and our interests as a sending State. As a receiving State, we clearly have an interest in reducing to a minimum the extent to which any persons physically present in our country enjoy exceptional treatment. But, as a sending State, we have an equally clear interest in ensuring that those to whom
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  we entrust the task of representing the United Kingdom abroad have the status and the protection that will enable them to perform that task.
  Under existing United Kingdom law, all members of a diplomatic mission, together with the private servants of the head of mission, enjoy complete immunity from every kind of suit and legal process both in respect of their official acts and in respect of their private acts. This means that a diplomat cannot be subject to legal proceedings in any circumstances unless his head of mission considers that there is a case for the waiver of the immunity.
  Under the Convention and the Bill, this position will be changed, and significantly changed. For the first time, members of a mission will be divided into several categories, with differing privileges and immunities. Only the so-called "diplomatic agent"—the head of mission and the diplomatic staff—will continue to enjoy the full immunity which I have described, but even then the immunity will be subject to three exceptions under Article 31(1) of the Convention.
  Members of the "administrative and technical staff"—such people as typists, wireless operators and archivists—will enjoy complete immunity only for their official acts. For their private acts they will have immunity only from criminal jurisdiction. Members of the "service staff"—the domestic staff of the mission will have complete immunity only in relation to their official acts. For their non-official acts they will have no immunity from either civil or criminal jurisdiction. These are significant changes. The immunities of about 4,000 people will be affected.
  I should like to mention Article 38 of the Convention in Schedule 1 to the Bill. At present, United Kingdom citizens on the staff of foreign diplomatic missions in the United Kingdom enjoy immunity from suit in respect of their official acts. This is a result of the Diplomatic Immunities Restriction Act, 1955. Under the Convention and the Bill, this will remain the position only in relation to heads of mission and members of the diplomatic staff. For all other ranks there will be no immunity at all under the Bill, unless such immunity be granted by Order in Council under Clause 2(6).

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  In addition, for the first time, the same limitations will apply to permanent residents as well. Hitherto, there has been no discrimination against permanent residents.
  These are important changes, but at once they lead us to ask the question: are they consistent with our needs as a sending State? Are we, in accepting them, jeopardising the position of our representatives abroad and hence the interests of Her Majesty's Government? The Convention contains a provision in Article 47(2,b) under which it is open to States to accord to each other on the basis of custom or agreement better treatment than that called for by the Convention.
  Under this Article, it would be open for us, for example, to agree with another State to complete the immunity of the administrative and technical staff of our respective missions or to remove the exceptions to the immunity contained in Article 31. We have had to decide whether to make use of this provision and to include in the Bill a general power to make agreements going beyond the Convention.
  The House will appreciate that this has not been an easy decision to take. In the end, we have thought it right not to seek such a power and, with two exceptions, to accept the Convention as striking the right balance. These two exceptions are reflected in Clause 7. They are both cases where we have existing arrangements going beyond the Convention which we simply cannot terminate unilaterally even should we wish to do so.
  The first relates to the immunity from jurisdiction of the subordinate staff. This is contained in Clause 7(1,a). When the power was conferred by the Diplomatic Immunities Restriction Act, 1955, to withdraw immunities from the representatives of foreign countries which were not according to our representatives the degree of immunity available under our law, we had to discover the countries in respect of which the power should be exercised. In doing so, we were able to come to arrangements with certain countries which also had a rule of reciprocity.
  Under these arrangements one country assures the other that the subordinate staff of the mission will enjoy the full
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  immunity from jurisdiction. These arrangements were made with about four countries where we were keenly concerned to have this kind of protection for our own staff. I am sure that the House will not expect me to elaborate on the security aspects of the immunity from jurisdiction of persons connected with our missions abroad.
  I will merely say that it is quite clear that the threat of legal proceedings, in other words, blackmail, is a weapon which can be and is used to subvert members of diplomatic missions in some countries. The vital protection which we must have is to be able to assure every member of the staff of our mission in these countries that threats of legal proceedings can be ignored and that in no circumstances can such a threat be carried out without the consent of the head of mission.
  Clause 7 will allow the full immunity to continue in relation to a very limited number of countries. Their names will be published in connection with subsection (2) as soon as we have had time to consult the countries concerned. I stress that there is no question of concluding any further arrangements, indeed the Clause as drafted would not allow for new arrangements. It is merely a question of honouring those we already have.
  Clause 7(1,b) would continue certain arrangements which we have already under which administrative and technical staff of the mission enjoy the same Customs exemption as the diplomatic staff. Under Article 27 of the Convention, in Schedule 1, administrative and technical staff will enjoy Customs exemption only in respect of articles imported at the time when they first take up their posts, whereas the diplomatic staff, under Article 36(1), enjoy Customs exemption throughout their tour of duty. We have arrangements with nine countries giving the more extensive exemption, and, here again, we cannot terminate them at will. We have to consult the countries concerned, particularly because the arrangements in some cases, at the request of other countries, have been confidential. In due course their names will be published in accordance with Clause 7(2).
  I should now like to turn to a matter which has occupied a good deal of the

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  attention of the House at various times in the past, namely, motoring offences by persons entitled to diplomatic immunity. The changes made by the Bill in the immunities of the subordinate staffs of missions will have an effect on the problem. Members of the administrative and technical staffs will become liable to civil proceedings in respect of claims arising out of off-duty accidents. Members of the service staff will be liable to both civil and criminal proceedings in respect of off-duty accidents or offences. This means, for example, that an Embassy chauffeur will not be able to plead any immunity when he is not acting in the course of his duties.
  Mr. Leslie Hale: Who decides this? Let us suppose that I am knocked down by a gentleman who is an assistant cook, or whose wife is an assistant cook, employed by the Ruritanian Embassy? How do I establish that he is off duty?
  Mr. Mathew: Surely, if the hon. Member found himself in that position and the servant of the embassy pleaded immunity, this would be a matter for the head of mission. He knows whether the man was on duty at that time or was off duty. I am taking a case where there is no other evidence I suggest that in a number of these motoring cases it might well be perfectly obvious whether the servant was on or off duty at that moment.
  Mr. Hale: I agree, but suppose that the head of mission gives a certificate and says, "You were knocked down on the beach at Skegness by a gentleman driving a car off the road. He was on his way to cook a dinner for the Ambassador at Newcastle-on-Tyne and, therefore, was on duty"? This is not so far from some of the things that have occurred.
  Mr. Mathew: The hon. Member has experience in the courts and knows that this is a matter of evidence. It must depend on all the circumstances and the evidence available at the time. Any prospective plaintiff, in bringing a case against a defendant, is in this position. He must have the evidence, and the onus is on the defence in this case to plead an immunity. It will have to be proved, and
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  surely, in most cases, there will be a number of facts in the possession of the prospective plaintiff.
  Mr. Hale: This is important. We ought to get it clear. The question which I am asking is this: if a certificate is given by the head of a mission, is that binding on any tribunal in Britain or is the tribunal entitled to go behind the certificate and to question its accuracy, validity and honesty—and, if so, how?
  Mr. Mathew: Is the case any different from any ordinary running down case? A policeman appears or is sent for, and it does not matter whether there is a C.D. plate on the car or not, because that has no legal validity. If the person concerned pleads immunity, then it is for the police to find out whether he is entitled to immunity. The test of immunity surely would be the same as before—either he was entitled to it or he was not. If he were on duty, then he was entitled to it; and, if not, then he was not entitled to it. Surely this is a matter in which it should not be beyond the wit of our legal machinery to discover the answer. If he held out improperly and wrongly and against the facts that he was entitled to immunity, I do not think that there would be much difficulty in refuting that case.
  Members of the service staff will be liable to both civil and criminal proceedings in respect of off-duty accidents or offences. This means that an embassy chauffeur will not be able to plead any immunity when he is not acting in the course of his duties. This should help to remove a good deal of the room for irritation and misunderstandings which at present exist in this field. However, it is true that for on-duty offences and accidents there will still be cases in which diplomatic immunity can be and will be claimed.
  In a recent Adjournment debate I told the House of the new procedures which the Foreign Office and the Commonwealth Relations Office have recently adopted to try to reduce the extent of this problem. The police are now forwarding to the Foreign Office weekly tables of traffic incidents involving persons claiming diplomatic immunity. It is the intention of the Foreign Office and the Commonwealth Relations Office to

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  bring these to the attention of the missions concerned. In addition, I can say that the doyen of the Diplomatic Corps in London is taking a personal interest in the problem and has brought to the attention of heads of missions the obligation which diplomats are under to obey the laws and regulations of the United Kingdom, whether or not they can be enforced against them.
  Steps are being taken to ensure that missions have available to them adequate parking facilities so that the cause of some of the difficulties may be removed. I assure the House that we have this problem of diplomatic motoring offences and incidents under close and constant scrutiny and that we are not at all unhopeful that it will be solved by good sense and restraint on the part of all concerned.
  I want to refer to one or two points of detail in the Bill. It may be useful if I say something about exemption from local rates. Embassies and certain members of their staffs have enjoyed for over 70 years a partial relief from local rates. The Treasury at present accepts liability for that part of the general rate which is of no direct benefit to the embassy or the diplomat concerned. The so-called beneficial portion of the rate is paid by the embassy or the diplomat. This relief is at present given in one of two ways. Either the Treasury pays the full rate to the local authority and then recovers the beneficial portion from the embassy, or from the diplomat or else the embassy or the diplomat pays the full rate and recovers the non-beneficial portion from the Treasury.
  Under the Convention and the Bill, embassies and the official residences of diplomats will have a legal exemption from rates to much the same extent as the relief which they enjoy at present. Since it is a legal exemption, it is intended to adopt in all cases the first of the two procedures which I have described, and in future the Treasury will pay the full rate and will recover the beneficial portion from the embassy or the diplomat concerned. The Ministry of Housing and Local Government have been in touch with the representatives of local authorities, who have welcomed the considerable simplification in procedure which is proposed.
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  The only other provision which I will mention at this stage is Clause 3, which gives power to withdraw privileges and immunities from a mission when the sending State is failing to accord to our mission in its territory the privileges and immunities conferred by the Act. This power replaces the similar powers in the Diplomatic Immunities Restriction Act, 1955, in relation to foreign missions and the Diplomatic Immunities (Commonwealth Countries and Republic of Ireland) Act, 1952, in relation to Commonwealth missions.
  This is a simple Bill. Its twin objects are to bring both certainty and uniformity into the law on diplomatic relations. I have attempted to explain the main provisions of the Bill. Hon. Members may well wish to raise other points of detail and, if the House grants me permission, I shall be happy to deal later in the debate with such points. I submit that the Bill, by enabling the Government to ratify the Vienna Convention, is a real step forward towards the codification of an important branch of international law. For all the reasons which I have given, I commend the Bill to the House.
  4.7 p.m.
  Sir Frank Soskice: With a great deal of what the Minister said when he was sketching the background to the Bill I think that hon. Members on both sides of the House will agree. It is a step forward in the codification and expression in clearish—I will not say clear—terms of certain basic and vital principles of international law. As far as we can understand it, we shall know that the privileges to be accorded to diplomatic envoys are those which are described in language, which is not pellucid in form but comparatively so, contained in the articles set out in the Schedule to the Bill.
  I think that the whole House would wish me to pay tribute to the International Law Commission and would welcome an effort, under the auspices of the United Nations, tending to the codification of international law, because this will tend to the improvement and maintenance of the stability of international relations between states as far as it goes.
  Having said that and having expressed agreement with those sentiments which

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  came from the Minister about the background to the Bill, I should like to begin to examine its content. The Bill deals with the result of discussions and agreements at the Vienna Convention. Under Clause 8, I notice that the Bill proceeds to go outside the limits of that Convention and to deal with a different topic. I refer to the State of Southern Rhodesia, as it is described in the Bill. The first point which I want to put to the Minister arises on Clause 8(2), which reads:
  "This Act shall be construed as if Southern Rhodesia were a State".
  That provision was explained by Lord Carrington, when he was speaking on behalf of the Government in another place, as a provision which was necessary to prevent Southern Rhodesia from losing diplomatic privileges which her envoys at present enjoy under the provisions of the Diplomatic Immunities (Commonwealth Countries and Republic of Ireland) Act, 1952. I can well understand it if the Government feel that it would be wrong to deprive Southern Rhodesia of existing privileges which are accorded to representatives from Southern Rhodesia. I cannot help feeling, however, that the language chosen is not particularly felicitous at present, when we read not infrequently in the Press of the possibility, indeed more than the possibility, of a unilateral declaration of independence by the Southern Rhodesian Government who are in power at the moment.
  That being the situation it seems to me not altogether happy to choose language which is so expressed as to equate Southern Rhodesia in the fullest sense with a sovereign independent country such as Western Germany or France or any other sovereign country. If language is to be inserted into the Bill to preserve the rights of Southern Rhodesia, that is one thing, and I should not oppose it. But I put it to the Minister that it is quite unnecessary to make any reference to Southern Rhodesia at all.
  The Bill does not as I read it, take any privileges away from Southern Rhodesia. The privileges which Southern Rhodesia at present enjoys are, so far as I understand it from the wording of the Bill, completely and wholly untouched. It seems to me, therefore, to
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  be quite unnecessary to embark upon the use of the language in Clause 8, which, as I say, has an unfortunate connotation, particularly in present circumstances.
  The scope of the Bill is defined in Clause 1 as being designed to substitute the provisions contained in it as to diplomatic immunity in the existing law
  "with respect to the matters dealt with therein."
  "Therein" means, by the Bill, that is the diplomatic relations between States, as I understand it, which are parties or become parties to the machinery of the Vienna Convention, and those States are set out in the Schedule—there are 81 of them—and Southern Rhodesia is certainly not included as a State; and as I read the provisions of the Bill it could have no effect on the existing status of Southern Rhodesia so far as diplomatic immunity is concerned.
  I really would ask the Government to look closely at that matter. It is a subject on which one must naturally, speak with great restraint and care in view of the somewhat tense situation at the moment, and I say no more about it, but I do ask the Government to consider whether it is necessary to insert that language or any language of the sort.
  Having made that general point I accept that what we are doing now is deciding whether or not we approve what the Government spokesman in another place described as a package deal. No doubt, our representatives in the course of the discussions in Vienna would have preferred some arrangements in some respects different from those which appear in the Convention, and in other respects, no doubt, felt well satisfied with what the Convention provides. We are asked to approve the package deal before the House. The question before the House is not whether we can alter the Convention, but whether we accept it or reject it as a whole, and that is what the Minister was inviting the House to do.
  Speaking for myself, I hope that the House will certainly decide that it ought to be accepted. It ought to be accepted as a step forward in the endeavour to do what we must constantly apply ourselves to trying to do, as I said, to codify in practice by intelligible law the relations which should subsist between

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  independent sovereign States. I think that this Convention, with its imperfections—I certainly think that it has imperfections—goes some way in codifying and cementing those relationships.
  I think that, nevertheless, if we do register our vote in favour of approving this Convention, we should bear in mind what it is we are doing. Fundamentally, in this country we are, I think quite rightly, very much against the idea of there being people here who are above the law. We do not like it. It goes against our instinct. We like to think of every person in this country as being amenable to the jurisdiction of our courts. It is a natural and, I think the House and people outside the House will agree, a proper instinct.
  What we are doing is deciding to approve, if we do so decide, a Convention which nevertheless preserves extremely wide immunities from the law for members of the staffs of diplomatic missions of foreign sovereign States. They are really extremely wide. I accept from the Minister that they are, by the terms of the Convention, to some extent narrowed from what they were before. The pre-existing diplomatic immunities are of long standing in this country. I think that they began with the Diplomatic Privileges Act, 1708. Indeed, they were in a less coherent form long before that, centuries before. Since then there has been a mass of common law on the subject. As they existed before, or rather, as they exist at the moment, before the Bill is passed, they are extremely extensive. As I have said, they are to some extent reduced as operated by this Convention. Nevertheless, they are extremely wide.
  What the Bill, or rather the Convention which is annexed to the Bill, or the relevant parts of it which are annexed to the Bill, does is to divide the members of the diplomatic staffs into three categories. They are now those who are described in the text of the Schedule as diplomatic agents; or they are members of the staff engaged, as the Minister said, in technical, administrative duties—typists, translators, telegraph operators, and so on. Thirdly, they are, in effect, domestic staff of the embassy concerned. I think we ought just to look and see what the Bill will preserve
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  by way of privilege to be accorded to these three separate categories.
  To start off which, I should have thought that we would have had no quarrel with Article 22, which provides that the premises of the mission itself should be inviolate. We would accept that. Similarly, I should have thought that we would have accepted complete immunity preserved by Article 23 for the sending State and perhaps for the head of the mission himself.
  While I do not say that we are cutting any new ground, still, when we look at the "diplomatic agent", we are in an area which is uncharted in extent. If we look at the matter de novo, starting from the beginning, and consider the "diplomatic agent" we see that he is simply described in the Schedule as a person who is entitled to diplomatic privilege. In the Bill there is no definition of the diplomatic agent apart from this. So presumably he is the person who one supposes the head of the mission designates, and who is accepted by the British Government, as being of the status of a diplomatic agent. He enjoys complete immunity from criminal process and, apart from what are really minor, unimportant exceptions, has complete immunity from civil process.
  Theoretically, whether on duty or off duty he can commit any crime he likes—
  Mr. Hale: His family.
  Sir F. Soskice: I was just going on to say that I agree.
  Sir Robert Cary: And he can park his car where he likes.
  Sir F. Soskice: Park his car where he likes? There are far worse things that he can do. I am not one of those who assume that ex hypothesi he will be a person who will lurk about the streets, looking for opportunities to commit crimes. I think that that is silly. However, theoretically—and although it is theoretical it can have practical application under operation of the law—he can commit any crime that he likes, when he likes, where he likes, against whom he likes. This really is going a long way.

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  Equally, he can commit any civil wrong. He can break a contract if he wants to, again, with these unimportant exceptions. He need not give any evidence in any court if he does not want to, and judgment can only be enforced against him, if it is obtained, in the event of his immunity being waived for that purpose. That is under Article 32. Suppose that the head of a mission waives for the diplomatic agent his immunity in respect of any particular civil process, suppose he commits a civil wrong—he slanders someone, or attacks or assaults someone.
  Suppose that the head of the mission waives the immunity for process against him. If he loses, a judgment can only be enforced against him if there is an express and separate waiver—before anyone can enforce judgment against him. It really is a case of "Heads I win, tails you lose". If he wins he could enforce an order for his costs against the unsuccessful plaintiff. But if he loses and there is an order for damages against him he can say to the successful plaintiff, "Try to get the money out of me. You will not." Unless there is a separate and express waiver, judgment cannot be enforced against him. That is going a long way.
  Then there is the same immunity, as my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) reminded me, and as I was going on to say, for members of his family, what are called the members of his family, forming part of his household. So long as they can be said to be living with him and forming part of his household they can equally go round committing any crime—or doing any wrong—although I know perfectly well that in the vast majority of cases they will not.
  Article 37 deals with the position of the administrative and technical staff. They and the members of their family forming part of their household have the same immunity, subject only to this that in the case of civil jurisdiction, but not criminal jurisdiction, their immunity does not extend to acts which they do not do in the performance of their duty. In respect of criminal jurisdiction they also have the complete immunity available to diplomatic agents. Then one gets the service staff, who have criminal and civil
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  immunity except in the case of acts outside the scope of their service. That is very wide.
  We are accepting or rejecting the agreement as a whole. We must not get an unrealistic idea about the problem we are discussing. It would be exaggerating and absurd to suppose that this country is half-full of diplomatic envoys roaming the streets and buildings looking for opportunities to commit every sort of crime. That is nonsense. Nobody asks the House to consider the Bill on that footing. But in the matter particularly of motoring offences the effect of the immunity causes considerable irritation to the public, especially in regard to parking offences. I was glad to hear the procedure the Minister outlined as being that which would be applicable. It is to be hoped that the members of all the missions in this country, 81, will respond and co-operate when the matter is brought to their notice in accordance with the procedure which the Minister outlined.
  I have ascertained the number of people whom we are considering. Quoting from Lord Carrington's speech in another place, the total number of staff of missions is now 5,039, and when the Bill becomes an Act the diplomatic agents with complete immunity will number 1,439; administrative and technical staff with almost complete immunity will number 2,794 and service staff with the more qualified immunity will number 552.
  Obviously, in 1964 it would be ludicrous to say that we can do without this immunity. We have to afford in our country the same sort of immunity to foreign envoys as we claim for our envoys in foreign countries. That is obvious. It is impossible for us to expect our envoys to work in a number of the places where they now work if they are potentially subject to what the Minister described in graphic language as blackmail, though I do not think that anyone would say that his language was over-coloured in that respect.
  We cannot, as yet, always have the same confidence in the courts of all other countries as we should like to have. No doubt the time may come when no member of a staff or his family will be at risk in having to work in such countries, but that time is not yet. Therefore, we have to accept that we must give that immunity which we would expect in other countries.

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  I therefore hope that the House will agree to accept the Bill as it is. It gives effect to a Convention which has its weaknesses, but, nevertheless, provides for what is an absolute necessity at present if our representation through our missions is to be conducted effectively without fear of hindrance and without anxiety on the part of those persons whom we send abroad and their families lest they should be in any way made victims or subjected to unfair processes in foreign courts. On that understanding, and provided that it is clearly recognised that there are defects which we cannot help, and which we should perhaps be able to eradicate and would eradicate if we had a completely free hand, I hope that we shall agree to give the Bill a Second Reading.
  4.25 p.m.
  Commander Anthony Courtney: I have very great sympathy with the remarks of the right hon. and learned Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice), almost in their entirety. But, like him, I would dwell for a moment on the defects in the Bill, which is, after all, giving the force of law in this country to an international Convention which was signed by this country's representatives three years ago.
  The first question that I should like to ask is why it is that during these three years Her Majesty's Government have not seen fit to bring the Bill before the House. Only now, when 22 nations have ratified the Convention, when it, therefore, becomes law internationally, is it brought before the House. We are entitled to know why the delay has occurred.
  As pointed out by the right hon. and learned Member, the reduction of diplomatic immunity and privilege which will result in this country from the Bill is evident and considerable. It highlights the lavishness of the diplomatic hospitality which we have afforded to foreign missions over the years. Now that 81 nations have got together and agreed on a certain scale of diplomatic privilege and immunity, we find that our own scale actually operating at the time is very much higher than that, and it will, therefore, be reduced considerably by the Bill.
  I want to make a few remarks about the relationship of the Bill to the Convention
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  of three years ago to which it gives the force of law. Schedule 1 contains Articles from the Convention which will themselves be given the force of law in this country. If we are accepting the Convention as a whole, why is it that 35 of the 53 Articles of the Convention are omitted from the Bill? It may seem a simple drafting point. Indeed, there are some Articles which do not apply because they are simply informative and there is no question of giving them force of law, but there are clear inconsistencies of detail.
  For example, the Schedule includes Article 27, which allows for the free communication of missions for all official purposes. On the other hand, it omits Article 26, which allows for freedom of movement and travel for members of diplomatic missions. I should have thought that the force of law would have been required for both Articles. I ask my hon. Friend to look at the list and perhaps include the whole outfit in the Schedule.
  I draw attention to two particular aspects of the Convention. The first point I want to make is that the principle of diplomatic immunity which governs the thought behind the Convention is clearly breached in one interesting small domestic matter. Under Article 36 of the new rules it is possible for the personal luggage of a diplomatic agent to be searched if a Customs officer feels that the case which he has not declared contains, for example, more slivovitza than he could be expected to drink during his tour of duty. To put it simply, diplomats who smuggle and are bowled out can presumably be made persona non grata. The point I am making is that that breach of diplomatic immunity is enshrined in the provisions of the Convention, which is a rather interesting commentary on modern practice. Who knows?—perhaps it will be added to in another international diplomatic convention by something to do with the parking of cars.
  My second point is about Article 47 of the Convention, which also does not find a place in Schedule I. Its object is to prevent discrimination. My hon. Friend has used the provisions of the Article to justify the taking of certain powers to increase privileges in respect of diplomatic immunity for four nations and customs immunities for nine nations,

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  nations which are not at the moment specified. I suggest that he should look at that Article closely again, when, perhaps, on rereading it, he will appreciate my own feeling about that Article, which is that it is a negative one and that only by implication does it allow nations to extend to each other more favourable treatment than is required by the provisions of the present Convention.
  It would seem that in Article 47 allowance is made implicitly by those who drafted the Convention for abuse or for double standards within the Convention. It makes allowance for certain action when the provisions of the Convention are applied restrictively by any particular nation. It seems difficult to imagine how a Convention can be observed internationally while, at the same time, allowance is made within that Convention for the application of its provisions restrictively. It implies a very curious double standard of international behaviour which we ought to consider rather closely in Committee.
  Now to the Bill itself. In Committee in another place my noble Friend, Lord Carrington, made two statements which seemed to me to be a shade conflicting. The first was that the Convention contains no provisions permitting reservations; in other words, one accepts the whole thing or one does not. The second was that in two respects we cannot accept the Convention as it stands. We have heard from my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary today that he has inserted enabling Clauses which amend the provisions of the international Convention as it is transformed into the law of this country. I suggest that this is a shade inconsistent in our thinking and that we should look more deeply into the causes of this apparent inconsistency.
  The result is the new Clause 7, which increases the immunities for four nations and the customs privileges for another nine. We have not been told who these four nations are, and this is by far the most important amending point. One might think that if we wished to increase privileges for certain countries they would obviously be allies and perhaps members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, but, as was hinted by my hon. Friend, we would now say, "Oh no, that is not so." These four nations are in
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  fact countries in which our own diplomatic representatives experience particular difficulty and, therefore, it is necessary for us to go outside the provisions of the international Convention, which we are accepting in toto, to make special reciprocal arrangements with those four countries.
  I feel—and I am sure my hon. Friend will agree with me when he looks carefully at Article 47—that this discriminatory Clause does not really permit him, within the terms of the Convention, to increase these privileges in respect of the four and nine countries respectively. But there is a third major amendment to this Convention which is being made in our own law, in Clause 3, which my hon. Friend has already mentioned and which gives the Government powers—absolutely rightly, as we would all agree—to withdraw privileges and immunities as a retaliatory act in the case of countries which have taken the initiative by doing something similar to our own representatives abroad. I mention these three amendments to the Convention because, in my view, they give a precedent for further amendment should this House consider it necessary, as it may well do on closer scrunity of the Bill.
  Today, my hon. Friend said, "I will not elaborate on the security aspect" and he was, of course, referring to blackmail and the difficulties which our emissaries experience in certain countries. But no one has yet mentioned the effect on our national security, as has been proved so sadly over the last few years, of any increased widening of diplomatic privilege to the representatives of certain nations which we know have abused those privileges. In another place Lord Killearn, who, I am sure the House will agree, has longer experience in these matters than most people in this country, said that in his opinion there had been over past years a serious abuse of diplomatic immunity. I feel that that has been proved without a shadow of doubt in recent times. We have heard quite a lot about car parking, but I should like to draw attention to published proof positive of this abuse extending to questions of national security.
  I refer to the security cases of Vassall, Blake, and further back to Maclean and Burgess. We have not been given much information, but we have been given

  1377
  enough to establish that the revelations of these cases show the serious danger to national security which has occurred in the past and which may well continue to occur if we do nothing about it. I believe that this excellent Bill gives the House and the country the opportunity of saying quite clearly that we will not tolerate further abuses of this immunity such as have occurred in the past.
  There is a precedent, as I have shown, for amendments to the law of this country in the Bill now before the House covering the provisions of the Convention, and I should like to turn for a moment, because this is a matter on which I feel somewhat strongly, to the three basic immunities of diplomatic agents which are misused in this country.
  First, as the right hon. and learned Member for Newport mentioned, is inviolability of mission premises. Secondly, there is the sanctity of the mission's communications, in which is included the diplomatic bag. Thirdly, there is the immunity of the person of a diplomatic agent from arrest or detention, which presumably includes search. Those three immunities, in varying degrees, are those which have been abused for the purpose of espionage against this country, as is proved conclusively by the published reports of the last few years.
  I believe that it should be the duty of this House to seek minimum powers to obtain the objective of deterring the further use of this type of espionage. We have in the Bill, and in the Convention which has been signed and which we hope will be accepted, a rather remarkable anomaly. Let us go back two years, to the case of Vassall handing documents to a diplomatic agent of a foreign Power in a public place. Had Vassall been observed—perhaps he was—by a security officer, the security officer would, under the provisions of the Bill and the Convention, have been powerless to do anything to the diplomatic agent, arrest him, detain him, search him, or anything else.
  This diplomatic agent, having accomplished his task, goes to his own country on leave. He flies back, and, on his arrival at London Airport, his baggage may be searched if he is suspected of
  1378
  having, as I said before, too much slivovitza. It is a remarkable commentary on our curious sense of proportion in this country and the way we have of sweeping unpleasant facts under the carpet even when national security is concerned.
  I ask my hon. Friend to look again at Article 29 in conjunction with Article 3(1,d). Article 29 of the Convention, which becomes the law of this country, covers the immunity of the person of a diplomatic agent from arrest or detention. I suggest that the minimum requirement would be satisfied if we applied sanctions or restrictions, by Amendment to the Bill, to this one immunity only of the basic three which I have mentioned. The Government ought to take powers in some way to qualify Article 29 in the sense of Article 3(1,d), which refers to lawful means of acquiring information.
  I am not a lawyer. I leave it to hon. and learned Members to work out how this could be done, but in my view it should be made watertight. A diplomatic agent of a foreign Power in this county should, in future, be clearly warned that he will be subject to arrest or detention if there are serious grounds for believing that he has engaged in espionage. Those are the precise words which we already apply to the duties of a Customs officer, allowing him to search the baggage of a similar diplomatic agent.
  There will be strong objections to any suggestion of this kind, and I believe that they take two main lines. First—we all feel this, because we know of incidents which have occurred—there is the possibility of retaliation against our own diplomatic representatives abroad as a result of any amendments or restrictions which we put on diplomatic agents serving in this country. Surely, there is sufficient evidence—those of us who travel in these countries know it very well—that there is already operating a double standard of conduct and behaviour towards diplomats which makes nonsense of any international Convention interpreted in the right spirit.
  Is not this the precise reason why my hon. Friend has to accept four countries within the terms of amendments made

  1379
  by the Bill, increasing immunities and privileges so as to protect our own people in those countries? What is forgotten is that, in this way, we extend immunities and privileges to representatives of a hostile country within our own.
  The second objection is a rather peculiar one, and for it I am obliged to the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Zilliacus). I have warned the hon. Gentleman that I intended to raise this point, and he has apologised for his absence, saying that he is in his constituency and cannot be present today. Just over a year ago, in an Adjournment debate, the hon. Gentleman, speaking about the abuse of diplomatic privileges in the sense of breaches of national security, said:
  "Do not an equal number of those who are personae non gratae have to leave the respective countries in cases of espionage? Do these problems not apply to both sides and not just to one?".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd August, 1963; Vol. 682, c. 843–4.]
  If the hon. Gentleman is right—he has as much right to study these matters as we all have—it must be clear by now that, if two sides are playing this kind of game, we are certainly having the worst end of the deal. Is it not time that we set aside all such possibilities and returned to base, so to speak? Ought we not to start with a clean sheet under the provisions of the international Convention as ratified by the Bill now before us?
  In general, I support the Bill, but I say firmly that it is time that the House took the question of national security a good deal more seriously than, with respect, it has hitherto. We should look very carefully at the detail of possible Amendments to the Bill.
  4.45 p.m.
  Mr. Leslie Hale: With respect to the Under-Secretary of State—I apologise to him personally, for I have an old affection for him, by greeting him with "Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes"—I think that what he said postulates the first problem that we face in dealing with the Bill. Even my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice), who spoke so ably, and with whom, in the main, I was in complete agreement, talked about
  1380
  exceptions to the rule being provided in the Bill. The Minister told us that even some exceptions have been added. To me, the exceptions seem to be new privileges, and they are not designed to subject an ambassador to litigation but to make it possible for him to complete his duties in relation to executorships or the ownership of freehold property—that is all—because it is obviously necessary to give him such power.
  There is one really quite monstrous provision which says that a diplomatic agent may waive his immunity to process, but, even if he does that, he has not waived his immunity to judgment. He may say that he will accept the arbitrament of law and contest an issue so long as he does not lose. If he is likely to lose, we cannot enforce the judgment against him, because the law specifically provides for immunity even after judgment unless he makes a second specific act of waiver.
  No one will deny—my right hon. and learned Friend put it very ably and clearly—that there is a need to protect our diplomatic agents, ambassadors or people from this country fulfilling the functions of ambassador abroad. Although conditions may have altered somewhat, I am not sure that they have wholly improved. The rule of law is very curious today in many countries, even in some Commonwealth countries.
  I have always taken the view that, on the whole, I prefer not to be tried at all, but I am quite certain that there are countries in the world today in which I would very much prefer not to face a trial. It is right to remember that exposure to the threat of process under a law of increasing incertitude, a law sometimes dominated by the head of State who reserves the power to dismiss judges who do not record verdicts which he favours, can be a terrible thing, from which we ought to try to protect by every proper means those who represent us abroad.
  The trouble with privileges is that they proliferate. There was a time when, in quite reasonable circumstances, Members of Parliament claimed immunity from arrest. Those who recall the picture of the five Members upstairs may well think that this was reasonable. This privilege became extended until, as Hatsell records, Members' servants were protected from

  1381
  arrest. I noted a case in the seventeenth century when, a Member's servant having been arrested, the culprits were brought to the Bar of the House at once and, after much discussion, were ordered to be paraded from Westminster to the Exchange back to back—and bare-back—on a horse with a notice calling attention to their crime. It was, I think, the horse which was bare-back, not the offenders—a matter which may be of interest at the moment to the authorities of Bexhill and Eastbourne. We know that the privilege was abused. John Selden, in his "Table Talk," complained that Members were incurring the just scorn of the people by proliferating these privileges.
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir William Anstruther-Gray): I hope the hon. Member will bear in mind that these are diplomatic privileges that we are debating.
  Mr. Hale: Yes, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I am discussing diplomatic privileges on Second Reading. On Second Reading, I discuss the principles of the Bill. On Second Reading I have always been traditionally entitled to call in evidence experience of comparative matters and comparative affairs in every reasonable and comparable form of life.
  The question of the privilege of private Members is always relevant. When I was on a mission abroad as a member of Western European Union, the Foreign Office provided me with a lavish double bed. When I invited my wife to participate, I found that I had broken the rules. Apparently, I could have invited a mistress because that would have been in the course of duty, or entertainment, but, my wife being in Paris, I was told that I would be surcharged. These are matters which exercise hon. Members from time to time. I have preserved a cheque for 1s. 10d. endorsed by the Foreign Office which states: "Received 1s.10d. in repayment for two boiled eggs ordered by the Member for Oldham but not consumed because they were underdone, not chargeable to public funds, at café complet at such and such a hotel, Paris". This was ten years ago, but the Foreign Office is not generous in according privileges.
  Another matter which I have raised from time to time in the House—and I
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  venture to say at once that again I am taking an analogy from another Bill—is that we are faced with a very great deal of obscurantism. The noble Lord who introduced this Measure in another place and gave much the same explanation as the Minister has given today—the noble Lord has left the quarterdeck—looked at the Clauses and said that they did appear to mean what they seemed to mean. He said that he would go back to the Foreign Office after the Committee stage and would find out why they meant what they meant and would return on Report and explain to the noble Lords what they meant and why. The noble Lord said that he had listened with great attention and came to the conclusion that the Minister knew what the Bill meant but that he had not been able to explain it
  It is in these terms that the Bill passed to this House. When there is an allegation of obscurantism it is invariably received with pococurantism—Id certum est quid certum reddi potest. Ministers say, "If we cannot tell you now, there is always the court of appeal".
  Two days ago the Court of Appeal was called upon to consider the terms and meaning of recent Measures passed by this House. Lord Justice Harman, in an outspoken addition to English literature, said, after pointing out that learned counsel on both sides who were technically learned in the law had overlooked one very relevant provision, that to arrive at a conclusion
  "involved the Court wading through a monstrous legislative morass, staggering from stone to stone, ignoring the marsh gas rising from it".
  At one time his Lordship had regarded it as the slough of despond and thought that the court would never have dragged its heavy feet through it; but quacunque via, getting from tuft to tuft as best he could. This picture of the Lord Justice laboriously tuft hunting in the interests of the nation is genuinely pathetic.
  Lord Justice Diplock, who obviously agreed in a brief but admirably reported judgment, said that he preferred the classic to the peregrinic approach. To me that had a touch of temporary obscurantism. My mind went to falcons swooping from point to point. I even recalled the Peregrine, the philosopher from Parius, who was a devotee of all

  1383
  the schools of sophism before he became a cynic, finally won immortality by a demonstrative self-incineration.
  But it was in the classic definition of an ambassador by Sir Henry Wootton that I found the clear explanation of Lord Justice Diplock's phrase. He was clearly referring, with some disfavour, to Chesterton's well-known statement that one could travel to Birmingham by way of Beachy Head and deplored enforced peregrination. Wootton said: "Legatus est vir bonus peregre missus ad mentiendum reipublicae causa", which I will translate as meaning that an ambassador is an honest man sent to lie abroad for the Commonwealth. The translator whom I quote said, "sent abroad to lie," which is rather more discourteous.
  We are entitled to ask whether anyone knows what this Bill means. I made an intervention which I thought was of some relevance. People are killed in motor accidents. We are not discussing Her Britannic Majesty's Ambassador to the United States, whom most of us remember with affection, or the United States Ambassador to the Court of St. James, a man of great ability, distinction and charm, who, I am sorry to say, we may be losing in the interests of his country because he may be returning to higher duties, who is a gentleman by nature. Even they have to face the dilemma that gentlemen of their type are reluctant to claim privileges for themselves but are duty bound to preserve them inviolate for their successors. This is one of the dilemmas of privilege even in this House. One asserts one's right to privilege sometimes because one feels that an individual is not justified in making a temporary sacrifice of a collective right or even be interpreted as purporting to do so.
  Sir Harry Legge-Bourke: Unless one wants to sit for Bristol, South-East.
  Mr. Hale: That point would take me rather a long time to develop. I had the great privilege as a Member of the House of Lords and House of Commons Joint Committee of expressing my views on that matter. Had they carried weight, we should not have had the present Prime Minister. I recall to the Minister a
  1384
  fascinating story penned by a very distinguished former public servant, Sir Lawrence Jones, who wrote the fanciful story of the Chancellor of the Exchequer accidentally and fatally shooting the Prime Minister, whom he did not like, on a grouse moor. There was the harassing question of whether he should take the vacant post in view of the circumstances.
  Had it been a distinguished ambassador who was grouse shooting the problem would have been even more acute, although the exception in the Bill seems to say that there could be litigation over the ownership of the moor but not over the corpse of the Prime Minister, and that it would not be possible to bring any criminal proceedings if there were any suspicion that the accident had been less fortuitous than was first apparent.
  I do not doubt that there must be and should be protection. It is right that there should be protection. I do not doubt that it is reasonable to say that an ambassador could be more bitterly attacked through his wife or children and that a bold and courageous man might be more timid in the face of threats of arbitrary action against his family than he would be over his own reputation. These are reasonable matters. But how far do they go?
  The courts have already interpreted "the family" as meaning the wife and children. They have not had to deal with the question of Mohammedan ambassadors to know how many wives and how many children. This is the essence of the matter. This is what we are dealing with. We are dealing with cases in which an ambassador may say, "I married this girl by a shake of the hand in the embassy yesterday. The is my 31st wife and I claim privilege against this criminal charge". I should be the last to say anything which might be thought to be derogatory about some of my friends in other countries who have their own views on marriage, and who are entitled to have them.
  What about a mother-in-law under this legislation? Is she a member of the family? [Laughter.] This is not being funny. As I understand the Clause, it extends to any relative who is living with him and, strangely enough, not to a relative who is not living with

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  him. A distinguished lady who, having married the ambassador, then falls out with him, loses her privilege the moment she has fallen out with him and leaves the embassy and establishes a state of separation. The provision seems not to have been fully considered.
  We are told that there is a new definition which everybody will clearly understand and that a diplomatic agent means a member of the diplomatic staff. Every one of us knows that that will come to mean any diplomatic member of the staff. Anyone who has a certain amount of diplomacy could get himself listed under that heading—unless somebody is to decide. I asked the Minister who would decide. This is the point at which we have come into conflict. If my widow comes along and says that the vacancy for Oldham, West, not only involved a by-election but also involved certain financial loss for her, because I had come into contact with a motor car bearing the sign CD., which we believe to be corps diplomatique but which might mean civil defence, what is she to do about it? I think that we are entitled to a definite answer on this.
  As I understand it, if the ambassador says, "In my view that car was being driven by a servant of the embassy on duty", that is the end of it. If the ambassador says, "It was being driven by a diplomatic agent on or off duty, it does not matter which"—that is an end of it. If he says, "It was being driven by a member of the administrative staff on duty", that is an end of it. If he says, "It was being driven by a servant of any of them on work of the embassy or in the course of duties being performed by the embassy", that is an end of it.
  One cannot even invoke insurance. Surely that is a wholly unnecessary and wholly unreasonable situation. There would be no difficulty at all, because of the existence of institutions such as Lloyds which can be relied on in such matters to exercise a very high standard of probity and which could provide a form of protective insurance which would have to be of a special nature—because one cannot sue an insurance company direct under our law. It may be possible under some laws. It is held that one has not an interest; one has not
  1386
  a legal interest in the policy of the owner.
  The insurance company is liable only if the ambassador or his staff are to blame. We have no means of establishing that, because we cannot even bring the matter to negotiation. We must simply accept somebody's decision. This puts an end to all action. The Bill means that somebody has an absolutely free hand to decide.
  I am not greatly concerned about parking offences, but the Minister in one sentence made the most damaging remark about the Bill when he said that the police are providing weekly lists. They used to provide a list once a century. Is it not time that we seriously considered whether the whole of this protection is necessary for the ambassador, his wife, his children, for the person who takes the place of the ambassador, his wife and his children if they are living there, and for other members of the staff? We know that administrative staff include shorthand typists, and in fact anybody in this country not of British nationality but employed at an embassy. That seems to be the effective test. Any of these people can leave a parked car at the moment in the middle of Westminster Bridge and say, "Go to hell"—and report the police for dumb insolence if they make an inquiry. That is being done, and it is establishing a position.
  Sir H. Legge-Bourke: I do not think the hon. Member is quite right in what he says. I think that if this is done the CD plate carries no privilege whatever with it. If that is done, the police are entitled to report that car, irrespective of whether it is carrying CD plates. It then goes through the machinery to find out whether the driver is privileged.
  Mr. Hale: I do not think that it would be usefully reported. There was a case reported abroad the other day of a man who was driving at 70 to 80 miles an hour and who issued a summons against the police for being hostile to him. Of course the police can report it, but what happens? As the well-informed Press tell us from time to time, traffic wardens are in this difficulty. After all, they are performing a duty entrusted to them by the House and trying to perform it with

  1387
  what courtesy they can. I do not say that I feel any great passion for them. I found a ticket on my car the other Christmas. I thought it was a present of soap from Lord Leverhulme, and I drove about with it for several days until I found that it was a ticket which would cost me £2.
  Now we have two categories with whom the traffic wardens deal. They see a car carrying a CD plate and they say, "This means corps diplomatique"; and they save themselves a lot of trouble by saying, "It is no use reporting that one". Of course, it may be transferred, if they are diligent, to the list which will be supplied from Scotland Yard once a week—or it may not. Respect for the law nowadays is diminishing, and I understand that they claim that anybody who gets pinched, and who has not a CD plate, writes to say that a friend of his was driving the car who is no longer in the country, having returned to his original address in Outer Mongolia, and he regrets that he cannot now supply the present address of the driver owing to the delay in bringing the inquiries forward, which is usually a few weeks.
  It is not a very happy state of affairs. My right hon. and learned Friend offered one defence—that we are ratifying an international convention. We are not. A lot of the international convention is not in the Bill and much of it has been amended. Amendments were introduced in another place, and special provisions were added. There is no assurance that other people will ratify the international convention in the same form. There has been another convention since then about consuls. We have not heard about it, and I gather that even the Government are not yet ready for it.
  We still have a very real dilemma. If the Minister is to seek the leave of the House to reply, I hope that he will do so, and that he will be given it, and that he will answer some questions. Will he tell us the number? Will he tell us who is to decide what is a member of the diplomatic staff? Will he tell us how one brings a matter to the court or whether one can bring a matter to the court in face of a certificate from the ambassador that the person was being employed in
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  the course of his duties as a servant of the embassy? Will he tell us whether any provisions are being introduced to provide for effective insurance cover? I see no reason why this should not be done. Finally, will he answer one point which intrigues me very much: why are these people to be exempt from the law of contract? They pay no tax, they pay no rates and they pay no duties except on theatre tickets, in respect of which one cannot split the duty. If they buy a few cigarettes outside those which are imported free of duty by the embassy, they may pay duty on them. But they are exempt from almost everything. They are exempt from Income Tax and Purchase Tax if they import goods—and I believe that they can also get an export certificate to buy goods in this country free of duty. I do not know how it is done, but I believe that it is done. They are exempt from almost everything but a small part of their rates.
  They can declare their bills and their papers inviolate in the embassy. Their papers are inviolate, their bags are inviolate—by which I mean their travelling bags—and they are free from almost any form of perquisition. They need only say, "We are lodging a few papers at the home of one of the members of our staff", and they become inviolate, too. Or one runs the risk of making a perquisition of an official document.
  They are protected in their forms of transport and they are exempt from the laws of contract. Why should they be exempt from the laws of contract? This question arose in a case in which it was held by the British courts that an ambassador was not even compelled to pay a call upon his shares. He could buy the shares and take the chance of their going up or going down, but if the situation of the company becomes precarious he cannot be compelled to supply the money which is due under a contractual obligation specifically entered into.
  The Minister will say, "Under the Bill we have cleared all that up". This is one thing which he will say that he is clear about because he will say, "This would not be part of its commercial activities". But might it not be? Would an investment in the Channel Tunnel—not, of course, in the first £1¼ million which we have heard about but later, when it is being developed—perhaps not

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  fall within the ambit of the duties of an ambassador who was a servant of a continental country? I should have thought that it might be.
  I say again that this House ought to make up its mind that it knows what it is doing or trying to do. It ought to make clear what the privileges are. It ought to have some method of being able to identify. The Lords of Appeal, two days ago, were talking not about the original maze of town and country planning but about a clarifying Act of 1959. Lord Justices of Appeal do not use language like that unless they are really concerned that the burden that Parliament is putting on the courts in leaving unresolved questions for their decision and referring to them matters which are outside the ambit of their control. Lord Justice Harman said
  "It would never have dragged its heavy feet through it; but quacunque via".
  I was almost tempted to translate that as Chacun a son gout, but I hesitate to do so. But it is time that Parliament took these matters seriously and that we had a little less pococurantism and a little more explicit definition so that we knew at the end of this Bill what we were doing and what the effect of it was likely to be.
  5.12 p.m.
  Mr. Ronald Bell: The hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) certainly succeeded in doing as he promised by proving to us that it is possible to go from London to Birmingham via Beachy Head, jumping one might say, from tuft to tuft on the way. However, if when he receives the missive which is undoubtedly on the way to him asking him to supply HANSARD with his quotations he finds it necessary to leave, I shall not take it amiss.
  I should like to ask my hon. Friend the Minister what is the nature of this Vienna Convention, which this Bill is mainly about? Am I to understand that we have ratified it and are proposing to make it an international treaty which binds this country? If so, is it of the nature which these treaties usually are, that we have to accept it altogether or else not accept it, except that we can go further than the treaty goes? That is to say, is it the position that the provisions of the Vienna Convention represent the minimum
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  diplomatic privilege which we mutually promise to operate in this country, and that if we operate less we cannot, in fact, ratify the Convention, but that we can give greater privilege, either generally or in particular cases, without being in any way in breach of the Convention? That is what I would expect the position to be, but I should like to know whether my expectations are correct.
  I see that the missive has arrived and the hon. Member for Oldham, West has leave of absence from me at any rate to take his dictionaries of French, Latin and other languages with him.
  If my assumption is correct, then, of course, there would be no difficulty about Clause 7, which provides that we can give wider diplomatic privilege to certain countries with which we have at the present time agreements which provide for wider privileges. On the other hand, I should find it difficult to understand how we can ratify the Convention unless there is a provision in it for a restriction such as appears in Clause 3. In saying that, I do not wish to indicate that I am in any way opposed to the provisions of Clause 3, which seem to me to be eminently reasonable.
  We have in fact taken retaliatory action on a number of occasions in the past, and I think it desirable that we should have the power to do so; but if, in fact, there are no reservations in the Convention, which I understand to be the position, how are we able to put Clause 3 into the Bill if we are proposing to ratify the Convention?
  Secondly, I should like to ask him to assist me on this point. On the second page of the Explanatory Memorandum to the Bill it is stated:
  "As the result of the Bill heads of missions will no longer be able to claim relief from income tax on interest on all British Government and certain other securities".
  That is all right, but it goes on to state:
  "High Commissioners of Commonwealth countries who are citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies or are permanently resident in the United Kingdom will lose their exemption from income tax. …"
  As I understand if, that arises from Article 38 of the Convention. I find that a rather disagreeable proposal. If all other diplomatic representatives, ambassadors and so on, and their diplomatic staffs are to enjoy exemption from

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  United Kingdom Income Tax—if that is right, and that is provided in the Convention—and if the High Commissioners of any British Commonwealth country are to enjoy exemption from the United Kingdom Income Tax in general, why should not these particular ones among them who at the time of appointment have been permanently resident in the United Kingdom, although not citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies, have equal privileges?
  Let us take a straightforward case of a Canadian who is a British subject but not a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies because he has ordinary Canadian citizenship. That is to say, he is a British subject but a Canadian citizen but he has been for some years permanently resident in the United Kingdom—a distinguished Canadian who is over here. His Government appoint him high commissioner in the United Kingdom for Canada—the kind of thing that could easily happen. He then comes into this special disadvantaged category of being subject to United Kingdom Income Tax, although all other high commissioners, ambassadors, every humble diplomat on the staff of a foreign country or of a Commonwealth country is exempt from it. I do not understand why this should be so.
  It would be an odd thing if that were the existing position and simply going on; but it is not the existing position. They are at present, as I understand it from the Explanatory Memorandum, enjoying the same exemption as other people, but by this Bill we shall be taking it away from them.
  If I am right in thinking that to ratify the Convention we have only to regard it as the minimum of privileges and that we are fully at liberty to confer wider privileges, and if I am right in thinking that Article 38, which is printed as an annexe to the Bill and which begins with the words:
  "Except in so far as additional privileges and immunities may be granted by the receiving State …"
  means, as it surely must, that we can go further in this matter if we want to, I suggest that we should take advantage of the liberty which the Convention gives us to put Commonwealth high commissioners in the same position as
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  ambassadors or, to be more particular, put high commissioners permanently resident in this country at the time of their appointment into the same position as high commissioners who have come to us from their own or some other country.
  Equally, I see that this disadvantage attaches to high commissioners of Commonwealth countries who happen to be citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies. The British Commonwealth has operated as a family and there are many people in Australia and Canada and other overseas British countries who are still citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies. They were born in Britain, but went to those countries and have lived there for perhaps 20 or 30 years, naturally retaining their United Kingdom citizenship. After all, the status of British subject was split only in 1949. Until then, it was a unitary conception, and as only 15 years have passed since 1949, there must be many people in British overseas territories who in the ordinary way are Canadians or Australians, or whatever it is, who have United Kingdom passports and United Kingdom citizenship. If one of those is chosen in his own country as high commissioner to Britain and is sent to London, he will find when he arrives that he is in a specially disadvantageous category and subject to ordinary British Income Tax, although all other diplomats are exempt from it. This is a regrettable innovation and I hope that something can be done to correct it.
  The right hon. and learned Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice) cavilled at the reference to Southern Rhodesia in Clause 8. I must say that if it is necessary to refer to Southern Rhodesia in the Bill at all, I should have thought that Clause 8(2) was about the most innocuous way it could be done, because it says:
  "This Act shall be construed as if Southern Rhodesia were a State."
  The implication of that is that Southern Rhodesia is not a State, but is to be treated as though it were. I cannot understand why the right hon. and learned Gentleman should take umbrage at that form of words. Whether it is necessary to mention Southern Rhodesia at all depends on a more detailed study than I

  1393
  have made of the partial repeals listed in the third column of Schedule 2. No doubt we can attend to that in Committee, but I should be very unhappy if in any way the existing diplomatic privileges of Southern Rhodesia were removed or reduced by the Bill.
  Finally, I hope that my hon. Friend will tell us a little more about the many articles not included in Schedule 1. I imagine that they do not need statutory force. Am I right in thinking that the Bill, which schedules certain articles in the Convention and which repeals certain Acts and certain parts of Acts, nevertheless will leave unchanged any part of the common law relating to diplomatic privilege which is not expressly repealed by it? That is my understanding and it may be the reason why it is not necessary to put into the Schedule certain of the omitted articles in the Convention, but there are certain rules of common law relating to the immunity of ambassadors and I assume that these will continue even though this statutory code is being introduced.
  With those remarks, I give my general support to the Bill.
  5.24 p.m.
  Sir Charles Mott-Radclyffe: The custom of diplomatic immunity is very old and very necessary. It has grown a great deal in recent years with the number of newly independent countries, and as it has grown and multiplied there is no doubt that abuses have multiplied. The Bill has many loopholes, but it is an attempt to regularise the whole principle of diplomatic immunity on an international basis. I am not so certain about how successful it will be in that objective.
  The hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) put his finger on the crux of the problem when he said that there were a number of countries in which he would not like to stand trial.
  Mr. Ronald Bell: He made it clear that England was among them.
  Sir C. Mott-Radclyffe: I agree with the hon. Member for Oldham, West that this is the crux of the problem. We have missions in almost all those countries and on those missions are men and women of all ranks and grades performing all sorts of different functions necessary
  1394
  to the life of diplomatic missions. All hon. Members would wish to protect members of our missions in those countries from the grosser form of abuse—and we can think of areas where the most savage sentences might be awarded for quite trivial motoring and other offences—but it is here that we come to the trouble, because the whole basis of diplomatic imunity is reciprocal, a quid pro quo.
  Therefore, if we are to achieve immunity for our own diplomatic missions abroad, who may be serving in countries where there are considerable difficulties, we have to give comparable immunity to diplomatic staffs of those countries serving in the United Kingdom, where the process of law and justice is very different and where the degree of immunity which has to be given seems to us here to be absurdly wide.
  Whether it be the inviolability of premises, the sanctity of communications by bag, the immunity of a member of a diplomatic mission from personal search, or liability to tax, the difficulty is that if we were to reduce the degree of immunity which diplomats in this country enjoy, our own diplomats overseas would be placed in still greater difficulty.
  For instance, if we withheld a foreign diplomat's immunity from arrest on leaving London Airport to go home on leave, supposing it were thought that he had been engaged in suspicious contacts, no one in this country would imagine for a moment that our police would abuse their powers. But it is very doubtful that we would not thereby put our own diplomats in certain overseas posts in an impossible position, with the chance of their being arrested on leaving other airports on the most ridiculous trumped-up charges. Normal life in the diplomatic service might be brought virtually to a standstill.
  It is this reciprocity on which the whole principle is based, and it is this which presents the House with the greatest difficulty, because, as has been said quite openly, there is in the whole concept of how we work and operate diplomatic immunity a completely double standard according to the country in which one lives, the degree of civilisation that one has acquired, and the experience which people in the different countries have had.
  Mr. Hale: The hon. Gentleman is speaking fairly and clearly, and he has not said a word from which I actively dissent, but when one considers what is, of course, an extremely important and serious matter, and when one applies it in the form of a blueprint, the reasoning is apt to get away from the subject when one is wondering whether the punishment of a cook at the Ruritanian Embassy for a breach of the parking laws in Britain would react on Her Majesty's Ambassador in Peking.
  Sir C. Mott-Radclyffe: One has to be very careful about giving any specific examples. In any case, it is better to take hypothetical examples. If we were to restrict the diplomatic immunity given at the moment to the servant of an ambassador, or to any domestic employee in an embassy here, in the way that some hon. Members have suggested, I think that there would be a great danger that week in and week out the domestic staff of Her Majesty's Ambassador in Ruritania would be arrested on all sorts of completely trumped-up charges in all sorts of ridiculous circumstances, thus rendering the work of the British Ambassador in Ruritania almost intolerable. That is the difficulty as I see it.
  Commander Courtney: There have been three instances in recent years of arrest or detention of Her Majesty's diplomatic representatives within the meaning of the Convention that we are discussing, which were flagrantly against the Convention.
  Sir C. Mott-Radclyffe: But when that happens we have the right of retaliation. That weapon has been used before now with varying degrees of effect. If my recollection is correct, when British diplomats serving behind the Iron Curtain were restricted in their movements to within 30 or 40 kilometres of the capital, we imposed similar restrictions on diplomats from Iron Curtain countries serving in London. We always have that weapon, and it is a weapon which ought to be used.
  The point that I was making was that where there is a Convention signed by 80 nations at Vienna, we in this House ought to ensure that while we do not
  1396
  put more people than necessary above the law—which is a principle which no one wants—we do protect the interests, or if you like the physical security, of members of the British Diplomatic Service serving overseas in difficult circumstances, and sometimes in very difficult countries.
  The Bill has been put together in a slightly haphazard form. It is strange that certain Articles of the Vienna Convention have been included, while others have not. I have no doubt that my hon. Friend will explain this and other matters which hon. Members have raised. I hope that the House will give its blessing to the Bill, but in Committee we shall have to look at it very carefully and perhaps stop up a number of loopholes.
  5.35 p.m.
  Sir Harry Legge-Bourke: It is somewhat piquant to say that the Bill stems from the Vienna Convention, when we find that in Vienna our own embassy is being so curtailed in senior members that we are beginning to wonder what the embassy is going to be there for it the process continues. During the last Recess I was one of the Members appointed to go to Vienna on behalf of the House to take part in a conference of Parliamentarians and scientists. We had the privilege of being entertained at the embassy while we were there. To my astonishment I found that in the one country which one can say has come out of the Iron Curtain, and therefore the one country in which it is most important to make a real success of things, the former consul-general, the former head of chancery, and the former Minister are now jobs carried out by one man. There is not much privilege about that. It is a considerable load for any man to carry, and I think that when we call on members of our overseas missions to carry out rôles of this sort we should ensure that they enjoy all the privileges necessary for them to carry out such tasks.
  An idea was put into my head by an old friend of mine who has served this country in many capacities, having been a Member of the House at one time, and has I think paid out the troops of Haile Sellassie in silver coinage of the late lamented Maria Theresa. There

  1397
  is in fact a law operating here. The law is that every social system produces a privileged class organically just as a muck heap produces maggots. If one looks at history, one finds that there has always been some form of privileged class, but this new diplomatic class which is emerging now—and in referring to diplomatic staffs I include the international staffs of the United Nations and other international organisations—is the first totally tax-free class since the pre-revolution French noblesse. It is the first class not subject to the civil law since pre-Reformation priesthood, but at least they could be hauled before the ecclesiastical courts.
  The more necessary the world considers it to have these privileged classes created, the more important it is that we should watch them, because they breed like flies, and presumably in the years to come we shall have the sons and grandsons—and perhaps daughters, as well—getting jobs in this privileged section of the world community simply because they are the sons or grandsons of somebody who was appointed in our day to serve the United Nations. This creation of the privileged class is on the grow. Maybe it has to grow, but I still say that the House would be wise to keep a very close eye on it.
  The chief security officer in a country in the Near East, which I had better not name, once said that if someone really wanted to find out where the illicit traffic in gold and drugs was most prevalent, he had better look in the diplomatic bags from Latin America and Mexico. I do not know whether this can be substantiated, but a chief security officer might well be a person who would have some grounds for saying such a thing. Some Arab States were included in his castigation.
  It is worth noting that as recently as the turn of February and March the Mexican Ambassador to Bolivia and two other Latin American diplomats were arrested in Canada on charges of smuggling heroin to a value in excess of 20 million dollars. I do not know whether, from time to time, any steps are taken by the Foreign Office, in conjunction with our police and security forces, to discover whether there is any connection between the visits of certain
  1398
  foreign diplomats and a sudden outbrust of drug trafficking in Britain. Certainly there should be.
  I do not know whether that Mexican ambassador to Bolivia had been to Britain around that time. I do not know whether Soho is benefiting from it. But we should be cautious before we grant privileges to people whom we may or may not like, may or may not trust, and may or may not know.
  Today, communications are so much better than they ever were that sometimes the man on the spot is the one man who is never allowed to take a decision; every decision is taken previously in Whitehall, and the man on the spot is merely told what to do. In the great days of our overseas missions the man on the spot was trusted to do the job which he had undertaken without being subjected to too much interference. I sometimes wonder whether our improved communications do not have their disadvantages as well as their advantages.
  One would have thought that because communications are so much better it would be less necessary rather than more necessary to grant these extra privileges. Yet we find that the opposite is happening. Privileges are being increased even now, although the Bill, and the Convention, to some extent, show that what this country has been providing by way of privileges was more than is now required as the basic minimum in the Convention. Perhaps it is a good thing that we are having to take away some of these privileges. Paragraph 4 of Article 27, and Article 36 of the Convention, dealing with Customs duties exemption, ought nevertheless still to retain to our authorities a sufficient right at least to open and inspect the diplomatic bag if they wish to when they are given information which may reasonably lead them to suppose that things are coming in which should not be coming in in it. Even if what comes in in the diplomatic bag may not have to pay duty, although it is dutiable, the bag can nevertheless be opened and inspected.
  In these days, with the ever-growing problem of drugs being taken by juveniles and supplied by the most irresponsible citizens, acting as intermediaries of someone else, it is right that we should be able to keep a proper check on these matters, and if the diplomatic machinery is such as to allow the importation of

  1399
  these substances we must use fairly stringently every power which remains to the Government under these Articles, and not give the impression that we are in the least lax in the exercise of what rights we have.
  I feel it is a great pity that one privilege is contained in the Convention, which we cannot amend. It is contained in paragraph 2 of Article 31, which says:
  "A diplomatic agent is not obliged to give evidence as a witness."
  In other words, he cannot be subpoenaed in British courts even if he has witnessed an accident or is himself involved in a case.
  But in respect of the observations made by the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) and others, about the abuse of our car parking laws and the exoneration of those who have committed offences under them, we ought all to be aware of the fact that the doyen of the Corps Diplomatique in Britain is held in very high esteem by all the missions in London; that he is well aware of what has been happening, and is doing his best to see that all the missions are made aware of the resentment which is caused in the public mind by what is taking place.
  Hon. Members may recall that in February I put down some Questions concerning the incidence of these parking offences and other motoring offences. Eventually, in a letter from the Joint Under-Secretary for the Home Department, I was given some appalling figures. For the year commencing September, 1960, there were 165 offences; in 1961 there were 789; in 1962 there were 1,746, and in 1963 there were 2,078. They are appalling figures, and I asked my hon. Friend whether he would try to discover which missions were the worst offenders.
  I entered into a bargain with my hon. Friend on this one: the doyen of the Corps Diplomatique in London made a specific request that he should be left to try to bring home to the offenders the need to rectify this appalling situation. On that understanding I undertook—and I do not intend to break my bond—not to disclose who were the worst offenders. But I want to make it clear, here and
  1400
  now, that if the figures continue on this scale I shall try to pin down in public which missions are the worst offenders, because it is grossly unfair to the British public to allow this sort of thing to continue.
  The misunderstanding about the significance of the CD. plate on motor cars is one of the principle causes of public resentment. My hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Sir C. Taylor) had a useful Adjournment debate on 10th April, to which my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs replied. As the hon. Member for Oldham, West said, it is clear that the letters C.D. might just well stand for "Civil Defence", for all the privileges that they carry. They carry none. I could put C.D. plates on my car if I wanted to, but I even avoided joining the House of Commons Motor Club because I bitterly resent people taking unnecessary privileges. I am aware that the original object of that exercise was to help the police to identify cars whose drivers were determined not to miss voting in the next Division. Nevertheless, I have often felt that the red badge draws unnecessary attention to one's car.
  I do not know whether any member of the Metropolitan Police get a thrill out of "running in" a Member of Parliament rather than an ordinary member of the public. I should not like to think that they do, but I feel that they would be only human if sometimes they did. Privilege ought to be exercised only when absolutely necessary. I am quite certain that a large number of CD. plates which are exhibited on cars are unnecessary. Their use should be confined to the cars of heads of missions and perhaps their deputies and heads of chanceries. It is not necessary for every member of the embassy staff to have CD. plates on his car in order to sustain his status.
  During the war I had a short experience of serving in an embassy overseas and certainly there are privileges which it is essential one should have. There are also some which it is extremely enjoyable to exercise. In London, where the amount of traffic is among the biggest of our problems members of all the missions, Commonwealth and foreign countries alike, would be well advised to take note of the indication conveyed

  1401
  by the figures which I have quoted and to comply with the request of the doyen of the Corps Diplomatique in every way possible. None of us wishes ill-will to be built up between foreign missions and our own people in London, and every time one misunderstanding occurs one can wager that it will spread into hundreds very quickly.
  I hope that my hon. Friend will give the House an assurance that, so far as we are able because of the implementation of the Convention of Vienna by the provisions of this Bill we shall watch for and seize illicit matter being brought into this country through diplomatic channels; and that we shall use to the full all the facilities provided to that end. This is perhaps one of the most important changes which has taken place as a result of the Convention. Search will be made much easier, but it will still be virtually impossible to charge duty. I must admit that there is no section of the community that I despise more than the person who gets a thrill from or enjoys opening the personal luggage of others and rummaging through it on behalf of the State. I find that rather a despicable exercise. But where privilege has been abused the offenders ought to be subjected to that unpleasant operation. If they have the power to do so, I hope that those who like rummaging through the private luggage of other people will not hesitate to do it, if they have the remotest suspicion that through diplomatic channels things are being brought into this country which ought not to be brought here.
  5.55 p.m.
  Mr. Edward Gardner: The emphasis which my hon. Friend the Member for the Isle of Ely (Sir H. Legge-Bourke) laid on the abuse of privilege is, I think, right. It is all too easy for those of us who are not diplomats to be annoyed by diplomats and some of the diplomatic facts of life. If the definition in Article 1 of Schedule 1 is applied and one identifies what is a diplomatic agent, one must face the fact that an agent is an exceedingly privileged person. It is, it has been, and it will always be all too easy for such a person to abuse his privileges. From the Articles contained in Schedule 1 it is clear that a diplomatic agent is inviolable.
  1402
  He is not liable to arrest or to be detained, and the receiving country must treat him with what is described as due respect. The receiving country must take appropriate steps to protect his person, his freedom, his liberty and his dignity. That is a pretty tall order for those of us whose freedom, person and dignity would suffer at the hands of the law if we were foolish enough to misbehave ourselves.
  In this country there are about 3,500 people who could claim diplomatic immunity. In one year the London County Council issued nearly 2,000 Excise exempt licences. In one year there were nearly 50 traffic accidents in which people were injured but were unable to make a successful claim because the plea of diplomatic immunity was raised. In one year about 2,000 parking offences were committed by people who claimed immunity because of their diplomatic status. The only satisfaction that we who are not beneficiaries of this immunity are left with is the knowledge that our own diplomatic agents abroad have the same privileges.
  However angry we may be about a diplomatic corps Rolls-Royce obstructing the traffic in Piccadilly, such an offence is clearly not one which harms this country, and I do not think we should allow our indignation over these smaller matters to blind us to the graver aspects of the misuse of diplomatic privilege. I am by no means certain, but I feel—as I think does my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East (Commander Courtney)—disturbed enough to raise the matter during this Second Reading debate. I am disturbed by the possibility that diplomatic privilege is being used by people engaged in espionage activities.
  This Bill gives the force of law to the relevant provisions of the Vienna Convention of 1961 and so converts what has been called one of the oldest subjects in the field of international law into a modern code. The 22 States which became parties to the Convention made clear that in agreeing to the various rules they intended to make a contribution to peaceful international relations between those States which agreed to comply with the rules. I suggest that it must follow, conversely, that any use of these

  1403
  rules which govern diplomatic privileges and immunities which, instead of promoting peaceful co-operation between the countries concerned, in fact tends to destroy or disturb those peaceful relations must of its very nature and definition be an abuse of that privilege for which, as I read the provisions of the Bill, there are no remedies available at present in law.
  Since 1961, when this Convention was agreed to by this country, much has happened in the international field. Possibly I speak for many in this House when I say that I am left with an uneasy feeling. A number of notorious spy cases since 1961 have given the impression—I hope it is the wrong impression, but certainly it is an impression I get—that diplomatic immunity has been used to conceal and make possible successful espionage. In 1961 the Convention recognised that not all diplomats are saints.
  The hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) quoted that maxim which he translated so aptly as meaning that an ambassador is an honest man sent abroad to lie. I think that is a little hard, but it was recognised in 1961 that a member of the diplomatic staff might involve himself or herself in an adventure of smuggling.
  Article 36 of the Convention, in order to meet this contingency, exposed the personal baggage of a diplomatic agent to inspection by Customs officers if—I use the words of the Article
  "there are serious grounds for presuming"
  that the baggage contains prohibited articles or articles not intended for the personal use of the diplomatic agent or any official use of the mission. A diplomatic agent bringing to this country a load of vodka for illicit sale could be stopped and his contraband could be seized. I have no doubt that it is a great relief to all of us to know that the Customs can search and, if they find any, can confiscate contraband of this kind, but what about the diplomatic agent who uses his diplomatic privileges and diplomatic immunity to give protection, not for some sordid smuggling enterprise, but in order that he may be able to trade more safely and more successfully vital State secrets which could undermine the whole security of this country?
  1404
  Under Article 29 of the Convention, as my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East was careful to point out, such a person acting in such a capacity still remains inviolable. He cannot be arrested, he cannot be detained, and no action—certainly under this Bill—can be taken against him. I feel some uncertainty and discomfort about this omission. Does my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary think that we ought to have in this Bill some provision which would give the authorities power to deal with the diplomatic agent abusing his immunity by undertaking espionage activities? Could we introduce into the Bill a provision of the character which is contained in the Article dealing with customs offences? Does my hon. Friend think that necessary? I should be delighted if he assured the House that such a provision is superfluous, but I invite him and the Government to consider it.
  Have we here a grave lacuna in the Bill, or is one's feeling of unease based on insubstantial and quite worthless grounds? I know not, but it seems that if we are to give Customs officers power to deal with smuggling we ought to give the authorities, if necessary, power to deal with diplomatic agents who are in fact nothing more nor less than spies. If there are any Communist counterparts to such a person as the fictional James Bond, the Government ought to take steps and powers to deal with them. I see nothing in this Bill which gives any such powers. I should like very much, as I am sure the House would like, to know from the Under-Secretary of State whether the Government think that such powers are necessary.
  6.7 p.m.
  Mr. James H. Hoy: I have one or two questions to ask arising from the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Billericay (Mr. Gardner). If the Government come across a case where an abuse of this kind has taken place by a member of a diplomatic corps from another country, have not the Government the right to ask for his recall? Has not this been done on numerous occasions? I think the Government have that power and I do not think it necessary to have inserted in this Bill power to deal with this problem. I should be surprised to find that the Government have not got that power.

  1405
  This would also apply to espionage. If any country wished to indulge in espionage it would not want to send away the results of its espionage in the diplomatic bag. If it were very good at this job it would find other methods of sending all the information it had. There is a great resentment in this country about the use of motor cars with C.D. plates. A member in the other House said that he insisted on putting C.D. on his car to prove that he had a clean driving licence, which seems about as useful as putting the letters on to represent Corps Diplomatique.
  If accidents take place there is no sanction of law against the driver of the offending car. I am told that other methods are adopted by which payments are made. That may be all right when the country concerned is prepared to honour the debt which results, but there may be smaller countries which will not enter the agreement. It seems quite easy for the Government to accord this diplomatic privilege to those countries when it is done at the expense of the citizen. It would be better if some reciprocal arrangement were made whereby the Government to which a diplomatic car involved in an accident belonged accepted responsibility, where appropriate, for damages. Certainly, this hardship should not be inflicted upon individual citizens injured in accidents involving diplomatic cars.
  I want to say something in defence of those who examine bags. I was a little surprised by the harsh things said by the hon. Member for the Isle of Ely (Sir H. Legge-Bourke) about Customs officers. After all, these officers are employed to do a job for the country and it is not a very pleasant one. He admitted that there are abuses and that it was therefore essential for officers to examine bags in order to stop or prevent such abuses. Having gone that far, it was surely a little unfair of him to describe our Customs officers as doing a despicable task. That task was laid on them by the nation.
  The hon. Gentleman instanced the case of dope being smuggled into this country and doing great harm to younger people. How is one to put a stop to that unless someone on our behalf has the right to examine the bags of those entering? I agree that we must always be very careful
  1406
  about extending the privileges of any person, even of a diplomat. But at least, when we ask some officers to do a certain job on behalf of the nation, we might have a little sympathy for them if that task is unpleasant.
  6.12 p.m.
  Mr. Mathew: By leave of the House, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I will answer now some of the points raised in this debate.
  In spite of some fairly hard things said about details of the Bill, and about the whole question of diplomatic immunity and privilege, and in spite of the rather colourful picture of a legislative morass and of marsh gas painted by the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale), the House has, by and large, given this useful Bill a welcome as a step forward towards the codification of this very important branch of international law. This law has grown up over many years and the initiative for codification originated in the United Nations. It is something that I commend to the House and which we should certainly welcome.
  We have had a good discussion, but the essence of the matter is, as has been said, reciprocity. Quite rightly, hon. Members have discussed what happens here as a result of diplomatic immunity and privilege. But I remind them that at least as important is what happens in foreign countries where we have diplomatic representatives.
  The right hon. and learned Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice) welcomed the Bill and raised a number of queries, including one on Clause 8(2), where there is a reference to Southern Rhodesia. The answer is straight forward. It is there because Southern Rhodesia is not a State and not because it is a State. It is a matter of recognising the diplomatic status of representatives of Southern Rhodesia. That status was already recognised in 1952 by the Act to which the right hon. and learned Gentleman referred. It would be illogical, therefore, to leave Southern Rhodesia out. The right hon. and learned Gentleman referred to the language of the reference not being felicitous, but that is attributing to some African nations a sensitivity and delicacy which they have not got. I do not believe that these nations are not

  1407
  able to see things as they are. Here is a country which already has diplomatic status under an Act passed by this House, and the Bill recognises the fact. I repeat that it would be illogical to leave Southern Rhodesia out.
  The right hon. and learned Gentleman also raised questions about certain definitions, including that of "diplomatic agent". I will deal with that in a moment.
  My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East (Commander Courtney) asked me a series of questions. A number of them were really Committee points, but I will do my best to satisfy his curiosity now. He asked why there had been a three-year delay before this Bill came before the House. The reason is that after we signed the Convention it was necessary to have full and complicated examination of the Convention and to hold consultations not only with the appropriate authorities here but in Commonwealth countries as well. It would have been most imprudent and open to criticism in the House had we rushed into legislation without meticulous examination of an important Measure.
  My hon. and gallant Friend also asked why only some of the Articles in the Convention appear in Schedule 1. Clauses 1 and 2 provide for the replacement of existing law, including the common law as it stands in this matter. The Articles appearing in Schedule 1 cover that ground with the alterations already indicated. To put it another way—the Articles omitted from Schedule 1 are those which would not require legislation in order to be enforced in this country.
  My hon. and gallant Friend also asked me about Article 47. It seems to me that he was accepting, like some other hon. Members, that this Article extends exceptions. I made it clear that we have existing arrangements which we cannot abandon without consultation with the nations concerned. There is no question of extending any and when my hon. and gallant Friend speaks of a double standard then that is a complete misdescription.
  My hon. and gallant Friend also referred, as did other hon. Members, to the use of these privileges for blackmail,
  1408
  espionage and other such activities. Is he really suggesting that we should abandon the protection given to diplomats here and so expose our own people overseas, many of them in countries where the rule of law has not the long tradition that we know, to all the pressures and dangers of which we are extremely well aware in this House? If certain countries have from time to time made use of the diplomatic bag and its immunity for espionage, if that were closed to them they would find other means. I do not believe that the extent or even the efficacy of espionage would be affected one iota, because other methods would be found.
  Commander Courtney: I share my hon. Friend's feelings about the possibilities of action against our diplomats abroad, but would he accept one proposition? With some countries, which need not be named, it can easily be a matter of policy to bring pressure to bear, not only on our diplomats abroad, but on their wives and families, for the very purpose of preserving or extending their privileges in this country, which is exactly what my hon. Friend is doing in this Bill.
  Mr. Mathew: My hon. and gallant Friend will appreciate that by and large this is not an extension. I do not believe that the task of any Power that wishes to do that will be made any easier by the Bill. However, these are matters for consideration in detail. My hon. and gallant Friend has raised a technical matter and I can only express my opinion. I do not believe that the point has any great weight.
  The hon. Member for Oldham, West in one of his typically eloquent speeches, in which he had the close attention of the House, as he always does, raised a number of important points. He recalled, somewhat nostalgically, the past privileges of Members of Parliament, which over the years have become unnecessary and have been lost. He accused the Bill of obscurantism and used some very hard words. If he is right, these are matters which will have to be tackled in Committee. He asked who decides whether a servant is off duty or on duty. Ultimately, as the hon. Gentleman knows, being learned in the law, this is a matter which must be decided on the evidence submitted to the court.
  Mr. Hale: These people never get to court.
  Mr. Mathew: The hon. Gentleman says that the offender will never get to court. The police must be satisfied that there is immunity. If there is any doubt about it, they can bring the person concerned to court, and then the court will decide, and there will be conflicting evidence in such cases.
  Mr. Hale: That is not the point. Incidentally, I am flattered at the suggestion that I have nostalgic memories of something which passed over in the reign of George III. Supposing the police have decided wrongly, how does my missus assert her claim over my bruised and battered corpse? The matter cannot come to court. I understood the Minister to say in opening that the certificate of the Minister that someone was a servant of an embassy was conclusive against a litigant.
  Mr. Mathew: In the hon. Gentleman's case, if his wife should have this misfortune, I have no doubt that she would communicate with the nearest Member of Parliament and I have no doubt that it would be brought to court. If a citizen lays an information, this must be looked into by the court and proof must be produced that there is an absolute defence of immunity.
  The hon. Gentleman also asked why contract should be covered by immunity. Contract has been there for many centuries. Nobody is immune from the law of contract. Diplomats are under a duty to comply, and always were under a duty to comply, with the law of the country in which they find themselves. This is quite different from immunity from jurisdiction. I have stressed this afternoon on several occasions what the reason for that is. We should be in the very greatest difficulty if the observance of the law in the case of our overseas missions depended entirely on court proceedings. We must have this protection because of reciprocity. It would be quite illogical at this stage to take contract out. I do not believe there ever would have been a Convention had this been proposed. The Convention would not have been signed. We would have been alone in putting forward that point of view.
  The hon. Gentleman asked who decides who is a diplomatic agent. A diplomatic
  1410
  agent is defined in Article 1 of the Convention. He is a member of the staff having the rank of attaché or above, appointed to that rank by his Government, and whose name is communicated to the receiving Government. In short, he is proposed in that status by the sending Government and is accepted as such by the receiving Government. This is clear from Clause 4. The hon. Gentleman asked a number of other detailed points and pointed to some ambiguities, which are primarily matters to be dealt with in Committee.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Buckinghamshire, South (Mr. Ronald Bell) asked what is the nature of the Vienna Convention and why we have not ratified it. We signed the Convention in 1961. The Convention has come into effect. The purpose of the Bill is to bring our law into line and to obtain the consent of the House so that we can ratify it.
  My hon. Friend then referred to Clause 7. This does not create a wider privilege. It maintains the exceptional arrangements we have in a very limited number of cases. The names of the countries concerned will be published in due course, after we have had time to consult and inform those countries. My hon. Friend will realise that we were bound by existing agreements. We should not have been able to contract out in the Bill, even had we wished to.
  Mr. Ronald Bell: My point on Clauses 3 and 7 was that, as Clause 7 provides for wider diplomatic privileges, It is not in any way inconsistent with the Convention, whereas Clause 3, which appears to provide for some restriction not provided for in the Convention, seems to me possibly to raise a difficulty.
  Mr. Mathew: Looking at the matter quickly, I do not see the inconsistency, but I will study this point. He also raised the question of Income Tax for citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies who are Commonwealth representatives. It is intended to deal with that in due course by Order in Council.
  My hon. Friend the Member for the Isle of Ely (Sir H. Legge-Bourke) raised a number of points, and I am grateful for what he said about the difficulties experienced by our missions overseas. He spoke about the diplomatic bag and drew a rather gruesome picture of large-scale

  1411
  smuggling taking place through it. I can assure him that Article 27 deals with the diplomatic bag while Article 36 deals with the personal baggage of diplomats. Under Article 27(3) the diplomatic bag cannot be opened, and this provision is included because it is essential for our own diplomats that there should be reciprocity in this matter.
  Sir H. Legge-Bourke: Accepting that, and realising the need for reciprocity here, will my hon. Friend say what he visualises would be done by the authorities in the event of it being brought to the attention of Her Majesty's Government, by the police or any other authority, that the use of the diplomatic bag was being abused?
  Mr. Mathew: We would inform the head of mission at once. Hon. Members should also not forget the ultimate sanction of withdrawing the immunity and declaring the diplomat persona non grata.
  My hon. Friend the Member for the Isle of Ely then referred to certain organisations. This Bill does not deal with the international staffs to which he referred, but there is the International Organisations (Immunities and Privileges) Act, 1950, which lays down the extent of their privileges and immunities. However, this Bill does not deal with international staffs.
  I thank my hon. Friend for the welcome he gave to the steps which Her Majsty's Government, the Foreign Office and the Commonwealth Relations Office are taking to try to bring some order into the difficult matter of motor and parking offences. As I said at the beginning of my remarks, I am not unhopeful that some progress will be made with the help of the distinguished Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, who has been energetic and helpful in this matter.
  The hon. Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Hoy) asked about protection for people injured in motor accidents involving diplomats. The answer is that this is covered in the usual way by insurance or other arrangements so that citizens are not placed in financial difficulty. Apart from the question of the diplomat taking out insurance cover, the head of mission concerned would take all
  1412
  steps to see that such difficulties were not encountered.
  My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Billericay (Mr. Gardner) drew a rather terrifying picture of increased espionage and crimes against the State. I would remind him that there exist records of cases concerning foreign envoys, many of them from states which have long since disappeared, who were engaged in activities near to high treason. Since my hon. and learned Friend is learned in the law, I need not elaborate on those cases. Suffice to say that this is not a new business; that in the past there have been many cases, even dating back to the time when the Jacobites were given assistance under the cover of diplomatic privilege. We certainly cannot say that this is a new feature.
  I appreciate the contributions and criticisms made of these provisions by hon. Members on both sides of the House and I hope that we will have an opportunity to consider these matters in more detail in Committee. In commending the Bill, I need only point out that this is a step forward in this important branch of international law, and is intended to bring certainty and uniformity into the law.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly read a Second time.
  Bill committed to a Standing Committee, pursuant to Standing Order No. 40 (Committal of Bills).

  WAYS AND MEANS
  Considered in Committee.
  [Sir WILLIAM ANSTRUTHER-GRAY in the Chair]

  DIPLOMATIC PRIVILEGES
  Resolved,
  That it is expedient to authorise such charges to income tax and estate duty as may arise from replacing existing diplomatic privileges and immunities by those provided for by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.—[Mr. Green.]
  Resolution to be reported.
  Report to be received Tomorrow: Committee to sit again Tomorrow.

  EDUCATION BILL [Lords]
  Order for Second Reading read.
  6.37 p.m.
  The Lord President of the Council and Secretary of State for Education and Science (Mr. Quintin Hogg): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  This is a very short Bill, but I hope that it will meet with the approval of the House as being valuable in content. It has two main purposes. Its principal purpose is to enable local authorities in England and Wales, and voluntary bodies, to experiment with new schools, but only new ones, in varying the age of transfer, subject to the approval of the Secretary of State for Education and Science. That is the purpose of Clause 1.
  The second purpose, which covers both Scotland and England and Wales, is to remove an anomaly connected with the payment of maintenance allowances whereby the parents of handicapped children at special schools are precluded from receiving the benefit of the allowances if those children are between the ages of 15 and 16. That is the object of Clause 2 in regard to England and Wales, and of Clause 3 in regard to Scotland. I think that I can assure the House that Clauses 4 and 5 are, at any rate for the purposes of a Second Reading, either formal or consequential.
  Perhaps I may deal with the two main purposes I have outlined in reverse order, that is to say, with Clauses 2 and 3 first. I would explain that the power that local education authorities have to make payment of maintenance allowances to parents of school children derives from Section 81(c) of the parent Act of 1944. This is drafted so as to permit the payment of maintenance allowances only in respect of children above compulsory school age, so that in the case of children at ordinary schools, whether they are handicapped children or children who are not handicapped, the age at which the allowances can be paid is, in consequence, 15. But under Section 38 of the principal Act it is provided that a handicapped child at a special school—not one at a general school—is deemed to be of compulsory school age until he reaches the age of 16.
  1414
  Although I am absolutely certain that it was not in the minds of the draftsmen when the Act was passed, the House will see that the combined effect of those two Sections, and of the two Sections of the Scottish Act referred to in Clause 3, which have the same effect, is to deprive the parents of handicapped children of the benefit of the allowances for a year after the parents of the child in an ordinary school, whether handicapped or not, have been entitled to draw them. For the parents of a handicapped child at a special school this adds a financial disadvantage to the initial misfortune which those of us who are happy enough to be parents of normal children can guess at and deeply sympathise with, but perhaps can never fully appreciate.
  I think that this is a mere anomaly, quite unintentional, and something that we have promised more than once to remedy when the opportunity occurred. I am glad that it has occurred now, and I am only sorry that it has not occurred before. Indeed, I hope that the day will arrive when we can evolve a method of Parliamentary procedure which avoids the consumption of Parliamentary time for uncontroversial and humanitarian legislation of this type. But we have not yet reached that stage.
  If I may return to Clause 1, which is the main purpose of the Bill and limited to England and Wales, this is more substantial from the point of view of educational policy, although it is frankly experimental in character and limited in scope. As the House will know, it is a fundamental assumption of our legislation that schools are divided into primary and secondary, and the age of transfer, as I am afraid we call it in the jargon of education, is round about 11—that is after 10½ and before 12. This is the result, if I might again be precise, of reading Section 8 of the Act of 1944 with the definition Section, that is Section 114.
  As the House knows, schemes of secondary reorganisation are very much in the air at the moment and it is, therefore, perhaps not altogether surprising that some local authorities—a notable example is the West Riding of Yorkshire, but it is not alone in that respect, I think—have shown a desire to experiment with the age of transfer itself. Owing to the way in which the Act is drafted in

  1415
  these two Sections, they cannot properly do so under the existing law.
  The purpose of Clause 1 is to remove this restriction for new schools, where the proposals meet with the approval of the Secretary of State for Education and Science under the well-known and very well tried provisions of Section 13 of the principal Act. The Bill was originally drafted for the benefit of local education authorities. This was because we supposed—wrongly, as it turned out—that only local authorities would be interested in experiments of this kind. In fact, up to that time we had only been approached by local authorities, but during the passage of the Bill through another place the voluntary bodies—the Roman Catholic authorities and the Church of England authorities—expressed the desire to be given a like right of experiment. Therefore, the Bill was amended in another place, gladly on our part, to include them.
  I hope that the House will agree that what we propose is reasonable. There is nothing specially sacrosanct about 11 as an age of transfer. The case for 11 was very well and fully argued in the Hadow Report of 1926 and nobody can say that it was not prescribed by the law deliberately. But many other countries—and, indeed, our own independent system, of which some hon. Members are unworthy examples—have very largely settled down to an age of transfer centring round about the age of 13. Although the Hadow Report argues the matter very learnedly, I have never quite rid myself of the suspicion that the real reason for 11 lay in the historical fact that the old system of universal, compulsory, elementary education prior to 1900 long ended at the age of 11, so that when the central Government and local education authorities came to add post-primary—or, as it was afterwards called, secondary—provision they found it more convenient to superimpose new schools on top of their existing school structure. This was the more natural since they were then dealing with a course of three or four years ending at 14 or 15, and not with a longer course, as it will be, ending at 16. It is therefore appropriate that we should give local education authorities and voluntary bodies, who must now be looking forward to raising the age to 16, an
  1416
  option to experiment with the age of transfer in the course of the wide experiments which are now taking place to reorganise secondary education generally. We do not now contemplate—nor, I think, ought we to contemplate it in advance of Lady Plowden's Report—any general change in the age of transfer. It follows that the actual provisions of Clause 1 are purely of an enabling character.
  Perhaps I should now refer to subsection (2), which enables the Secretary of State to designate a school emerging from one of these proposals as either secondary or primary, as may be appropriate, notwithstanding the fact that an unconventional age of transfer is proposed. This is the administratively easier of two alternative proposals. The other way of doing it, to invent one or two hybrid classes of school, neither primary nor secondary, would have led to a much more complicated piece of legislation, and it was thought inappropriate to a limited number of experiments as proposed in the Bill. With this explanation, which I hope hon. Members have found sufficiently intelligible, I commend the Bill to the House.
  6.50 p.m.
  Mr. Frederick Willey: This is a small but important Bill and we welcome it. I am sure that the right hon. and learned Gentleman will not mind my saying that we pay tribute to his right hon. Friend the Minister of State for Education and Science because one of his last actions as Minister of Education was to introduce this Bill. As the right hon. and learned Gentleman said, the Bill incorporates two important reforms and removes a very unfair anomaly which was to the detriment of the parents of handicapped children.
  We made repeated representations from this side of the House that this should be done, and we express pleasure that the Government are taking the opportunity of the extended Session to see that this anomaly is put right, but the position even when the Bill becomes law will not by any means be completely satisfactory. I have previously expressed great dissatisfaction about the present position in the matter of maintenance allowances for schoolchildren. We had the Weaver Report

  1417
  on educational maintenance allowances, but unfortunately its recommendations were not fully accepted by the Government. Not only are the allowances inadequate but there are wide disparities between different parts of the country and it is particularly unfortunate that the Government now shield themselves behind the present block grant provisions and that many of the disparities are now disguised.
  The proper step to take is to do as we suggest in "Signposts for the Sixties" and that is to see that maintenance allowances are provided by way of family allowances, with a steep increase in respect of children who remain at school after compulsory school-leaving age. This would directly help handicapped children. However, in their case unfair disparities do not only affect maintenance allowances. There may be some differences in the numbers of these children in different local authority areas, but no such variations can explain the present disparities in expenditure on their education. For example, expenditure on special schools per 1,000 of population is £979 in Liverpool but in Great Yarmouth it is as low as £142.
  Whilst we welcome the Bill and what is being done, I hope that the right hon. and learned Gentleman's affection for laissez faire will not mean that he remains indifferent to these disparities, to the prejudice of many handicapped children. Moreover, whilst we welcome what is being done for handicapped children by means of the Bill, it must be appreciated that a good deal more needs to be done for them. As long as there is a waiting list of 13,000 for admission to special schools we cannot be satisfied with what is being done, though we recognise the improvements made in the past few years.
  It is not only a question of accommodation. There is also the question of teachers. The National Advisory Council a few years ago set us a target of 10,000 qualified teachers for special schools, but this still remains a target and the acute shortage in teacher supply should not blind us to the special needs of these children. It is not only a question of special schools. There is a great need for specialist remedial teachers in the ordinary primary and secondary schools.
  1418
  When we recognise the provisions which we are making for the children at special schools we should also have regard to the care and attention which should be given to these children when they leave school. Very often, because we do not pay sufficient care and attention to the problem of handicapped children when they leave school, a great deal of work done at school is lost.
  Whilst, therefore, we welcome the Bill and congratulate the Government on taking this opportunity to right this anomaly, this only emphasises the need for much greater provision for handicapped children than we are providing and also directs our attention to the unevenness of the provision made throughout the country for these children. We equally welcome the other provisions of the Bill. We regret that the right hon. and learned Gentleman has not made further provision. This would have made the Bill into a miscellaneous provisions Bill and we would have had many suggestions to make to him, but we recognise that for good Parliamentary reasons he has avoided that temptation.
  We congratulate the right hon. and learned Gentleman on the provision to enable local authorities, who wish to experiment, to straddle the 11-plus gulf, but the House should clearly recognise that here we are doing two things. We are legitimising action which some local authorities have taken in defiance of the Ministry and in contravention of the 1944 Act, and we are removing an obstacle in the way of some local education authorities which have followed what they consider the best course in their determination—and I here use the words of "Signposts for the 'Sixties"—to reorganise the State secondary schools on comprehensive lines
  "in order to end the segregation by the 11-plus examination which is now almost universally condemned on educational as well as on social grounds …".
  However much the right hon. and learned Gentleman may seek to disguise this, the Bill is a capitulation by the Government. After having fought a rearguard action against the reorganisation of schooling on comprehensive lines they are capitulating, because the purpose of the Bill is to facilitate the provision of comprehensive schooling for secondary school children.

  1419
  It is true that, like the noble Lord, Lord Newton, in another place, the right hon. and learned Gentleman referred to experimentation, but there is no word about experimentation in the Bill. The right hon. and learned Gentleman knows well enough that once the Bill becomes law there will be considerable pressure on him from many education authorities to provide for schools which will bridge this 11-plus gulf. This ought not to disturb him. The right hon. Gentleman makes so many outrageous political statements that when he makes a sensible statement it is often overlooked, but when he was questioned about the reorganisation of education at Question Time a few weeks ago he said:
  "I thought that the tripartite system had already broken down seven years ago when I was Minister before."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th May, 1964; Vol. 695, c. 577.]
  The pity is that it has taken him seven years to tell us this and that during that time the Government have done so little about it.
  I give the right hon. and learned Gentleman the credit, however, that he differs from his immediate predecessors and successors in that office in that politically he is more than anything else a Liberal and really believes in laissez fair. During the short time when he was at the Ministry, the local authorities had greater freedom than they had enjoyed before or have enjoyed since. I have pleasure in reminding him that seven years ago he was faced with a new approach to the reorganisation of secondary education on comprehensive lines, as proposed by the Leicestershire Education Authority, and it is to his credit that he did not sabotage that scheme or seek to frustrate or thwart it. But the trouble is—and we are paying for it now—that he was not more positive.
  The right hon. and learned Gentleman ought to have encouraged and approved what the Leicestershire Education Authority was proposing to do. I believe that strictly he was obliged to have done that, because the scheme was obviously a radical variation of the 1950 development plan, but what he did was to completely abrogate responsibility Pontius Pilate-wise; he said that the local education authority had no need
  1420
  for his approval, had not sought it, and had not received it.
  Mr. Hogg: Pontius Pilate did not succeed in evading his responsibility.
  Mr. Willey: Neither will the right hon. and learned Gentleman, at least for a short time. As I say, we give credit to him for at least giving Leicestershire the opportunity. Leicestershire has set an example to other authorities in the provision of comprehensive secondary schooling.
  However, at the same time, we have had an absence of leadership by the right hon. Gentleman. This was illustrated in the Leicestershire scheme in other ways. There was the provision for "high flyers", originally intended for the top 10 per cent., but in practice for much less. This was an open evasion of the law, contrary to the 1944 Act. The right hon. and learned Gentleman knew all about it but did nothing. I am not complaining about the Leicestershire scheme on the merits. On the contrary. The purpose of the Bill is to regularise the position. We are in favour of it. It provides the flexibility which ought to be provided at the age of transition, and we support authorities like the West Riding which are seeking new ways to organise comprehensive secondary schooling. We are delighted that there has been a massive revolt against the right hon. and learned Gentleman and his Department and that by this Bill he is now recognising it.
  What is unfortunate, and what affects the present situation very much, is that the right hon. and learned Gentleman has shown a lack of courage and initiative which has seriously diminished the standing and respect which he and his Department have in education at the moment. In fact, the Bill is seven years late.
  I emphasise once more that we are encouraged by and support the action which many education authorities, not only the West Riding but Stoke, Croydon and many others of differing political complexion, are taking to organise expeditious ways of providing comprehensive secondary schooling. What is regrettable in this situation of revolutionary change—the Director of Education for Leicestershire described his own

  1421
  proposals years ago as revolutionary—is that we have not had a more constructive and positive lead from the Minister and his Department. The right hon. and learned Gentleman seems quite unaware of the obligation which Parliament placed upon them.
  One has only to turn to Section 1 of the Education Act, 1944, to see that it is the right hon. and learned Gentleman's duty to
  "promote the education of the people of England and Wales and the progressive development of institutions devoted to that purpose, and to secure the effective execution by local authorities, under his direction and control, of the national policy for providing a varied and comprehensive education service in every area".
  I shall not embarrass the Minister by emphasising control and direction. A Secretary of State who relied overmuch on control and direction would be as unfortunate as a Secretary of State who abnegated all responsibility. But what is wanted in the present situation is a sense of direction and guidance, and this is what the right hon. and learned Gentleman is conspicuously failing to give.
  We on this side accept and warmly support the present division of responsibility in education. It is a partnership, but it is an unfortunate partnership if the senior partner is a sleeping partner. The Government ought now to give forthright assistance to local authorities in their plans of reorganisation. What makes matters worse is that not only is there not any sense of direction forthcoming but the local education authorities carrying out these difficult tasks are not receiving any guidance, help or even information from the right hon. and learned Gentleman. At Question Time a few weeks ago, when my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South (Mr. Merlyn Rees) suggested that the Department should collate and render readily available information about the reorganisation of secondary education, the right hon. and learned Gentleman stubbornly rejected this suggestion. In fact, it is left to enterprising local authorities such as the London County Council to provide the information. The least the Secretary of State should be doing now is to help this reorganisation by providing such information as he has in his Department.
  The right hon. and learned Gentleman mentioned the Plowden Committee. He will realise as well as we do that it is
  1422
  unfortunate that contemporaneously with this reorganisation we should be awaiting the results of the Committee's deliberations. I suggested to him that he might take the initiative and invite the Committee to offer us an interim report on the question we are discussing now, the age of transition. He refused to do so. I would respect the views of the Plowden Committee, but I think that the right hon. and learned Gentleman has no excuse for not taking any initiative. He should at least invite the view of the Plowden Committee on the possibility of providing an interim report.
  Especially now, when we are discussing this Bill, we ought, if it be possible, to provide all the information and help we can give to create an informed opinion on the question of the age of transition. The idea of middle schools itself is not new. Not long ago, I saw a memorandum prepared by my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Mr. Idwal Jones) making this very suggestion as far back as 1942. However, we have no accepted or clear view about the age range. There are different proposals from the West Riding, Stoke, Croydon and other authorities. The Association of Education Committees, apparently, leans towards the age of 12 as being the right one. It seems that the National Union of Teachers is equally divided on whether the age should be 11-plus or should be 12 or 13. There is every ground—I am with the right hon. and learned Gentleman in this—for pragmatic experiment, but there is also every ground for providing, as best we can, informed opinion and help.
  If he stands by what he says at Question Time, the Secretary of State ought to be ready lo help those local education authorities which, because the tripartite system has broken down, are now facing the urgent problem of reorganisation. Instead, they are having to do as best they can without any advice or assistance from him. I have every sympathy with the plea of the National Union of Teachers that some order ought to be introduced into the administrative chaos which is rapidly developing. At least, we need some co-operation and guidance from the Minister and his Department.
  The Secretary of State mentioned denominational schools. We know that the Bill was introduced without any reference to denominational schools. No inquiry

  1423
  was made. It was introduced in panic because of the action which the West Riding was, apparently, ready to take regardless of anything which the Secretary of State might do. The Bill in itself is not sufficient to meet the problems of the voluntary schools. In any scheme for reorganisation, the voluntary schools will face real and special difficulties, and their position merits attention, consideration and advice from the right hon. and learned Gentleman. But this is what is lacking.
  When we hear Lord Newton in another place and the right hon. and learned Gentleman here talking about experimentation, we get no hint of a proper sense of initiative, guidance and help. We are little further forward than we were at the time of the Government White Paper in 1958. Today above anything else, we want from the Government and from the right hon. and learned Gentleman a clear and explicit commitment to the reorganisation of secondary education on comprehensive lines. This we have not had, and herein lies the source of present difficulties.
  The Bill is a small but important and valuable Measure. It will be a useful instrument for the next Government, because the next Government will be clearly committed to providing social justice for handicapped children and to providing an adequate and sufficient education for all those enjoying secondary schooling.
  7.10 p.m.
  Sir James Pitman: I should like shortly to support the Bill, and to say, although it may sound ridiculous, that it is possible that this could be a major revolution of very great importance to a large section of our people. I am speaking particularly on behalf of those who are conceptually weak. They do not have the conceptions in their head even if they have the vocabulary. It seems to me that this Bill opens up the possibility of special schools in that sense.
  As I read the Measure, such a school could start from three and go on to 63; it has to be below one age and above another. This lack of conceptual ability is present throughout all the age groups and is of very great disadvantage to the
  1424
  people concerned. There is an obligation on the State, and it is a duty of the teaching profession, to supply what have been the deficiencies in the environment of the child or even the adult.
  I have here the statement from the National Union of Teachers to the Central Advisory Council for Education. It is dated June, so it is only one day out of date. I should like to read two paragraphs of it:
  "It is the child's linguistic environment which most profoundly affects the development of his measured ability and attainment. 'Primary Education' puts it in this way. 'The development of thought itself depends on a multiplication of names and a perception of categories and concepts they imply.' The whole chapter on language in this handbook takes on a new significance in the light of the findings of Douglas. Of all the cultural inequalities that widen the differences between child and child it is the richness or poverty of its early linguistic development which demands most attention. 'As the child progresses through school', says a National Foundation for Educational Research Report, 'initial differences related to differences in early and continuing cultural opportunity tend to be reinforced', and once again the findings of Douglas support this conclusion."
  Paragraph 10 states:
  "The problem is particularly recognised in all countries … as, for example, in Israel, with its problems of the oriental Jewish immigrant, and in the U.S.A., with its negro"—
  and I might add its Puerto Rican problem.
  "We cannot do better than draw the Council's attention to the article by Charles E. Silberman, Lecturer in Economics at Columbia University, in the May, 1964, issue of 'Harper's Magazine', which deals with the problem in both these countries."
  I will send the Minister a copy of this.
  It is very hard for us to recognise, but a substantial portion of young children in our schools, and consequently of adults, do not understand language. When the teacher says, "It is time to put your things away, to get on your coats and go home", they do not understand those words, although they act upon them. Throughout life they solve their communicative difficulties by watching what the effect of language is on people next to them. Their little beady eyes observe and copy the actions of others. In other words, they are, in effect, like a do" which sits down when one says "Sit down" to it. But that is not a linguistic message; that is a Pavlovian conditioning to the environment. The teacher is able

  1425
  very easily to teach concepts provided he knows that that is the necessity.
  By the Bill local authorities will be empowered to run special schools of this kind. As I see it, we learned our concepts accidentally by experiencing a number of situations. If the situation was big, or bigger, we had in situation 127 a bigger glass than another glass, accidentally in situation 254 a bigger piece of bread than another piece of bread, than a bigger boy or a smaller boy. These are different situations which we observed and memorised and from which we analysed the common factor of this concept of one thing being bigger than another. An adult in Tokyo would use a different word from the word a German would use in Berlin or a Frenchman in Paris, but in England we use our word. A child is lucky if an adult gives him as a catalyst the word "bigger" in all those situations because that helps the child enormously in forming the concept as well as knowing the vocabulary with which to operate that concept in one's mind.
  In the graphic arts and in the schools the process need not be accidental; it can be planned and deliberate. Instead of being situation 204 and then not repeated and reinforced until situation 500, it can be picture 1, picture 2, picture 3 and picture 4, and always the word will be "bigger" and Uncle will not come in and say "'greater" instead of "bigger" and thereby cause a lack of repetition and of reinforcement and introduce a new factor, one of confusion.
  In the schools we have this problem for a limited number of people, but they are very precious human beings. Their potentialities are, as far as we may expect, as great as those of anybody else, but they have been handicapped, and subsequently are handicapped throughout their lives, by the fact that they have not had the initial teaching in the concepts which are the basis of communication. In the beginning was the word "logos" and that means "the concept". It was given a different ticket in Tokyo, Paris and Berlin, but the concept is the same where-ever man communicates with man.
  Now that we have segregated the children with frictional difficulties in reading from those with a lack of conceptualisation, local authorities will be able under the Bill to test them to find out
  1426
  whether it is lack of conceptualisation which is holding them back. It is possible even at the age of three, which is when such teaching should begin, to find out whether children are lacking in this opportunity of situational backgrounds and so of concepts. We can test even better and more successfully at later ages, but the real issue is to find out those children who are thus suffering. Under this Bill it seems to me that the local authorities will be able to find out and identify the very young children, and even the older people, and to set about giving them that opportunity of living which comes from man being a communicative animal.
  Man differs from the dog in that he understands the generality of concept of the word "sit" as an action. He understands the generality of concept of the word "down" as a preposition in a direction. That is mankind's enormous difference from the animal kingdom. A dog sits down when one says "sit down", but there is no conceptualisation passing, only a response to a Pavlovian conditioning.
  May we hope that local authorities will use the Bill in the way that it can be used. I think that we should welcome it very warmly.
  7.20 p.m.
  Dr. Horace King: I am glad to follow the hon. Member for Bath (Sir J. Pitman), if only to say that I regret that this is, I believe, the last time when he will take part in an education debate in this House. He will not be coming to the next Parliament. Those of us who have followed education debates in the House for the last 15 or 20 years know the tremendous contribution he has made to them. I will not follow the particular point he raised. I feared for a moment that he wished to make all our little children into Pavlovian dogs with a series of conditioned reflexes, but he escaped from it towards the end of his speech and I followed with great interest his description of the problem which he drew to the attention of the Secretary of State.
  I raised with the then Minister of Education, four or five years ago, the anomaly which is to be put right by Clauses 2 and 3 of the Bill. Since then, the problem has been raised at conferences of education associations. The

  1427
  difficulty has always been that of waiting for a Bill into which to put the reform, and I think that the Secretary of State was wise in suggesting that Parliament should one day find a method of doing what the whole House wants done without waiting for the procedure of getting together a lot of little reforms to put into a Bill. It always seems to me that we could get a single-Clause, non-contentious Bill through the House much more easily than Departments fear would be the case.
  Parents receive a maintenance grant—subject to an income test—if their children stay on at school after school leaving age. The grant may not be big enough, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) pointed out, but it has certainly improved tremendously since some of us persuaded the Government to set up the Weaver Working Party. I hope that the right hon. and learned Gentleman will take the opportunity of the fact that Clauses 2 and 3 deal with maintenance grants to note that whilst some local authorities are paying more than the Weaver Report recommended, and some are paying the scale, that some still pay less.
  The Weaver scale has now become national policy. I hope that the Secretary of State will take the opportunity to have a word with those local authorities which are still too mean to pay adequate maintenance grants to the poor children who stay on after school leaving age. I hope that any councillors who read HANSARD will make sure that their own local authorities come up to scratch on this very important matter.
  However, as the Secretary of State pointed out, if the child is mentally or physically handicapped and has to attend a special school, the school-leaving age for such a child is taken as 16 years. It was the parent of such a child who brought to my notice some years ago the simple fact that there was no maintenance allowance for the child between the ages of 15 and 16.
  We do not make a maintenance allowance for a normal child in order to compensate for loss of earnings. It would be a much bigger allowance if we did in these days, when youngsters are paid so much for leaving school. The allowance is meant to help parents keep their
  1428
  children at school during the most expensive, non-earning period of the life of youngsters.
  The only difference between a normal and an abnormal child of 15, since neither is earning, is that the parents of the handicapped child will have greater expenses to meet than the parents of the normal child. Parents of abnormal children find that they are far more costly to keep than normal children. Sadly enough, there is often no prospect of such a child ever becoming a wage earner. I am therefore delighted on all counts, to think that now such children are to receive a maintenance grant. I share the view of the Secretary of State that we should have given it to them years ago.
  I congratulate the Government on this reform, which will help some hundreds of Britain's most hard-pressed mothers. It is only one of a series of useful little Measures which the Government have brought in over the past years to help the parents of handicapped children which I have not time to mention.
  Nevertheless there is much more yet to be done for the handicapped child. Anyone who serves on a local education authority knows that every authority in the country has lists of children who have been recommended for special education and treatment but who are unable to get it because either an appropriate school simply does not exist or because it is overcrowded and has long waiting lists.
  Even more difficult is the problem of the ineducable child. I think that the greatest tragedy that can happen to a family is when the local medical officer reports that a child cannot go to any school, not even a special school. Then there is also the problem of what happens when a handicapped child leaves the special school only to find that there is no work for them. I hope that one day we shall have a full debate on the problems of special schools and handicapped children so that we may appreciate how much splendid work we have done since the war but how much still remains to be done.
  I share the view of the hon. Member for Bath that Clause 1 is very important. I have watched the transformation of the Tory Party's attitude towards education over the last 40 years with amazement and delight. They have climbed

  1429
  on to educational bandwagon after educational bandwagon. I remember their conversion to "further secondary education for all". I remember their conversion to the ending of all-age schools—I think that it was the last Minister of Education but two who announced that epoch-making discovery. They were also gradually won over to adequate maintenance grants, although we had to persuade them to adopt the report of their own Weaver Working Party.
  These are just a few of the education reforms they have slowly come round to accepting. Now Clause 1 suggests they are not quite certain whether or not to fight the election on the battle cry of "Hands off the grammar schools!" They dare not say "Hands off Eton and Harrow!" because that would not win votes. They may come out and say, as they did when they said, "We are for social services", "We are the party for experiment in selection at 11-plus—the party for comprehensive secondary education". I have the idea that the cry of "Hands off the grammar schools" will last for just one more election, in spite of Clause 1.
  In Clause 1, the party opposite are adding another nail to the coffin of tripartism and already the Secretary of State, chief of many Ministers of Education, is converted—or seems to be. The National Union of Teachers in its evidence to the Plowden Committee, has come down on the side of ending the 11-plus in favour of the establishment of comprehensive schools where practicable.
  That is a real change of attitude of the N.U.T., which has been singularly backward about this aspect of education reform—singularly so, because it has been the pioneer in most education advances. Indeed, the N.U.T. now regrets that Britain is coming to accept a comprehensive system of secondary education only when the moment of doing it will be bedevilled by the fact that it has built all its secondary schools on the basis of tripartism and when many local authorities will, therefore, find it difficult to do even the experimenting allowed under Clause 1 because of the physical nature of the buildings.
  It is a simple fact that everywhere in the country Britain's singular and
  1430
  lamentable contribution to education theory—that one can divide children into three groups, 20 per cent. academic, 10 per cent. technical and 70 per cent. the rest which one does not want to say anything about—has been torn to shreds by every local authority. No one except a backwoodsman believes that one can diagnose accurately at 11-plus a child's ability to profit by education to the age of 18 or 20. No local authority has a completely tripartite system of secondary education. Even the most conservative—and I use that word with a small "c" because some of the Labour authorities are conservative about this—have transfer at 13 or 16 or the interchange of children constantly between various types of secondary schools. Nearly every local authority has some bilateral schools—technical grammar or technical modern or grammar modern. Not all but most of them are providing a fifth form in secondary modern schools. Some are even providing a sixth form or, if they do not provide a sixth form, are making it easy for able children from the fifth form to transfer to the sixth form of a grammar school.
  Then we have experiments like those at Leicester and West Riding. The West Riding experiment is the one on which Clause 1 is tailored. In Leicester there are two kinds of secondary schools—a kind of junior secondary school and a senior secondary school—and in West Riding there is almost a new kind of middle school between primary and secondary.
  There are progressive authorities, not all of them Labour, which have boldly set up comprehensive schools, transferring all the children at 11-plus to the nearest secondary school, which offers to an able child everything that a grammar school offers and also to the not so able child many more opportunities than it would have had in the secondary modern school.
  There are authorities like London which compromise. London rightly boasts of the fine achievements of its comprehensive schools; but they are not completely comprehensive. Some 11 to 12 per cent. of London's children still go to selected grammar schools, but even in London and certainly in Sunderland, where I visited an excellent comprehensive school three or four

  1431
  months ago, when the choice is given to parents to choose between selection at 11-plus with the possibility of winning a place at a grammar school or simply to the nearest comprehensive school, parents are choosing to send their children to the comprehensive school. In the case of Sunderland, of this year's 250 11-plus intake in the area dealt with by that comprehensive school about 98 per cent. of the children opted to go to the comprehensive school rather than sit for grammar school examinations. Now, West Riding is asking not merely whether it is right to select at 11-plus but whether it is right to transfer children from primary to secondary education at 11-plus. This is much more serious, in my opinion, than the question of whether we should select at 11-plus.
  About the only thing that the 1944 Education Act said about the form of education was that primary education should begin at the age of five—children must be sent to school at the age of five—that secondary education should be provided separately from primary education, and that the transfer should be, as the Minister said, between the ages of ten and a half and twelve. There was not a word incidentally about tripartitism in that Act.
  The Minister has never had power to prevent experimentation in kinds of secondary education. He could frown on it, as he did or his predecessors did, but he is now relaxing the frown and even smiling. In Clause 1 he goes much further. The age of transfer itself is thrown into the melting pot. I regard this as an important innovation that the House does well to look at. If hon. Members believe in selection of children for different kinds of secondary education, obviously selection can be more effective and accurate at the age of 13 than at the age of 11. The common entrance examination is taken at about the age of 13. Incidentally, it is a much more exacting examination than that of selection at 11-plus. The ablest children in the prep school have to work hard, and there is no royal road for the middle-class child who wants to go to the rich man's public school.
  Selection at the end of prep school can be much more accurate because it
  1432
  is two years later than selection at 11-plus, but the real issue of Clause 1 goes beyond even the question of selection. I believe that all our concepts of education are at present in the melting pot. Old barriers, the least defensible of them the barrier between public and private education, must, I think, go in these modern days. The raising of the school-leaving age to 16, when it comes, may demand an alteration in the structure of education as revolutionary as the changes which will take place in the content and quality of secondary education when all our children are being educated to 16.
  To carry out Crowther would be a revolution; to carry out Newsom for the average child would be a revolution. The Plowden Committee will examine, among other things, the question which is posed by Clause 1: what should be the age of transfer from primary to secondary education? I believe that it will also examine the question of selection at 11-plus. I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North in his suggestion that we ought to formulate our own decisions on this question of transfer from primary to secondary now. I think that we ought to wait until the Plowden Committee has reported. It would be rather impertinent to anticipate Plowden.
  Mr. Willey: The two points that I made were, first, that we should ask the Plowden Committee whether it would be prepared to give us an interim report, in other words, its opinion on this subject, and, second, that those authorities making a decision on this should have all the guidance and informed opinion that is available.
  Dr. King: I am always prepared to listen to my very good friend on the Front Bench. I was coming to that. He argued that one way by which we could get out of the dilemma would be by asking Plowden to anticipate its own findings on this issue and whether it would make this the first remit from the Minister. I think that it would be folly to anticipate the findings of Plowden on this, but I would nevertheless emphasise one or two points.
  I heartily agree with the Secretary of State when he expressed the suspicion that many of our educational reforms

  1433
  had been carried out for non-educational reasons. Almost every educational advance has been for a bad reason. We first had the expansion of secondary and technical education because Lord Haldane discovered that Germany was a military force and we had to educate Britain to cope with the scientific and economic might of Germany. The whole theory of the tripartite system of education depends on the buildings which existed in 1944. We have made educational decisions on financial grounds—the number of teachers that we can afford—rather than on any educational basis. I hope that no one will use the elasticity of the powers that Clause 1 gives to the age of transfer to transfer children from any other age than that which the law at present lays down unless the reason is an educational one. Merely to transfer from primary to secondary because the building suits, or because it would be cheaper to have teachers this way than the other is the kind of reason which I hope will not enter into the mind of any local authority. If Clause 1 comes into operation, I hope that it will be for educational reasons and not for administrative convenience.
  I am delighted that there is to be no tampering with the age of entry. The glory of British education is that ever since 1880 every British child has gone to school at the age of 5. Indeed, we have slipped back since my childhood. A reading of the Secretary of State's own pamphlets on primary education shows that thirty of forty years ago most of our children were getting to school between 4 and 5, but there are children in England today who do not go to school until the term after they are 5. I hope that some day when we consider this age of entry we shall endeavour—and we do not need an Act of Parliament to do it—to see that every child gets into school at the beginning of the year in which his fifth birthday comes. Infant education has been compulsory since 1880.
  I would say, as I have said before, that infants' schools have played a great part in the development of British education. Many of the experiments in freedom, in pedagogy, have taken place in infants' schools. The broad aims of the infants' schools are pretty clear and I think that
  1434
  I will carry every hon. Member with me when I say that the infants' teachers know the purpose of infant education and are carrying it out magnificently. In the same way, junior education presents a definite picture. School from 8 to 11 has a sense of unity and purpose with which there should be no tampering unless the reasons are really valid and substantial. As was suggested in another place, it may be one of the reasons for the downward trend of the age of puberty.
  It may be that as we raise the secondary leaving age to 16, we shall have to reconstruct education with infant education from 5 to 7, with nursery school education before that as soon as we can get it and afford it, and with junior education from 8 to 11 or 12. The Association of Education Committees suggests 12, but for a bad reason. I am certain that if junior education were freed from the bugbear of selection at 11-plus, it would have new worlds to conquer and a great expansion and development. The Clause makes experiments in that direction possible.
  I said that I hoped that the reasons would be valid, and I say that because I am distressed by the attitude of the Association of Education Committees to the subject of the age of transfer. We need more men teachers, but the A.E.C., making its recommendations to the Plowden Committee, mixed up teacher supply with education advantages. It put forward what I regard as a bastard theory. It suggests that it would be good to raise the age of leaving primary school to 12 or 13—it finally settles in favour of 12—and at the other end to raise the entry into school to 6, on the ground that the older children in a school are, the greater the status of the school and the more attraction it has for men.
  I must protest with all the force I can command at this concept that the status of a school depends on its size, or on the age of the children in it, or that there is something more dignified about a man teacher than about a woman teacher. I thought that we had ended the hang-over of sex inequality in education and that we were moving away from the concept that the smaller the children, the more there could be packed into a class and the less the teacher need be paid, and the lower his status. If we are

  1435
  to change the school transfer age, let it not be tied up with the question of attracting men, especially if the argument for attraction is fallacious.
  I will enter one last caveat. I am all for experimentation, but the teaching profession is afraid that too much experimentation can lead to fragmentation. Families in Britain are mobile. When a father and mother leave one area to go to another, they do not want to find a system of education so different that the child is handicapped in the transfer. This is why I am glad that the Minister himself must be satisfied about the reasons which prompt any change in the age of transfer. This is why I sympathise with the point of view of my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North. We do not want direction of education by the Minister from the centre. We want this marriage of local and central authority to continue in what I regard as a very pleasant and happy state.
  However, if we are so afraid of uniformity that we go to the opposite extreme and have too much variety in the system of education as between one part of England and another, children will be deprived, especially those who have to move, of equality of opportunity. Leaving one area for another is a trying enough experience in a child's educational career, but to leave one system of education for an entirely different system could be devastating for the child transferred.
  I hope that the Bill has an easy passage. We could have had a much bigger Bill, but this is not the political or Parliamentary time for it. I am glad that the right hon. and learned Gentleman has brought in a useful reform in Clauses 2 and 3 which rights an injustice and I hope that the authorities will use the powers of Clause 1 with care.
  7.45 p.m.
  Mr. Enoch Powell: I intervene in the debate only momentarily to support the hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) in his disagreement, for it was a real disagreement, with his hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey). Over the past years, it has undoubtedly been found that the time span 10½ to 12 is too narrow and constrictive
  1436
  as a definition of the outer limits of the age of transfer from primary to secondary education. We now know that the definition of "junior pupil" and "senior pupil" in the definition Clause of the Education Act, 1944, has proved too narrow for our purposes, and it is therefore right and necessary to do what the Bill does, to make it possible for organisations to be brought into existence, and for new schools to be built, in the light of ages of transfer which lie outside those limits—subject to the agreement of my right hon. and learned Friend.
  In other words, in the words of the hon. Member for Sunderland, North, there is ground for experiment. It is, however, quite wrong and contradictory, having said, and rightly said, that there is ground for wider experiment than the existing law permits, for him to complain that the Government and my right hon. and learned Friend do not give clear and explicit guidance on the reorganisation of secondary education, and indeed of education generally.
  The hon. Member for Itchen touched on one, and perhaps the most important, of the reasons why it would be premature at this stage to attempt to lay down such clear and explicit guidance from the centre. It is not only that the Plowden Committee is in the earlier stages of its work. It is mainly that the extension of the school age, both through the raising of the minimum leaving age to 16 and through the continual increase in the size of fifth and sixth forms, which is one of the most encouraging and important developments of recent years, opens out a field for the rethinking of the structure of our school education on which we are now only beginning to enter.
  It would be quite mistaken at this stage, at the moment when we are rightly making it possible to experiment with more freedom by loosening the statutory framework, to say at the same time that we ought to be coming forward with a clear and explicit policy from the centre.
  Having said that, and having with every hon. Member who has spoken supported my right hon. and learned Friend in his loosening of the bonds of the 1944 Act, I am afraid that I must accuse the hon. Member for Itchen himself of an inconsistency in the extraordinary passage in which he spoke of the Conservative

  1437
  Party getting on to the educational band wagon. As he went on to detail the major advances in education over the last 50 years, it was remarkable that every one of them had been introduced by a Conservative Government and Conservative Minister of Education. It is an extraordinary band wagon that one starts rolling oneself in order to get on to it. In fact, throughout the whole of this period the Conservative Party has been the pioneer in the great advances in education which the hon. Gentleman detailed. It is a pity that he should have fallen into this contradiction when he was rightly convicting his hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North of a less serious one.
  7.50 p.m.
  Mr. Merlyn Rees: The right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) raised the question of experimentation and how the Government can assist change. I propose to deal with that in a moment, so perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I do not come to it straight away.
  When the right hon. Gentleman indulged in party polemics at the end of his speech, he was unfair in regarding the 1944 Act as a Conservative one. I had always thought that my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) played at least some part in that legislation. As my right hon. Friend is retiring at the end of this Parliament, I think that it is only fair to put that on the record.
  Mrs. Eirene White: The 1918 Act, the other great Act, was also the product of a war-time Coalition Government and not of a Conservative Government.
  Mr. Rees: My hon. Friend is correct.
  I should like to concentrate my remarks on Clause 1—not that I regard Clause 2 as unimportant. Indeed, I am sure that we all have tragic cases brought to our notice by parents who have children who come under the category of Clause 2.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Morley (Dr. Broughton), who has a great interest in this matter, has also reminded me that in Leeds, part of which I represent, it is considered such an important question that the Leeds Trades Council has set up a committee
  1438
  to deal with the problem of mentally handicapped children and to try to force the Government to deal with the Scott Report, which it says has been pigeonholed. The council feels so strongly about this that a petition is being raised in the area to try to force the Government's hand.
  Clause 1, at line 2, refers to the establishing of a new county school and in line 3 there is another reference to a new school. Is there some legal reason for this? Does a school which is in existence become a new school, perhaps by altering the age range? I am wondering whether there is any underlying reason for the use of the word "new", twice in the Clause, and in the Minister's speech.
  Mr. Hogg: It is for the purpose of experimentation. There is no legal reason for it, but there is a political one. There is no necessity for it legally, although the Section 13 procedure which is involved is concerned mainly with closures and openings of schools.
  Mr. Rees: To me the great significance of Clause 1 is that it will allow yet other changes to be made based on the comprehensive principle.
  I should like to say a word about the bipartite or tripartite system. In another place the Minister of State said that the basic reasoning of the Hadow Report and the 1944 Act was now being questioned. I query the use of the word "now". The questioning of the tripartite or bipartite system has been going on for many years, and in my view was wrong from the beginning. It was a great pity that the arguments about three types of children were enshrined in some sort of educational canon law. As the word "now" was used by the Minister responsible for schools, I draw to the attention of the right hon. and learned Gentleman a speech that was made by the Minister of State who is now responsible for higher education.
  Speaking to the Education Committee Conference on the 5th July, last year, he said:
  "Let me assure you that neither I nor my colleagues in the Government are wedded to any particular pattern of secondary school organisation; none of us believes in pre-war terms that children can be sharply differentiated

  1439
  into various types or levels of ability; and I certainly would not wish to advance the view that the bipartite system, as it is often called, should be regarded as the right and usual way of organising secondary education, compared with which everything else must be stigmatised"—
  that is the word he used—
  "as experimental".
  More recently, in fact on 26th June, the right hon. and learned Gentleman said:
  "It was already generally accepted doctrine seven years ago that the old tripartite division of secondary schools … corresponded to no sensible division of ability amongst pupils."
  The Minister responsible for education in another place believes that it is only now that the tripartite system is being questioned. He is mistaken, and I think that we should have the Government's view on this.
  Now I take up the use of the word "experimental" by the right hon. Gentleman and also, mistakenly—in my view—by my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King). In another place the Minister said on 9th April:
  "The Bill will allow experimental bridges to be thrown across the gulf."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, House of Lords, 9th April, 1964; Vol. 257, c. 262.]
  Yet the Minister responsible for higher education regards the word "experimental" as a stigma, judging from what I quoted a moment ago.
  There is a world of difference between the two. There is a world of difference in approach. If we regard the existing tripartite system, however modified, as the norm, everything else is an experiment which may or may not come off. What is the Government's policy with regard to this. In a recent debate the Parliamentary Secretary talked about the dangers of being dogmatic in education. I agree with him, but the trouble is that if one supports the existing set up, the established system, one is regarded as not being dogmatic. One becomes dogmatic only when one is trying to effect some sort of change.
  I respect the views of the right hon. and learned Gentleman and of the right hon. Gentleman about the tripartite system, but in my view theirs is not the general view of the party opposite. It is not a very rewarding exercise, but recently I have ploughed through various
  1440
  local government election addresses, and even Parliament election addresses. I found that time and again it was said that we on this side of the House wanted to destroy this system; that we were against the tripartite system.
  I specifically exempt from that the leader of the Tory group on the City of Leeds Education Commitee. Whatever differences he has with our side of the council chamber, the arguments are carried on and couched in terms which to my mind show that both sides of the Chamber are looking for reasonable forms of change. It is not enough to have a change of heart at the top. We have heard this afternoon that it is a partnership between the central Government and local government. There must be reasonable views at the local level as well.
  I return to Clause 1 of the Bill. This will allow other arrangements for primary and secondary to be made. In my view the principle one will be schools which will take children from nine-plus to 13-plus. It will make viable a middle school. This is something for which, in a small way, I have worked for many years. It is one reason why I welcome the Bill in general, and this Clause in particular.
  I am prepared to be dogmatic about this, after a good many years working in schools. It is wrong at any one time to try to sort children out into one category or another. Not that children do not differ in ability; goodness knows, they do. But whatever method one uses, and at whatever age one says, "This is what this child will do in the future", one is bound to be wrong. I believe dogmatically, therefore, in the comprehensive principle. But I do not believe dogmatically in the form of carrying it out. It must be carried out in a wide variety of ways.
  I would like to bring in a personal note involving the right hon. and learned Gentleman. I was once involved in a by-election in which I was unsuccessful, in 1959, in a suburban area near London, and the right hon. and learned Gentleman came to speak at a political meeting in the school where I worked—the school that I had attended, that my wife had attended and to which all my friends went. I was responsible for the sixth form, university entrants, and so on. I

  1441
  was told afterwards that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had challenged my arguments on that occasion, and had said that I was a chap who wanted to destroy all this. But my argument then was precisely the same as that which the right hon. and learned Gentleman has been using this evening. I am grateful when one sinner repenteth.
  Mr. J. C. Jennings: I am following the hon. Member's arguments about selection very closely. Does he reject selection altogether, at any stage in the child's career? If he does, how does he apportion a child's abilities and say that one child will go into the grammar school stream and another into the secondary school stream, and so on?
  Mr. Rees: All I am arguing is that this should be done within the context of one school, so that changes can take place.
  Mr. Jennings: By examination?
  Mr. Rees: If necessary, in certain subjects. The point is that if the break is made at 11-plus we are telling a child that a decision has been made. That is what is put on the piece of paper that the parents receive.
  I feel very strongly about this. Perhaps there is also a psychological reason behind it. I failed the 11-plus, although I passed it the year afterwards, because another school was built. Subsequently I spent ten years at university. Can anybody blame me for thinking that the bloke who told me that I had failed was wrong? One swallow does not make a summer, but I am very sceptical about selection at 11 years of age. I believe in selection, but in my view it must be done in the context of one school.
  There was a sneaking feeling on my part—I am sure that I was wrong—that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had come to this political meeting realising that education was an important issue. Perhaps he had not read what my argument was, or perhaps he was deploying his argument in terms of electoral advantage. I acquit him of this, however, and I feel that the fact that what he said was wrong five years ago is now being put forward by him shows that there has been a change of mind on his part.
  I make no complaint about it, but the odd thing is that the right hon. and
  1442
  learned Gentleman went to a relatively non-selective school for children and young people between the ages of 13 and 18. That is excellent, but I would have thought that the fact that I was putting forward on that occasion an argument for a school other than a very selective one for the ages from 13 to 18, would have been very pleasant from his point of view, because imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I was simply arguing that a school for children between the ages of 13 and 18 provided a much better unit than did one for children between the ages of 11 and 18. I still believe so.
  Mr. Hogg: I must correct the hon. Member. The school which I attended was highly selective.
  Mr. Rees: We could argue about this a great deal. I prefer to believe that the Common Entrance Examination is far more flexible, perhaps in terms of the social background of people, than is the 11-plus selection examination. I go so far as to say that if, as is suggested, at 11-plus we are sorting out people who will pass the General Certificate Examination—that is the object of the 11-plus examination—yet it is not what we are trying to do in the Common Entrance Examination, very sensibly.
  In the context of examination successes overall—and I am not playing down the high academic successes of certain public schools—the ordinary level G.C.E. has a higher rate of pass at grammar schools than is the case in the general run of public schools. I do not put forward the argument that grammar schools are superior to public schools, but we are telling the child who enters a grammar school, "You are selected as suitable for an intellectual type of education".
  Mr. Jennings: The hon. Member constantly refers to the process of selection. That is what is behind our whole system and method, and our feeling about change. He keeps talking about the fact that at 11-plus a child is told that he is destined to take the G.C.E. Let us be quite plain about this. In a comprehensive system of education, at what stage in a child's career will he be told that he will take the G.C.E.—and how?
  Mr. Rees: It would depend upon different subjects. This is becoming a pedagogic argument. In certain subjects one would have to begin to form a judgment

  1443
  at 11 or 12 years of age, but in other subjects it would not worry me if no attempt was made until 14 or 15 years of age. This is not the time to deploy arguments about the weaknesses in our concept of intelligence. I am in favour of the able child. I feel strongly about the great need of this country for able children. I am simply saying that I regard our present system as the wrong way of going about selection.
  I now turn to a subject which was touched upon by the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West and by my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey)—the question of the communication of ideas. One of the great problems in modern life is the problem of communication in industry and in other human activities. A similar problem exists in education. How do the people in the schools—administrators and teachers—find out what is going on in other schools in other areas? At the moment we are told that 90 out of our 140 local education authorities are investigating change. The result of this Bill will be to spark off even more investigation. But in my view it is not good enough that these discussions should take place only at inspectorate level. We know that they go on. The inspectorate gathers a great deal of knowledge about different parts of the country, and we teachers pick up rumours that the chief inspector and other inspectors are discussing proposals with the director of education.
  This is not good enough. Discussions must go on, but they should be wider. It is not good enough that directors should have their own pet schemes, some of which are first-rate and some of which could lead to a great deal of trouble. I put forward the plea that this is a political matter. I am astonished when people say that this should be kept out of politics. If ever there was a political argument, this is it. People should discuss these matters on the basis of informed opinion. The trouble is that there is nothing to work on. At the very least, without the right hon. and learned Gentleman's Department deciding or commenting upon anything, some sort of information should be available.
  What have been the results of the London County Council scheme? What have been the results of the changes that
  1444
  have gone on in Leicestershire. Is it perfect? Are there no weaknesses in the plan? The Leicesteshire experiment it seems is excellent, but we have to read the Sunday newspapers, and the odd articles in various publications, in order to gain any information about it. It would not be canon law; it would not mean that because the right hon. and learned Gentleman has commented on a scheme that it should be regarded as the right way to proceed. But there should be some method by which people can talk intelligently about the various methods of selection, and schemes of secondary education.
  The whole question of selection has changed over the years. I am going to be personal again. This is very much a personal matter for many people. My father passed the 11-plus under the original 1906 arrangement and then, by some curious alchemy, he and most of his friends went to work in the pit. In my day, too, the result of my examination made a difference—it decided my future. I am not prepared to have my children's future determined by what is written on a simple piece of paper at the age of 10-plus.
  This is a political matter. The right hon. and learned Gentleman will find that this argument seems to be far more important in areas where his party has the greatest support. By the very nature of social change they tend to be the people, on the whole, who went to grammar schools, and they are determined to see that their children have a similar sort of education. Most of them, sensibly enough, admit that they are not arguing that their children are all geniuses.
  I come back to the point about the public schools. The civilised factor about public schools which has struck me since I came in contact with them—or rather with the people who went to them—is that, unlike some of our grammar schools, they do not set such great store by academic success. To my mind that is a much more civilised attitude. To return to this Bill and this Clause and the question of the schools for children from 9 to 13. Are there problems which we can face before these schools are set up? It is put to me strongly by colleagues, not of my political belief, who teach in the traditional 11 to 18 schools

  1445
  that to make the break at 13-plus will profoundly affect G.C.E. successes at 16. It will give only three years in the grammar school and that would be fatal. Many people in grammar schools are seriously worried about the effect on science and language teaching. They say they must have the full five years. Is this is? Is there no experience on which we can draw? Must it all be a leap in the dark? People feel strongly about this and that is why many of them disagree with my educational views which they say will destroy the institution which has developed over the years.
  When I asked at a number of schools, the argument was put to me—now I am still acting as a devil's advocate—that there will be a shortage of trained staff for the middle schools. There is a shortage it is said of teachers in higher education anyway; they are being funnelled off to teacher training colleges, to colleges of advanced technology and universities. The highly qualified teacher wishes to teach the sixth form. He will not get sixth form work in the middle school. To a large degree it is a problem of salaries. The extra money comes from sixth form teaching. I ask that some consideration be given to the needs of the middle school. With full pre-consideration, they could, in my view, lead to a profound and valuable change in some parts of British education. In my view, this question of middle school salaries will have to be discussed at Burnham. It should loom large in the salary discussions which are now taking place. There is a lot to be said for staff colleges where this sort of thing could be discussed. If the Army, the Navy and the Air Force can have staff colleges to discuss major issues, the teaching profession, in its widest sense, should also have them.
  There is a point of constituency interest that I should like to raise. There are some schemes, which are similar to the Leicestershire scheme, I suppose, where the boy or girl will go from 9 to 13-plus and if the parents then wish, and the child wishes, go on to a grammar school from 14 to 18, similar to the public schools. I am told that in some schemes unless they opt to stay until 18 they stay in the existing school up to 15. It has been put to me by headmasters that this is fatal in working-class areas
  1446
  where lads of 13-plus are not in a position to move on to the grammar school—not because their parents are wicked people, but because they are paid on hourly wages and do not know what the future will be. It may also be that there is no tradition of university or college. If the lad goes home at 13-plus and asks to stay at school until he is 18, more often than not the answer is likely to be "No". If the lad however stays on until he is 16 he often finds himself doing five subjects at O-level. He is more mature than the average child and often he makes the decision himself that he will go on for two years in the sixth form and on to university. This is a social factor which ought to be taken into account. In general, however, I welcome the middle school idea.
  I wish to raise with the right hon. and learned Gentleman the question of parental choice. We all know that in Section 76 of the Act it says that the wishes of the parents have to be taken into account. We also know that they are not. We know—at least I know—that in answering a Question which I put to him last week, the right hon. and learned Gentleman said:
  "Authorities generally do not allocate pupils to different types of secondary education to meet the wishes of parents …"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th June, 1964, Vol. 697, c. 104.]
  During the Faversham by-election I was astonished to find that the right hon. Gentleman said
  "We"—
  that is the party opposite—
  "will not force other people's children into schools against their parents' wills."
  That is what the right hon. and learned Gentleman said. It is done now. I have no choice in respect of my lad. The right hon. Gentleman is arguing on a political occasion that there is now parental choice. How else can one interpret his words? I challenge him, in order to get this clear. On reading this, many of my friends believed it. One got in touch with the local authority and said that the Minister responsible for education was saying that now there was parental choice and that the wicked Labour Party would end it. What was in the mind of the right hon. and learned Gentleman when he said this? The only way one can get parental choice is by some sort of comprehensive system.

  1447
  There is also the question of where the local education authority comes into the picture—
  Mr. Charles Loughlin: Before my hon. Friend leaves the question of parental choice, may I ask whether it is not true to say that very often the choice is restricted by the catchment area determined by the local authority? Even where there are parents in a catchment area who wish to send their children out of the area the local authority refuses to give the parent a choice.
  Mr. Rees: That is a different question, the question of catchment areas arises in terms of similar types of schools. I am making the case in respect of the 11-plus examination and selection.
  In the same speech the right hon. and learned Gentleman said:
  "We will not force children into schools against the wish of the local social democracy. … "
  That was a bit of a Freudian slip, the reference to social democracy, but those are the words used. The party of the right hon. and learned Gentleman will not go against the wishes of the local authorities who desire to change their type of secondary education. There is no other way to read what he said. What does that mean? What of the plans being actively discussed politically in the area of the Greater London Council, where the borough councils have responsibility for secondary education, and all sorts of exciting ideas are being discussed? People there read this speech and took it to mean, as I did, that the Minister is saying that he will not go against the wishes of local social democracy That is what he said at Faversham and I can only assume that it is correct.
  I mentioned earlier a by-election in which the right hon. and learned Gentleman attacked me for views which he now holds. During the Faversham by-election we find him with some sort of split political personality. On the first occasion I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt, but now, in my view, the right hon. and learned Gentleman says one thing as Minister of Education and another when there is political
  1448
  advantage to be gained from it. We were rather cross about this at home and we got crosser about it every day. Then on 23rd June the right hon. and learned Gentleman made a speech to the Association of Education Committees. This was a different right hon. Gentleman. He said:
  "Each side, I think, in national and local politics owes an obligation, so far as he can, so to operate the party battle which is essential for the continuance of our democratic life that public advantage emerges."
  What public advantage emerges from the statement I quoted which was made in the Faversham by-election? His own lapses, I suppose, are responsible for the inclusion of the phrase, "So far as he can". It seems that the right hon. and learned Gentleman cannot.
  Watching his performance in education, on the one hand belligerent and aggressive and on the other humble and objective—the two sides of the character of the right hon. and learned Gentleman—I wondered what it reminded me of. I cast my mind back to the secondary schools in which I worked, I looked through the various Reports by Hadow, Spens and so on and looked at the psychological sections. I consulted the journals. I read book after book and found that the hallmark of the adolescent is a personality that fluctuates between aggressiveness and humility. The right hon. and learned Gentleman is the essential adolescent. He has the doubtful distinction of being the first adolescent to be the Minister responsible for education while still actually adolescing. There is no other way in which to interpret the speech he made at Faversham.
  He made two statements. He said that those whose children are coming up to the 11-plus can operate parental choice, but they cannot. He also stated to local authorities that he will not interfere with local social democracy. Is this the case? He says one thing education-wise and one thing political-wise. This does not help people who rightly or wrongly feel dogmatically both ways. The job of the Government is to play these things down so that changes can take place when people themselves have cooled down and are able to look at these matters objectively. We should not force these things on to people. While I wholeheartedly believe the Bill is a step forward, I wish

  1449
  that the right hon. and learned Gentleman responsible for it would realise his wider educational responsibilities on political occasions.
  8.22 p.m.
  Mr. J. C. Jennings: In part I welcome this Bill. I am not so happy about Clause 1, but I think that the other Clauses are admirable.
  I should like to follow the hon. Member for Leeds, South (Mr. Merlyn Rees) on the question of selection. I may have something to say about that later. We must realise that in education we are living in an age of transition. It has been said from both sides of the House that the 1944 Act, whether it is regarded as a tripartite or bipartite system, is dead. It is certain that whatever we think of the 1944 Act now it performed a revolutionary purpose in our system and it gave us what we always needed in education, a mixed system. That is what I always want to see. I never want to see our educational system in a straitjacket. There is room for experiment, yes, and that is the value of this Bill.
  In the uncertainty and in the controversial thinking on education which is going on in all parts of the country and in this House it is of paramount importance that we should recognise that a new look at the whole system is needed. If it is true that the 1944 Act is dead or dying, we have to have a new Act which will reshape our system to what we want it to be. That is why we await the outcome of the Plowden Committee with some interest. The point of controversy in this argument tonight obviously ranges around the present system of grammar schools, secondary modern, secondary technical and primary schools, on the one hand, and the full-blooded comprehensive system on the other. This is what literally divides the two parties.
  I am not dogmatic about comprehensive schools or a comprehensive system. I have said for many years now that there are certain parts of the country where a comprehensive school is the correct answer. In a wide, diversified rural area in which we could not get a large enough entry stream it is obvious that a comprehensive school is the right answer. In East Anglia, Anglesey and
  1450
  certain other places that is the type of thing we need, but in an area such as my constituency of Burton, where so far as is humanly possible we have achieved a perfect educational system—which is not threatened by the Labour Party but which is threatened by something about which I shall have something to say next week—the comprehensive system would not be the answer. It would despoil and destroy years and years of work, particularly the work of the grammar schools and technical schools.
  This is the challenge; this is where we have to examine our policies. I say quite bluntly to my right hon. and learned Friend, is Clause 1 of the Bill the beginning of the end of the grammar school? I am not talking of the grammar school system but about the grammar school as a separate entity, a separate school. We all know about the Leicestershire plan. It keeps grammar schools as grammar schools but essentially it changes the very nature and content of the school so that no longer does it carry on the traditional pattern of the grammar school.
  Mr. Merlyn Rees Mr. Merlyn Rees indicated assent.
  Mr. Jennings: I am glad that the hon. Member fully agrees. I accept the challenge politically. In my political thinking as applied to education, the Leicestershire plan and all its hybrid brothers and sisters and cousins are a definite challenge and danger to what I regard as the traditional grammar school. Whether it is a middle school of 9 to 13 or if the break comes at 14 and the parent has the right to opt for his or her child to go to a so-called grammar school irrespective of ability, when it comes to selection what do we expect of a grammar school?
  The hon. Member said that he is all for the able body. I am delighted that in the Bill we make provision for the handicapped child. When it comes to the high flyer I am almost a heretic. In recent years we have done a tremendous amount for the maladjusted and handicapped child. Let us go on doing that. What we are tending to do in reshaping our educational system, obviously in the limited experiment allowed for in Clause 1, is to descend to a level of mediocrity.
  Dr. King: Has the hon. Member seen the records of the academic achievements of the sixth forms of comprehensive schools? Does he know, for instance, that in the Isle of Man the achievements in quantity and quality in the sixth form, academically considered, are superior to anything which existed in comparable grammar schools?
  Mr. Jennings: I do not dispute that comprehensive schools are doing a wonderful job. I said that I am not dogmatic about comprehensive schools. The point I was taking was that made by the hon. Member for Leeds, South about selection. I am quite sure that in a comprehensive school they are in the end put into streams. They must be. I have no doubt that this is done successfully, as the hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) says, and that they get wonderful results. I was pointing out certain effects of the Leicestershire plan. A parent has a right to say of the child when it is 13, "This child will go to a grammar school irrespective of whether it is dull and backward or a high flyer". I was talking about the high flyers.
  Mr. Rees: I pointed out that there are 90 local education authorities watching Leicestershire. The hon. Member says that there is mediocrity in the Leicestershire scheme. How does he know? Has he read of the L.E.A.s moving forward without, on the surface, any informed opinion?
  Mr. Jennings: I have informed opinion, because I live on the edge of Leicestershire, I am the Member for Burton and I have watched this plan develop ever since its inception. Under a plan such as the Leicestershire plan, by which, irrespective of ability, a child can be sent to a grammar school, we shall tend to a level of mediocrity. I have seen it for myself. I have a classic case on my own doorstep where the whole nature of a traditional grammar school is being changed by this influx. The hon. Member quoted colleagues in the profession who were frightened that this would cramp and stultify the whole scope of grammar school education.
  We have done much for the average and maladjusted children, but if we as a nation are to hold our own in a highly competitive and computer-minded world,
  1452
  we must give the earth to our high flyers, to the top 5, 6 or 7 per cent. We have to groom them and to give them every encouragement possible, and we must get away from social justice, averaging out and mediocrity. Let us encourage our high flyers, and we shall compete with the best in the world.
  We have heard much nonsense talked about the wickedness of the 11-plus. Whether it is 11-plus, 12-plus, 13-plus, 18-plus or 21-plus, we underestimate the resilience of our children when we talk about the stresses and strains of examinations. How do we select at any stage in a child's career? We come back every time to some form of test, whether it is an objective test, an essay test or the old-fashioned scholarship. We must test at some time. We have heard much poppycock about the child not knowing about the test, but we underestimate the intelligence of the children. Even if it is spread over two years or more, they will begin to sense when they are being examined. The hon. Member is a teacher, and he knows. In every class there are children, no matter how good the teaching, no matter how competent the school, no matter how grand the amenities, who detest school. When people tell me that the comprehensive system gets rid of selection, I say that it is complete nonsense. In the end we have the grammar school stream, the average stream and the dull and backward stream in the comprehensive school. The parents, instead of saying that Johnny has gone to a grammar school, will say that he is in the grammar school stream.
  I welcome the Bill, but I am frightened about Clause 1. In another place the Minister of State for Education and Science said that this was a simple operation intended to enable a strictly limited number of educational experiments to take place. Does my right hon. and learned Friend agree with this phrase? I am sorry that I was not present for the opening of the debate, but I was busy with the affairs of Burton ready for next week.
  Mr. Hogg: If my hon. Friend refers to HANSARD tomorrow he will see that I said almost exactly the same thing. I hope that it was not very much different, and if there is any difference I will try to explain it.
  Mr. Jennings: The phrase was "a strictly limited number of educational experiments". The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) said that the Bill mainly put right what authorities had been doing outside the Act, because the Director of Education for Leicestershire saw how he could drive his educational coach through the Act, and this set the whole process going. In another place Baroness Summerskill explained what this Bill will do. This blows the gaff and gives the game away. She said:
  "More and more local authorities are anxious to introduce comprehensive schools"—
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Robert Grimston): Order. The hon. Member must not quote from a speech in another place except by a Minister. He may refer to what the noble Lady said.
  Mr. Jennings: I will paraphrase it. She said that the purpose of the Bill was to enable local authorities who were desirous of bringing in comprehensive education in their areas to do so. This is what frightens me about the Bill. It pleases hon. Members opposite. I want to see a proper approach to the word "comprehensive" in our educational system, which I admit needs reshaping.
  In spite of all the criticism, we have a system of education of which we should be rightly proud. I am sick and tired of people denigrating our educational system and comparing it unfavourably with the systems in the U.S.S.R. and U.S.A. We have many things which we could teach them. No doubt they have many which they could teach us. But in all our debates and discussions, let us stick up for our own country.
  8.38 p.m.
  Mr. George Lawson: As a Scotsman who is not a schoolmaster, I have some hesitation in challenging the hon. Member for Burton (Mr. Jennings), who is an ex-schoolmaster. Schoolmasters are rather like doctors. The suggestion is that no one but a schoolmaster has any right to put forward any views on education and what should be done about education.
  Mr. Jennings: I did not say that, nor did I imply it.
  Mr. Lawson: Perhaps I should have said that in this respect some schoolmasters are rather like doctors. Doctors
  1454
  perhaps have a better justification for this attitude than some schoolmasters. I am reinforced in my readiness to offer a little criticism because I know many schoolmasters who disagree with the hon. Member for Burton. Educationists are very divided on this issue. There are the stalwart opponents of the comprehensive system, of whom the hon. Gentleman is one. There are the stalwart supporters of the comprehensive system, of whom my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South (Mr. Meryln Rees) is one.
  Although the Bill is a small Bill as regards Scotland—only one of the Clauses relates directly to Scotland—the main subject of debate this evening is of considerable interest to us all in Scotland. I am happy to say that Clause 1, about which there has been so much discussion, is unnecessary in Scotland. Traditionally over the years—and over a much longer period than has been the case in England—Scotland has had an education system which has been open to virtually all youngsters. It has been a comprehensive system. The schools which are still boasted of in Scotland are comprehensive schools.
  The characteristic school in Scotland is a comprehensive school. At the time when comprehensive schools were the schools in Scotland beyond any question, doubt or challenge, Scotland beyond any question or doubt provided the rulers of England—I will not say "and Wales". Doubt as to the status and standing of Scotland is beginning to emerge only now that we have begun to adopt something of the English system. The setting up of what we call junior secondary schools, sorting children out when they are about 11 or 12 into the junior secondary school or the senior secondary school, is indicative of the type of system that there is in England, and it is causing very grave disharmony and much disturbance in Scotland.
  This is an alien system which is being injected into our long-established system which produced such excellent results. The hon. Member for Burton doubts the possibility of the comprehensive school operating in areas with large concentrations of youngsters where there could be a diversity of schools. In Scotland we have had comprehensive

  1455
  schools in country areas and in towns. Heriot's in Edinburgh is a comprehensive school. Over the years, Scottish comprehensive schools have produced men and women, in so far as opportunities have been available for women in Scotland, who have shown that they can carry the burden of empire as well as any coming from the playing fields of Eton.
  The hon. Member for Burton said that the comprehensive system was a step towards reducing everyone to the level of mediocrity. He said that the high flyers—the 4 per cent. to 6 per cent.—should be singled out and carefully nurtured so that they would reach right to the top, and that this would enable us to hold our own with the rest of the world. The Empire was not built on the high flyer. We have all heard the argument that battles were won and empires made on the playing fields of Eton. Those who came from the public schools of England and who were said to have played such a large part in building and running the Empire, which has now gone, were not the type of people who had the high academic ability and quality of which the hon. Gentleman spoke.
  Britain and the world needs a great range of developed capacity and I believe that in some respects we tend to be needlessly narrow in our views and unaware of what the world requires, for we must not think in terms of one or two types of ability possessed by hand-picked youngsters when tested at the age of 11, 12, 18 or even 19. If youngsters are given the right opportunities they select their own range of capacity according to their abilities. This is the way people who are worth anything emerge. Many of them emerge having had to overcome great handicaps, but I appreciate that not all of them emerge and I agree that in the past a world of potential capacity mus have been lost through lack of opportunity.
  I am not agreeing that all the emphasis should be placed on the special child. It is too easy to concentrate on the child who can easily remember or easily turn something off his or her pen. There are many others who are equally able to turn things out with their hands, things which the youngster more adept
  1456
  at using a pen would never dream of making.
  In considering the way we should proceed we must consider what tests we apply, what means we have of saying, "This is the best way to find the most promising youngsters". This cannot be decided on the basis of a test at school or university. One must see what the boy or girl does upon becoming a man or woman; how he or she lives and the sort of things that are done. It is for this reason that I say that we tend to be needlessly narrow in selecting certain types according to ability.
  Whatever happens, we must provide the best facilities we can, although I believe that those facilities will always be limited and that we will never achieve all we desire. Nevertheless, if I were asked what sort of youngster I would nurture and nourish I would say not only or not so much the lad o' pairts, the lad of ability, because he starts out with an advantage, but the youngster who finds progress more difficult. It is rather a contradiction in terms to think that we spend so much more effort on the child who finds learning easy. If youngsters with less ability were helped to get over their difficulties they might be able to show many of the high flyers and quick-off-the-mark fellows just what they can do. I am, of course, talking not merely in terms of character but of sheer ability.
  Mr. Jennings: I hope that the hon. Member will realise that I, too, made a differentiation. I did not for a moment suggest that the dull or backward child should be neglected. I pay tribute to what we are doing on their behalf and I have urged that more should be done. I also recognise that over the years, particularly since the war, the average child has been encouraged to a great degree. I emphasised the fact that there was a danger involved here but, at the same time, I urged that we should not neglect the real high flyer—the type who can make all the difference between our position in the world being a high or low one.
  Mr. Lawson: I cannot accept that, and although I do not wish to drive the hon. Member into an extreme position, what he is suggesting is dangerous and could

  1457
  lead, if followed, to a growing concentration of effort on the brightest youngster to the detriment of the rest.
  Mr. Jennings Mr. Jennings indicated dissent.
  Mr. Lawson: I can, perhaps, best illustrate my point by referring to a school in my constituency. This came to my notice only a few months ago. I attended a women's meeting and heard them talking about their youngsters. One woman described a class of children who were about 18 months away from the sorting-out process—it is not the 11-plus with us. She said that they were already sorted out by the teacher into categories, and that in one category was the cream of the children, to whom the teacher wished to devote his energies to seeing that they passed. Those others who did not pass were doomed from that stage onwards. I know of a headmaster who, after asking the children to which of the senior schools they hoped to go looked down his nose and audibly spoke of the hopelessness of their thinking that they could get to a particular school. One child told her parents of that kind of thing.
  Here is stigmatising, and the putting on of the seal of failure, as I hear my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) comment. We cannot say what capacity a youngster has, and we should provide opportunities for the youngster himself to select one of a number of ways that are equally necessary to our society. I might add that the right hon. Gentleman has taken over control of higher education in Scotland very much against my inclination; and that it will not be long before he hears a lot from us on the subject.
  We welcome Clause 3, and are only surprised and a little distressed that it should come forward in this way. I well remember that at 15 minutes past 11 o'clock at night on 8th May, 1963, the noble Lady the Under-Secretary told my hon. Friends and myself that she could not accept just precisely what is now before us. I was then substituting, as my hon. Friends will recall, for our hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Mary-hill (Mr. Hannan), who has persisted on this point over the years. He had been pressing it just prior to that occasion, and had been turned down on the basis that this could not be done on a Scottish
  1458
  basis but only on a United Kingdom basis. As on that occasion, my hon. Friend the Member for Maryhill is not able to be with us tonight, although that was very much his wish. Indeed, had he been here I would not have been speaking at all.
  All the arguments having been produced to show how weak and absurd that United Kingdom basis was, the noble Lady rose at 15 minutes past 11 o'clock on 8th May, 1963—
  Mr. William Ross: Without a single Tory supporter.
  Mr. Lawson: —and said that the argument about the United Kingdom did not enter into the discussion, but that there was a quite different argument. We had destroyed that argument, and the noble Lady proceeded to tell us that it did not matter and had never mattered and that what mattered was that if she on behalf of the Government were to adopt what my hon. Friend the Member for Maryhill had urged on her the Government would be adopting a practice which would be detrimental to the existing set-up. Her argument was that the compulsory school-leaving age for the handicapped child was 16, as opposed to the normal 15, and that my hon. Friend's scheme would mean that those responsible would be acting contrary to the encouragement of ability. The payment of the grant or bursary was not designed to help a family in need—a family allowance could perhaps do that—but was intended to encourage a child of ability to stay voluntarily at school. In proposing our scheme we were therefore going contrary to a basic principle.
  This was something like the argument which we have heard today from the hon. Member for Burton. Here was a rejection of my hon. Friend's plea to help the handicapped child, and the noble Lady said that if the scheme were adopted it would produce the criterion of age rather than of voluntary attendance at school by the child of ability. We did not think very highly of that argument then, any more than we do now after listening to the hon. Member for Burton.
  Mr. James Boyden: Obviously; the Scottish Office was far behind the English Education Department, because when my hon. Friend the

  1459
  Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) and I were pressing for a long time for the adoption of this proposal we were told that it was just a matter of finding the Parliamentary time. There was great difficulty in finding that time, but the Scottish Office obviously was against the proposal in principle.
  Mr. Lawson: If one does not want to do something one can find any sort of argument. On one occasion it suited the noble Lady's book to take one line, and on another occasion it suited the Government to take another. The noble Lady spoke of the difficulties and the repercussions which were produced. Her heart bled for the handicapped youngsters. She has a heart and it occasionally shows itself, but on that occasion she said that nothing could be done because many more new difficulties would be created. It was so immensely difficult that despite her sympathy and her desire to help, and despite the pleadings of my hon. Friend the Member for Maryhill over the years, it could not be done—and yet now here it is done in nine lines of this Clause. The noble Lady really will have to do some explaining of all this. I am commissioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Maryhill to welcome what the Government are now doing. It should have been done long before this.
  9.0 p.m.
  Mr. Geoffrey Johnson Smith: I had not intended to intervene in the debate, but I have found it so fascinating, particularly some of the comments of hon. Members opposite, especially those of the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey), that I think it right to say a few words.
  Along with hon. Members on both sides, I welcome the Bill for the reasons which have been ably put by previous speakers, notably the particularly persuasive reasons advanced by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell). Whatever our reasons for welcoming the Bill may be, there is one piece of common ground, I think, namely, that all of us recognise the need for change and we think that the Bill will help us to come to sensible conclusions about the nature of that change. We are all innovators.
  1460
  However, the course of the debate has clearly shown that that is about as far as agreement between the two sides goes.
  The basic question is, "Change to what?" Some of us refuse to be stampeded in this matter. In my view, we are in some danger of moving into an era when there are too many pedagogues peddling panaceas, not all of them as persuasive as their promoters imagine. There have been many strong views expressed, and there is the danger of mighty schisms developing in the education world over the next few years. As the hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) so wisely said, if too many of these views are given credence and are implemented, there will be the danger of severe fragmentation in our education structure.
  The hon. Member for Sunderland, North gave me the impression—I think that he gave the House generally the same impression—that he regards the Bill as a kind of signpost to the comprehensive school. This is certainly one of the interpretation put on it by the noble Lady, Baroness Summerskill, in another place. I do not regard the Bill as anything of the sort, and I take this view not for any reasons of prejudice. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Mr. Jennings), I believe that there is a very good case to be made for comprehensive schools, but I see no reason why the good grammar school, the proficient technical school and the sound secondary modern school should be swept away and the comprehensive system be substituted in their place. I strongly reject the dogmatic approach of the hon. Member for Sunderland, North and some of his hon. Friends.
  The hon. Gentleman told my right hon. and learned Friend that he should give a clear lead to the local authorities. Some of the flaws in his argument were pointed out very clearly by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West and I shall not develop them further, but I wonder to what extent the hon. Member for Sunderland, North thinks that his own party, of which he is one of the principal spokesmen, is giving us much of a clear lead about the organisation of our secondary education system.
  My critical view of the party opposite in this respect is shared by many people

  1461
  outside the House. I draw particularly to the attention of the House an editorial published on 8th May in the "Teacher", which, as we know, is the journal of the National Union of Teachers. I hope that it will not be regarded as too lengthy a quote because I believe that it says something important and that what it says deserves a wider audience. The "Teacher" says:
  "For some time we have been asking what the Labour Party is going to do about the grammar schools in the light of the Party's declared aim to introduce a comprehensive system of secondary education and Mr. Wilson's, somewhat contradictory statement that they would be abolished 'over his dead body'. Many other people must have been asking the same question, because Labour's National Executive has issued a special circular for the guidance of M.P.s and election workers on the subject. The new circular says that Socialists intend to reorganise secondary education on comprehensive lines"—
  we heard that today from the hon. Member for Sunderland, North—
  "and in carrying this out they will carefully preserve what is valuable in grammar school education, namely, a wide range of courses up to university entrance standard. What it does not say is what will happen to the grammar schools themselves, as separate, selective institutions—which is precisely what everyone wants to know. And yet, in the Commons last week Mr. Merlyn Rees, M.P., himself a former grammar school boy and teacher, said that the last thing he would do was to destroy the grammar school system. The National Executive might have saved its time; all its circular has done is to perpetuate the present equivocal position of the Party on this subject."
  I would hope that the Labour Party would be less equivocal. I think that it would serve the cause of education for it to be so. It would serve the cause of education tremendously if some hon. Members who belong to the Parliamentary Labour Party were, in some places, less dogmatic. I think that this is what my right hon. Friend may have had in mind when he suggested at Faversham that the freedom of choice of our citizens in the form of education that we have in this country would be seriously limited if a comprehensive system of education were imposed. If one adds to the view of the hon. Member for Sunderland, North the view expressed by some hon. Members opposite about what they would do to the independent private sector of education if they were the Government, it makes me, for one, shudder about the freedom of choice which the people of
  1462
  this country would have. It seems to me that at no time has a rational and pragmatic approach to education been more needed than now, and, in my view, this Bill approaches the problem in just that spirit.
  9.7 p.m.
  Mr. James Boyden: I agree with the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras, South (Mr. G. Johnson Smith) that the Bill is not exactly a panacea. It is a mousey little Bill. It is certainly not the Pandora's Box which the hon. Member for Burton (Mr. Jennings) feared that it might be. I wanted to remind the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell), who is having a very long dinner hour, and the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras, South that in 1867 Disraeli stele the Liberals' clothes and Gladstone won a great victory in 1868. In 1944, Conservative Ministers in the Coalition Government were compelled by Labour Members of the Cabinet and the feeling of the country to attire themselves in educational clothes which fitted them badly. The British public was not deceived by the Tory disguise. They gave the Tory masqueraders a decisive verdict in 1945.
  During the last twelve months hon. Members opposite have been dressing up again, and, in the words of a very eminent Tory, they have learned nothing and forgotten nothing. In the 1964 election the public will ignore their fancy costume and return the Labour Party.
  The Bill has three Tory characteristics. It is too little, and very late. It is the 59th minute of the eleventh hour. It is cheap Tory modernisation. It offers marginal improvement with the minimum of finance. There is a kind of Tory law of fading returns: the loftier the principle, the less the money.
  Thirdly, the Bill marks the gradual moving away of the Tories from their belief in aristocratic education to meritocratic education. We welcome this slight move to the Left. At least meritocracy is better than aristocracy. But they are still a very long way from evolving a genuinely democratic education system.
  As my hon. Friend said, the use of Clause 1 for the modification of secondary and primary education should not

  1463
  be for needs which are not strictly educational. I notice in the same context the A.E.C. memorandum to the Plowden Committee. If the Secretary of State is worried about the "wastage" of women, so it is called today, will he face the problem? If he wants more men teachers, will he face the problem? I hope that he will not try to get round it through the back door by altering age structures so that the purpose is to make primary schools more attractive to men. Will he follow the suggestion set out by the Labour Party for the attraction of married women back to schools by giving them tax inducements and part-time superannuation rights and by getting the local authorities to appoint advisory officers to welcome them back?
  Mr. Hogg: I would not be in order if I replied to the first part of the hon. Member's question, but to the second part I can say that I have no power of doing anything under this Clause except to approve a proposal from a local authority. The principles upon which the approval of a Minister is given or withheld under Section 13—which is the procedure imported into this Clause—are very well known and I shall be limited to them.
  Mr. Boyden: But the right hon. and learned Gentleman could very well allow a flood of applications of this sort which would have as their main motive trying to deal with the teacher shortage instead of dealing with the situation in particular schools on an education basis. However, it looks as if the Secretary of State can assure us that he will only make his decision on an education basis, and if he does that I will be content.
  I would have thought that the purpose of the Clause was, by experimentation supported in another way by research, to find out the best education organisation for children. The Education Act and its practice has been to make State education more and more child-based. Possibly this is what the Secretary of State wants, but I hope very much that he will make this clear.
  I want particularly to talk about provision for handicapped children. Clause 1 should be able to make a contribution to better education for them. I have
  1464
  here evidence by the Guild of Teachers of Backward Children to the Plowden Committee about the transfer of handicapped children from one class to another. It says:
  "In this sense neither the age of 7 nor chat of 11 has magical properties with regard to certain groups of handicapped children, and it should be possible for children to be retained in primary schools or in all-age schools as long as they can benefit more from such provision than from change.
  Transfer from infant to junior school and from junior to secondary schools can create problems for various groups of backward children unless there is close relationship between the schools."
  As I read Clause 1, it will enable this to be done in new schools better than it could be done before, and I hope that the general principle will enable local authorities which are perhaps not as conscious of this difficulty as the Guild to take careful note of it.
  As I said earlier, the Clause giving higher maintenance allowances has been awaited a long time and I am tempted to agree that it is strange that Parliamentary time should be used as an excuse for not putting right until as late as this what was known and admitted to be a bad anomaly. I hope this will be associated with a good deal more interest in the teaching of handicapped children and provision for them. This is why I say that the Bill is inadequate. We would have hoped that there would have been a good many statements and a good deal of activity by the Secretary of State's Department to make a real bite into the problem of handicapped and backward children.
  For a long time I have been worried about the lack of places. I know that advance has been made, but there are still, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North said, about 10,000 children awaiting places. The central problem is not even the lack of places on the waiting list but the fact that because there is such a deficiency of places ascertainment is not done as energetically as it should be, and many authorities do not take the steps that are open to them because of the difficulties. The actual number of places that is short now is a great deal more serious than it would appear.
  The second difficulty that I would like to stress is that nothing like enough

  1465
  training is given to the teachers of handicapped and backward children. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will soon read, if he has not done so already, the evidence of the National Society for Mentally Handicapped Children which has been saying, what some of us have been saying for quite a long time, that we need some training centres, not necessarily training colleges but probably several university departments, to specialise much more widely than they are doing. We certainly need a number of teacher training colleges to specialise in the training of handicapped and backward children, but we also need a big drive to offer opportunities for training those teachers who are in special schools and who have not had that training.
  I received a little while ago the actual number of teachers who had been trained for special education and it was very small indeed. I think it would be fair to say that this is a field in which there has been the maximum neglect. Inasmuch as this Clause puts right this anomaly, I hope that we can expect from the Secretary of State, in the short time that remains to him, more evidence of interest in the training of the various categories to which I have referred.
  In order to make any impact next year, many of these plans should be well advanced now and places made available in the various colleges. The actual setting up of the institution I have been referring to would perhaps take a little longer. I do not think that it is good enough for the Ministry of Education to accept that when it has advertised supplementary courses and special places and the number of places has not been taken up that is an excuse for not instituting still more places and bringing more pressure to bear on the local authorities.
  Not only is the educational provision for backward children and the training of teachers for this work the Cinderella of the educational world, but so is the school medical service which ascertains children. School medical officers are overworked and are not supported by auxiliary staff. Psychologists are difficult to obtain. There has been a very slight movement forward in the matter of psychologists and psychiatrists in the regional hospital boards who are available for this work.
  In giving a somewhat tepid welcome to this very slight Bill. I hope that we can
  1466
  expect that it will be a prelude to the right hon. and learned Gentleman doing a little more work in the Department, so that when the day comes, we can take it over more nicely and give it the impetus it needs.
  9.20 p.m.
  Mr. Robert Cooke: I hope that I am right in assuming, Mr. Speaker, that the debate can continue beyond the hour of 10 o'clock and that by intervening I shall not deprive my hon. Friend, or any other hon. Member, of the opportunity to catch your eye.
  My right hon. and learned Friend was described by a rather uncharitable hon. Member opposite as an adolescent. If to combine a sense of fun and good humour with brilliant intellect and command of language is to behave like an adolescent. I hope that there will be more of that type in the House in future.
  It has been suggested that anyone who would introduce into the debate the battle of the preservation or otherwise of the grammar schools might be described as a backwoodsman. I hope that no one will accuse me of that, for the main topic with which I wish to deal is the threat of the extinction of all the grammar schools in my own city. I take part in the debate because I see the possibility of the misuse of the Bill as a vehicle for the hastening of the extinction of these fine schools.
  The hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) quoted a speech—I am not sure who made the speech, but it was meant to be someone respectable and was probably a Minister of the Crown—which suggested that the relationship between the Government and the local authorities should be that of a happy marriage in education and that there should be local freedom. I am all for that, but in my own city it seems that this happy marriage has been a shot-gun wedding and that for political reasons the local authority is completely disregarding the whole spirt of educational thought.
  We learn from hon. Members opposite of the unity which one hopes will continue in the educational system. In Bristol we are threatened with the complete destruction of the existing system. No one would deny that experiment is a good thing, and that is what the Bill

  1467
  is about to a very large extent, but I am sure that it would not be the will of any hon. Member interested in education, whatever his view, that a city should be faced with the possibility of the destruction of all its grammer schools at one blow.
  I noticed some hon. Members looking at me with displeasure when earlier this evening I was reading a newspaper in the Chamber, but I brought that newspaper into the House in order to be able to quote from it, because it gives considerable support to my case. It is the Bristol Evening Post, which is not noted for its support for the Tory Government, or for Conservative Members of Parliament for the City of Bristol. At best, it would be described as an independent newspaper. On Friday, 26th June, it had the headline, "The heads speak out". Above the headline were photographs of the heads of the seven schools in Bristol which are direct grant schools and which are threatened with dire measures by the Bristol Education Committee.
  In recent months, the Bristol Education Committee has had a sub-committee in secret session to consider the future of these schools. The members of the sub-committee have been bound to secrecy until the proposals could be finalised and submitted to the Education Committee. However, appalled by what has been happening, certain members of the Committee, from my party, have felt themselves obliged to break silence and to speak out and give the citizens of Bristol knowledge of this very grave threat to these schools. It is planned by the local education authority, which has a majority of Socialists, to withdraw from these schools all the children placed there by the local authority, a very severe threat to these schools
  That so appalled the committee representing the schools—a committee headed by the Dean of Bristol—that it issued a statement saying:
  "We can see no reason why the city should not continue to make use of the rich diversity of educational provision in Bristol, where maintained and direct grant grammar schools and comprehensive schools at present co-exist."
  That statement was signed by a number of responsible people at the head of those schools.
  1468
  No one would deny that there are cases where grammar schools should be closed. In country areas where there are a large number of grammar schools, there could be a good case for comprehensive schools to be created, and perhaps a better job could be done in a rural area where the population was scattered if there were one fine, large school, but in a city which has this splendid tradition going back over such a long time, and with schools providing the finest education—and no one would deny that, not even hon. Gentlemen opposite, nor the members of the city council who are out to smash these schools—we see this spectacle of aiming to smash these fine schools, and I would not willingly support the Bill if I thought that it could be used as a further vehicle for that sort of activity.
  There are other matters dealt with in the Bill, and I would not quarrel with any of those. For many years I served on the education committee in Bristol, and I think I can say that I have had a fairly wide experience of the State education system in all its aspects. I have served on management committees, on governing bodies, and so on, in special schools as well as in the ordinary type of school. No one would deny that in this changing world experiment is very necessary, but local freedom can be used for dangerous political purposes, and I shall find it difficult to support the Bill unless I can be assured by my right hon. and learned Friend that it will never be his wish to see the sort of wanton destruction which is planned in my native city taking place under the cloak of a Measure of this kind.
  If I receive that assurance, I shall be able to support the Bill, but at the moment I am in some doubt about whether I can give it my support because it seems that in Bristol local freedom has not worked out well. It is being used as a cloak for political activity which cannot but do harm to a number of splendid educational institutions which have rendered great service in the past, are rendering fine service now and, I hope, will long continue to do so in the future.
  9.29 p.m.
  Mr. E. G. Willis: I do not wish to follow the hon. Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Robert Cooke) into the argument about the grammar schools in Bristol. I rise to say a few words

  1469
  about Clause 3. I join my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) in expressing pleasure that this Clause has been included in the Bill, but my pleasure is rather marred by the discreditable way in which the whole business was handled by the Scottish Office and by the hon. Lady.
  I took part in the debate on 8th May last year. On looking at the record, I see that I was speaking on this subject after midnight. We pooled our forces and tried to get the hon. Lady to accept this proposal. On that occasion there was not a single Scottish Tory Member in the House. They were not worried about handicapped children. Incidentally, there is not a Scottish Tory Member on the benches opposite tonight. The hon. Member for Edinburgh, North (Earl of Dalkeith) has just run in like a Derby winner.
  Mr. Robert Cooke: I am sure that the hon. Member will have a sense of proportion and will tell the House how many Scottish Socialist Members are now present.
  Mr. Willis: During the course of the debate there have been eight or nine Scottish Socialist Members present. I do not want to waste time by naming them all.
  Mr. Robert Cooke: It does not take much time to count up to one!
  Mr. Willis: If the hon. Member had been here a little longer he would have seen them, and would also have heard them.
  My pleasure at the introduction of the Clause is marred by my memory of the rather disgraceful manner in which this matter was handled. The hon. Lady must admit that her speech on 8th May last year was a bit of nonsense.
  The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Lady Tweedsmuir)The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Lady Tweedsmuir) indicated dissent.
  Mr. Willis: If it was not nonsense, why are we now departing from what she said then? We tried to tell her last year that it was nonsense, but we could not persuade her. My hon. Friends and I have been pressing for this minor reform for some time, in respect of England and Wales, and also Scotland. My English and Welsh colleagues were told
  1470
  that there was no Parliamentary time, but Scottish Members had the necessary Parliamentary time. We had the opportunity to do this, but the Scottish Ministers were so spineless that they could not take the opportunity that was offered them. That is what rather disgusts me. The Scottish Office was content to drag along on the heels of England. As soon as the English Department decided to introduce the Bill, the Scottish Office found that it could slip this in.
  Mr. Lawson: My hon. Friend knows that it could never be argued that there would be no time in the Scottish Committee. We can always make time for matters of importance.
  Mr. Willis: I agree, but my hon. Friend will, remember that we spent hours on this matter on 8th May. A Bill was before the House at that time which could have been amended to include this proposal, but the plain fact was that the Scottish Ministers accepted the dictates of the English Ministers in respect of this trifling matter. They were not prepared to stand up and say, "In our view this is right. We shall have this now. If England cannot find the time for it, that is not our problem. Let the English find time to introduce a Private Member's Bill". I ought slightly to amend what I have said, and point out that it was not the hon. Lady's nonsense; her brief was prepared in the Scottish Office and the hon. Lady read it with her customary charm, but the content was an awful lot of stuff and nonsense.
  I rose to express my sorrow at the fact that under the Tories Scotland has sunk so low that in order to achieve this trivial reform we have had to wait for the English Ministers. Now the situation will be rather worse, because the right hon. and learned Gentleman has been foisted on to us—a matter about which we shall have a considerable amount to say. The hon. Member for Bristol, West might admire the intellectual capacity of his right hon. and learned Friend, but we do not want him interfering in Scotland. We like to deal with these matters ourselves.
  I welcome the Clause, but I had hoped that the noble Lady would intervene in the debate. She might have told the

  1471
  House, in rather a generous manner, "I am sorry about what happened last year, I appreciate the fact I was wrong". She might have displayed some semblance of penitence. It may be that the noble Lady is not big enough to do that, but I think it only right that she should do so. No one loses by saying, "I am sorry, I made a mistake". We admire people who do that. I had hoped that the noble Lady would address the House and say that last year she was wrong and that many of the arguments did not stand up to examination. Unfortunately, it looks as though we are to have a winding-up speech from the right hon. and learned Gentleman.
  Mr. Robert Cooke: Hear, hear.
  Mr. Willis: We have heard from him once and this is only a three-page Bill. In fact it is not even a three-page bill—there are two pages. Is not it a rather pathetic sort of Government that cannot produce two people to speak on such a trifling Measure? There seems a lack of capacity somewhere. Apparently they do not trust each other, and can trust only the right hon. and learned Gentleman.
  I had hoped that we might have had a winding-up speech from the noble Lady. Scotland is mentioned in the Bill and there is no reason why a Scottish Minister should not speak. Surely it has not become a great sin for a Scottish Minister to interfere in matters affecting Scotland. We are getting into a terrible position under this Tory Government. We have been sinking, and now we are not even allowed a Scottish Minister to speak on Scottish matters. I should have thought that we might have had at least one short speech—not a long one, just a short one—dealing with this very important point; and a few regrets expressed; and due apologies offered to the members of the Opposition for having resisted this with such vigour on previous occasions. Perhaps also thanks might have been expressed to the Opposition for the way in which we have nobly assisted the noble Lady, in the complete absence of her political colleagues. We have assisted her on this Clause which I welcome.
  Earl of Dalkeith: The hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis) complains about my right hon. and learned Friend speaking twice. May I ask whether the hon. Member was present in the Chamber to hear my right hon. and learned Friend when he spoke on the first occasion?
  Mr. Willis: I consider myself fortunate not to have heard him.
  9.39 p.m.
  Mrs. Eirene White: I think that it may be convenient if I intervene at this point—with the rising tide of Scotland behind me. I understand that the Rule is suspended and so no doubt we shall be able to carry on happily for a little while, which will give the noble Lady the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland ample opportunity to make amends, which I feel that she should do. My Scottish colleagues have made abundantly clear that on this matter the Government were seriously in error 12 months ago, and I think that the decent thing to do would be to acknowledge it. The noble Lady is putting on a brave smile, but I do not see why she should be forced to speak through the mouth of the right hon. and learned Gentleman. As time will present no difficulty, we shall look forward to an explanation from her later.
  By now the right hon. and learned Gentleman will have realised, if he did not know before, that if a Scottish Clause is included in a Bill the voice of Scotland will indeed be heard. We are glad that our Scottish friends—at least those on this side of the House; they are a little thin in numbers on the other side—are showing a genuine interest in this matter which has been raised on many occasions by hon. Members on this side of the House, in relation to Scotland and to England and Wales. That is the question of the inequity of a handicapped child in a special school being obliged by law to remain at school for a year longer than other children—which is very right and necessary—and the parents of that child not being eligible for a grant which the parents of a perfectly able-bodied child would be able to obtain from the local authority.

  1473
  I reinforce what my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) said about our extreme disquiet at the variations in maintenance grants made by different local authorities. It a child's needs are comparable and the circumstances of the parents are comparable, in equity the parents of that child should have the appropriate grant no matter where he or she lives. This is the unfortunate part about this Clause, which otherwise we welcome very warmly indeed. I am sure that all who are interested in education have been gratified to read in the last few days the very interesting evidence submitted to the Plowden Committee by those concerned with the education of handicapped children.
  I have here the evidence of the Association for Special Education in its memorandum to the Central Advisory Committee. In reading it I was particularly struck by something which is of very great concern to me. That is the question of the pre-school child. I wish to make reference to the scope of the Bill because, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North pointed out, we think it a great pity that this Bill was not an Education (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill.
  We are most of us aware of the circumstances in which the Bill was brought before the House. We are grateful to the Minister of State who deals with higher education for seizing what appeared to be a gap in the Parliamentary time-table to introduce a small Measure with two points only in it. Because of the Title it is impossible now to insert any other matter. Unfortunately, his political calculations went awry. I think I am correct in saying that when the Bill was planned he was under the impression that the Prime Minister might appeal to the country in June. Therefore, it was essential if the Bill was to go through that it should be kept to minimum provisions. I am particularly regretful about this. Among the many minor reforms—I am not now speaking of major legislation—I should like to see legislated for is the position of the Secretary of State for Education in relation to pre-school children who are not in recognised nursery schools or classes.
  At present we have a vast number of private nurseries, private play groups and
  1474
  so on, springing up all over the country. They are exclusively in the province of the Ministry of Health and local health authorities. This means that the whole question of child development and educational play provision is omitted. The sort of inspection which is carried out of hundreds of private groups of one kind and another is confined narrowly to matters of health. The inspectors who go around are much more concerned about the number of lavatories and such things than with the development of the child.
  Only in one or two cases on which the Minister has turned a blind eye do local authorities use their nursery staff and inspectors to give advice and assistance to many parents who, because the Government have not pressed on with nursery education, have tried to provide it for themselves. This may appear to be a small gap in our educational provision, but it is exactly the kind of thing which could have been put into the Bill had it been drafted somewhat differently. I shall not pursue that because, unfortunately, it has not been included in the Bill. We have not had an opportunity of including this or several other relatively useful matters which could have been in the Bill had the calculations of hon. Members opposite been more politically astute.
  Apart from the assistance to handicapped children, the main Clause is Clause 1, which is permissive and which will allow local education authorities, and in particular the West Riding, to pursue schemes of reorganisation which at the moment they could not legally do. I am all for flexibility and for experiments, but I must say frankly that I am beginning to become a little concerned at the multiplicity of schemes which are being considered all over the country. My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South (Mr. Merlyn Rees)—possibly the right hon. and learned Gentleman can confirm this in his reply—said that 90 local education authorities are actively considering schemes of secondary reorganisation.
  Mr. Hogg: I think that the number is about right, but without notice I could not give an exact figure.
  Mrs. White: I have every reason to think that the figure is not far wrong.

  1475
  Well over half the local education authorities are actively concerned in schemes of reorganisation. This should much concern us, because evidence is being submitted to the Plowden Committee which suggests that children should be removed from one school to another at the age of 8, of 9, of 10, of 11, of 12, of 13, of 14 and of 16. The only age I have not heard mentioned is 15. This means that unless we are careful we may find ourselves with an extraordinary patchwork of secondary organisation in this country.
  Both the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) and my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) said that we should have no kind of formulation at this stage. In a sense I can see what they mean, but the Government have put education authorities in a very difficult position, because they have not awakened early enough to see what has been happening in education. Several years ago the right hon. Gentleman expressed the view that the tripartite system was crumbling, but apart from permitting the Leicestershire experiment he did no more about it. His predecessors have been obstinately obstructive and his successors have been myopic, and the result has been that education authorities are agonising over the question how they will carry out their secondary organisation.
  As my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, South said, nowhere can authorities turn for objective advice. If one writes to education authorities or members of various groups, one is likely to have a statement which is either concerned with local conditions, which may not apply in one's area, or is a partisan view which, unless one has considerable local knowledge, one might not be in a position to assess. It is lamentable that because of lack of foresight on the part of the Government there is no place at the moment to which a member of an education authority may turn for an objective weighing-up of the advantages and disadvantages of various possible schemes of organisation of various groups by age and so forth.
  It is also extremely unfortunate that the Plowden Committee was appointed so late. I am well aware that there is a
  1476
  system in the Department of Education of a central advisory council which is appointed ad hoc and given a certain remit. Until it has worked its way through that, any other major pressing problem must wait its turn. The result of all this is that we have had reports on the universities. We have had the Crowther Report and the Newsom Report. We are still waiting for a report on the foundation of it all—the primary schools and, following them, the transfer from primary to secondary education. Unless the right hon. and learned Gentleman informs us tonight that a request may be made to the Plowden Committee for an interim report on the age of transfer, we shall have to wait another two years until 1966 before we have the full report of the Plowden Committee.
  What, therefore, is the position of education authorities all over the country—the great urban authorities, the rural authorities, the small authorities, the large authorities—which have come to the point when they believe that secondary education should be reorganised? We have had much discussion tonight, particularly from hon. Members opposite, on the pros and cons of the comprehensive system. The hon. Member for Burton (Mr. Jennings), professing that he was not being dogmatic, was dogmatic until his very last sentence, when he said that it all needs re-shaping. Having reached his last sentence, he did not say how.
  The hon. Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Robert Cooke) spoke of the difficulty in Bristol. I do not want to go into all the local conditions there, but I put this to the hon. Gentleman. It is impossible for an authority which is attempting to reorganise its secondary education on comprehensive lines when it has a large number of highly selective schools in the city. I am familiar with the matter of principle. It cannot be done, because, if there is a large proportion of selective schools in the city, there cannot be comprehensive education. The two things do not go together.
  Mr. Robert Cooke: Surely the hon. Lady would not make out a case for abolishing all the grammar schools?
  Mrs. White: I am not arguing that case one way or the other. I am pointing out that, if comprehensive schools are

  1477
  being aimed at, they cannot be comprehensive when within their catchment area there is a high proportion of highly selective schools. The two things do not match. Therefore, it is essential that one should fully understand the difficulties of education authorities whose schools, which should have a full range of ability, are deprived of children of a higher range of ability because they are creamed off into the other schools. This is a real difficulty.
  I repeat that I do not wish to go into the whole question. Those of us who are concerned with education matters are very familiar with the arguments by this time. My deep convction of the need for the comprehensive principle in secondary education is based, as much as anything, upon the effect of selection on primary education. I am convinced that, so long as selection is kept at 11, 12 or 13, there will be a detrimental effect upon the education of children of primary school age. The evidence of this is incontrovertible and is becoming increasingly recognised. It is for that reason, as much as for any reason within the secondary system itself, that I, for one, am passionately against selection of children at 11 or any comparable age.
  I have said that at present members of education authorities and administrators in local authority offices are having deep heart-searchings about how they are to implement the principle which they believe to be educationally right—the comprehensive system. Because of lack of foresight, many of them have to do this within a structure of school buildings which it is very difficult to adapt. This, again, is because of the intransigent position of so many Conservative Ministers of Education, for there has not been adequate foresight in this matter.
  Had the Minister seven years ago reached the view that the tripartite system was crumbling, he should have said so. He should have said, "Let us at least so plan our secondary buildings that we will be able to use them flexibly, one way or the other". It should have been so organised that had an experiment gone one way or the other, in favour of tripartite or bipartite education, comprehensive or otherwise, our buildings would have been flexible enough to be used whichever way the argument went.
  1478
  Without such forethought and foresight it cannot be a success. Ministers should have taken an educationally objective attitude and have said, "We have not made up our minds. We do not want to be dogmatic. He will not build and so go one way or the other but will keep the position open". It is impossible, however, for the position to be kept open if one builds in a way which in itself determines the pattern of one's educational organisation.
  Unfortunately that is what has been happening during the past decade. That is why we are now going to be in great difficulties in many places in achieving a thoroughly satisfactory reorganisation. In some places there will be far more expense and difficulty than there would have been had a statesmanlike view been taken towards this problem. The fact that 90 education authorities are now coming round to our point of view is indicative that we have been right; the tripartite system was mistaken and that alterations will have to be made. Because for political, and I emphasise political, and not educational reasons—for political, doctrinaire, dogmatic reasons—local authorities have not been encouraged to have flexibility in their building programmes, we will possibly have considerable damage done to our educational organisation in future.
  I wish to conclude by asking a question which happens to be of a constituency interest to me. I will not go into the local details of the difficulties which have arisen in my county; I ask this question in a general context. I have said that there is nowhere to which local authorities or their elected representatives can turn for objective information and advice; in other words, there is no publication or series of reports, and so on from which they can obtain information or are able to balance the pros and cons of different methods. What do they do in these circumstances? The answer is that they go direct to the Ministry and ask for comments on specific schemes.
  This is exactly what happened to the Flintshire Education Authority. Certain proposals which have been the subject of contention in the county—I will not go into the merits of them one way or the other—were submitted to the Ministry for comment and advice. The

  1479
  comment received was to criticise the proposals in detail on purely educational grounds, to point out that there were various defects, omissions and deficiencies which, according to the Ministry's inspectors and officials, appeared to be manifest to them. The authority was strongly advised that other methods of organisation should be carefully examined. This advice was completely flouted by the Flintshire Education Authority, which took no notice of it whatever.
  When advice has been sought in this way and has been completely disregarded, what does the Minister do? He, after all, is responsible for the proper organisation of education. We all recognise that it is a partnership, but the ultimate responsibility rests with him. When his official advice is tendered, and is completely disregarded, we bare entitled—
  It being Ten o'clock, the Debate stood adjourned.
  Ordered,
  That the Proceedings on the Education Bill [Lords] and on the Perpetuities and Accumulations Bill [Lords], may be entered upon and proceeded with at this day's Sitting at any hour, though opposed.—[Mr. Hughes-Young.]
  Question again proposed, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  Mrs. White: I was asking the Minister whether he would be good enough to reply to what I put as a general question. It is true that it happens to have arisen in my own constituency, but I have a feeling that, with all the schemes now under consideration, a similar position is likely to arise in a number of other local authority areas, and it would be for the general benefit of educational administration if we could have an answer from the Minister as to exactly where he stands in those circumstances.
  10.1 p.m.
  Mr. Hogg: I am very grateful to the hon. Lady the Member for Flint, East (Mrs. White)—
  Mrs. White: By leave of the House.
  Mr. Hogg: If I require the leave of the House, I certainly ask for it, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, but I thought that as I moved—
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Robert Grimston): The right hon. and earned Gentleman, having moved the Second Reading, must have the leave of the House to speak again.
  Mr. Willey: Although, in that case, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I am sure that the Minister will have the leave of the House to speak again, we note with surprise that although he has sat with his colleagues who share his responsibility, he has not allowed one of them to reply.
  Mr. Willis: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. While we might be willing to allow the right hon. and learned Gentleman to speak a second time, surely we shall also hear something from the noble Lady the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland.
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: That is not a point of order for me.
  Mr. Willis: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. May I take it that it will be in order for the noble Lady to speak after the right hon. and learned Gentleman?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: If the noble Lady rises and catches my eye. The Rule has been suspended.
  Mr. Hogg: I apologise for making this error of procedure. I had looked at the rules of order, and misinterpreted them. Otherwise, I would not have forborne to ask for the leave of the House. I had misunderstood what the rules of order said.
  Before replying to the debate at large, I should like at once to deal with the last question put to me by the hon. Lady the Member for Flint, East. I am not sure that I would be within the bounds of order if I were to give her a full answer to her question. It is a very proper question to ask, and if I only give her a very short answer, with the forbearance of the House, I might say that I would be very glad if she were to return to the subject on an occasion when the rules of order are less exacting than they would be were I to enlarge on the matter now.
  On the particular application of the hon. Lady's question, there is a Question on the Order Paper for tomorrow, the answer to which I do not want to

  1481
  anticipate. As to her general question I would simply say that I fully accept her view of my responsibilities in the matter; that is to say, that it is my responsibility at any rate to see that things do not get out of hand in educational matters. My powers are confined to Sections 13 and 68 of the Act, and the hon. Lady will know that there is a fairly long tradition of the limiting circumstances in which successive Ministers of Education have, on the advice of the law officers, interpreted their powers under Section 13. They are fairly well known, but on some other occasion, if the hon. Lady wished it, I would desire to enlarge upon the subject.
  My powers under Section 68 are more general in character but more limited in application. That is to say, there must have been something very perverse about the local authority's behaviour before the Secretary of State would be entitled to invoke those powers, and I should be very slow to do this. I want the House to understand that under both Section 13 and Section 68 what I said at the by-election is exactly true. It is not my view of my duties to act as a court of appeal from a local authority. A local authority has the right and the duty under the Act to carry out certain functions. Although I am often being pressed to act as a court of appeal from a local authority, I do not view that as the intention of Parliament in entrusting me with the limited powers under Sections 13 and 68.
  In passing, this is also the answer to the criticism of the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) when he accused me of neglecting my duties under Section 1, because if he reads the Act he will see that, although the duties under Section 1 are general in character, and I accept the responsibility which they impose upon me, the powers which I am given under the remaining Sections must be read with those duties. I do not consider it my function to exceed my powers in relation to a local education authority.
  Nevertheless, those powers were intended to be used in suitable cases and, if I were so advised and I accepted the view, subject to the constitutional limitation which I have tried to express, and if I believed that a situation had arisen where either under Section 13 I ought to withhold my approval of a scheme
  1482
  or under Section 68 I ought to give a direction, I would not shrink from the responsibility that the law had imposed upon me. I hope that the House will note that I say this in response to a particular question, and that my general approach to my duties is that I am not there to act as a court of appeal for the local electorate. If a local authority, duly elected, chooses an educationally viable scheme it is not my duty to substitute my own judgment for that of the local authority even where my judgment would not coincide with its judgment.
  This brings me to the heart of the argument of the hon. Member for Sunderland, North. My conviction, and it is something about which I feel quite deeply, is that there is quite a variety of perfectly allowable options—educationally legitimate options—for local authorities to choose from, and that there is no absolute right or absolute wrong in these cases. There is a broad band of suitable options for local authorities of different political complexions to choose from in accordance with their convictions, and I would not feel inclined to interfere with a local authority, whether Socialist or Conservative, inside the band of those options.
  If for some reason a local authority—and I hope that it never would—chose to act perversely and be unreasonable and chose an option which was not educationally acceptable and chose to do something which was outside the band, on either side, of legitimate options, I should feel it my duty to intervene, but not otherwise. This is not a divergence from my speech to the Association of Education Committees on 26th June or from my recent speech at a byelection. I was saying exactly what I have now tried to express to the House. I was saying it to both assemblies, although in the one case I was the guest of a body composed of more parties than one and in the other case I was standing on the platform of a political party expressing that party's point of view. There was no inconsistency, although there was a difference in tone between the two speeches which I felt not only entitled but bound to adopt.
  I now turn from the hon. Gentleman's diversion to what was also a central theme in both speeches from the Front Bench opposite. There has not been any

  1483
  lack of guidance on these matters either from my predecessors or from myself in my previous incarnation and in my present incarnation. If the hon. Member for Sunderland, North will do me the honour of reading my speech to the Association of Education Committees, he will see that on that occasion, only last week, I made some very positive statements which were designed to cover in a reasonable way exactly the ground which many speeches today have covered. I approached these matters in exactly the way which the hon. Gentleman wants. Whether or not he would have agreed with any of the sentiments I expressed, he could not claim that there was any lack of guidance.
  When the hon. Gentleman suggests that I have only informed the country seven years later of the view which I formed in 1957, that the tripartite system was on its way out, he is completely wrong. I am not asking him to do any historical research, of course, but if he looked the matter up he would find that I had in terms expressed those views during my previous period of office.
  There is considerable confusion in some people's minds about selection and universal comprehensiveness, and about selection and streaming. These are not absolutes. There is no absolute dilemma for the local authorities or for the central Government. This confusion, I thought, was revealed clearly in the interchange between my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Mr. Jennings) and the hon. Member for Leeds, South (Mr. Merlyn Rees). The truth is that the situation is more complex than some people think.
  Moreover, to those who ask for objective advice and some form of Ministerial guidance I reply that these are contentious matters. Most of the schemes which we have been discussing, whatever their merits or demerits, have been running for a relatively short time or in relatively restricted areas and, although one may express a strong conviction—most of us have expressed strong convictions—yet if one were to ask for an objective assessment of what they had done or failed to do, one would inevitably get from any reasonably impartial judge the conclusion that more time must be given to assess them. Therefore, I do not plead guilty on that count.
  1484
  In reply to the hon. Lady the Member for Flint, East when she says that these local authorities have no one to turn to, I remind the House that both I in my recent speech to the Association of Education Committees and my predecessors have repeatedly stressed the desirability in these cases, whether or not the Minister's approval is technically required under Section 13, of consulting the Ministry, consulting the local teachers, consulting the inspectorate, and even—I say this, with respect, to the hon. Member for Leeds, South with reference to another point which he made—consulting the parents and the local electors, so that these schemes are thoroughly discussed before they are adopted and are not entered upon precipitately, without discussion.
  I promise that I should never try to take advantage of any technical powers of approval or disapproval which I had under the Act if they would come early on and try to discuss these things, taking account of the excellent advice from officials, if not from me, which is available in my Department and in the Inspectorate. They have, and I wish it to be generally known that they have, somewhere to go to discuss these matters in confidence before they adopt in public political attitudes from which sometimes it is both embarrassing and difficult to retreat.
  I return to the main theme of the Bill. When I moved the Second Reading I ventured to canvass the merits of what is proposed. Although I shall for the sake of correctness refer to some of the more political remarks which have been made in this debate, I will try to confine my main remarks to the educational merits of the Bill rather than deal with all the wider educational issues which have been raised.
  We have had some very fascinating speeches today, apart from that of my hon. Friend the Member for Bath (Sir J. Pitman), who soared into the stratosphere of metaphysics and psychology, where I shall not attempt to follow him. The majority of speeches have been concerned with the merits of selection and non-selection and the reorganisation of secondary education and comprehensiveness in all its various forms versus the rest. This Bill is not designed precisely to make experiments in reorganisation, although I have tried to define

  1485
  my attitude to them. It is about experiments with the age of transfer. Although these questions are not unrelated, I should say frankly that they are not the same. I was concerned simply to deal in my speech with the question of the age of transfer.
  Before I get to that, I should like to deal with the two points which have been raised on Clauses 2 and 3, which are the subordinate part of the Bill. I confessed candidly that I wished that both Clause 2 and Clause 3 had been introduced before, and I pointed out why when I moved the Second Reading. It seems to me sad that we in this House cannot, in the atmosphere which we have engendered and the rules which we have developed, find a way of passing uncontroversial and humanitarian legislation without so much discussion and exhaustion of Parliamentary time. I believe that there is a wide feeling of agreement in the House on that.
  However, I should have been extremely sorry to see an anomaly for the parents of handicapped children which it was promised would be removed and which was obviously an anomaly removed for Scotland but not for England. This is not because I am an English Minister. It is because I am a Minister of the United Kingdom and because I think that the parents of handicapped children south of the Tweed, who are governed by the same legislation as that which governs those north of the Tweed, should not suffer a handicap when it is removed north of the Tweed. This is my conviction.
  I have not had very long to consider the speech on 8th May of my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, but I noticed that the matter was raised on that Bill only at the recommittal stage. She pointed out with perfect truth that these allowances were originally introduced for the purpose of encouraging parents to keep children on at school beyond compulsory age. She said that a change of this kind required a little more consideration than could be given at that stage of the proceedings. That is what she said; I have read it.
  I do not think that my hon. Friend has anything to apologise for. The only thing that I would criticise is the suggestion that we could do it for Scotland without at the same time doing it for
  1486
  England. That would have been a thoroughly serious and bad piece of legislation.
  Mr. Lawson: Is the right hon. Gentleman contending that if, on a particular occasion, it could not be done for England and Wales, it should not, therefore, be done for Scotland when the opportunity existed for doing it?
  Mr. Hogg: The argument is that it is right to do it for both at this time in this case, and I believe that reasonable minded English and Scots would both agree that that is a reasonable proposition. The real trouble here is not the attempt to differentiate between England and Scotland, but the fact that in this House we have not yet evolved an adequate method of dealing with uncontroversial legislation that everyone wants.
  Mr. Ross: The right hon. and learned Gentleman will appreciate that England and Scotland have not the same legislation in this case. We have entirely different Education Acts, as he will see from the fact that, in this Bill, different Clauses apply to England and Scotland. Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman further continue research into what happened on 8th May? If he does, he will discover that the Secretary of State for Scotland gloried in the fact that the welfare services under the National Health Service would be dealt with at different times and in a different way for Scotland from that for England and Wales.
  Mr. Hogg: We are not talking about the National Health Service. We are talking about this anomaly in the Education Act. I was about to point out that the legislation is exactly the same and it would have been contained in a single Clause but for the fact that the numbers of the Sections and the dates of the Acts are different. That is why we have to have Clauses 2 and 3. I see no reason, therefore, to qualify a word I have said.
  The second important point raised by hon. Members was the difference in the levels of maintenance allowances as between various local education authorities. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North referred specifically to the Weaver Committee. I make the fair point that the Bill does not cover this aspect at all. It simply removes an anomaly as between

  1487
  one class of parent and another class, which deprives one class of a financial advantage which has accrued to another. What the hon. Member for Sunderland, North, was talking about, and what might well be debated more fully on another occasion, is the level of maintenance allowances to all children.
  The hon. Lady the Member for Flint, East and at least one other hon. Member also raised the question of the general treatment of handicapped children. It is of course true that the level of allowances by some local authorities is higher than that of others. I concede that at once. So long as one has general grant, it is inevitable. However, my impression is that this is because many local education authorities pay higher rates and have more generous income scales than the Weaver Report recommended. So far as I know, the great majority of local education authorities pay at least the Weaver rates.
  My Department would be interested to receive any information about local authorities which pay less than what I have described as the Weaver rates, because I would make it my business to initiate informal discussions which might well help remove that difficulty.
  Mrs. White: Does not the right hon. and learned Gentleman agree that the Weaver rates should not be immutable but adjusted to such inflationary tendencies as there might be?
  Mr. Hogg: I do not think that I should find any difficulty in accepting what the hon. Lady says, that nothing is immutable.
  Dr. King: The last time the right hon. and learned Gentleman's Ministry gave us figures, a number of local authorities were paying less than the Weaver rates. Will he look into that?
  Mr. Hogg: I have been on the Bench throughout the debate, with the result that I have not been able to pursue the matter very far, but I am told that no direct information is available to my Department since the general grant led us, as a matter of policy, to stop policing the rates. Our information, which is likely to be in general true, is that the great majority of local authorities pay either the Weaver rates or something more
  1488
  generous, and I do not see why they should not do so if their finances allow.
  Mr. Willey: When I last raised this issue with the Department I was told that the information was not available because of the block grant system. However, that reply is not adequate and this information ought to be obtained. Handicapped children are a special category of children and are compulsorily obliged to attend special schools. I cannot see any reason why the right hon. and learned Gentleman should not think of providing in that case for at least the minimum scale. I hope that he will consider this in Committee.
  Mr. Hogg: There are two separate parts to what the hon. Gentleman has said. I will certainly seriously consider any suggestion from him about what information my Department should provide. However, as regards the differences in scales, I will say only that maintenance allowances are designed to meet the needs of parents who keep their children at school, and this Clause is designed to open those allowances to a new class of parents, but not to differentiate between different classes of parents or different classes of child or to provide different rates of allowances according to whether a child is handicapped or whether it attends a special school. That would be a very much wider proposition and I should have to consider it very carefully before being prepared to concede that there was a great deal in it.
  Mr. Boyden: Some time ago, the right hon. and learned Gentleman's predecessor gave me details of local authorities which were paying less than Weaver rates. I have in my hand a very detailed document which his Department is now revising for me and which gives the total amount of awards which local authorities make for maintenance and the percentage of their income which this represents. I should have thought that the Department almost certainly had the actual number of awards so that it could easily divide it out and find out what they were.
  Mr. Hogg: I would much rather that the hon. Gentleman pursued this detailed matter with me at a time when I was less disadvantaged than now when I have to reply to a debate. I have gone

  1489
  beyond the terms of the Bill in trying to give the information available and I think that I must now return to the issues which have been raised.
  The hon. Member for Sunderland, North suggested that I should either indicate rather firmly what the view of my Department was about the suitable age of transfer, or press Lady Plowden for an interim report about the age of transfer. I think that he is wrong about this. I agree with the hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) that this would be premature. That was also the attitude of my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell).
  Of course, the possibility of an interim report was one of the first ideas which came into my head after I assumed my present office, and I immediately took great care to find out whether it was feasible. Perhaps I had better not say exactly what inquiries I made, but I made as many obvious inquiries as would have occurred to the hon. Member. I must say that I received a very frosty answer and I was not encouraged to pursue the matter.
  On reflection, I was persuaded that the question of age of transfer was so much at the heart of the whole complex of the problems into which Lady Plowden was inquiring that it would be impossible to judge this issue without judging the others. Short of pressing her to form a conclusion in advance of the evidence, or form a conclusion which would prejudice the whole of the rest of her report, the suggestion was not feasible. I have not got the terms of reference here, but they are to this effect: to consider education in all its aspects, including age of transfer to secondary education. I do not blame the hon. Gentleman for pressing it upon me because it was one of the first ideas which occurred to me, and therefore if he was mistaken in pressing it on me I was mistaken in pressing it on myself. However, I think the answer is what I have already given, that it is not sensible to prejudge this question because it cannot be disentangled from the general issues which Lady Plowden has to inquire into.
  Mr. Willey: I am obliged for what the right hon. Gentleman has said. I
  1490
  said that I would respect the views of the Plowden Committee upon this matter, but we are nevertheless facing a real difficulty. The Committee is considering something which is very germane to changes which are taking place at the moment. I also appreciate the right hon. Gentleman's difficulty, because of this, in providing information which he ought to provide to the authorities which are facing this problem. He might be accused of prejudicing the eventual Plowden Committee Report. But we have to get a sense of urgency here. It is unfortunate that this is the last of the comprehensive Reports that we are having on education, but we are facing a real practical difficulty and I hope the right hon. Gentleman will not be discouraged but will pursue the matter further.
  Mr. Hogg: I agree that there is an element of urgency about this, as there is about all important questions, but it would be a radical change of policy to change the age of transfer from that which was recommended after very careful argument in the Hadow Report, and I could not ask the Plowden Commitee to skimp its work in order to arrive at a preliminary conclusion, because although I think there are great disadvantages in delay I think there would be worse disadvantages in making radical changes and making them wrongly.
  Mrs. White: While we agree with the right hon. Gentleman about the undesirability of a precipitate decision which might be wrong, does he not recognise that what he is saying adds force to our argument that there was a lack of foresight in his Department in not recognising that this inquiry should have been made further? It is almost 40 years since Hadow.
  Mr. Hogg: I do not agree with that. I think Ministers and officials were very much preoccupied, certainly when I was there last, with the urgent questions attendant upon the provision of secondary education for all. We had the 1944 Act which deliberately chose to adhere to the age of transfer of between 10½ and 12. As a matter of fact, I considered this very point seven years ago when I was in office before. There were some bright young people

  1491
  in the Department who tried to make me do it, but I was persuaded—and I think rightly—that to have done this before we had got rid of the all-age school and before we had got a stage further with the provision of adequate secondary education for all would have added confusion to extreme pressure.
  Although there is an element of judgment in all these choices, I do not regret the choice I then made. Nor am I at all inclined to reproach my successors for having adhered to it. However, if there is a guilty party in this matter, here am I; and I am prepared, at any rate, to say that I stand by what I did. There is an element of judgment in all these things. In handling an administrative problem one has to consider the pressures upon oneself and upon one's officials, and I believe I chose rightly. However, we are again tending to stray a little from the Bill.
  I thought that parts of the speeches from both sides of the House, but particularly from that side, were of an electioneering character. There is a time and a place for everything, but I rather thought that this was not the time and possibly not the place. I do not complain that the hon. Member for Sunderland, North called me a liberal who likes laissez faire. It was a pity that there was no one on the Liberal benches to hear him do it. Both parts of the statement are completely wrong. But I rather minded when, having called me a liberal who likes laissez faire, he complained that I was occasionally guilty of outrageous political statements. I thought that that was a case of Satan rebuking sin.
  I do not resile from what I said at a by-election about parental choice. There are plenty of people in this country—and I thought that the hon. Member for Leeds, South was one of them—who think that Section 76 of the Act is a dead letter. I should like to tell the hon. Gentleman that I am not one of those people. I think that this is part of the
  1492
  law of the land, and it will be administered as part of the law of the land as long as I am Minister.
  Mr. Merlyn Rees: Would not the right hon. and learned Gentleman agree that in answer to a Question that I asked last week he said that authorities generally do not allocate pupils to different types of secondary education to meet the wishes of the parents. It matters not to those who are parents what the Minister would like to do. What does happen is that there is no parental choice at 11-plus.
  Mr. Hogg: There is much too little parental choice, in my judgment. If there is a system of selection, there are people who come quite obviously on one side of the line or the other. That is to say, there are some who could not gain by a grammar school course, and some who would gain from no other kind of course. There I would not be tremendously impressed if the father or mother said, "I do not like what you offer". But there is a broad band of cases where the pupil can gain from either kind of course, and indeed from several different kinds of course. Therefore, I say to the hon. Gentleman, to the House, and to local authorities, that I am not prepared to suspend Section 76. I am against forcing children into schools of a type which the parents do not like.
  If I am asked for justification for that, I say, as I said at the beginning of my remarks, that there are a number of perfectly legitimate options both for parents and for local authorities. As long as people keep within those options, I have no quarrel with them. I think the law ought still to stand as it is, because Section 76 provides a reasonable safeguard for local authorities through the words
  "so far as is reasonably practicable".
  I have tried to cover a number of questions which have been raised, and I ask the House to give a Second Reading to a Bill which, whatever may have been said that is contentious, has met with almost universal approval for its own terms.
  10.40 p.m.
  Mr. William Ross: I had hoped that without prompting we would hear from the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland.
  Mr. Robert Cooke: On a point of order. As the House is to discuss education in Scotland for the whole of tomorrow if it so wishes, is it in order to have a further discussion on the subject this evening?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Robert Grimston): The hon. Member is in order in raising the subject on the Second Reading of this Bill.
  Mr. Ross: The hon. Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Robert Cooke) is young. The trouble is that I doubt whether he will learn from experience in this House.
  We are dealing with a Bill which relates to Scotland. It is not the case that only one Clause relates to Scotland. The fact is that only two Clauses do not. I am tempted to follow the wide and interesting paths which speakers have so far pursued in this debate.
  I was amazed at the interesting way in which the right hon. and learned Gentleman began his speech. He was asked a question, but he excused himself from answering it by saying that he did not want to get out of order. Then he proceeded to get as far away from the subject of the Bill as he could for at least a quarter of an hour, and gave us his views about selection, streaming and the rest of it. He then said, "I will now deal with the Bill.".
  Mr. Hogg: A woman tempted me.
  Mr. Ross: And the right hon. and learned Gentleman proved a very weak vessel. What I am concerned about is the fact that although the right hon. and learned Gentleman now has a certain standing in relation to Scottish education, he shows a woeful ignorance of it.
  In his remarks on the Clause which is of most importance to Scotland he told us that we were governed by the same legislation. We are not. We are governed by separate Acts of Parliament. Just now he was telling us about parental choice, and how he was not going to become a court of appeal. Does not he
  1494
  know that under the relevant Scottish Act a parent has the right to say what kind of school his child is to go to, and what kind of secondary education he will follow? Does not he know that if there is disagreement a parent has the right of appeal to the local board of control, and then, if he is still dissatisfied, he can appeal to the Secretary of State who becomes a court of appeal? That is the position under Scottish legislation, and I glory in the fact that there are these differences.
  Mr. Hogg: The hon. Member is not entitled to misrepresent what I say. It will be within the recollection of the House that I said that the Scottish law as dealt with in Clause 3 was the same as the English law as dealt with in Clause 2, and that the only reason why we had two separate Clauses was that the dates of the Acts and the Sections of the Acts were different
  I was not talking, and the House knows I was not talking—and I venture to say that the hon. Member knows that I was not talking—about the identity or otherwise of the Scottish law with regard to parental choice or any other part of education.
  Mr. Ross: The right hon. and learned Gentleman's second speeches, which tend to be explanations, are always much more explicit and longer than his first ones. If he reads HANSARD tomorrow he will find that his first reference to the subject contained the phrase "are dealt with by the same legislation." They are not. If he wants uniformity of treatment, will he have uniformity of treatment in England and Wales on the one hand, and Scotland on the other, after these provisions become law under the same Statute? Of course there is not uniformity of treatment in England, as compared with Scotland. The position is entirely different. For the same subject we have different legislation and different Acts of Parliament. Even if we put it into one Act of Parliament, because we have to have different Clauses referring back tho different legislation, we get different results.
  The right hon. and learned Gentleman glossed over what happened about this subject when we discussed it in the House on a previous occasion Apart

  1495
  from the hon Lady, he is the only Tory Member who has mentioned the question On 8th May last year we started a debate on the subject of Scottish education at 10 o'clock and finished at 3 o'clock in the morning We dealt with Scottish examination systems, and there was not a single Scottish Tory Member in the Chamber They have Questions on the Order Paper this week about it, but they could not say a word about it when they could have influenced matters
  We also dealt with other matters concerning Scottish education At present there is a question concerning the E.I.S., and no doubt some bright Scottish Tory will stooge a Question for the Secretary of State about Glasgow Corporation, and the representations of the teachers. That subject was also dealt with on that night. We dealt with many matters concerning Scottish children, local authorities and professional men, and we dealt with the question of handicapped children. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that the hon. Lady was quite right. She had advanced the argument that the matter had come to her late, on recommittal.
  I have the report of the debate, and I also wrote down what the hon. Lady said. At the end of a considerable argument she was saying that it could not be done educationally; it would require to be done in another way, and not by way of an educational statute.
  What the hon. Lady said was, "At this stage it will require considerable thought and discussion to find another way of doing it". Does she agree that those were her words? Would the right hon. and learned Gentleman like to make another explanation of what he meant to say? The phrase was, "I cannot accept it at this stage without a great deal of thought and consultation to see whether there is another way of getting round the difficulty". That is what she said. My hon. Friend was concerned not only with the Bill but with the Children and Young Persons Bill, with which a United Kingdom Committee was dealing. On Report, as a last desperate measure and knowing that it was outside the Long Title of the Education (Scotland) Bill, he put this
  1496
  down and got an agreement in relation to recommittal. Just a fortnight before, the Secretary of State said, "We cannot do it unless we do it in joint legislation." But the hon. Lady said that legislation had nothing to do with it, and that there was the question of the anomalies which would arise.
  There are two sets of children at school in Scotland at present, both over 15. There are those between 15 and 16 who are the pride and joy of then-parents at the senior secondary schools. It is possible for them to get a maintenance grant. The other children, the handicapped children, because of the compulsory leaving age, are still at school but handicapped—still loved by their parents, but one knows what heavy hearts many of these parents have about them and their prospects for the future. They are denied the maintenance grant.
  The hon. Lady said that if we gave to the handicapped it would mean that people who were at school compulsorily were being paid as against those who were there voluntarily. She said that it used to be a gap of two years but that when we raised the school-leaving age the injustice would be wiped out. The implication of her remark was that nothing could be done educationally until 1970, although at that time we had a different Prime Minister and the right hon. and learned Gentleman was lording it elsewhere. We had not then even had the announcement about 1970. The hon. Lady explained to us that it might be done by maintenance grant but that it was all wrong to do it in that way.
  That is the part of the reason why the debate went on so long. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Scotstoun (Mr. Small) was there. My hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) had moved it in the absence of my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Mary- hill (Mr. Hannan). My hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis) was there, and spoke, and I managed to get a few words in myself. [Interruption.] Who supported the hon. Lady? Not one of them, either by their presence or by their voice. She will remember that that night she was left completely on her own. Even his noble Lordship did not show up that night. The Secretary of State disappeared at 10 o'clock and left her on her own—
  Mr. Lawson: We broke up early because we were sorry for the hon. Lady sitting there so long.
  Mr. Ross: It was not a case of being sorry. It was out of consideration for the hon. Lady.
  Earl of Dalkeith: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman has not learned yet that quality is sometimes better than quantity.
  Mr. Ross: Until we hear the noble Lord we are not able to judge, because such is his quantity that we do not know whether he has any quality apart from the quality with which he was born, and that has a special meaning in Scotland.
  This is something which should have been done long ago. The hon. Lady and the Government had an opportunity to do it in May last year. Up gets the Secretary of State for Education and Science and says, "If only we could have found a way in this House to deal with uncontroversial legislation and get it passed speedily, but we have not." Does he know that last year we in Scotland persuaded the Secretary of State, and through him the Leader of the House, to give us a new Sessional Order which enabled us to set up a second Scottish Committee to deal with private legislation?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Order. I think that these reminiscences are going a bit too far.
  Mr. Ross: It is not reminiscence. It is a case of answering the point made by the right hon. and learned Gentleman, because we did pass two Private Bills of this character. If the Government had done the same with this subject, this would probably have been law, but the Government did not do it. They held up other private legislation as well. This is not our fault. It is the Government's fault.
  I think that the hon. Lady should quite honestly get up and say that she regrets that she did not exercise what
  1498
  power she had last year to accept our Amendment. She was new to the job. I think it was the second time she had appeared in the House at that Box. It might well be that if she had then had the experience she has now gained, and the realisation of the power of persuasion she can wield in the Scottish Office, she would have exercised that authority at that time and not come to the House with these dreadful orders to resist, to use any argument she liked but not to give in, rather like a former Minister of Education who said: "Treat 'em mean and keep them keen."
  The Government have treated meanly the parents of handicapped children in Scotland, but we are glad that at long last we have got what we asked for.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly read a Second time.
  Bill committed to a Standing Committee pursuant to Standing Order No. 40 (Committal of Bills).

  EDUCATION [MONEY]
  [Queen's Recommendation signified]
  Considered in Committee under Standing Order No. 88 (Money Committees).
  [Sir ROBERT GRIMSTON in the Chair]
  Resolved,
  That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to enable county schools and voluntary schools to be established for providing full-time education by reference to age-limits differing from those specified in the Education Act 1944, as amended by the Education (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1948, and to enable maintenance allowances to be granted in respect of pupils at special schools who would be over compulsory school age, or, in Scotland, over school age, but for section 38(1) of the said Act of 1944 or section 32(4) of the Education (Scotland) Act 1962, it is expedient to authorise any increase attributable to the said Act of the present Session in the sums payable out of moneys provided by Parliament under any other enactment.—[Mr. Hogg.]
  Resolution to be reported.
  Report to be received Tomorrow.

  PERPETUITIES AND ACCUMULATIONS BILL [Lords]
  As amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.
  Order for Third Reading read.—[Queen's Consent, on behalf of the Crown, signified].
  10.55 p.m.
  The Attorney-General (Sir John Hobson): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
  This may appear to be a somewhat recondite and technical subject, but it has some important social and economic consequences because it deals with questions of whether there should be a limit to the length of time during which capital should be tied up and the length of time within which interests should vest in trust funds and funds disposed of by will.
  These are important matters, first, as to whether there should be a limit in these matters and, secondly, how long that limit should be. When those matters have been discussed and decided, the question arises as to how those limits should be applied in a great variety of circumstances applying to many forms of dispositions and instruments and to many different types of interest which are created under those instruments.
  It is because the Bill deals largely with those latter questions that it is a technical matter. We have been involved in some technical and, at the same time, difficult discussion on the subject. We should, nevertheless, not overlook the fact that the Bill will have important impacts, first on family settlements and on dispositions by will—not only of great estates but many individual testators and many people who are making family arrangements in relation to family businesses and quite small estates—and, secondly, it will have important impacts indeed upon pension funds, where very large funds are at stake. The impact of the Bill on these funds will concern those who have an interest in them both as to the continuation of those funds and on the right to accumulate the income of the funds.
  We made some Amendments in Committee and I should like to express to hon. Members who where members of the
  1500
  Committee my appreciation and that of the Government for putting at the disposal of the Committee their knowledge and experience of this difficult subject and for the help they gave in trying to improve the Bill. You will have observed, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that there were no Amendments down on Report. This is due not to exhaustion on the part of Members of the Committee but, I hope, only because they have exhausted their capacity to improve the Bill further.
  The Bill removes some of the inflexibility of the present law and it will, I hope, do something to make more real the giving of effect to the actual wishes of testators and those who have made settlements. It particularly does so by looking to see what happens as time progresses, rather than considering at the moment when an instrument begins to operate every possible contingency which could occur, and saying if one of them could occur outside the proper period, then to that extent the disposition is invalid.
  The other major reform is that the Bill introduces a convenience for conveyancers in allowing a fixed period of 80 years instead of a conveyancer having to rely on the device of a Royal lives clause or other device for use for private settlement and pension funds.
  I wish, once more, to express the gratitude of the Government and, I am sure, of all hon. Members to the Law Reform Committee, the members of which considered this difficult subject. The Committee consisted of two lords justices, two high court judges, as they then were, three members of the Bar, two solicitors, four academic lawyers of distinction and a secretariat provided by the Lord Chancellor's Department.
  I am sure that a difficult technical and complicated subject of this sort could not have been dealt with except by a Law Reform Committee that could bring expertise of the standing and quality that this Committee could bring to bear on the subject. I think it now shows that the Law Reform Committee can deal with these extremely difficult topics in a way in which almost no other committee, unless similarly constituted, could have dealt with them. It also shows that law reform is not simple and easy and cannot be done in a hurry,

  1501
  and requires very long and careful consideration.
  I think that I need say no more as the Bill has been very thoroughly discussed on each of its stages. I commend it to the House.
  11.6 p.m.
  Sir Frank Soskice: There is not much left for me to say on the Third Reading of the Bill. I certainly think that we achieved one great objective in the course of our discussions, and that was to discover what the Bill meant. It is a Bill which has far-reaching implications, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman said. It is not quite as abstruse as it looks at first sight, but it is nevertheless a Bill which, on the whole, is removed from our daily dealings and normal intercourse one with another.
  I do not feel that my anxieties have been wholly removed with regard to the substitution in Clause 1 of the 80 years' perpetuity period. I do not feel more convinced than I was earlier by the argument that was used of the Royal lives device as a justification for making a discretionary trust an easier thing to draft and to incorporate in a document. However, I am glad to assent to the new proposal in the Bill because, on the whole, I think that the advantages which the Bill confers in improving the law with regard to perpetuities and accumulations outweighs that disadvantage.
  I certainly agree with the right hon. and learned Gentleman that the "wait-and-see" Clause, Clause 3, is a good one. I think that it will remove a good deal of uncertainty and will give rise to much more precision in the ascertaining of the interests of beneficiaries under dispositions.
  I should also like to take this opportunity of thanking the right hon. and learned Gentleman for the great help that he has given the House personally, and those associated with him, both in the course of our earlier debates on the Floor of the House and in the course of our Committee debates. I also join with him in expressing appreciation of the work of the Law Reform Committee, I agree with the right hon. and learned Gentleman that no single body of human beings could have addressed itself to this task as that Committee has done and that we owe it a great debt of gratitude
  1502
  for undertaking an examination of the existing law with regard to perpetuities and accumulations.
  I should like to put one or two points to the right hon. and learned Gentleman. I understand that he has already received, as I have, representations with regard to the possible effect of the Bill on pension schemes. In particular, I understand that apprehension has been felt with regard to this possible result of the Bill. Clause 15 of the Bill may, so it is thought, impose serious difficulties as far as the accumulation of rules are concerned in the case of privately administered pension schemes.
  That would not be the case if Section 164 of the Law of Property Act, 1925, does not apply to pension schemes. I gather that the view of the Government is that that Section, in fact, would not be applicable to such pension schemes. I believe that the Government have cited and relied upon two decided authorities, the second of them, which is the more directly in point, being the case of the A.E.G. Unit Trust, reported in 1957 in Chancery, page 415.
  Although the Government relied on that case, I gather that those who have put difficulties which they feel with regard to the point are not wholly reassured, and I would be grateful to know if the right hon. and learned Gentleman has any statement which he thinks he can make on the point.
  The other point that I gather has been raised with the Government is one turning not on the accumulations but on the perpetuities aspect of the Bill. The point centres on the "wait-and-see" Clause—Clause 3. I understand that it is felt that it may be well nigh impossible to administer both existing and future pensions schemes because of the new situation introduced by Clause 3. It is thought in some quarters that the possible results of that Clause may be that each individual payment under a pensions scheme will have to be treated as a separate disposition, and will have to have applied to it a separate perpetuity period. If that is the case, so the apprehension is voiced, it will be well nigh impossible to administer pensions schemes.
  I have reason to think that the Government have answered the apprehensions expressed, and feel that no difficulty

  1503
  need be feared in that regard. Nevertheless, the doubts have been voiced, and it would be a great help to those concerned with the administration of pensions schemes if the right hon. and learned Gentleman felt able, if the House gave him leave, to say what the Government feeling is with regard to these two categories. I gather that there are other similar points of a highly technical nature which I do not think it would really help the House now to raise, but any further and general statement that the right hon. and learned Attorney-General might think fit to make would be greatly appreciated among those who have to deal with pensions schemes.
  11.7 p.m.
  The Attorney-General: With the permission of the House, perhaps I might deal with the points raised by the right hon. and learned Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice). I am very grateful to him for his support of the Bill. He asked, first, whether Section 164 of the Law of Property Act, 1925, might not apply so that pensions funds would be adversely affected. He is right in saying that this point has been dealt with in correspondence and, certainly, the view of myself and those who have also considered the Bill, and of my noble Friend, the Lord Chancellor, is that Section 164 is inapplicable to pensions funds; that the Section was never intended to apply, and did not apply, and did not have reference to bargains or contracts entered into for purposes other than the purpose of accumulation, and that if that were not so it would lead to great difficulties, because it would endanger such essentially commercial transactions as partnership agreements which provide that certain sums shall be drawn from the profits, and that the remaining profits shall be accumulated and divided up only at the end of a long term of years.
  Unless the principle underlying the particular cases to which the right hon. and learned Gentleman referred is that commercial transactions, contractual transactions, transactions that are not intended merely to provide a fund the income from which shall be accumulated for a number of years are not subject to Section 164, very great difficulties indeed would occur. It is quite plain, I should have thought, that should
  1504
  the courts disagree with the view I have expressed of the inapplicability of Section 164 to pensions funds and other such commercial transactions, any Government would have immediately to legislate retrospectively to put the matter right, because one could not leave a situation in which the accumulations that had been made under very numerous funds and very numerous arrangements were found to be invalid and improper. The matter would have to be put right in such circumstances by legislation, should the courts in the end disagree with the view that I and the Lord Chancellor in correspondence have expressed.
  It might be said that this could have been dealt by putting in a Clause for the removal of doubt, and that this would have prevented any possibility that the courts might disagree with the view that has been expressed, but it would then have been necessary not only to have defined what a pension fund was to which Section 164 was not to apply, but to lay down a complete code of all those commercial and other transactions in which and to which Section 164 was not to apply. This would have raised very difficult and awkward questions, and had legislation been confined only to the question of pension funds it would have thrown very much more doubt upon the other transactions to which it is at present thought that Section 164 does not apply.
  So much for the point on Section 164. As to the impact of the principle of "wait-and-see" contained in Clause 3 upon pension funds, I find it difficult to understand how it can be thought that that provision will apply to each individual contribution as it is made to a pension fund. Most pension funds will still be subject to either a Royal lives clause or possibly in future a fixed period of 80 years which, whatever one may say about family settlements, will be of great use to conveyancers in drawing up a perpetuity period for a pension fund. What one will have to wait and see is whether the fund set up lasts for the specified number of years or when the Royal lives drop.
  Until that happens the fund can properly be carried on without any contravention of the perpetuities rule and therefore it does not seem that there can be

  1505
  any cause or any reason why anybody should consider that individual contributions must be separately analysed, because if at the moment when they are made the "wait-and-see" period has not come to an end they will be a proper contribution to an existing fund which is being properly carried on.
  I therefore find great difficulty in understanding what is the point that is being made under this heading. Those on whom I rely for advice also find it difficult to see that there is any cause for anxiety and I hope that the House will accept the Bill and give it a Third Reading.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed, with Amendments.

  HOSPITAL SERVICES, LOWESTOFT AND YARMOUTH
  Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Finlay.]
  11.13 p.m.
  Mr. J. M. L. Prior: I am grateful to you, Mr. Speaker, for allowing me to raise this matter tonight and to my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health for being here to reply. I also welcome the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Yarmouth (Mr. Fell) is here to join me in the debate.
  Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft have a long and deep-rooted rivalry and it is not always that my hon. Friend and I have exactly the same views on leading issues of the day, but as we have personally good friendship and good relationships, so I think have our two towns. Certainly anything that we can do to foster the good relationships between the two towns we shall try to do.
  My purpose in raising the question of the future of the Lowestoft Hospital and of hospital services on the East Coast, which affect Great Yarmouth as well, is to call attention to various problems which have cropped up in the last year or two. During the past two or three years I have been waging something of a campaign to bring about an improvement in the orthopaedic and maternity
  1506
  services at the hospital. Whilst I must admit that I have had my disappointments with the maternity service, on the question of providing further maternity services I have met the Chairman and the Chief Medical Officer of the Eastern Regional Hospital Board. They have explained the position fully to me and I have to say frankly that I have been quite convinced that their decision not to build further maternity accommodation in Lowestoft but to concentrate on building it at Great Yarmouth was a correct decision. I should like to hear from my hon. Friend when he expects the new maternity unit at the new Northgate Hospital at Great Yarmouth to come into operation, and I hope also that he will give some idea of its cost.
  Once the new maternity unit is completed, the six beds at Lowestoft will become available for general practitioner maternity cases, and, of course, on completion of the new general hospital at Northgate, the number of maternity beds at Lowestoft will go up to 24. This, I think, will be ample for the needs of the Lowestoft area. At the moment, there are about 800 births registered in Lowestoft during one year. Although we have only six beds, 254 live births and nine still-births were registered as taking place at the hospital last year. No one can deny, therefore, that there is a great need for more beds; but, equally, no one can deny that the staff did a wonderful job in dealing with the number they had.
  I pay my tribute to the hospital staff and to the work which they do. There is no better or more loyal staff anywhere, but, unfortunately, their morale has been lowered recently by what I must describe as irresponsible rumours surrounding the future of Lowestoft Hospital. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to state quite categorically tonight that there is no intention to close Lowestoft Hospital, that it will continue to play the rôle earmarked for it in the Hospital Plan, and that the 74 acute beds which are mentioned in the Plan will be used for ordinary surgical cases as well as for other purposes.
  I hope that my hon. Friend will say that the new Northgate Hospital, with all the equipment now needed for neurosurgical, orthopaedic and serious operations, will concentrate on that type of

  1507
  work. At present, most of my constituents who have serious illnesses of those types have to go to London, Cambridge or Norwich, and it will be a great improvement for them and their relations who have to visit them if we have a new hospital as close as Great Yarmouth. We have to realise, of course, that, whatever our local ambitions may be, the important point is that patients must have first consideration and we must do what is right for them.
  The waiting list at the hospital has grown in the last two years. My hon. Friend will be able to confirm that much of this is due to an increase in the number of orthopaedic cases. This follows partly from the fact that we pressed very strongly, two or three years ago, for greater orthopaedic facilities, as a result of which a specialist was appointed to Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft, and he has now taken on a good many of the cases which previously were put on the Norwich list. This has increased our waiting list locally, perhaps giving a rather unfair impression of the local situation.
  I want this debate tonight to kill the rumours which have been floating round the town about the future of the hospital, to show quite plainly that the hospital has shortcomings but that they can be overcome. I want my hon. Friend to give encouragement to the medical and hospital staff generally, to restore their confidence and to enable them to see a reasonable future ahead.
  My hon. Friend could do something else. He could, as an earnest of his good intentions for the future of the hospital, say a word about the need for a new pathology laboratory. The one we have badly needs replacement. Perhaps my hon. Friend will also accept my thanks for the new casualty and out-patient department that has recently come into operation and also for the provision of a new theatre.
  If he can give me the assurances I have asked for, I think he will realise that I am trying to take a balanced view—and my constituents, I am sure, will do the same—of the need of the East Coast generally. We need improvements in the East Coast hospital services generally. We are keen that these should be carried out quickly and efficiently.
  1508
  With that in view, we are prepared if necessary to forget our local problems in order to achieve better all-round services.
  11.20 p.m.
  Mr. Anthony Fell: I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) for his kindness in allowing me time to say a few words in the debate which, as he said, affects both his constituency and mine. I also welcome anything that brings the two constituencies closer together. He has a reputation in this House for being most zealous for the people of the area and it is typical of him that he should have started this short debate in this generous way.
  I thoroughly support everything he said and underline the question he put about the new Northgate Hospital, the maternity part of which I understand is a special provision to be built first. I understand that it will be ready in a year or two—I am not sure which. I hope that it is the former, because the position is rather serious. When my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary answered a Question I put to him about the number of babies born at home in the County Borough of Great Yarmouth, he said that the percentage was 55 per cent. of live births in 1962. The figure I had was 62 per cent. I am not proud that that figure was greater, although I was assured that it was correct. It was, indeed, alarming because it was the highest percentage in the country.
  If a mother wants to have her baby at home then, provided that she is fit, she should be allowed to do so. Nevertheless, I always feel that women are not all the same in these matters. I remember, as a boy in New Zealand, a Maori woman with 11 children. One morning she cooked breakfast for the family, cleaned up the house, had a baby at about 11.30 and then cooked lunch. Not all women are the same, however, and certainly not all could achieve such a miraculous thing.
  Perhaps admission to hospital is not necessary for the first birth but I think that it is necessary for births thereafter, if only from the point of view that the mother can then get a little respite from looking after the rest of the family.
  It is important to get these facilities not only for Lowestoft but for Great

  1509
  Yarmouth as well and to get them very quickly. According to the statistics, the people of Great Yarmouth are the worst provided for in the country in this respect. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary is doing and will do the best he can.
  Another aspect is that of staffing. The nurses do a wonderful jot—and I have had quite close experience of it. What worries me is how we are to get the nurses for these great hospitals which we are building and rebuilding and which we are to build. I wonder whether the Ministry of Health could have a further examination of this subject. My hon. Friend will probably agree with me that it is not basically a question of wages necessarily, although that enters into it when it comes to competition with other wages in the locality, but it is also a question of hours of work—which are very difficult—and facilities.
  The facilities for the nurses in some hospitals in the counties are abysmal. The nurses do the best they can with them, but it does not help to attract nurses to the profession if facilities are bad. If facilities were better and if there were more staff so that young nurses did not have to do jobs which they were not competent to do, so that their jobs were not so alarming for them, more nurses might be attracted into the profession.
  I end by saying how grateful I am to my hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft for giving me this opportunity to speak, and I hope and trust that the maternity block in Northgate Hospital will be built very soon.
  11.27 p.m.
  The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (Mr. Bernard Braine): I should like to compliment my hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) and my hon. Friend the Member for Yarmouth (Mr. Fell) on the way in which they have put their case. It is not the first time that they have pressed me or my right hon. Friend on the subject of hospital facilities in their area.
  The area with which they are concerned is in the easternmost part of the East Anglian hospital region. In this part of the region, much of which is sparsely populated, the main hospital
  1510
  centres are Norwich and Great Yarmouth. This has been so for many years and the main reason is, of course, that Norwich and Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft contain about half the 500,000 or so population of the whole sector. Some increases in population are expected to occur in the years ahead, but although there may be local variations in these increases, the pattern is likely to remain approximately what it now is. The Norwich hospitals serve the general hospital needs of two-thirds of the whole and the Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft hospitals the remaining third.
  In this sector of the region, two district general hospitals are needed to serve this population of about 500,000, the several Norwich hospitals acting as one. There is not now, nor is there likely to be in the future, a need for a third such major district centre. What I might describe as the coastal population, centred mainly in Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft, is therefore expected to share one hospital, and our broad planning for the hospital service is on that basis.
  The Hospital Plan, published in 1962, foresaw that as major development schemes were completed, they would enable better provision to be made for the work now done at Lowestoft General Hospital, but this was essentially a long-term forecast. Tonight, my hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft has asked me about the future of the hospital in his town. He will be glad to know that the Regional Hospital Board is not contemplating its closure. In fact, the Board has always considered that there will be a continuing need for substantial hospital facilities in Lowestoft. My hon. Friend will be aware that the Hospital Plan shows his hospital as still having 98 beds in use by about 1975.
  Of course, the rôle of the hospital may change: as developments take place elsewhere, and as the new district general hospital develops in Great Yarmouth and begins to provide a full range of services for the people of the area. I can assure my hon. Friend that there is no intention to reduce the actual number of beds in Lowestoft, though there may well be some changes in their use. My hon. Friend has asked me particularly whether the acute beds

  1511
  which will still be available at Lowestoft by 1975 will be used for ordinary surgery. He will appreciate, I know, that not even doctors, let alone laymen, can be sure how particular conditions will be treated 10 years from now, and what will then be the ideal pattern of medical services, since the pace of progress in medical science is very rapid indeed. But I can tell him that when the project team which will be set up to plan the new Northgate Hospital in Great Yarmouth gets down to work, it is bound to take into account the excellent surgical team already operating at Lowestoft. This, I think, is a matter which is best discussed at professional level.
  As my hon. Friend has rightly surmised, once the new Northgate Hospital is fully in commission and is equipped to deal with serious illness and major operations, Lowestoft and Yarmouth patients, who at the moment have to go to hospitals in London, Norwich and Cambridge, will be treated much nearer home. It is quite clear that my hon. Friend's constituents will benefit considerably from the developments in Great Yarmouth, and I was glad to hear him say so tonight.
  My hon. Friend quite properly raised the question of provision for maternity. As I think he knows, the Regional Hospital Board has carefully considered interim schemes to increase the number of maternity beds at Lowestoft. Unfortunately, it has found no acceptable solution. In view of this, and also because of the need to release the accommodation now occupied by the maternity department at the Great Yarmouth Hospital for use as a gynaecology unit, the Board has decided that the provision of additional maternity beds at Great Yarmouth must be given priority. I can tell my hon. Friends that the Board is considering a scheme at the moment. It has drawn up provisional schedules of accommodation as a basis of discussion and is treating the matter as one of great urgency. I am not able to answer precisely the questions about cost or about the date of completion, but I will watch the situation closely and I will let my hon. Friends have full information on that subject as soon as it is available. Once
  1512
  this scheme is completed, it will greatly ease the pressure in regard to maternity beds in the area.
  My hon. Friend has asked whether, when this new maternity provision is made at Great Yarmouth, the six maternity beds at Lowestoft might again become available for general practitioners. I know that this is a matter of some importance to general practitioners in Lowestoft, but it is not one on which I can or should pronounce tonight. It is, I suggest, best discussed at professional level. There are a number of ways in which this might be done, and I would certainly expect it to be done at the appropriate time.
  I fully subscribe to what my hon. Friend said about the devoted staff at Lowestoft General Hospital and the services provided there. But, as he knows, it is impossible to expand this hospital. The site is far too cramped. However, it seems certain that the hospital will continue to serve local needs after the new District General Hospital is built at Great Yarmouth, and in this rôle it is expected to have out-patients, casualty, pathology and X-ray departments. It will have more maternity beds and there will be provision for long-stay elderly patients. As I have already indicated, there may well be some surgery.
  No one would claim that the present service at Lowestoft is entirely adequate for present-day needs. We are engaged all over the country in endeavouring to improve our hospital services, and a massive programme is under way. This is the reason why we have a hospital plan. Nevertheless, the Board has in the past spent not inconsiderable sums on improving the hospital at Lowestoft. Up to a year ago it had spent more than £35,000, the main items being a new boiler house and plant, air-conditioning for the main operating theatre, and improvements to the X-ray department. In the past 12 months a further £20,000 has been spent, including improvements to the casualty surgery which was brought into use a few weeks ago, and to the new theatre which began operating on Monday of this week.
  My hon. Friend has mentioned the inadequacy of the pathology laboratory at Lowestoft. I agree with him about this. It certainly needs attention. I am glad to say that the Regional Hospital

  1513
  Board shares this view and has agreed in principle to carry out improvements which are to be discussed in detail shortly. My hon. Friend will know that there is not a great deal of scope here, because space is limited, but I hope that something can be done to improve the conditions under which valuable work is done.
  I know that my hon. Friend has been concerned about the waiting list position at Lowestoft. I agree with him that the figures show rather more patients to be waiting for general surgery, ear, nose and throat and orthopaedic surgery at the end of 1963 than at the end of 1962, but the explanation is simple. Because of the appointment of new consultant staff, local patients who would formerly have had to go to Norwich are now being seen locally. More work is being done at Lowestoft, and it is being done under better conditions. It is true that in some specialties a few more patients are waiting. In gynaecology, where a new consultant has been appointed, more patients have been seen and treated. The picture is not one of stagnation or neglect, but rather one of improving facilities and better use being made of them.
  I can well understand the view of my hon. Friend's constituents, many of whom feel that it will be a loss if their main hospital services are developed outside their town. I am sure that on reflection they will realise that there can be only one major district hospital for the two towns. I hope that they will see that it is necessary to take a firm decision as to where the new general hospital for the area must be located. The decision to build it at Great Yarmouth flows from the concept of a district general hospital as outlined in the Hospital Plan. This concept envisages such a hospital as normally containing 600 to 800 beds serving a population of 100,000 to 150,000. Other hospitals might be smaller, though they would rarely be of less than 300 beds. Each of these would be located in or near the middle of one of the centres of population of the area it serves. In practice, priority is bound to be given to the centre which is already serving a greater
  1514
  population, and in this instance, as both my hon. Friends recognise, this centre is Great Yarmouth.
  There is a further consideration which is sometimes in danger of being overlooked. It is not always appreciated by laymen that recent years have seen considerable advances in medical science involving considerable changes in methods of diagnosis and treatment, and these advances will continue. Most patients needing in-patient care nowadays require the attention not only of the physician or of the surgeon, but also of other specialists such as radiologists, pathologists and anaesthetists in support who work as a team and require to have at their disposal complicated and costly equipment.
  The district general hospital offers the most practical method of placing this full range of hospital facilities at the disposal of patients. My hon. Friend has rightly said to me that the first consideration in these matters must always be what is best for the patient, and viewed in this way I feel sure that it will be seen that what is being planned for this important area of East Anglia is really in the best interests of all who may need hospital care there
  My hon. Friend the Member for Yarmouth raised the question of staffing. I entirely agree with what he said. But with the development of better hospital facilities conditions will improve for the staffs. The conditions in the new district general hospitals which are now being completed are superb, and second to none. We hope that they will attract the right kind of staff, in the right numbers. There are local shortages, but generally speaking staffing is running at record figures.
  I am glad that my hon. Friends have raised this subject tonight, because it has given me the opportunity of putting this knotty local question into some sort of perspective. I hope, therefore, that what I have said will be of some use not only to my hon. Friends but to their constituents.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Adjourned accordingly at nineteen minutes to Twelve o'clock.

TRANSPORT
  Heavy Goods Vehicles (Special Driving Licences)
  Heavy Goods Vehicles (Special Driving Licences)
  Traffic Fumes
  Traffic Fumes
  Evening Classes (Driving Instructors)
  Evening Classes (Driving Instructors)
  Road Users (Driving Instruction)
  Road Users (Driving Instruction)
  Heavy Goods Vehicles (Roadworthy Tests)
  Heavy Goods Vehicles (Roadworthy Tests)
  Transport Drivers (Working Hours)
  Transport Drivers (Working Hours)
  Transport Holding Company
  Transport Holding Company
  Car Windows (Stickers)
  Car Windows (Stickers)
  Rural Transport Survey
  Rural Transport Survey
  Inland Waterways (Voluntary Workers)
  Inland Waterways (Voluntary Workers)
  Motorists (Sleepiness)
  Motorists (Sleepiness)
  Land, Leyton (Car Parking)
  Land, Leyton (Car Parking)
  Vehicle Examiners (Roadside Inspections)
  Vehicle Examiners (Roadside Inspections)
  Commercial Vehicles (Construction and Use Regulations)
  Commercial Vehicles (Construction and Use Regulations)
  Drinking and Driving (Publicity Campaign)
  Drinking and Driving (Publicity Campaign)
  Accident, Crickley Hill
  Accident, Crickley Hill
  Survey, Greater Manchester Area
  Survey, Greater Manchester Area
ROADS
  A.1 (Newark)
  A.1 (Newark)
  Speed Limits (Side Roads)
  Speed Limits (Side Roads)
  Road Construction Equipment
  Road Construction Equipment
  Expenditure
  Expenditure
  A.645 (West Riding)
  A.645 (West Riding)
  A.30 and A.1 (Traffic)
  A.30 and A.1 (Traffic)
  Motorways (Speed Trials)
  Motorways (Speed Trials)
  Speed Limit (Motorways)
  Speed Limit (Motorways)
  Croydon-Crawley Motorway
  Croydon-Crawley Motorway
  Lay-bys (Public Conveniences)
  Lay-bys (Public Conveniences)
  Bristol
  Bristol
  A.19 (Peterlee)
  A.19 (Peterlee)
  Inner London Motorways
  Inner London Motorways
  Crane Accident, North Circular Road (Inquiry)
  Crane Accident, North Circular Road (Inquiry)
  Road Works (Safety Precautions)
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  Christchurch Bypass (Burton-Stony Lane Junction)
  Christchurch Bypass (Burton-Stony Lane Junction)
  School Entrances (Car Parking)
  School Entrances (Car Parking)
  Three-Lane Roads
  Three-Lane Roads
  Road Junction, Willesden (Traflic Signals)
  Road Junction, Willesden (Traflic Signals)
  Whipps Cross, Leyton
  Whipps Cross, Leyton
  South-East Lancashire and North-East Cheshire
  South-East Lancashire and North-East Cheshire
  New Roads (Tenders)
  New Roads (Tenders)
  A.50 (North Staffordshire)
  A.50 (North Staffordshire)
  Cycle Tracks
  Cycle Tracks
  Bypass, Wall, Staffordshire
  Bypass, Wall, Staffordshire
  London-Basingstoke Motorway
  London-Basingstoke Motorway
  Motorway Warning System
  Motorway Warning System
  Accidents
  Accidents
  Crash Barriers
  Crash Barriers
  Road Research Laboratory (Report)
  Road Research Laboratory (Report)
  Trunk Roads (Removal and Re-erection of Bus Shelters)
  Trunk Roads (Removal and Re-erection of Bus Shelters)
  Parked Vehicles (Obstruction)
  Parked Vehicles (Obstruction)
  A.5 Route
  A.5 Route
RAILWAYS
  Blyth, Tyne, Newbiggin, Ashington Line
  Blyth, Tyne, Newbiggin, Ashington Line
  Branch Lines (Closure)
  Branch Lines (Closure)
  Swindon-Gloucester Line
  Swindon-Gloucester Line
  Lichfield and Tamworth (Rail Closures)
  Lichfield and Tamworth (Rail Closures)
  Scotland (Rail Closures)
  Scotland (Rail Closures)
  Glasgow-Gourock Line
  Glasgow-Gourock Line
  Goole-Selby Line
  Goole-Selby Line
  Birmingham-Dudley Line
  Birmingham-Dudley Line
  Passenger Tickets (Cheaper Routes)
  Passenger Tickets (Cheaper Routes)
  Glasgow-Kirkintilloch Line
  Glasgow-Kirkintilloch Line
  Vandalism
  Vandalism
  Concessionary Fares
  Concessionary Fares
SHIPPING
  Public Inquiries (Fishery Vessel Casualties)
  Public Inquiries (Fishery Vessel Casualties)
  United States Federal Maritime Commission
  United States Federal Maritime Commission
  Nuclear Propulsion
  Nuclear Propulsion
  Blackwater and Crouch Estuaries (Navigation Aids)
  Blackwater and Crouch Estuaries (Navigation Aids)
  Foreign Built Merchant Ships (Registration in the United Kingdom)
  Foreign Built Merchant Ships (Registration in the United Kingdom)
  New Cunarder
  New Cunarder
  Aberdeen Harbour Docks
  Aberdeen Harbour Docks
MINISTRY OF AVIATION
  Phantom Aircraft (Evaluation)
  Phantom Aircraft (Evaluation)
  Middleton St. George Airport
  Middleton St. George Airport
  Concord (Extramural Expenditure)
  Concord (Extramural Expenditure)
  TSR2
  TSR2
  Airports, Wales (Expenditure on Facilities)
  Airports, Wales (Expenditure on Facilities)
ROYAL NAVY
  Compassionate Discharge (Purchase)
  Compassionate Discharge (Purchase)
ROYAL AIR FORCE
  Air Patrols, Bahamas
  Air Patrols, Bahamas
MINISTRY OF DEFENCE
  Defence Expenditure (Increase)
  Defence Expenditure (Increase)
SCOTLAND
  Roads, East Aberdeenshire (Expenditure)
  Roads, East Aberdeenshire (Expenditure)
  Teachers
  Teachers
  Divorce Petitions
  Divorce Petitions
  Road Accidents
  Road Accidents
  Deaths from Cancer, 1953–62
  Deaths from Cancer, 1953–62
  Hospital Accommodation
  Hospital Accommodation
  New Towns (Houses)
  New Towns (Houses)
  School Places (Costs)
  School Places (Costs)
  Imported Corned Beef
  Imported Corned Beef
  Teacher Training Colleges (Evening Classes)
  Teacher Training Colleges (Evening Classes)
AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD
  Agricultural Holdings, Suffolk
  Agricultural Holdings, Suffolk
EDUCATION AND SCIENCE
  Teachers (Shortage)
  Teachers (Shortage)
  UNITED NATIONS (UNITED TOWNS ORGANISATION)
  UNITED NATIONS (UNITED TOWNS ORGANISATION)
HOSPITALS
  St. Lawrence's Hospital, Bodmin
  St. Lawrence's Hospital, Bodmin
  New Hospital, Treliske
  New Hospital, Treliske
  Lycett Green Committee (Report)
  Lycett Green Committee (Report)
HOME DEPARTMENT
  Detective-Sergeant Challenor
  Detective-Sergeant Challenor
HOUSING
  Lowestoft
  Lowestoft
EMPLOYMENT
  Agricultural Workers, Suffolk
  Agricultural Workers, Suffolk
  Railway Employees
  Railway Employees
  Hull
  Hull
  Government Training Centre, Hull
  Government Training Centre, Hull
PENSIONS AND NATIONAL INSURANCE
  National Assistance Recipients, Hull
  National Assistance Recipients, Hull

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR On the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Coventry

LORD RUNCORN
The Right Honourable Dennis Forwood Vosper, having been created Baron Runcorn, of Heswall in the County Palatine of Chester, for life—Was (in the usual manner) introduced.
LORD INGLEWOOD
William Morgan Fletcher-Vane, Esquire, having been created Baron Inglewood, of Hutton in the Forest in the County of Cumberland—Was (in the usual manner) introduced.

IMPORTED SYSTEMS FOR BRITISH POLARIS FORCE
3.0 p.m.
LORD KENNET: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what systems and parts of systems for the British Polaris Submarine Force will be constructed by, or imported from, the United States.]
THE MINISTER OF DEFENCE FOR THE ROYAL NAVY (EARL JELLICOE): My Lords, Article III, Paragraphs 1 and 2, of the Polaris Sales Agreement (Command Paper 1995) sets out in broad terms the systems and sub-systems which are being purchased from the Government of the United States of America. These comprise the weapon system as a whole (except for the warhead) and the complex arrangement of electrical, hydraulic and air sub-systems which operate and support it.
LORD KENNET: While thanking the noble Earl for his reply, may I draw his attention to something said by the Prime Minister in another place on April 23?
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: No, no!
LORD KENNET: This is still in the form of a question. May I draw the noble Earl's attention to a Question answered by the Prime Minister—
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: No, no!
LORD KENNET: Is the noble Earl aware that, on that date in another place, the Prime Minister explained that we are exporting plutonium to the United States; that this is not going to be used for military purposes; and that, in exchange for this, the United States is exporting uranium-235 to us, although he did not say that this material was not going to be used for military purposes? Is it not the case that this American U235 is going to be used in the warheads, which are allegedly of British manufacture, of the missiles for Polaris submarines, and also as fuel in the propulsion units of these submarines; and that, therefore, the claim that they are of independent British manufacture and control looks even thinner than it once did?
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, so far as the independence or otherwise of the Force is concerned, I think the position is quite clear. The Force will be under our own ultimate control, and it will therefore be genuinely capable of operating, if there should be the need for it, as a genuinely independent Force. So far as concerns what is going into the submarines, I am of course aware of the statement by the Prime Minister in another place on April 23, but I would draw the noble Lord's attention to paragraph 28 of the Defence White Paper, which I am sure will reassure him, if he needs reassurance, on this point. The first sentence of that, if I may briefly quote it, reads:
"We have now reached a point where supplies of fissile material already available or assured will be sufficient to maintain our independent nuclear deterrent and to meet all our defence requirements for the foreseeable future."
LORD KENNET: But could the noble Earl answer the direct questions: whether or not these submarines will be fuelled by American U235, and whether or not the warheads will contain the American U235?
EARL JELLICOE: I should like notice of the specific question on fuelling, because these are difficult and complicated matters and I certainly should not wish to give a reply "off the cuff" on that. So far as the warheads are concerned, I am advised that it is not possible to say whether any of or all the fissile material for these warheads would have been manufactured at Capenhurst or imported from the United States. But I would, if I might, again remind the noble Lord that paragraph 28 of the Defence White Paper went on to say:
"If at any time further supplies of fissile material are required for defence purposes it will be possible to resume or increase British production."

MIXED-MANNED NAVAL FORCE
3.2 p.m.
LORD KENNET: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they endorse the following statement which has been made by the special adviser to the United States Secretary of State on the Multilateral Force:
"All allied naval experts who have examined the problem have concluded that, with skilful training and good motivation, efficient and happy ships can be jointly manned by crews made up of men from allied navies",
and, if so, whether they will now make available to the House the studies mentioned.]
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, Her Majesty's Government certainly believe that a mixed-manned force of surface ships could be made to work. But the real question under consideration is not whether it is feasible but whether it is necessary and, if it is necessary, what form it should take. I cannot make available any official studies of aspects of the Multilateral Force. As the noble Lord knows, the American proposal is under consideration by the Working Group in Paris. Their deliberations are confidential.
LORD KENNET: My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for his full and courteous reply, Is the Working Group in Paris
588
still confined to the practical question of mixed-manning or is it now expanding its attentions to the question of control—who will actually have the power to fire these weapons? If not, would Her Majesty's Government consider proposing that this question should now be examined?
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, I think that all aspects of this force are under study in Paris, and British proposals are being presented to the Working Group there to-day.
LORD CONESFORD: My Lords, what on earth is "good motivation"?
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, I am not quite certain, but I assume it is an American phrase to describe the sort of motivation which usually inspires me.
LORD OGMORE: My Lords, may I ask the noble Earl, arising out of his original Answer, whether it is not the fact that this force may have important political and diplomatic purposes as well as military ones?
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, I think that my right honourable friend the Prime Minister has made this clear on a number of occasions in another place.

MAGISTRATES' HANDBOOK AND TRAFFIC OFFENCE SENTENCES
3.7 p.m.
LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government why, in the handbook, The Sentence of the Court, issued by the Home Office to all magistrates, which purports to provide comprehensive information to help courts in selecting the right sentence, no mention is made of the forms of sentence particular to the Road Traffic Acts when offences against the provisions of those Acts constitute approximately 80 per cent. of the work of magistrates' courts.]
THE MINISTER OF STATE, HOME OFFICE (LORD DERWENT): My Lords. the main purpose of this handbook is to provide general information about

589
sentences and forms of treatment, rather than to deal with particular types of offences. To have included information about the provisions of the Road Traffic Acts would have complicated unduly a publication that already attempts to cover a very wide field.
LORD LUCAS or CHILWORTH: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that in a very forthright statement made only on Monday last his right honourable friend the Home Secretary said, after referring to the fact that the road accidents problem was one of the greatest problems of our time—and I quote:
"I do not accept that there is any essential difference between offences against the traffic law and offences against the criminal law. Both are offences against society."
Is the noble Lord further aware that Government spokesmen, including Lord Chancellors, have for years impressed on the magistrates' courts of the country that the one great deterrent to the dangerous behaviour of motorists on the roads, which is a prime cause of road accidents, is the sentence of disqualification? Would not the noble Lord agree that it is incongruous that this document, which purports to cover sentences that may be given by the courts, completely ignores this one? Does he not think it a great pity?
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, the answer to the first two supplementary questions is, Yes; to the last one, it is that although disqualification is commonly described as a penalty it is essentially a safety provision, designed to protect the public from the perils of a criminally had driver by excluding him from the roads.
LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH: My Lords, does the noble Lord wish to tell the House that in the Road Traffic Acts the sentence of disqualification is not a sentence?
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, I was referring to the noble Lord's original Question, which asked why disqualification was not mentioned in the pamphlet. Disqualification is, In fact, perfectly clear to magistrates. It is not a form of treatment. I should have thought that to clutter up this pamphlet, which essentially deals in general terms with the form of sentences, would have taken
590
up quite unnecessary room. There is no doubt about what disqualification is.
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, would the noble Lord not agree that in a debate on the Road Traffic Act the Minister then in charge made it clear that, in the view of the Government, disqualification was the best method of dealing with these offenders; and that therefore it was part of the punishment?
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, that may well be so, but I still say that it was unnecessary to describe all sentences in detail in this pamphlet.
LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH: My Lords, with respect to the noble Lord, this is a document issued to all magistrates. Does he not think that it is grossly misleading to state every sentence a court can give, except the one that Parliament has considered to be the greatest deterrent—that is, the sentence of disqualification? If the noble Lord will read the foreword, written by his right honourable friend the Home Secretary, he will see that it says:
"It is their duty to protect the public and see that there are effective deterrents to crime."
Parliament has said that one of the greatest deterrents to dangerous and careless driving is disqualification, and it is the only sentence which it is open to the courts to give that is omitted from the document.
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, as the noble Lord knows full well, this pamphlet deals with what happens when sentences are given by the court, and with their effect on offenders. It is unnecessary to explain to magistrates the effect that qualification has on an offender. He is disqualified.
EARL ALEXANDER OF HILLS-BOROUGH: My Lords, I must say that the Opposition feel exceedingly dissatisfied with the answers of the noble Lord on this matter. If this document is to be properly complete, it should cover all the sentences that are open to magistrates. I must say that I feel completely unhappy about the situation, and I would ask the noble Lord to take it back and have it reconsidered.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD DILHORNE): My Lords, I am sorry to

591
hear the noble Earl express that view. This handbook does not purport to set out a list of all the circumstances in which a particular sentence can be passed by a magistrate. In my view, it is a very useful handbook. It draws the attention of the magistrates to what happens when they pass particular sentences. It is of great value in that regard, and I hope very much that every magistrate will read it. No one is in any doubt as to what happens when a sentence of disqualification is passed: from that moment, it becomes unlawful to drive a motor car on the road. I endorse, if I may, the expression of opinion given by my noble friend, that it really is not necessary to put in a handbook on sentences, which explains what is meant by Borstal training, and all the rest of it, a paragraph to say that if someone is disqualified from driving on the highway it means that he will no longer be allowed to drive on the highway.
LORD MORRISON OF LAMBETH: My Lords, I am sure that the Minister of State for the Home Office will be grateful to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor for coming to his rescue, which he certainly needed. But may I put it to the Minister of State that this question of disqualification is an important form of possible sentence for road offences, and would it not be better for him to admit that there has been a little slip-up in the Home Office in the drafting of the document, which Home Secretaries are usually not too "sticky" in admitting, and to promise that, as a consequence, in the next edition consideration will be given to the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth?
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, it is certainly an effective form of sentence, but I repeat that it is quite unnecessary to put it in this handbook.
EARL ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I must say that I am equally uphappy about the answer of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. All we can do is to return to the matter again. We must pursue it.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I am sorry to hear the noble Earl say that. I rather feel that, if he is unhappy about my answer, he cannot have
592
made a study of the contents of this handbook, and I shall have great pleasure in sending him one.
EARL ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I think that we all retain a certain amount of intelligent judgment of the answers given, and we are able to assess whether they are reasonable or not.
BARONESS WOOTTON OF ABINGER: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, implied that this handbook has been distributed to all magistrates. Will the Minister confirm that this is so, because it does not accord with my experience?
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, my right honourable friend sent it to all magistrates' courts committees, the day before publication, with a circular expressing the hope that the committees would think it right to provide copies for magistrates and stating that the expenditure would rank for repayment.
BARONESS WOOTTON OF ABINGER: My Lords, is there any information as to how far committees have fulfilled that hope?
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, I have not got such information. That is a matter for the magistrates' committees.
BARONESS WOOTTON OF ABINGER: My Lords, would not the noble Lord agree that the net effect of this is that a large number of magistrates have never seen this leaflet?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, perhaps I can help again on that point. I am very concerned to see that every magistrate should be in a position to get this pamphlet. I have had one or two cases brought to my notice where there has been delay, because the matter has not gone before the magistrates' courts committee. No doubt the committees will have regard to what my right honourable friend the Home Secretary has said, and I hope, perhaps, to what I have said on this matter. If it is brought to my attention that any magistrate has not received a copy, I will take steps, to the best of my ability, to see that he does, because I think that it is very desirable that every magistrate should read and study this excellent handbook.

COMPENSATION FOR VICTIMS OF CRIMES OF VIOLENCE
3.17 p.m.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they propose to make any changes in the proposals contained in the White Paper on Compensation for Victims of Crimes of Violence; and, if so, whether they propose to issue to the Victims of Crimes of Violence Compensation Board instructions at variance with those proposals, or whether they intend to present to Parliament a White Paper containing their revised proposals.]
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, in reply to a Question by the noble Lord on June 24, I informed your Lordships of the amendments made to the compensation scheme in the light of the debates in this House and in another place. It is not the Government's intention to publish a further White Paper, but the amended scheme, which was set out in full in my reply of June 24, will be reprinted in leaflet form for the benefit of intending applicants.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, may I thank the noble Lord for his courtesy in sending me a copy of the revised White Paper, which in fact is a new White Paper and contains the whole of the scheme for compensation for victims of crimes of violence? Is the noble Lord aware that those of us who took part in the debate will be gratified that, for once, some of the representations made have been met in the revised White Paper? I hope it will be a success.
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for what he has said. He will remember that the object of the debate was that we should get the advice of the two Houses of Parliament.
LORD AIREDALE: My Lords, would the Government not consider extending the scheme to cover those motoring offences where the vehicle is not identified, which means that the compulsory
594
third party insurance does not apply and the victims' only hope is that the Motor Insurance Bureau will be generous towards them?
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, the operation of the Motor Insurance Bureau is a matter for my right honourable friend the Minister of Transport. I understand, however, that before making payment the Bureau has to be satisfied that there is a reasonable certainty that, if there had been proceedings against the driver, the court would have awarded damages. I do not think that it would be appropriate to attempt to extend this scheme, which is designed to deal with crimes of violence, to cover injuries caused by unidentified vehicles in cases where the driver would not have been held liable.

THE CHANNEL TUNNEL
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, I should like to inform your Lordships that, at some suitable time after 3.30 o'clock. my noble friend Lord Chesham will be making a statement on the Channel Tunnel.
MINISTRY OF HOUSING AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT PRO-VISIONAL ORDER (SHOREHAM AND LANCING) BILL
Brought from the Commons; read 1a, and referred to the Examiners.
PIER AND HARBOUR PROVISIONAL ORDER (KING'S LYNN CONSER VANCY) BILL
Brought from the Commons; read la, and referred to the Examiners.
PIER AND HARBOUR PROVISIONAL ORDER (BIDEFORD HARBOUR) BILL
Brought from the Commons; read la, and referred to the Examiners.
LONDON TRANSPORT BILL
Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons

WORLD POPULATION AND FAMILY PLANNING
3.20 p.m.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTONrose to call attention to the world emergency created by the population explosion and to urge Her Majesty's Government to press, in the Agencies of the United Nations Organisation, for practical measures to help member nations, who so desire, to spread the idea and practice of voluntary family planning; and to move for Papers. The noble Lord said: My Lords, it is two years since your Lordships discussed the world population problem, on the Motion of the noble Lord, Lord Casey, and I am sure we are all delighted to know that he will take part in the debate to-day. I make no apology for returning to these questions and asking your Lordships to consider them afresh. Very much discussion and much publicity has been given to the matter, from all possible angles, in the meantime, and, personally, I think this is all to the good. But what I am asking of your Lordships and of the Government to-day is to give attention to one aspect of this matter which seems to me possibly not to have received all the attention that it deserved.
The Prime Minister has recently emphasised in another place, and your Lordships endorsed this view in a debate last week in this House, that the gap in wealth between the affluent and the underdeveloped countries is a matter of the first importance in world politics to-day. This view was forcibly expressed during the summer, at the recent United Nations Trade and Development Conference at Geneva, and in the fascinating Report of Dr. Prebisch (which has been before your Lordships), the distinguished South American economist who was Secretary-General of the Conference and who is generally regarded to-day as the spokesman for the 77 nations that come in the category of "underdeveloped".
I would refer, in passing, to one sentence in the Report, and I am not going to refer to this matter again in particular. Dr. Prebisch shows on page 5 that in relation to pre-war times the per capita food production in the developing world in general has remained stationary ever since the war. I am no
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expert, and would not for one moment pretend to be, on the question of food production, but it appears to me that many people are far too complacent in this matter and about the world food situation in general. Per capita it has not improved. And have we not to-day more than half the world undernourished?
I must apologise to your Lordships for the fact that in the remarks I shall venture to make to-day there will be a number of statistics. Some of them were given in the last debate by the noble Duke, the Duke of Devonshire, on behalf of the Government, but I fear that they are necessary to my argument this afternoon, and I ask your Lordships to bear with me. It is, as I have said, two years since we debated this question, and in those two years the world population has gone up by well over 100 million people, or more than twice the population of this country. The basic figures, of course, are very sobering. If I may put it in this way, since Adam and Eve, it took up to 1830, roughly 130 years ago, for the population of the world to reach 1,000 million. In the next 100 years, up to 1930, this figure doubled, to 2,000 million. In the next 30 years, up to 1960, it reached 3,000 million. By 1970 it will be well over 3,500 million. And it is certain that by the year 2,000 it will be well over 6,250 million; indeed, it is estimated officially that the figure will be slightly higher than that.
With the world's population doubling, and continuing to double every 30 or 40 years or so, it means that in some 70 years' time, while our grandchildren will still be alive, the world's population will be 12,000 million, and growing at an ever faster rate. For this world population figure to-day does not grow on an arithmetical progression basis, of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, but doubles itself: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64 and upwards. After that the figures become fantastic. And who knows what may happen thereafter? I will not weary your Lordships with the figures, but I think I have said enough to show that this population explosion which is already with us is a major problem of the world to-day. Indeed, I believe it is the supreme problem before us at this moment.
What I wish to emphasise in general in this debate is that this increase is

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enormously more serious in the underdeveloped countries of Africa, Asia and Latin America than in Europe and North America. Birth rates of between 40 and 50 per 1,000 people are found in these underdeveloped countries, where two-thirds of the present population of the world reside. In Europe and in Japan the figure is about 19 per 1,000. In the United States, Canada and the U.S.S.R. the figure is 25 or 26 per 1,000. The rate of population increase, which, after all, is the vital statistic, shows that, even though the death rate in these underdeveloped countries is much higher than in the others—and still far too high— the economically more advanced parts of the world, where birth rates and death rates are both love, have a much slower rate of growth in general.
I do not intend to weary your Lordships with many more figures, but the rates of population increase are roughly these: in Asia, 2·5 per cent. per annum; in Africa, over 2 per cent. per annum; and in Latin America 2·5 per cent. per annum. When we come to Europe, we find that it is 0·8 per cent. per annum; in Japan it is just under 1 per cent. per annum; and in the United States and the U.S.S.R., which curiously enough run exactly parallel in this matter, it is about 1·6 to 1·8 per cent. per annum. These are overall figures taken over very large areas. In several countries they have growth rates of 4 per cent.; and I am told that in Costa Rica at the present time the rate is something like 5 per cent. To refer to a specific country, the official estimate for India, for example, is that over the next fifteen years the population of India will grow by 187 million, or rather more than the entire present population of the United States of America.
This enormous population explosion did not become acute until after the Second World War. It has been due to the impact of new drugs, and to the remarkable success of the World Health Organisation, about which we do not hear nearly enough. They have had wonderful successes in various parts of the world in combating the scourges of malaria, tuberculosis and many other killer diseases. This has dramatically reduced the death rate, especially among infants. It is this factor, the reduction of death rates, rather than an increase in birth rates, which has caused this
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explosion. If one might describe the decline in death rates as "death control," this is expected to continue for many years to come; and that is good news for all of us. But there is little prospect, unless something is done, for a decline in birth rate. I think the comment made by the writer Mr. Aldous Huxley was apt when he wrote:
"It is self-evident that a society which practises death control must at the same time practise birth control."
In the underdeveloped countries this dramatic rate of population increase tends now to wipe out all the efforts that are being made on all hands and all the aid that is now becoming available and is being given—there is not enough of it, but a great deal is being given —in an endeavour to raise the standard of living of these poverty striken countries. It would appear to me that, because of this, this effort is all for nought, as I will endeavour to show in a moment. This is the position at the present time, and it is likely to deteriorate, not improve. In many of these countries, in Latin America, in Africa and in Asia, nearly half the population of the countries is under fifteen years of age. I would ask your Lordships to consider what that means in terms of education, food and water, and, when they grow up, in terms of jobs.
In a debate two years ago the noble Duke, the Duke of Devonshire, on behalf of the Government, made some remarks about the great efforts that had been made since the conception of the Colombo Plan in 1960. I refer to the OFFICIAL REPORT of June 6, 1962, at col. 659. The noble Duke said that in the eight or ten years the Colombo Plan had made available to member countries in South and South-East Asia assistance of something like £3,600 million. Since then, there has been an official report about the Colombo Plan, and I venture to quote two or three sentences from it to your Lordships. It said:
"in terms of numbers the population of the region in 1950 was 625 million; and it increased to 800 million in 1961–62. One of the main causes of this increase (of 175 million) has been that mortality rate has rapidly declined while fertility, on the other hand, has generally remained constant. The Colombo Plan has contributed in no small measure to the fields of health and medicine to cause this decline in the mortality rates. This rapid rate of population increase has

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inevitably caused some concern to those countries which are densely populated and which are trying to achieve speedy economic development"—
I would emphasise these words in this report—
"with the result that, as the recent E.C.A.F.E. study observed, there is even a danger"—
in these areas which have been the subject of special attention and special aid—
"that the development effort will not be large enough to offset the effect of a rapid population growth and that per capita income will decrease."
To give one other interesting sidelight, British Guiana is much in the news at the present time. It is one of the most disturbed countries within the British Commonwealth. Incidentally, the rate of population increase in British Guiana is possibly the most rapid in the world. A remarkable development has taken place since the war, and they have reduced the death rate for infants under one year of age from the appalling figure of something like 250 in every 1,000, to about 60 in every 1,000. That was a magnificent achievement, but it has meant that the population increase in British Guiana is greater than anywhere else in that part of the world.
The High Commissioner for India saw this Motion on the Order Paper and has been good enough to write me a letter on the subject, as it refers to his country. This letter I received only yesterday evening, and it is of such importance that I would venture to quote verbatim two paragraphs from it. I trust your Lordships will not mind if the quotation is rather long. Doctor Mehta has taken such trouble, and has put the matter in such a nutshell, that I should like to read it to your Lordships. After referring to the Motion, he goes on:
"We in India are greatly interested in the practice of voluntary family planning and have taken such educative and practical measures as have been possible. As a result of a large number of measures taken to improve living conditions of the people and their health during our successive Five-Year Plans, death rate in India has rapidly been reduced, increasing the expectation of life. From 27·4 in 1941 the death rate in India in 1960 declined to 17·9. By 1971 the expectation of life at birth may be as much as 47·5 years as against 32 years only a decade ago. The birth rate, however, remains the same, with the result that the rate of increase of population during the years 1951 to 1961 was 21·49 per cent."
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Since then it has actually risen, so that the last figure given by the United Nations was something over 2·3 per cent. per annum. Doctor Mehta goes on:
"At this rate, we may be 625 million in 1976. The problem indeed calls for an effort on a gigantic scale. I scarcely need say more here than to quote our Health Minister, Dr. Sushila Nayar:
'Family planning is, therefore, considered an essential element in the strategy of development. The challenge of rapid population growth faces not only India, but the whole world. I am impressed that many other countries are showing increasing concern in this subject. Some of those countries where the rapid growth of population is not a problem now will be faced with it sooner or later. This calls for international co-operation on a wider scale. Countries in different parts of the world should pool their resources and experience to meet this challenge. Perhaps some sort of consortium might be developed whereby interested countries could pool and share resources and experience. Thus we might altogether deal with this problem rapidly for the good of future generations everywhere.'"
That is the official regard for this problem that India has to-day.
If I may take one more small illustration of the present position which was given to me—and I think it is striking—recently there has been a great deal in the newspapers about the Aswan Dam, this great enterprise going on in Egypt at the present time, the hundreds of millions of pounds it has cost, and the wonderful things it is going to do. We read that by this dam the cultivatable land in Egypt will be increased by about one-third. That sounds a magnificent. achievement. But in the fifteen years it will have taken to complete the dam, the population of Egypt will have increased by a great deal more than one-third, and therefore, from that point of view, although they are running as fast as they can, they are not keeping up with the tide of population.
Two years ago the United Nations, as your Lordships will no doubt remember, set an ambitious target for each of the underdeveloped countries, and said they should aim at, as a target, a figure of an annual growth of 5 per cent. by 1970. What does this target really mean? It is what we are aiming at; not what we have got. Yet it means that if you take a poor country with, say, an income per head of 100 dollars per annum and a population growth rate of 3 per cent.

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per annum, even if they fulfilled the target to the letter the increase in income per head in ten years would only be about ten times; or one dollar (6s. 8d.) per head per year. It would be 100 years before those poor countries could even double their income of to-day.
I would conclude this part of my argument by quoting to your Lordships some words from that great public servant. Mr. Eugene Black, who, until recently, was President of the World Bank, and, I suppose, more than any other man, with the possible exception of the United Nations Secretary-General, able to obtain information on this subject. In the foreword to a recently published book he said:
"To-day's extraordinary and accelerating growth in world population receives far less attention than its due.… But the difficulties by population growth will not be banished by ignoring them. The Present surging increase in population, concentrated largely in the poorest countries of the world, affects us now. It threatens directly the success of the greatest enterprise of our day—the international development effort which is attempting to provide tolerable living standards to that two-thirds of mankind which is now almost always in want. And if this enterprise fails, the consequences for our own comfortable civilisation will be grave."
I have endeavoured in these few remarks to outline the world problem as I see it, and I hope I have not bored noble Lords with this subject. My Lords, what are we going to do about it? Are we going to do nothing? Are we going to wait until the world is submerged by its own fertility or driven in its despair to resort to such things as indiscriminate, induced abortion on a wholesale scale? Surely not, my Lords. I would put three points to your Lordships on how I think this problem should be tackled. First, and above all, it is essential that peoples and Governments know accurately the conditions, not only in the world but in their own countries, too, and arrive at a full understanding of the acute problems which population growth poses, for both their own economic and their own social progress. This job of communication is a big one, and we cannot expect all the underdeveloped and poor countries to tackle the problem alone. I say, therefore, that this dissemination of knowledge should be a high priority job for the United Nations; in fact, one of their paramount jobs.
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In the last debate some speakers suggested that it was perhaps impertinent that the United Kingdom should appear to be lecturing underdeveloped countries on their population problems. I am not one who holds that view; but, even so, if that criticism had any validity to this country alone, it could surely have no validity at all if the information is provided from the United Nations itself. I believe that dissemination of knowledge, my Lords, is the first step.
The next step, surely, is to start now planning for and building up adequate maternal and child welfare services throughout the world, in which education in family planning should be an integral part. The methods of family planning must, of course, be in harmony with the cultures and religions of the areas and peoples affected, for nobody wishes to shove these things down unwilling throats. But this problem will, in turn, require an extensive effort in the training of doctors, midwives, nurses and welfare workers in the methods involved. The International Planned Parenthood Federation, which has thirty or forty different countries as members and of which our Family Planning Association is one of the founder members, is endeavouring to do this, so far as voluntary subscriptions allow; and within this small area we claim, I may say, remarkable success. Some colleagues and I have been endeavouring to raise more funds for this work, and I am glad to say that since the autumn, when we started our campaign, we have had a good response, and, indeed, have been privileged to raise something like £80,000 already for this work. But this is only a small pioneering effort; the United Nations and the World Health Organisation must step in if we are to make a real and effectual impact on the problem.
My Lords, results can be shown. One might refer to Japan, but Japan in its emergency followed methods—abortion and the like—which none of us in this House, I think, would support. Wiser counsels, I understand, are being followed in Japan and abortion is now frowned on, and family planning methods are the ones encouraged. On a smaller scale, the efforts of the Planned Parenthood Federation have shown striking results in family planning in such countries as Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea, Puerto Rico

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and Chile. I have details here, but I will not weary your Lordships with them to-day. There are results which can be shown even from small pilot schemes that we, with our small resources, can make available; and if the whole impact of the United Nations and the World Health Organisation were thrown into this matter the whole position, in my opinion, would be transformed.
Thirdly, comes the question of research, which is equally important and was much emphasised in the debate two years ago. We want research into the present facts of economic growth and effective measures of fertility control—methods suitable not only for different societies and different religions, but different educations and different standards of education. We want research into the best methods of countering obsolete attitudes and practices, especially among the illiterate populations. Surely, here again, in research, the United Nations Organisation is the one which should be paving the way. That is why in my Motion I call upon the Government to do all in their power to influence the United Nations on this problem.
I now come to a difficult question. It seems to me that to-day one of the essentials is to see, as a first step, that the wide areas of agreement on this subject that are now established and already achieved by Roman Catholics and non-Roman Catholics alike should be known. It does not seem to me to be realised that there are wide elements of agreement between us all on this matter. We should not only concentrate on that area where there is still disagreement; and, of course, this disagreement is largely concerned with methods. I must confess that at the moment agreement on methods is not in sight; but I emphasise the words "at the moment", for I am sure everyone who is interested in this problem awaits with especial interest the announcements on these problems which we understand are going to be made from the Vatican in the autumn.
I venture to propound two propositions, and I wonder whether my noble friend, Lord Longford, or anyone else who may be speaking from the Roman Catholic point of view, will give them
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consideration. I have already informed my noble friend Lord Longford of them. Could we not all agree to this?: first, that no person or Government has a right to impose family planning practices which are contrary to individual religious beliefs; and, second, that no religious group has a right to impose a veto, explicit or tacit, on public policy towards family planning research or towards Government response to requests for aid from countries who want it.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, am I allowed to intervene since I have been mentioned by name? The noble Lord was good enough to show me these propositions, and I indicated that I thought the second a very unfair way of ventilating the question. Certainly in this country to suggest that Roman Catholics are so dominant that they could impose a veto is quite fantastic.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: My Lords, I am grateful for the noble Earl's intervention. I am not referring only to this country or largely to this country. It is in large areas, especially in Central and South America and others on the Continent, where this position is very much more striking.
A Gallup Poll in this country last year showed that 68 per cent. of the public would approve if the United Nations supplied help and information on this problem of birth control to nations who asked for it, and only 10 per cent. in the country disapproved. It was very interesting to note that, of the Roman Catholics asked, only 22 per cent. disapproved and 78 per cent. approved that those who asked for it should get this information from the United Nations. America carried out a similar questionnaire and got a very similar response. An inquiry in India, run jointly by the Indian Government and the World Health Organisation, showed that at least 75 per cent. of the couples asked expressed the desire to learn methods of family planning, and similar attitudes have been seen in Ceylon, Puerto Rico, Jamaica and other countries. The High Commissioner for India sent me with his letter a book on family planning programmes, published by the Indian Government, which has gone very closely into these matters and is setting up all sorts of clinics and

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organisations in the villages throughout the country. There is a mine of information in this book. I refer to it only to show that these things are desired by many in those countries.
Given a chance, I believe the people of this country and people all over the world, are anxious to obtain knowledge. I believe parents everywhere in the world, of whatever race or colour or educational standard, want to give their children the best prospects in life. And if this is so, I venture to say we must be concerned with population trends. Surely it should be our ambition that no unwanted child should be unnecessarily thrust upon this crowded earth. I hope I have done sufficient to justify my claim that this is the most pressing world problem of our time. Some have said that the most pressing world problem is the possibility of nuclear war. Fortunately that would seem somewhat to have receded. But this problem is right on us and we are in the midst of it at the present time. It would appear that it is an essential task of our time to stabilise population growth before it smothers us.
May I quote, just before I finish, words which have been quoted in this House before but have a peculiar significance. They were used by the late High Commissioner for India, Dr. Chagla, who I know is a friend of many in this House. He was talking to a group discussing the Freedom from Hunger Campaign, which had such a remarkable response from the ordinary people in this country, and he said:
"Unless we can fight this population explosion, which is as dangerous and more subtle than atomic explosion, then all this aid is like writing on the sand; you write on the sand and the tide of population comes in and wipes out all that has been written."
The United Nations Agencies, which as I have said have wonderful records in their fields, are so vitally concerned in improving the health and economic position of the people of these countries that it seems to me that in a few years historians will think it quite ludicrous that those Agencies should not assist in this sphere which, as practically every one of them involved in this work privately admits, is so vital to the success of their work in feeding and caring for the human race. If we can persuade the United Nations in this matter: if
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the Government will be more forthcoming, more positive in their action here than they were at the last sessions; and if the American Government will do the same, as we have some reason to hope they will, then I believe we can step out on to the road of facing up to this problem and ensuring that it does not do damage to the world. I beg to move for Papers.

THE CHANNEL TUNNEL
3.56 p.m.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF TRANSPORT (LORD CHESHAM): My Lords, with your Lordships' permission, I will now repeat a Statement on the Channel Tunnel which has just been made by my right honourable friend the Minister of Transport in another place:
"The British and French Governments have decided that the further geological survey for the Channel Tunnel should begin this summer.
"Arrangements are being made for the Channel Tunnel Study Group to conduct the survey on an agency basis under the general supervision of the British and French Governments, who are to appoint a Joint Commission of Surveillance for the purpose.
"Half the cost will be met by Her Majesty's Government and half by the French Railways which, at the instance of the French Government, are participating in the contractual arrangements with the Study Group for this purpose.
"The survey is expected to cost about one and a quarter million pounds. I shall shortly be asking the House to make provision for the British share by way of Supplementary Estimate. Meanwhile, any expenditure on the British side would fall to be met by an advance from the Civil Contingencies Fund.
"The survey arrangements are entirely without prejudice to decisions yet to be made by the British and French Governments on the organisation and financing of the Channel Tunnel project: but the present intention of both Governments is that, eventually, the cost of the survey shall be charged to whatever organisation may be set up for the Tunnel itself.

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"Copies of the texts of an exchange of Notes between the British and French Governments on these matters will be placed in the Library of the House."
That is the Statement.
EARL ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, on this occasion we are obliged for the courtesy of the Government in giving us this Statement for which we specially asked in the circumstances in which it arose. The statement now made is, of course, just what we have been expecting as a result of the Statement made to your Lordships last February. It is a little delayed, perhaps; nevertheless, it is a very good thing to organise this survey, which we understand will cost £l¼ million. There are two points I should like to raise with the Minister about it. The first is as to the Joint Commission of Surveillance which, in the case of France, is to have technical advice from the French Railways. Will similar plans be followed to have British advice given to the British end of that Commission? No mention is made of that, and I thought it rather strange to have special mention of the French Railways and nothing with regard to the British.
The other point I think was raised before in your Lordships' House, and that is whether in the general survey some account will be taken of what would be the likely effect upon industrial development in this country and whether there will be over-stressing of movement of industry to the South-East because of this particular project. And may I ask whether this is also to be part of the case to be inquired into and to be submitted from the British end to the Joint Commission of Surveillance?
LORD REA: My Lords, before the noble Lord replies, may I say that I think he will appreciate that almost everybody will welcome greatly the fact that matters are now going ahead. Progress on the question has been rather tardy for some time, and this Statement which he has made is most welcome. I was going to ask him a question which I rather think has been asked by the noble Earl, but I am not quite sure whether it is the same. I see that half the cost is to be met by Her Majesty's Government, and half by
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the French Railways. That does not seem quite an ordinary balance. Is it a distinction without any difference? Are the British Government and the French Government in fact both paying?
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, I am pleased to endeavour to answer the questions that have been put, and if I may start with the last one, I would ask your Lordships to believe that it is sufficiently difficult for me to do my best to answer for the British Government without answering for the French Government as well. On the particular matter raised by the noble Lord, Lord Rea, all I can say at the moment is that it is of course a matter for the French Government; but I understand that, for some reason of their own, they find it more convenient to deal with the matter in this way. As I understand it, the effect in the long run is much the same. There is nothing, I fear, that I can add to that.
On the noble Earl's first question, there is of course quite adequate representation on the Joint Commission of Surveillance, and the British co-chairman of it will he Colonel McMullen, who is the Chief Inspecting Officer of Railways in the Department of my right honourable friend; and Doctor Stubblefield, who is the director of the geological survey, will also be a member of the Commission. I understand that other experts will be appointed in due course, including a finance member, and that the composition of the Commission will be in parallel with similar experts appointed, one by the French and one by ourselves.
Of course, the effect that the Tunnel might have on development in the South-East is not a matter for this Commission which is engaged on surveillance of the geological survey for the method of construction and the route of the Tunnel. But I assure the noble Earl that, while it is not their particular pigeon, I would agree that it is Her Majesty's Government's pigeon and it is one to which they are paying due attention.
LORD BOOTHBY: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend whether he can give us any indication of how long this geological survey is expected to take, when it might be completed?
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, the best I can say on that is that, subject. obviously, to physical difficulties and

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weather, I certainly hope that it will be completed within about one year.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, pending the conclusion of this geological survey, will my noble friend ensure that the main railway lines from the Tunnel mouth to the Midlands running via Ton-bridge and Reading are not closed?
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, in principle I should be delighted to help my noble friend, if I could be quite certain where the Tunnel mouth was.
LORD PEDDIE: My Lords, will this Commission be concerned exclusively with the geological and engineering aspects of this construction, or will it also embrace all the economic aspects of the problem?
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, I had hoped that I had not given the impression that that was their job. The social, economic and other aspects are most certainly matters for the French and for the British Governments, and in due course they will most certainly be facing up to them in a way which is proper. But the first stage, obviously, is the geological survey, to ascertain the actual facts upon which the project can be accurately based.
EARL ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, may I thank the Minister for his helpful replies to questions on this matter? There is only one point that has occurred to us on this side: we were not quite sure whether the appointment of one or two transport officers to the Joint Commission on the British side is quite the equivalent of what is being done by the French Government in relation to the French Railways. Will they be equally represented?
LORD CHESHAM: Yes, my Lords, I had hoped that I had reassured the House on that point. If not, I hasten to do so again. The appointments to the Commission are on a parallel level, and this business of the French Railways— which I have found some difficulty in explaining, because am not in a position to do so—is in fact something which suits the financial arrangements of the French rather than having direct participation.
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But it gives them no extra power, so to speak, compared with us on this particular Commission, which, I am quite sure, is running in parallel.

WORLD POPULATION AND FAMILY PLANNING
4.6 p.m.
Debate resumed.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, I am sure that noble Lords on both sides of the House thank the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, for initiating this interesting debate which gives us an opportunity of making an individual contribution on a pressing world problem. I say "individual" because I presume that there is no Party policy in this matter, and therefore, when every noble Lord speaks, he will be speaking solely for himself. I think also, that special significance attaches to the debate to-day because it has been opened by the Chairman of the Family Planning Association.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: My Lords, I hasten to disabuse the noble Baroness. I am not the Chairman of the Family Planning Association; I am only Chairman of the Appeal Committee.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, I should have said that the Appeal Committee was the most important part of the Family Planning Association. Surely to-day, in 1964, the principle of birth control has not to be argued between modern politicians, and indeed modern theologians, with the exception of the Roman Catholic Church, whose views, of course, we all respect. But it seems that even the Roman Catholic Church is now, by slow degrees, adjusting itself to the concept of family planning—that is, if we are to be guided by recent pronouncements from the Vatican. As the noble Lord says, we look forward to the autumn to learn the final decision of the Church—a most important decision, because so many countries have big Catholic populations.
May I just at this stage say (because the noble Lord in his Motion refers to "practical measures") that if the Pope

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finally approves of family planning, I hope that he will at least protect Catholic women from methods which may prove harmful. Among these—and here I am speaking for myself and for a number of others who feel as I do—I include the contraceptive pill which has been given world-wide publicity, with the result that innocent and ignorant women believe that, because it appears in the papers, there is a tacit approval by authoritative sections of society and organisations. Another "practical measure" is called the plastic coil. I would remind noble Lords that years ago there was a thing called the "Grafenburg ring", which became totally discredited after it had been used by innocent and ignorant women.
At this stage, when we talk about this matter in terms of practical politics, we must not fear to face up to the tremendous propaganda which is being conducted by those who have a financial interest in the matter. There is, I fear, a tendency to approach this question in a state of panic, with the result that contraceptives which have not been adequately tested for harmful effects are put on the market and sold in countries where poor and ignorant women are bound to suffer. In these great overpopulated countries about which we have been talking this afternoon—and I listened to the noble Lord's statistics with careful interest—there is, as the noble Lord probably realises, a dearth of doctors, a dearth of nurses, and a dearth of all those people who can protect these women who, it is suggested, should be taught some form of contraception. It should be borne in mind that there are two parties to any pregnancy and that birth control should be a shared responsibility.
We know—and the noble Lord has mentioned this—that insecticides and antibiotics have made possible enormous advances in mass control of mortality in underdeveloped countries; and perhaps it is not fully realised that a major portion of the cost is borne by Western countries alone and acting through international agencies. Accordingly, in these primitive countries the death rate can fall irrespective of the culture, the economy and the Government of a
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country. Furthermore, a higher birth rate is most likely in consequence of a reduced incidence of those diseases which tended before to sap the virility of a population.
However, in my opinion, it is an oversimplification of the whole question to argue that if an international agency distributes contraceptives in the overpopulated areas the birth rate will decline. May I remind your Lordships—and this has an important application to the present position—that neo-Malthusianism started with the writings of Francis Place in the 1820's, and from England the movement for birth control was carried first to the United States and then, at the end of the 19th century, to Europe.
Many attempts were made at the beginning of the century to establish clinics—to establish them as the noble Lord has mentioned—in a number of other countries, but without great success. The noble Lord has quite rightly brought to the attention of the House the fact that various clinics in Chile and South America are doing well, but these are isolated little clinics. An effort has been made for many years. We sent a powerful group—the noble Lord will see this when he looks up the history of the Family Planning Association—to India in the early 'thirties, but they have made very little impact; and it was assumed in those days that the world-wide success of the movement was only a matter of time since it is fostered by industrialisation. The only country in which effective control has been established outside the Western world is Japan. It is only in those communities where procreation up to the physiological limit was never traditional that family limitation has become general. We must look to see what are the traditions of these great countries.
It seems, therefore, that the population theory cannot be discussed without reference to the nature of a particular society. In a traditionally agrarian society many social wants can he satisfied only through the family, and therefore persons seek to establish one as soon as possible. Let me remind your Lordships that in India, which we have just heard about— and I have the greatest respect for Dr. Mehta; he knows so much about the subject. and is a doctor of medicine—as well as in

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other countries there is no old age pension; therefore a man or woman may well say, "The bigger family I have, the greater insurance I have against poverty in my old age". What does the noble Lord think a birth control clinic in these crowded villages can do in those circumstances? In an industrial, urban society the family is less important and there may be little pressure on the individual to marry early and have children.
Of course, Malthus was an economic pessimist, for the Malthusian theory rests fundamentally on the view that poverty and indigence are the inescapable lot of man. Chadwick, the great 19th century reformer, repudiated Malthus. He asserted that the limits of subsistence had not been reached in England and that improvements in production were more conspicuous than diminishing returns. Indeed, if we examine the figures we shall find that the development of Western economies offers a complete rejection of the Malthusian theory. Where substantial improvements have taken place in living standards, the absolute level of population has risen but the rate of population increases has diminished. In Great Britain the birth rate had fallen from 34 per 1,000 of population in 1851, to 15 per 1.000 in 1938.
The causes of this decline in fertility are not far to seek. The amount needed to support a family is determined by social habit and custom as much as by physiological needs. We understand this well in the age of the "mods" and the "rockers"—these boys who demand motor cycles from their fathers before they have even left school, as well as wanting expensive holidays, expensive suits, and so on. People must live up to the Joneses, the amount needed to support a family is determined by social habit, and the desire to have children may be measured by modern standards of living. Children are expensive, and in a developed country they compete with other needs.
Nevertheless, the desire to have fewer children can be implemented only by a knowledge of birth control, and the information available suggests that in ancient and mediaeval Europe and in Japan fertility was held under the physiological maximum. In Europe this control was effected primarily by marriage patterns and to some degree by infanticide. In
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Japan infanticide was a common practice. I agree with the noble Lord that they practised abortion. It was traditional in the first place for them to limit their families; therefore, in the last century infanticide was practised. Later on that perhaps was regarded as rather primitive; and so abortion became prevalent. Now birth control is accepted by the Japanese. Of course, in these areas enough children were born to maintain population and to provide for a small growth, but the margin was not great; whereas in some of the countries—and the noble Lord has not mentioned China—in old China and India, for example, girls married at puberty or before and there was strong social pressure on everyone to marry and have many children.
That is the background of the situation. What can we do in these circumstances? It seems to me that family planning can only follow in the wake of a higher standard of living and literacy and an enlightened approach to family welfare. It cannot precede it. They have tried to do it that way in India, but we have to realise that family planning just cannot come first. What is required, surely, is a co-ordinated programme whereby all the industrialised countries could contribute an adequate amount over a period of years through a world development authority. Furthermore, it calls for a global approach. In order to control the populations of China, India, Africa and Latin America, there will have to be a persistent and costly effort to promote industrialisation and education. I feel, my Lords, that the Western world is only trifling with the situation. Now that the old imperial structures have been destroyed, the gulf between the coloured nations and the rest may widen, and the suspicions and the frustrations which accompany widespread poverty must be aggravated.
President Kennedy said in an address to the two Canadian Houses of Parliament that Canada and the United States between them could produce enough food to feed the whole present population of the world at an adequate level of calories. Yes, my Lords; but of course this can be achieved only if the food produced in North America is given away to other parts of the world; or, alternatively, if the people in those regions are provided with effective purchasing power. In order to produce the

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maximum, the whole surface of the globe must be treated as a single unit for the purposes of food production and distribution. Of course, this was actually achieved a few years ago at the end of the Second World War and just after it. It will be recalled that the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Agency took control and was responsible for rationing the world's population.
Unfortunately, immediately the crisis was over, nationalism directed the destiny of nations. Let us hope—those of us who are interested in promoting a World Government—that the executive organ of a World Government will provide a similar agency. For hunger, my Lords, is still a stronger power than nationalism. Then, working in conjunction with this organisation, the World Health Organisation could provide an agency for birth control information. All the things that the noble Lord describes can be provided by this very fine authority; and I agree with him that it has done magnificent work.
My Lords, human beings have bred to the limit as an insurance against the huge toll taken by famine, disease and war. Nature's way is to let both the birth rate and the death rate run at a maximum. But from man's standpoint this is both inhuman and sub-human. It is an offence against the dignity of man and, especially, of woman. We want to bring into the world only the optimum number of human beings, and that is the number that can have the best possible life.
4.23 p.m.
THE MINISTER OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (THE EARL OF DUNDEE): My Lords, I think it might be helpful if the Government's view on this Motion were stated early in the debate, but I look forward very much to hearing the whole of it, and I shall still be at your Lordships' service if any of you would like me to add anything further at the end. My noble friend Lord McCorquodale of Newton has argued that we should press the United Nations to help those countries who desire it "to spread the idea and practice of voluntary family planning." I shall therefore tell your Lordships what the United Nations has been doing lately about this. I shall also indicate what line our
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representatives there might take in future; and, also, what we ourselves might be able to do—which I think my noble friend recognises is probably very little—unilaterally, and not through the Agencies of the United Nations.
The General Assembly of the United Nations, at its Seventeenth Assembly the year before last, 1962, discussed the relationship between population growth and economic development. The Assembly adopted a resolution—resolution No. 1838—which I should like to say a word about, which does not authorise any operational activities such as my noble friend would like to see, but only requests that the Secretary-General and the special Agencies should undertake study and research, and should conduct an inquiry among the Governments of Member States of the United Nations. The replies of a great many developing countries which had been received by the Secretary-General were published in a Report by the Secretary-General, which will be presented to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations this month. I have obtained a copy of this Report, which I have put in the Library in case your Lordships might like to study it.
Resolution 1838 originally contained a recommendation that the United Nations (it is rather similar, I think, in its terms to my noble friend's Motion) should give technical assistance as requested by Governments for national projects and programmes dealing with the problem of population, and these words were approved in the Second Committee of the United Nations. But on the Report stage in the Plenary Session of the Assembly, it was decided to deal with this proposal as a separate Motion requiring a two-thirds majority, and when the vote came there were 34 in favour and 34 against, with 29 abstentions, so it fell to the ground. The United Kingdom delegation voted in favour of retaining the clause as it had stood in Committee, but it was not carried. The Resolution now in force is therefore confined to a study of the problem and the collection of information.
My Lords, my noble friend's Motion refers to the "world emergency created by the population explosion". I do not know where it was first described as an

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explosion: I think it was in the book by Richard Fagley. But, anyhow, one feature of this emergency or explosion is that the growth of population is more rapid in those countries which are unable to provide their multiplying numbers with food, work and homes. There are two obvious remedies for this state of affairs. They are not mutually exclusive; they can be applied together. One is that the world should produce a great deal more food—either in North America, or elsewhere—and other necessities of life, and should find means of transporting these things to the people who need them. The other remedy is that people whose economic progress is being delayed, or perhaps even reversed, by excessive population should try to have not quite so many babies until the growth of production has caught up with the growing number of human beings.
The first remedy, although of course it contains many technical difficulties both of production and of distribution, at least does not present us with any kind of moral uncertainty. No one, I think, will dispute that it is a good thing to double and to re-double our production of food, so that the growing number of hungry human beings may be fed. We should, of course, seek to use surplus food produced by richer countries, as the noble Lady has quite rightly suggested, for the consumption of those who are hungry in other parts of the world. But the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation have always held, I think rightly, as a matter of general policy, chat it is not only far less difficult but also much more effectual that we should export agricultural capital and technical knowledge, so that the underdeveloped societies may grow more of their own food, rather than try to export a vastly increased quantity of food grown by the richer countries, and to export it for thousands of miles. But, however it may be done, the world as a whole is certainly capable of supporting not only its present large population but a far greater population than it now contains. The trouble is that, whatever means might be taken to distribute food, the population is growing faster now than food production can be increased.
The merits of the other remedy, voluntary family planning, are less certain,
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both morally and scientifically. Even in the most sophisticated Western societies it is only within the last two or three generations that family planning by means of contraceptives has become respectable, and it is a much shorter time since the Lambeth Conference, representing the Anglican Communion from all parts of the world, declared that family planning in such ways as are mutually acceptable to husband and wife is a right and important factor in Christian family life.
But, my Lords, in the General Assembly of the United Nations, which rejected the proposal to which I referred a moment ago, the Anglican Church is less well represented than it is here, and the number of delegates who uphold what is still the traditional Catholic opinion on birth control are, proportionately, far more numerous in the General Assembly of the United Nations than in the Parliament of the United Kingdom. As the noble Lady said, there has been some public discussion lately among Catholics about this question, and whether the Church of Rome might or might not modify its traditional teaching, either next autumn or at any other time, is a hypothetical question into which I do not think I can go. I thought that the noble Lady was perhaps a little rash in asking that the decision this autumn should be a final one. If it were one she did not like, she might wish it to be not quite so final. However, we do not know what may happen about that.
The practical situation with which we have to deal is that for the present, at least, the Governments of most Catholic countries, in the United Nations and elsewhere, are against State-aided and State-sponsored birth control. And, my Lords, it is not only the Governments of Roman Catholic countries who are opposed to State action. So far as I know, the African Negro States—not all the Arab ones, but I think all the African Negro States—are very much against it on moral and other grounds; and so are the Communist countries—possibly for different reasons. Of course, any of these countries, Catholic or African or Communist, or any group of countries, might change its views sooner or later, but at the present moment they constitute a

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very large proportion of the world. And this is, surely, a subject on which we should—and, indeed, must—respect and tolerate opinions which we do not ourselves hold. We must not assume too readily that the prevailing contemporary opinions in the part of the world where we happen to live are invariably right, or even that all ecclesiastical opposition is necessarily wrong.
Not so long ago the practice of private duelling was regarded by many excellent and upright people as a necessity of honour in certain circumstances. It was always condemned outright by the Church, whose teaching was rejected and disregarded by many of the most honourable men, both Catholic and Protestant. Now, in the twentieth century, public opinion of every kind, Christian and non-Christian, has come round to the Church's point of view.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: My Lords, might I interrupt my noble friend? I am grateful to him for what he has said, but he mentioned that African Negro opinion was definitely hostile. I think he will find, on inquiry, that there is a big change coming, especially in East Africa, and that there is a great demand among Africans for knowledge on these matters.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: I said, my Lords, that it is possible that any of these countries, or any group of countries, may sooner or later change its opinions; but we have to deal with the present situation, which is that the Governments representing these countries are not in favour of this—and if we were to try to obtrude our opinions upon them it is very likely they would think that we were envious of the increase of the coloured population compared with that of Europe.
I think that probably the majority of your Lordships would very likely agree with me in not accepting the argument from natural morals against birth control, because it seems to me that the argument is neither intellectually conclusive nor morally convincing. But if I had lived two hundred years ago I might easily have said exactly the same about duelling, because our rational processes are so often influenced by the prevailing fashions of thought and of belief by which we are surrounded. And, my
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Lords, when we look at the scientific side of this subject, I think we should be equally careful to distinguish between a working hypothesis and a proved scientific fact. The noble Lady has very cogently pointed out that we cannot be certain, and we may not know for a long time, what will be the long-term effects upon human health of certain well-known kinds of contraceptives; and I am not sure that we are really in a position to be dogmatic about the long-term relationship between birth control and changes in the growth or decline of population.
I suppose there is probably less birth control in the Irish Republic than in most Western countries, yet their birth rate is very low; and even if there were no emigration, it would still be a matter of concern. In the Report to which I have already referred. the Irish Government say this:
"The failure of population to increase is an impediment to economic growth, which is in turn an obstacle to a population increase. The breaking of this vicious circle is the main task facing the Irish Government".
So it would seem that in Ireland they have exactly the opposite problem to that which afflicts so many of these underdeveloped countries and the suggested remedy for which is family planning and birth control.
On the other hand, I think it is fairly certain that in the United States of America there is now a great deal more birth control, a great deal more widespread use of contraceptives, than there was in the period between the two wars, but the increase in the American population, though not quite on the Asiatic scale, is now vastly greater than the increase in the inter-war period. It has already reached 190 million, and seems likely to reach 240 million by 1980, and 340 million by the end of this century. As for our own country, your Lordships have often been reminded lately of the fact that all our educational planning for the next generation has been completely upset by the sudden and unexpected rise in the birth rate, which has caused all these plans to be revised.
Now, my Lords, I am glad that my noble friend has stressed in his Motion and in his speech that we should take practical measures to help only those nations which desire it, because on a matter of this kind where opinion is so

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deeply divided it would be quite wrong that we should take the initiative in proposing to help any country whose Government is not pursuing a policy of family planning and whose Government has not first requested us to give help or advice. Indeed, it might be counterproductive; it might have the effect of putting them against it.
If your Lordships would like to read this Report which I have put in the Library you will find an interesting comparison of the views collected by the Secretary-General from 43 countries. There are many who, although they stress the fact that their population is increasing too fast for their economic development, do not approve of family planning as a remedy; and there are others who are not very much interested from any point of view. Some of the Arab countries show a slight interest. India and Pakistan are two of the best-known examples of those who try to pursue a positive policy. The late Mr. Nehru and his Minister of Health often said that all their efforts to achieve a higher living standard will be frustrated if they do not take effective steps to keep their population within proper limits, and an important aspect of their work is to evolve what they call simple and readily accessible contraceptives. Thousands of clinics have been established all over India, and the central Government pays 100 per cent. of the costs. It is not only a question of illiteracy, although that is important as an adverse factor, but the population is so huge and communications are so difficult that the vast majority of the Indian people cannot avail themselves of these facilities; and the effects so far have been exceedingly small.
The Government here recognise the seriousness of the world population problem and we feel it would be difficult to carry out the aims of the Development Decade unless the rate of population increase is more in accordance with the growth of material wealth. We are prepared to give bilateral technical assistance to family planning projects on the same terms as we give it in other fields. A few months ago the Secretary for Technical Co-operation, through our Ambassadors and High Commissioners, informed a number of Commonwealth and foreign Governments, as well as some colonial Governments, that we are willing to apply to family planning exactly the same
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principles as govern our aid generally: namely, we should seek to respond to requests for technical assistance made to us by overseas Governments.
There is no question of our becoming involved in countries where there has not been a decision to promote family planning; but for countries where there has been such a decision we are prepared within our technical assistance programmes to finance visits or periods of service overseas by British medical and scientific experts or experts for the organisation of family planning, and also to provide the finance, the training and the research in this country for suitable people from overseas. We do not expect that the results of any aid we can give in this way will be very sensational or large. I think that most of the countries which are likely to carry out policies of this kind have as much technical information as they want, and I do not think they are very likely to ask us to give them more. But we are glad to do what we can.
My Lords, as to the United Nations—and that is what my noble friend was primarily thinking of in his argument—so far their activities have been pretty well confined to demographic science, and the Population Commission, which is a branch of the Economic and Social Council, have been fairly active in this field. They have given considerable help with the taking of censuses in underdeveloped countries and with ensuring that there is a proper analysis and evaluation of census data. An Asian Population Conference was held by the Economic Commission in December of last year and a World Population Conference is going to be held in Belgrade in September, 1965, to which we shall send a representative. Its objects are to improve understanding of population problems, especially the demographic aspect of the problems of economic and social development; to stimulate interest in scientific research; to collect data relating to these problems; to enhance the value of such research and data by an exchange of ideas and experience among specialists in the relative fields.
Anyone may say: "Why go on doing this talking and scientific research when the world population may increase so much as to lead to terrible famine or war?" But we cannot stop people from

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breeding and we must have more knowledge if we are to persuade them to do it themselves. My noble friend said a great deal about the necessity said a great deal about the necessity of acquiring more scientific data, and the noble Lady opposite was, I think, very probably right in saying that we must make people literate before family planning can become effective; and that cannot be done in a few days. But the Government are prepared to consider sympathetically any proposals for assisting the developing countries where this problem is pressing, if in the United Nations the question of practical action should be raised again—and my noble friend hoped that it might be. We are willing to support measures which are desired by the majority of developing countries and we shall be guided by their wishes in this question.
We are also prepared to consult other friendly Governments—my noble friend mentioned the United States—to consider what measures could usefully be taken at the United Nations. We think the technical assistance through the United Nations should be available to assist States which show a desire to spread the idea and practice of voluntary family planning. I am sure it is right that we should do what we can to disseminate information, but I am equally sure that family planning in the world will not become a reality until many hundreds of millions of families have the knowledge and the means—which they have not yet got—to take the necessary individual decisions which they believe to be morally right.
4.47 p.m.
THE LORD BISHOP OF LONDON: My Lords, I should like to add my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, for allowing us the opportunity of considering again this vital question of the mounting increase in the world population. In his introduction the noble Lord has given us the statistics and there is no need for that field to be traversed again. What they show, I believe, is that in the total world picture we have a situation of emergency, but that there are areas where there is already a crisis situation. It is perhaps important to keep these two pictures to some extent distinct in our thoughts.
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The Office of Population Research at Princeton has estimated that in four countries in Africa the rate of population increase exceeds 3 per cent. per annum. Other agencies tell us of eight countries in South America where it exceeds 3 per cent.; and since population increases in geometrical progression, a 3 per cent. annual increase in any region means that the population doubles in 23 years. When we combine these figures with the known facts about the level of nutrition in various countries, we can see that the largest increases in population are taking place in those very regions where the food shortage is to-day most marked.
Half the world's population is undernourished and the number of those suffering from under-feeding or hidden hunger is likely to double by 2,000 A.D., unless food production can be raised overall by something like 200 per cent. We realise the nature of the problem that has to be faced, and faced realistically. Much is being done to increase agricultural productivity, but unfortunately it is not yet evident that the necessary increase can take place in those areas where it is most needed. Indeed, the rapid rate of population growth is already acting as a brake on economic development in these countries, as has already been mentioned in the debate this afternoon.
There are two problems: a total world population increasing at such a rate that the future adequacy of our total resources has at least to be considered, and certain regional populations already so dense that life is lived at the lowest level of poverty, and those populations increasing so rapidly that local resources, at the highest predictable rate of increase, cannot be expected even to maintain the present level of bare subsistence. Behind these facts are the human problems—families living in conditions in which anything like family life is impossible: children born only to suffer and to face a life of malnutrition; mothers and fathers condemned to yet greater misery as they see the effects on the children whom they have produced.
When everything has been done that the generosity of individuals in the more affluent countries can do, the problem in some areas still remains intractable and insoluble on any short-term calculation. The magnificent response to War

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on Want, Oxfam, Freedom from Hunger, Inter-Church Aid and other appeals has its own inherent importance and value. That individuals in one country should care sacrificially for other individuals in other countries on a world scale is vitally important, because it is personal and not merely official. I hope that for this reason we shall continue to give every possible help to this kind of voluntary effort. But we shall delude ourselves if we believe that this can do more than scratch at the problem of world hunger and of the increasing need for productivity.
So, too, we must give every possible support to such Governmental sharing of resources as has already been referred to by the noble Earl, Lord Dundee. Yet these, by themselves, are not going to solve the question. I believe that the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, was essentially right when she referred to the need for the improvement of education as the long-term solution. We can believe that the spread of education and a rising standard of living—and how desperately that is needed in some parts of the world! —will lead not only to an increase in productivity in the most hard-pressed regions, but also (though of this we cannot be quite certain) to a voluntary reduction in the size of families. What the noble Lady said about the importance of social background in various areas in relation to the problems of population limitation is extremely important and is all to little understood and considered.
As the UNICEF Report on Children of Developing Countries has pointed out:
"A country's personal potential is limited by the number of children who are able to complete their preliminary and secondary schooling."
And the recent UNESCO Report estimates that in South and South-East Asia alone 87 million children still lack the facilities for elementary education, and that by 1980 in those areas there will be a further 130 million children to be educated. While we in this House have viewed with some alarm the effect of our own modest population increase upon our established standards of education, a problem like that makes our own problem pale into insignificance, and perhaps makes us wonder whether we are not being too niggardly in the encouragement that we give to sending some of our best teachers to help in the improvement of education abroad, even if it may mean
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a temporary lowering of our own educational standards.
Throughout the world, in the developing nations there is a hunger for knowledge which is no less important and no less real than the hunger for food—and the two are intimately related. The World Council of Churches is sponsoring a world appeal for literature as a small voluntary contribution to solving this particular problem, and I hope that when the time comes the people of this country will play their part in supporting this and similar appeals.
But, my Lords, are we really serious when we talk about sharing our educational knowledge with other developing countries? Only a fornight ago I read in the Press that the Community Development Clearing House, established in 1949 by the University of London Institution of Education, will close on December 31 this year for lack of the necessary funds, which seem to amount to the magnificent total of £5,000 per annum. This is a very small thing. Perhaps the Community Development Clearing House, over its years of existence, has been able only to scratch a little at this problem of mutual assistance in the field of potential education, but I am sure that it has done something of great value. Can we afford to let even one little agency like this go, when so much remains to be done and there is still so much to be known?
Although I believe that in the long term education is the only answer, we must not overlook the essential part of the education of women. The noble Lady referred to this—and rightly so. In many countries of the world the education of women still lags behind the education of men. It comes second when there is any need for the reduction of facilities. Yet, as Aggrey of Ghana used to say frequently, in his early days as Vice-Principal of Achimoto, "Educate a man and you educate an individual. Educate a woman and you educate a family". And everything that has happened in Ghana, since that country moved into the field of education, has shown how right was his judgment.
Is there not a need, also, to consider short-term action? This I take to be, basically, what the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, is asking us to consider. We need education, we need

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research, desperately badly; but in the meantime the populations increase. Are we driven to believe that we must do what we can to encourage some kind of family limitation? I find myself driven to that conclusion. And the Christian Churches—I believe that this can be said to be true without exception—do not disagree that family planning is right. What they differ on is the rightness of the methods which can be used. And here there is already a common field which needs to be explored. More research is still needed about the various methods which are available. Such research should be supported in every possible way.
Within the Christian Churches there is an urgent need, which I believe is now being met within all the Churches, for a reconsideration of traditional moral theology, which was developed when the crucial need was for increased population, and which has still to come to terms with the obligation of parenthood under the threat of over-population. The noble Earl, Lord Dundee, has already referred to the Lambeth Conference resolution of 1958, in which it was asserted that the responsibility for deciding upon the number and frequency of children is laid on the conscience of parents, and they must be free to decide, according to their conscience, what methods should be used and how limitation might be secured.
Within marriage—and I cannot emphasise too strongly that, from my understanding of the Christian point of view, it is only within marriage that any form of contraception can be considered as morally defensible—there are methods of contraception which may prove to be acceptable to Christian conscience and sufficiently simple to be capable of effectiveness in an illiterate or semi-illiterate society. But with the present rate of female illiteracy in the underdeveloped areas, any sophisticated methods are just not practical. The noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, referred to this. I hope that the warning which she gave against the foisting upon illiterate populations of unproved methods and methods where the side effects or the long-term effects are not known, and the fact that they must be safeguarded against this, will be heeded.
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This is perhaps part of the pooling of knowledge and experience for which the noble Lord asks in his Motion. We do not know very much about it yet, and I think we have to be honest enough to admit it. Certainly we do not know enough about it in terms of taking what may work with a relatively educated society here to another people with a different social tradition and background, with very little understanding as yet of the problems which are involved, and certainly not capable of any sophisticated methods. We need, then, more study and research, both medical and theological; and we can be thankful that this study is in progress. It needs the support of all of us.
The knowledge that we possess already, and the warning we have ourselves gained, should be available for all countries to consider. That, I understand, is basically what the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, is asking for in this Motion. It imposes no attitudes on anyone; it asks only for such information as there is to be made available to those Governments which ask for it. If through that means something may be done on a short-term basis to alleviate distress and misery in a crisis situation, I should myself feel bound in conscience to give it such support as in a personal capacity I am able to give.
5.4 p.m.
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: My Lords, I believe we are all equally grateful to the right reverend Prelate for his moving speech, because, although he said he spoke in a personal capacity, I have no doubt that he was reflecting the view of many of his colleagues and that he was giving the blessing of most of the members of his Church to the promise of support which the Government have given at the United Nations and to individual Governments for efforts that are being made to bring about population control.
Those of us who spoke last week in support of the United Nations Development Decade can hardly fail to speak again to-day in support of the noble Lord's Motion, and to endorse what he has said in his wise and very instructive speech. I am glad, indeed, to see the names of several noble Lords who spoke last week on the list of speakers this

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afternoon. Your Lordships will remember—perhaps I may remind the House briefly— that the United Nations target of a 5 per cent. per annum increase in the national income of the poor countries by 1970 was based on two assumptions. One was economic aid, which we discussed last week. The other assumption, to which the United Nations attached, and still attach, equal importance, was population control. For the possibility of reaching this minimal target by 1970 depends on an average rate of increase in the population of the poor countries of not more than 2 to 2½ per cent. per annum. This assumption has, unfortunately, though we are nearly halfway through the Development Decade by now, not yet been realised.
Many of the poor countries in Latin America, Africa and South Asia have a population which is increasing at a more rapid rate than 3 per cent. per annum; and, indeed, the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, mentioned Costa Rica, which has a growth rate of 5 per cent. In some of these countries large families are still linked with personal or national pride and family economics. There has, in fact, been little population control in the majority of these countries since 1960–that is to say, since the start of the Development Decade. Some Governments, notably the Governments of India, Pakistan, Ceylon and Tunisia have initiated a nation-wide campaign for family planning; and these Governments provide clinics where advice and instruction are given. But such Governments are an exception to the general rule.
In the majority of the poor countries there has been no Government lead or official support for family planning, which has been left, as it was for many years in this country, to the pioneering efforts of voluntary societies. In this field. I am sure your Lordships will agree that the International Family Planning Association has played a noteworthy and very creditable part. This decision of the countries in question may be foolish, and they may regret it later on. But we obviously have no right to impose our views on other countries or on individuals who do not agree with us. What we can do is to set an example by our own national policy, which should be to give support to all countries
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and individuals who desire to limit their families in the general interest.
Here I come back to the noble Lord's Motion. He asks us to support the United Nations in helping member nations that want help with their family planning; and the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, made an important statement on this subject. But may we look for a moment at the present position of the United Nations? It would not be unfair to say that the support of the United Nations for family planning hitherto has been a bit half-hearted and timid, and has been limited rather to ascertaining facts and demographic studies—in fact, to disseminating information which, though of importance and valuable, is not nearly so important as more practicable steps. The attitude of the United Nations was well described by the President of the Population Reference Bureau a few years ago. With your Lordships' permission (it is the only quotation that I intend to make) I should like to read his words. He said:
"… the United Nations has been impeded in any realistic, curative attack on the population problem because of a three-way split in thinking concerning policy formulation. The Communist bloc has steadily maintained that 'Neo-Malthusian efforts to reduce the population or to restrict its growth are unscientific and reactionary'; the Roman Catholic bloc, while agreeing quite explicitly in principle that over-rapid growth in regions of intense population pressure can be disastrous, has opposed any consideration which might imply the use of means of control morally unacceptable to the Church. The third group consists of the demographic representatives of the Western nations, who recognise the gravity of the crisis, but who have been disposed to evade the issue because of the fear of political consequences."
At any rate, as the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, pointed out, we supported the proposal that the United Nations should give technical aid. On that point, I think our behaviour is beyond blame. But we appear not to have pressed this matter in the United Nations with the degree of support it deserved. I hope we shall not continue to be regarded as being in any sense neutral or timid, and that the voice of Britain at the United Nations will be heard in support of any country that asks for assistance in dealing with its population programme.
Of course, we and the other Anglo-Saxon countries, as several noble Lords have already pointed out, have a Catholic minority. The right reverend Prelate

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emphasised the fact that there is a wide area of agreement between Catholics and non-Catholics. There is no difference of opinion, I think, about responsible parenthood. It is entirely a question of the method or means by which this responsibility should be carried out, and this matter is being considered by the Catholic Church at the present time. In the meantime, we are surely entitled to expect that all minorities will accept the public policy supported by the Government and by Parliament in respect to these family problems.
Clearly, as the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, said, the proper organ of the United Nations for co-ordinating research and scientific knowledge of these matters, and for disseminating the results of research among the poorer countries if they ask for guidance, is the World Health Organisation. I know that family planning is at present excluded from its agenda—and perhaps the noble Earl will deal with this in reply—but I hope the British representative will be instructed to press for a reconsideration of this very unfortunate decision, because I am sure the World Health Organisation is the right organ of the United Nations to take up this great matter of assisting countries which want assistance with information and, if required, technical aid for the control of their population.
Apart from the United Nations, there are two other ways in which the wealthy countries can help the poor countries. One is research. I am sure there ought to be co-ordination and pooling of research in all the advanced countries. I will not go into that, because others are much better qualified than I am to deal with research. The other is to give financial and technical aid, either bilaterally or through the United Nations, to those countries that are trying to solve their population problem and who ask for our help in doing so. The noble Earl made a very important statement on this subject this afternoon. I think it was a declaration of policy that has not been made by any Minister in another place, and I hope it will be widely studied and widely reported in the Press. I think this is the first time the Government
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have said publicly that they support the principle of technical aid for developing countries who ask for it.
If I were to criticise the speech of the noble Earl in any way it would be that he seemed a little doubtful, a little pessimistic, perhaps even sceptical, about the possibility of applying this principle. I did not think he showed a sufficient sense of urgency about this matter of providing technical aid. Bilateral aid to poorer Commonwealth countries who want assistance in family planning seems to me to offer us a splendid opportunity for a fresh initiative in Commonwealth policy. After all, the great majority of the Commonwealth people live in extremely poor countries. By taking this initiative we should not only open a new field for constructive Commonwealth cooperation; we should also set an example to the rest of the world in co-operation between economically advanced and economically backward countries. I greatly hope that this will be one of the matters discussed at the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference next month, and I hope the noble Earl will submit this proposal for the consideration of his right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Commonwealth. We know that economic aid will be on the agenda, and population control is the logical corollary of aid, for without it the purpose of aid will undoubtedly be defeated.
As three of the new Asian Commonwealth countries, India, Pakistan and Ceylon, are already engaged in family planning programmes, and several of the African Commonwealth countries have asked the United Nations for assistance —I think if the noble Earl looks back he will find that I am correct about that —I am sure that this initiative on the part of the United Kingdom Government would receive a favourable response. This limited amount of technical aid need not add to the total cost of our overseas aid expenditure, and I am quite certain that other forms of aid could be subtracted from the programme without any loss if we were to give technical aid instead. I hope that family planning, like education, will become an important part of our technical assistance programme to Commonwealth countries.

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Perhaps your Lordships will allow me to quote the example of Sweden, a country that in this, as well as in some other respects, appears to be a little ahead of us. Sweden did some time ago what we perhaps should have been doing, and what I hope we shall do in the future. I quote the example of Sweden because it shows that this principle to which the noble Earl adheres can be, and has been, applied successfully, and should be applied in the future. In 1958, the Government of Sweden made a bilateral agreement with the Government of Ceylon to co-operate for three years in the implementation of family planning in Ceylon, with the ultimate aim of extending the successful features of a local programme to the whole of the Island. The fourfold aim of this joint project was (1) to assess attitudes in the villages towards family planning; (2) to investigate the possibilities of applying family planning; (3) to give instruction in methods of family planning, and (4) to assist in training a Singhalese health staff in this kind of work.
The project has been highly successful. During the first four years since the agreement was signed the birth rate in the village area where this experiment was made has dropped sharply as compared with the birth rate either in its own district or in Ceylon as a whole. My only regret about this operation is that it took place between Sweden and Ceylon, and not between Britain and Ceylon. But there is still time for us to follow this Swedish example. Further delay would, I am sure, be disastrous, because it would by then be too late to check the population explosion. We cannot wait until other parts of the world reach the standard of living reached in Europe and North America. This is a matter of the utmost urgency, and the time factor is all important. I hope that the Government will act now to support family planning on every possible occasion at the United Nations, among its agencies and on all its committees, to encourage and co-ordinate research into family planning methods. I am sure we have much further to go in that respect and into human fertility research—research which has been done in the advanced countries—and to assist any country, particularly if it is a member of the Commonwealth, who ask the British Govern-
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ment for help in carrying out its own programme of population control.
5.19 p.m.
LORD CASEY: My Lords, we must all be most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, for creating this opportunity to discuss this subject of major international importance. In spite of the fact, as the noble Lord told us when he started, that this subject has been discussed on a number of previous occasions in your Lordships' House, I believe that it cannot be discussed enough. I do not come to this subject at all unprepared, and it is my belief that in Britain this subject of world-wide importance is not nearly enough in the minds of the people who count; and, with great respect to the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, I would include in that the members of Her Majesty's Government.
This subject comes to us from time to time under a number of headings: family planning, research into the reproductive cycle, birth control, reference to the World Health Organisation, which, indeed, is the subject matter of the noble Lord's Motion to-day. But all these headings add up in the end to the same thing: the discovery by research of a socially acceptable contraceptive, suitable to tropical conditions for the developing countries. That we have not yet obtained, in spite of the very considerable amount of research that has been done.
My Lords, my interest in this subject is confined to the intense problems created by population pressure in the developing countries, of which perhaps the most typical are the two great Commonwealth countries of India and Pakistan. They are not, of course, alone: Latin America, Ceylon, Singapore, parts of Malaysia and many others have been mentioned; but for my purposes I am concerned mainly with the two great Commonwealth countries in Asia, India and Pakistan. I am not in the least concerned with the situation in this regard in respect of the densely-populated and highly industrialised countries, of which, of course, the United Kingdom is a paramount example. That is not in my field of interest; I am concerned only with the developing countries which have the most intense problems arising from

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population pressure. With that short caveat, I should like to address myself to the subject matter of the noble Lord's Motion.
This Motion is moved against a very considerable background of documentation. This matter has been threshed to death, particularly in the last five years, demographically in the public Press and elsewhere. There is no lack of knowledge for those who want to have knowledge of this subject, either on the demographic side or on the social and political side, of the effect of population pressure if nothing is done. I would say, with respect, that those who are not yet convinced are probably in the same category as the individual who is supposed to have said, "I regard the works of Robert Burns as immoral, and for that reason I have not read them."
The simple facts, if I may burden your Lordships for a very few moments, are these. India and Pakistan are most densely populated countries and are daily becoming more so. By reason of constantly increasing population pressure their economies are threatened in the future— and not necessarily in the very distant future. The population pressure of these countries, and other countries similarly afflicted, is stopping any rational rise in living standards, and at no very great remove is threatening social and political stability in those countries, in particular, in that regard, in India and Pakistan. Let me just state very briefly the reason for my being able to make those very positive statements.
India to-day has a population of over 450 million people, increasingly annually at a rate of at least 10 million. Pakistan has nearly 100 million people, increasing at a rate of 2½ million a year. Each of these two countries is very poor indeed, as those of your Lordships who have lived, worked and served there, will realise. Their standards of living are probably one-twentieth of that in Great Britain or my own country, Australia. They suffer very high rates of unemployment, and still higher rates of underemployment. Their Governments are trying desperately to remedy this situation and, as your Lordships know very well, some years ago instituted a series of Five-Year Plans. India is in its third
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Five-Year Plan, and I think that Pakistan is now in its second.
These Five-Year Plans entail a very great deal of money—not the normal budgetary sums, but developmental money. In this year of her Five-Year Plan India is spending the equivalent of well over £1,000 million, of which over £300 million is provided from outside India. The figures for Pakistan are that this year she will be spending the equivalent of £350 million on the fourth year of her second Five-Year Plan, of which about £120 million comes from abroad. These great sums of money are spent on improving the infrastructure of those two great countries; on improving their industries, their power production, irrigation, transportation, and the like. The result, of course, is that many new industries are being created and, in consequence, at a short remove, the production of a wide variety of goods in India and Pakistan is being increased.
If the population were static or with a rationally small percentage annual increase, that increase in production would inevitably improve the pathetically low standard of living. But that is not happening in any appreciable degree that can be noticed with the naked eye. With this tidal wave in India of 10 million new mouths and bodies to cope with every year, and in Pakistan 2½ million, it is not a question only of feeding them. They have to be educated, employed, clothed and housed; and their health must be looked after. People speak from time to time as if the feeding of these extra mouths were the only thing. But it is far from being the only thing. I believe that these large expenditures—they would be large for any country—are doing little more than keeping the already very low standard of living in these countries from falling still further. In other words, these great sums of money provided from domestic resources in India and Pakistan, and from other well-disposed Western countries—including, of course, Britain herself, and other Commonwealth countries—is being very largely wasted if we look on their purpose as being that of helping to improve the standard of living of these countries.
These countries are not going to be content to stand still, though at the moment, so far as their standard of living is concerned, they are running very fast

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in order to stand still. I do not believe myself, with some little knowledge that I can claim of the Asian Commonwealth countries, that they are going to be prepared to stand still indefinitely. They see, and are well aware of, the constantly rising prosperity in the West, and perhaps almost in particular in this country, and of the widening gap between the prosperity of the West and the lack of prosperity in their own countries. The economic gap is widening and not narrowing, as those of your Lordships will realise who know the results of and have followed some of the discussions in the three-month United Nations Conference on Trade and Development in Geneva which ended quite recently.
In the light of all this, India and Pakistan attempted family planning as a national Government policy a number of years ago. The problem was, and is, that all they have to work on are the rather old-fashioned, complicated and expensive methods of family planning which the West have been using for a number of years but which I believe to be wholly inappropriate to tropical Asian conditions. The central target, I think, is the illiterate Indian village woman who first, cannot afford, and secondly cannot understand, the rather complicated procedures that existing methods, even the most recently developed methods of coping with contraception, necessitate.
The noble Earl, Lord Dundee, spoke of the family planning clinics that exist in India. I obtained the numbers of them only this morning from the Indian High Commission in London. There are over 8,500 family planning clinics in India, and something like the equivalent number in Pakistan. They do a great deal of good work, have no doubt, particularly among the relatively sophisticated members of their respective populations. They do, I am quite sure, good work in respect of motherhood and the like; but they cannot do their prime purpose because the contraceptive which is both suitable to their conditions and socially acceptable has not yet been devised. I believe that is the simple fact of it.
Various methods of coping with the situation that I am attempting to describe have been suggested in the past, some from the West and some originat-
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ing from Asia itself. One is that there should be exhortation for people to take advantage of the so-called safe period. That was tried in India on a large scale ten years ago and failed completely, and there are current reports from the Government of India on it. Other people —cynical people, I believe—say "Grow more food". I suppose you could grow more food to cope with the tidal wave of oncoming new population, but there are a number of "ifs"—if you had a new system of land tenure in India and Pakistan, which I cannot see any Government in prospect being able to bring about; if you spent the vast amount of capital monies necessary to bring about the necessary irrigation works and fertiliser plants on the grand scale, and a great many other "ifs". When you have done all that, if you do it, you have still to cope with the employment of these ten million new people a year, and their clothing, housing, education, and seeing to their health. The combination of all these things, I believe, is beyond human capability in those countries.
There are other individuals—I have heard noble Lords in this House express this— who say that this should be left to the countries who suffer from it, India and Pakistan in particular. I have never heard a more cynical remark than that. Anyone who knows India and Pakistan, as I claim to do a little, knows that they have not the scientific resources to evolve the contraceptive they need. I think that is a cruel remark, trying to throw it back into the laps of the countries suffering from the problem.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, I do not know who made this remark.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: It was Lord Hailsham who made the remark, now Mr. Hogg.
LORD CASEY: The remark has been made on more than one occasion in this House. I think it was made two years ago when I had the privilege of introducing a Motion on this general subject.
Then there are others who say, "Do nothing; let nature take its course. That, again, is, I believe, a cynical point of view. I believe there is only one solution of this problem— and my opinion is as nothing compared with the many experts who have had a lifetime's experience of

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it—and that is more scientific research into the long and intricate chain of male and female reproduction, in an effort to find a chink into which it may be possible to interpose some deterrent—I do not say what sort—that would inhibit conception. And for Asia the contraceptive to meet that specification has not yet, as I have said, been evolved. It may be evolved in the future. It has been said in this House to-day that we must not impose our views on India and Pakistan. Heaven alive—impose our views! On what? Do not India and Pakistan know very well, having created their national family planning departments, what they are doing? They do not need our view that they should indulge in family planning; they thought of it a very long time before we did. But what they have done is to ask to be supplied with the results of scientific research in this country and the United States to enable them to do the job themselves. Nobody is trying to tell India and Pakistan what to do; they know very well. They have appealed in particular to the United States, time and time again, for this degree of expedited scientific research.
There has been a great deal of response in the United States. There has been intense agitation, particularly in the last five years, agitation from a wide variety of well-informed people and institutions, towards the taking of more positive steps to aid other countries to a solution of their population pressure problems. And this agitation in the United States has met, I think, with increasing results, beginning with the American President's Draper Committee Report of 1959; then came the National Academy of Sciences Report in 1963—and that body, as your Lordships know, is the equivalent of the Royal Society in this country —which called for an expansion of research laboratories for the scientific investigation of the bio-medical aspects of human reproduction.
Then, again, also in 1963–and may I commend this to the noble Lord—there was a statement by the late President Kennedy himself, who, I may remind noble Lords, was a Roman Catholic. He said, in effect (these are not the precise words but they are a careful cut-down):
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"The United States should do more investigation of the whole reproductive cycle and give the results to the world."
In May, 1963, just over a year ago, there was an official Government announcement on behalf of the United States Administration that they would give a substantial contribution to the World Health Organisation for research into human reproduction.
As to what has been the position in this country I am less well aware, and that is not because I have not tried to find out. But perhaps the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, when he replies towards the end of the debate, would be good enough to lighten my darkness by adding to what he said earlier on about what has been done and said by Her Majesty's Government and their instrumentalities—by the National Health Council, for example, which I would expect to be the relevant instrumentality, and others, to encourage further research into this problem. I have some idea of what is going on in certain fields in this country. To the extent that a layman can know, I know what has been done by the Society for the Study of Human Fertility, with its several hundred members, most of whom, I think, are devoting themselves to the general problem we are discussing to-day. I know the work and writings of Professor A. S. Parkes, Professor of Reproductive Physiology at Cambridge. I know the work of the Family Planning Association and the very many contributions it has made to constructive publicity for this problem, under the distinguished Presidency of the noble Lord, Lord Brain. I have tried to discover what the Medical Research Council has done and said, presumably on behalf of the Government, but I cannot discover. I should like very much to know.
The things that have been said in the United States, either by Governments or by high-level scientific bodies, I think have given great encouragement to the great Foundations in the United States, in particular the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations, who between them have spent a number of millions of dollars a year for no less than 12 years on this subject of human reproduction. A very considerable amount of work has also been done by the ten principal pharmaceutical companies in the United States, endeavouring to find a chemical

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orally-taken contraceptive. I have inquired in many quarters what the relationship is between the amount of money spent on this subject in this country and in the United States. I have had many shrewd guesses that the Americans are doing ten times as much; I have been told in another quarter that they are doing twenty times as much, and I have heard even more extravagant figures than that.
I do not believe there is anything like sufficient high-level interest in this subject in this country to enable research to be stimulated and encouraged. I do not know—perhaps the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, will be good enough to tell me if he happens to know—what British Ministers have discussed this subject with, say, the late Mr. Nehru, with Ayub Khan of Pakistan, with Mr. T. T. Krishnamachari, with Mr. Nanda in India and with Doctor Chagla, and the various Ministers of Health over the last few years. Have these subjects been discussed? I am certain that if they had been, any of the gentlemen I have mentioned would have expressed themselves in most direct and concrete terms on what India wants and what Pakistan wants. But whether or not there has been that degree of personal contact on this highly important matter, I do not know.
When I ask, as I frequently do in this country, what is the reason for the relative indifference in this country, certainly from the Governmental point of view, I am frequently told—in private, of course, not in public—that it is the influence of the Roman Catholic Church. To-day, I took a little trouble to look up the percentage of Roman Catholics in this country so far as this has relevance to what I am saying, and I find it is under 10 per cent. The proportion of Catholics in the United States is 25 per cent. Yet, in spite of that greater percentage of Catholics in the United States, they find themselves able to do—what is it?—ten times, twenty times, anyhow a great deal more than is done in this country. And, even from a Catholic President, it is made the subject of a public statement of considerable consequence.
I have probably spoken for too long on this subject; but it is one that is close to my heart and one to which I have given a good deal of attention in the last ten years. I repeat my gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord
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McCorquodale of Newton, for having given us all, and myself inferentially, this additional opportunity to discuss it. I finish only by saying that I support his Motion with great enthusiasm as dealing with one of the really pressing world problems, if not the most pressing world problem, short of a nuclear war breaking out. Also I believe, as I have said, that this subject is one of the least realised of the important subjects with which the world is faced to-day.
5.42 p.m.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, in rising to support this Motion, I heartily agree with the noble Lord who has just sat down. I am quite convinced that the subject of this debate is one of the most important in the world. When you think that it has taken us 200,000 years to reach our present population of, I believe, about 2,800 million, and we are told that by A.D. 2000 we shall probably have doubled it, or even exceeded that total —that is in only 35 years—if that is not a world problem, I do not know what is. Equally, as other noble Lords have pointed out, over half of this increase is in Asia which covers only one-fifth of the world's surface.
We have heard the noble Lord, Lord Casey, say that we pour millions into the under-developed countries to raise their standards, but of course our object is, to a great extent, completely nullified because where we have sought to increase the diet and the hygienic conditions in those countries, instantly the number of mouths to feed has doubled. I have seen a little of this myself in various parts of the world. Some say—I think we have heard this to-day—that provided we increase food production, we can keep pace with increasing population. But all the evidence is now against this.
It is perhaps possible for a few years to increase food production so that two-thirds of the world is living at a subsistence level, but the time is bound to come when food production cannot do even this. As we have heard, several Asian leaders are acutely aware of this. The late Mr. Nehru frequently said that his Five-Year Plans were being frustrated by the ever-increasing population. India has courageously embarked upon great family planning organisation, but

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according to current population figures from that country this does not appear to be having the success it deserves.
This is a heart-rending subject. We have appeals from OXFAM. Anyone who has seen under-nourished people or children who are hungry knows that it is an appalling thing, but I cannot help feeling that if some of the finance that goes to OXFAM could be spent on education in birth control in these countries it would really do more good. If you bring food into these countries you are really only aggravating the problem. I quite agree that you ought to do everything to improve agriculture in these countries. But in the long term it is cruel to bring in food artificially unless it is kept up in ever-increasing quantities.
We have heard from one eminent professor, Professor Kay, that although the amount of home-grown and imported food brought into these underdeveloped countries is increasing, it is still well below that needed to meet the net rate of population increase. I do not think that it has been mentioned in the debate to-day that the situation in regard to home-grown food supplies in Asia and Africa has not been altogether aided by the upheavals that have attended the granting of independence to these countries. Food production there has hardly increased at all since pre-war days. In some areas it has even decreased owing to the dispossession or disappearance of the European farmers. Only a short time ago a friend of mine who has just come back from Morocco told me that in the days of the French it had a thriving agriculture, but now it is going backwards. I am also told that the same state of affairs exists in Ceylon and in quite a few other countries in these parts of the world.
These underdeveloped countries must understand that if their agricultural production is to increase, as it must increase, they must give every encouragement to the European farmer to remain there. I cannot understand how anybody can say that birth control is not an absolute necessity in such countries, for otherwise one is going to have an ever-increasing number of people, countless millions of them, living almost like animals. I have seen many of them in such conditions, as I am sure have many of your Lordships.
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It is quite impossible in these conditions for people to develop their full spiritual nature as human beings.
We have heard a lot of talk about education and, obviously, education and family planning go hand in hand. But if one has people who are desperately under-nourished, it is extremely difficult to educate them. Their brains are undernourished and they cannot concentrate. Their conditions are so appallingly squalid that for any man to rouse himself out of the apathy which such conditions induce requires superhuman effort. Somehow one has to teach them birth control, but education takes a long time.
The situation in the British Isles, about which I should like to speak for a few moments, does not, of course, cause the same concern as the problem in Asia and Africa. An extraordinary point about the position in the British Isles is that Eire has not had any population increase at all. The noble Earl, Lord Dundee, made this point. Of course, the reason is probably emigration. I have often thought that if one had the Dutch in Ireland one would probably have a population in Ireland of 25 or 30 million. But, on the other hand, if one had the Irish living in Holland one would eventually have nobody there at all because they would probably forget to repair the dykes and would all get drowned—but presumably that will never come about.
We have hope in this country because, as we have heard to-day, all the denominations of the Christian Church have now agreed on the necessity for family planning, which is, of course, a step forward. Probably the noble Earl, Lord Longford, will correct me if I am wrong, but so far as I am aware the only difference between the Christian Churches, the Church of England and the Roman Catholics, is as to the method employed for family planning. The Church of England, I believe, has now come round to the idea that it is far more Christian to have two or three children and to bring them up decently and in good conditions than to have twelve children and to bring them up in poverty. I quite agree with that view. The Church of England, I understand, in order to achieve that aim, allow the use of contraception.
I understand that while the Roman Catholics agree it is better to have three

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children brought up in decent conditions than it is to have twelve in poor conditions, they maintain that contraceptives are evil. Their idea of family planning is by self-restraint at certain periods. I cannot understand the logic in the Catholics saying this. I can understand, from the moral point of view, that it is good for everybody in every walk of life to indulge in self-restraint and self-discipline, but I cannot understand why Catholics say that they do not agree with contraceptives because they interfere with the natural laws of nature, whereas the whole time we are interfering with the law of nature in other ways. After all, we keep weak, unhealthy people alive, and one cannot interfere more with the laws of nature than to do that. So I really cannot understand the logic of that argument. If nature had her way there would be no problem at all, because nature is very callous so far as the individual is concerned and she is only interested in the survival of the species.
Obviously, in relation to the population problem in the British Isles, one cannot have anything like a Government direction in relation to the size of families, but I believe that what one has to do is to take into account the great financial responsibility involved in having children. After all, highly educated people, quite apart from the religious question, control their families; they have only as many children as they can afford. But the majority of the population, as their children are to all intents and purposes supported by the Welfare State, do not have this onerous burden. I have often wondered whether the family allowances are not nowadays out of date. I should prefer to see the money spent on other things, such as education. I am sure there is a point here for future Governments. In any event, we have no guarantee that the family allowances are spent on the children. I know several cases where I am quite sure they are not, and I think they are spent in the pubs and on gambling. This is a point in which I have always been rather interested.
In this country we now have no need at all for a large population, as the days of vast armies are over. We have automation in industry and one does not need a vast population for industry. So I really think it is up to us, for the
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future happiness of mankind, to do everything we can to encourage the control of population. I should like heartily to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, upon introducing this debate, and I warmly agree that this matter is, from the global angle, the responsibility of the United Nations. Here is something really worthwhile that the United Nations can do. The United Nations have not always been successful in their political junketings around the world, but here is something which, if only it can be well organised through them, will add very greatly to the happiness of mankind. Of course the problems are absolutely immense. There are racial suspicion, ignorance and tribal customs; and the greatest of all these is suspicion. The reason why the lead has to come through the United Nations is that, if it came solely through the Anglo-Saxons or through the Europeans a great number of Asians and Africans would, I am sure, feel that perhaps it was a white trick to "do down" the coloured races. That is, of course, completely absurd, but we cannot have them thinking that. I can only say that if something is not done soon, on a world-wide scale, there will probably be, owing to this great pressure of population, either a war, in spite of the deterrent effect of nuclear arms, or a terrible plague—and if there is a plague it will sweep across the whole world. I heartily support the Motion.
6.4 p.m.
THE EARL OF IDDESLEIGH: My Lords, "Population explosion". I wonder whether it would not have been more scientific to put that word "explosion" in the plural. It is true that the decrease in the death rate has something to do with the various population explosions that exist to-day. But it is to my mind fallacious, and unscientific, to stress too much the common elements in these separate population phenomena. There is a population explosion, for all I know (but we know very little about it), in China. There is a population explosion, as we know very well, in Southern Asia. There may be the danger of a population explosion in Africa; and South America was also mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of

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Newton. These four phenomena do not have very much in common.
In South America as a whole there is no population problem; but there are appalling population problems in a great many of the South American towns. Conditions in the shanty towns of Santiago are indescribably horrible, and in those conditions there is intensive population increase. Yet South America is an under-populated continent. I have some figures here of statistics of persons per acre in some South American countries. In Bolivia there are 3 persons per square kilometre; in Paraguay there are 4 persons; in the Argentine, Peru and Venezuela there are 8 persons per square kilometre; and there are 9 in Brazil, 11 in Chile, 13 in Colombia, 16 in Ecuador and 35 in Uruguay. That compares with 217 persons per square kilometre in Britain or, if you take England and Wales separately, with 307. Therefore I say that South America is an empty, under-populated country, and needs, through just and sometimes drastic legislation, a better distribution of its population. I say that, my Lords, because we are too often inclined to attribute to population pressure ills that arise through human injustice and economic incompetence.
I remember well in the 'thirties, when we were suffering so terribly, that we had people saying, "Britain is overpopulated". I well remember a debate in this House in which mass emigration was put forward as a solution for the economic distress and unemployment from which we were suffering. Of course that was nonsense. And I believe it to be equally unscientific to speak of the population problem in South America without reference to the social conditions that produce the slums of Santiago.
But in Southern Asia there is undoubtedly a great and serious population problem. And it is worse in Malaya and Singapore than in India. But India is the country on which our thoughts should be concentrated, for India is the first underdeveloped country to seek to remedy its population troubles by a neo-Malthusian campaign.
Three other countries have tried neo-Malthusian campaigns, with marked suc-
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cess. The population of Sweden was drastically reduced by such a campaign; it was also successful, according to its objects, in Denmark; and it was very markedly successful in Japan, as has been mentioned. But these are highly-developed, industrialised and well-educated countries. It could have been predicted that, granted the materialistic outlook which also distinguishes these three nations, a neo-Malthusian campaign would be successful. But now India is attempting the same remedy for her troubles. Much has been said about India, and many interesting statistics have been quoted. What has not been quoted is the remark made by the late Mr. Nehru when he opened the Asiatic Population Conference in December, 1963. I have not been able to obtain a verbatim report of his speech, although I have made every effort to do so from India House. But, through the courtesy of the noble Lady, I have obtained an abbreviated report of the late Mr. Nehru's remarks. He said, when opening that Asiatic Conference, that India's birth prevention campaign had been a failure. When considering the evidence we cannot possibly ignore a remark like that.
The problem of Indian overpopulation arises from many factors, notably from one which has not yet been mentioned, and that is the child marriages. I myself believe that the true remedy for India's excessive population would be to abandon those child marriages, which are so shocking to us in the West. I speak with respect of this institution of a great civilisation, but it is very hard for us to reconcile ourselves with this particular social phenomenon. But what has India been doing in its neo-Malthusian campaign? It has opened 8,000—or is it 8,500?— clinics, and these clinics have attracted a great deal of interest. Indians are respectful to their Government, whatever their Government may be, and an initiative of this kind by Congress Raj has naturally engaged the interest of the people. Unfortunately, however, an Indian Government publication tells us that interest has been chiefly among women over 35, for these wretched women who have been having children, child after child, for 20, 22 or 25 years naturally feel they must find a remedy. I have every sympathy with them; but,

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of course, the effect on the birth rate of teaching contraceptive measures to these women of over 35 is negligible.
The clinics in India have provided material free to all the poor who come, and that has enabled them to keep some check on the degree of persistence in contraception which has prevailed among their clientele. It is admitted that the standard of persistence has not been notably high. The Indian married couple learn these methods with interest and curiosity, but they do not persist with them, and that has been part of the trouble. In point of fact, India, with its millennial tradition behind it, will not easily be persuaded to change the basic pattern of its marital life. Of course, let me agree at once that, among the more intelligent classes in India, the better-educated classes, the Westernised classes, the campaign has been a great success. Of course, they take to it very readily; but they are so few, and I cannot wholly welcome a development which brings about small families among those intelligent and educated people who are best fitted to bringing up children.
There has in fact been a tendency to take less interest in contraceptive information and to concentrate more effort and more expenditure on sterilisation. Sterilisation camps have been set up throughout the country, and they move about from one place to another. They have attracted a very large number of Indians, and they have had a considerable measure of statistical success. An Indian Government publication informs me that, between January, 1956, and June, 1963, more than 250,000 men and 150,000 women submitted to sterilisation. One would nave thought, would one not, that that was a simple and effective method of population control? Unfortunately, most of the candidates for that operation have proved to be men who are over 40, and, again, the effect on the population has not been very great.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt, but I would say just for the accuracy of the case that page 15 of the book we have both been looking at gives the number of sterilised as 242,000 men. Is that the figure the noble Lady gave?
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: Yes.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: I am sorry to have interrupted.
THE EARL OF IDDESLEIGH: I was supplied with that book and with another. I will not quarrel about whether it is 242,000 or 250,000. It is not a very great matter.
These are the facts that we have to face. However much some noble Lords may dislike them, they must be taken into account. Nobody thinks there can be any virtue in asking the United Nations to support a neo-Malthusian campaign when the signs are very much against its being successful. But as a matter of fact, the United Nations are supporting it. India receives substantial sums of unallocated aid—in other words, aid for which the Government of India do not have to account—in its development programme. It is clear that this unallocated aid helps the Indian Government bear the expenses of the campaign in question.
When we come to the United Nations, we find it divided into three parties. Two of these are the neo-Malthusian party and the anti-neo-Malthusian party. The latter, as the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, said, comprises the Communist States and the Catholic States. I do not pretend to be competent to expound the views of the Communist Governments. I imagine, however, that their condemnation of birth control has something to do with their propaganda. I think it might be a very useful point when spreading propaganda among simple and uneducated people to say, "The Colonial powers are so mean that they would even deny you the right to have a family. If only you take up Communism all your troubles will be at an end." That is very much what one of the Communist delegates said at the United Nations Conference. I had the greatest interest in reading the Report, the Hansard of that Conference. With the Catholic States, it is quite simply a matter of conscientious objection; and we in this country who have had such long, honourable and liberal dealings with conscientious objectors know very well that it is not very much use arguing with a conscientious objector.

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For that reason I will not follow the noble Lord who preceded me into his profound theological dissertations about the Catholic attitude. It is not a thing that can be very much affected by argument. There is of course the possibility that, in view of the re-examination of the question which is now going on in Rome, some modification of the Roman Catholic attitude may take place. I do not know in what direction. I do not know what the Pope may allow; but I know very well what the Pope will not allow. I feel on very secure ground in saying that there can be no accommodation between the Roman Catholic Church and sterilisation, or certain other methods referred to in this book which form part of the teaching given in the "population campaign" in India.
The third party to which Her Majesty's Government have hitherto adhered appeals to those who feel there is great need for more information to study the matter. In that respect I heartily endorse the words of the noble Lord, Lord Casey. We need a great deal of study on three points: first of all, the social effects of a neo-Malthusian campaign. There are difficult points here; you may interfere with the balance of age groups if you drastically reduce the number of children born in one generation, and the problem arises of who is going to look after the older people. Then there is the balance of sexes. That comes into it, too, especially in Asia. In Asia, where our correct Western ideas of the equality of the sexes have not very much penetrated, every man wants to have a son. He will go on having children until he gets a son. If possible he will get two sons; then, if he is using birth control, he will stop; but of course the result of that is that there is bound to be a great excess of female births. It will throw the sexes out of balance and make many other social problems which will need to be studied.
Then there are scientific problems such as those connected with the long-term effect of the sterile chemicals, and there are also problems connected with the whole subject of fertility. But really there is a vast amount we do not know about fertility. For example, why in some epoch in history a nation may immensely increase and why, in another
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epoch, it will greatly decrease. There is very little we know about the matter and one of the best pieces of news we have had for a long time was that the Ford Foundation was financing a world-wide study of fertility on a scientific basis. I do not know whether the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, can tell us how long that is going to take or whether he can give us any more details.
My Lords, I was going to end my speech by congratulating Her Majesty's Government on keeping in the neutral group in this matter and being content, as their representative was in 1962, with a demand for closer study of the problem. I was very much surprised at the announcement which the noble Earl made this afternoon. The noble Earl explained that perhaps not very much help bilaterally would be given. "It is only a little one"; but it is a decision in principle; and, though, of course, I recognise that I belong to a small minority, I very much regret that that decision has been made, and I regret that it is apparently endorsed by a representative on the Front Bench of the Labour Party. I can say no more. I wonder whether the noble Earl will feel the need to go a little further and to tell us a little about the methods which we are going to teach. I have spoken of sterilisation. Will British doctors be used to instruct in vascectomy? The noble Baroness Lady Summerskill has spoken about sterilisation pills. What is the attitude going to be to that matter? Are we going to instruct bilaterally in that? I leave these questions to the noble Earl.
6.30 p.m.
LORD SANDYS: My Lords, I rise to support the Motion which has been introduced so eloquently by my noble friend Lord McCorquodale of Newton, to whom we are deeply grateful, if for no better reason than that this debate follows closely on the heels of the debate a week ago on the United Nations Development Decade. I feel that today's debate is highly important, because it allows us to see last week's debate in the right context.
My noble friend Lord Massereene and Ferrard sought some information about the policy of OXFAM on family planning. I hope that I may be permitted to furnish him with such details as I have. At the present moment—I say "at the

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present moment," because this may be revised at a later date—OXFAM does not have a policy on family planning. What OXFAM thinks is this. We do not question the right and the duty of other qualified people and bodies to explore responsibly the many complicated technical and moral questions involved in man's increasing control, not only of his environment, but also of his fellow men. As a non-sectarian body we cannot advocate methods of birth control, which we know are at present disapproved of by a large section of our supporters. That is the official line taken by OXFAM, which my noble friend requested. I will pick up as I proceed one or two of his points.
The question of whether the Western countries do or do not appreciate the importance of over-population in the East, or the Northern countries the over-population in the South, is largely a hypothetical one. A great part of the problem, as we are well aware, is centred in Asia and is perhaps best looked at through Eastern eyes. For a large number of reasons, Western views are suspected of having some neo-colonial connotation. A distinguished Indian, Mr. Chagla, who has been quoted this afternoon and who is very knowledgeable on this subject, made an eloquent appeal for research into oral contraception. This appeal was quoted three years ago in your Lordships' House by the noble Lord, Lord Casey, who said so much on this subject, on an objective line, this afternoon. At the risk of wearying your Lordships, I feel that this is so relevant that I should like to repeat it.
Mr. Chagla said:
"I want you to imagine what it means for millions of children to be born in underdeveloped countries, children who will suffer from malnutrition, who may have no proper home to live in, no employment when they grow up and may spend their lives discontented and dissatisfied and become bitter human beings, a prey to any new idea which may promise them better prospects and more tolerable conditions. I am very impatient of arguments which are advanced against birth control and family planning on grounds of morality. What is this morality which condemns millions of children to poverty and destitution?"
Surely it is the purpose of the Freedom from Hunger campaign and the United Nations Development Decade that this poverty and destitution should be remedied by expanding food production and
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distribution. However, in certain areas, all efforts to increase production are overtaken by the growth of population at an even greater rate. This does not contradict the fact that total world production is still just keeping a little ahead of total world population. It is on a regional basis that things have gone badly wrong.
I hope that the noble Lord who introduced this Motion will permit me to digress for the purpose of quoting an example of a regional problem. The North African area is one with which I am well acquainted, and perhaps I may quote the example of Morocco, which has already been referred to by my noble friend Lord Massereene and Ferrard. In Morocco, production can feed a population of only 10 million, whereas a young and rapidly increasing population is now reaching a height estimated at between 12 and 13 million. That means that about 3 million have to be fed through the auspices of the United States Share Our Surplus programme, though naturally this will not go on for ever.
Where can this expanding population look but to the Sahara for room in which to make a livelihood? Climatic changes can be brought about only gradually, through a change in the ecology. The first steps in this direction have already been taken by the countries bordering on the Northern fringe of the Sahara. My noble friend said he thought that the Moroccan agricultural programme had gone back. I beg to dispute that point with him. Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya have substantial tree-planting and agricultural programmes. In Egypt, I million acres have been reclaimed on the Western bank of the Nile, and in Nigeria, in the South-West of the Sahara, conservation is preventing the advance of the desert. But this is not enough. Reclamation on any large scale requires a vast international effort. Research on this effort has been going on for some years. A Sahara reclamation programme would need the full weight of F.A.O. behind it, but I feel that if the United Nations were to take the initiative this would have the support of, and certainly would be acceptable in, a large number of African countries.
Over-population has many side effects. Professors Barque, of the University of Liège, writing in the New Scientist recently, spoke of "the cage

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effect" which mankind is likely to suffer—the noise, the relative lack of solitude, the invasion of open spaces. These are all familiar phrases, indicating some of the unpleasant features which are increasing in our daily life in this country. I believe that many other evils of to-day can be ascribed to overpopulation. The noble Earl, Lord Iddesleigh, felt that this was incorrect; but I suggest that such things as housing shortage, land scarcity, overspill conurbations, the destruction of our beautiful countryside and the thrombosis of transport, can in part be ascribed to the over-population of these islands. I suggest that this over-population has been actively encouraged by successive Governments over a long period. They have encouraged immigration and population growth. This is a short-sighted policy, when we cannot expand our land area and when we have no convenient large area to reclaim on our shores. When we examine in detail some of the difficult problems, such as transport and town planning, I think that we shall entirely agree with the noble Lord who proposed this Motion, that the population explosion is one of the most important questions of our time: and of this country, in particular.
6.40 p.m.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, the noble Lord who has just made such an interesting speech informed us that an eminent gentleman, Mr. Chagla, had expressed impatience at the introduction of any moral arguments against birth control. I hope that Mr. Chagla is not listening this afternoon and that the noble Lord himself is ready to tolerate a few arguments of that kind. All of us here this afternoon —and I think this applies widely outside this House—recognise the problems which are caused by the unprecedented increase in the number of human beings in certain areas of the world. I am not quite so gloomy, even on the statistical side (and, so far as I remember, I am not going to introduce a single figure), as the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton. who, if I may say so, introduced this debate in a way that we all expected, and who speaks for a great many dedicated people. I am afraid I did not take
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down the noble Lords words, but I think he said that something very frightening was certain to happen, and I believe he said it was certain that the population would reach a certain point by A.D. 2000. At any rate, he implied that this tremendous increase in population, to which he referred, was bound to happen. I am afraid I do not think that certainty exists in this field: far from it.
Many of your Lordships will remember —the noble Lord will recall this, because he was in the Government, which is far more than I was—that the Royal Commission on Population was set up in this country in 1941 because they thought the population was vanishing; but by the time the Royal Commission had finished, the trouble seemed to be the other way. Then down went the population, from 1947, and people brought out all sorts of plans for the schools, prisons and everything else, in the belief that the population was going down. But then, quite unexpectedly, it swung round, and from 1955 or 1956 it started to go up, and it has been going up—I am talking of this country—ever since. So even here, where we have far more information than they can possibly have in the rest of the world, we have been surprised again and again by developments. I am afraid I do not take the view that these colossal figures which were mentioned are bound to happen.
I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Sandys—though I think he slightly understated it—brought out that the world food supply is still increasing faster, as a whole, than the world population. Nevertheless, I do not want to argue the matter with the noble Lord on the statistical side this afternoon. I am ready to agree with the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, and all other speakers, that probably the utmost gravity is raised by these issues, particularly in the underdeveloped areas of the world. I admired the general approach of my noble friend Lady Summerskill, who once again brought up the fact, as it seemed to me, that, whether one thinks birth control is or is not important, even if it is accepted, and in whatever form it is accepted, it is only a part, and not a major part, of the tremendous effort that must be made by the wealthy countries to help those countries that are in need.

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But when. I say that we all recognise the gravity of the problem, I would add that we are, at the same time, aware—and if we had not been aware before, the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, has informed us so—that many of the leading countries of the world are strongly opposed to any such Motion as that which has been brought before us this afternoon. The noble Earl, Lord Dundee, reminded us that this was true of Russia and the South American countries— I think he spoke of the Catholic countries generally—and a number of African countries. We must reflect that what might be called the leading countries on the Continent, namely, France, Western Germany and Italy—and they might or might not be called Catholic countries—are opposed to the line of policy suggested by the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton.
As the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, is well aware, it has been the general policy of the United Nations not to try to give help on broad lines. There are, of course, controversial decisions among those who receive such help and those who are asked to give the help. Quite apart from the moral aspects, which, with the permission of the noble Lord, Lord Sandys, I will come to in a moment, I very much question whether a Motion of this sort would be of ultimate benefit to the underdeveloped countries themselves, if only because of the divisions it must create among the great nations. Although I have no reason to suppose that the Motion will be pressed to a Division, I must make it clear that, if it were, I should in some way have to register my vote against it.
I would also endorse what the noble Earl, Lord Iddesleigh, said about a certain anxiety. Perhaps I did not follow things quite so closely as he did, because the middle of the afternoon is my worst time of the day, but I share some disquiet if the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, indicated that in the future more help on family planning is going to be given to backward countries than in the past. He played it down, so it seemed to me in my not very alert condition; I thought he said it would not amount to much, anyway. But then I heard it said that this was a departure in principle, and, if so, I would express strong disquiet. I should like to echo the question raised by the noble Earl, Lord Iddlesleigh, of what kind of advice we are going to
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give, to whom we are going to give it, and what are the conditions we should consider satisfactory. It may be said—it has not been put quite in this way this afternoon—that it is no business of ours: that when you see a distressed country asking for help, you ought to give it without asking how they are going to use it. I gather from the noble Earl, Lord Iddlesleigh, that a certain amount of help is given in that way.
But I wonder whether many noble Lords would press that argument very far. They would hardly suggest that we should give help to countries to embark on a large sterilisation campaign. Supposing we found that a particular country was giving the help, or a considerable part of the help, to unmarried persons—and when I say that I do not mean people about to be married, but those who have no intention whatever of ever getting married: should we favour giving help to a country that was going to use it in that way? The right reverend Prelate the Lord Bishop of London spoke impressively about his own strong opposition to any policy of that kind here. Suppose that we find countries abroad doing the same thing, do we oppose it?
If I am told that this is a bit fanciful, may I remind noble Lords that the excellent organisation, the Family Planning Association, have adopted an ambiguous attitude on this point of aid to unmarried girls? I need not go into it in detail, but a motion which would mean that this aid was actually given in the clinics of the Family Planning Association was defeated at a recent conference; but an amendment was carried saying that the unmarried should be referred to the Youth Advisory Centres —and I stress these words—the setting up of which the Family Planning Association should encourage, and at which medical advice on sex problems, including advice on birth control, should be available. The Family Planning Association, willing, as it were, to wound, but yet afraid to strike, are not guilty of giving this advice in their own clinics, but recommend the establishment of centres where this advice should be given. If they believe it is right to do it here, presumably they think it right to do it elsewhere. Therefore, when we talk of giving bilateral aid we are entitled to ask

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whether the Government attach any importance to the conditions in which that aid is given.
I know that the House will bear with me a little if I say something, in addition to what fell from the noble Earl, Lord Iddesleigh, about the Roman Catholic attitude. It is known that among the world religions opposed to certain methods of population control are the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Catholic churches of the East. The reasons for this opposition of my own Church are sometimes not appreciated; and there has been some speculation lately, and a great deal of discussion in the Catholic Press, as to whether the Roman Catholic Church may modify its views in the near future. So I should like to say a few words on the Roman Catholic attitude to birth control and the likelihood of any change in this attitude this autumn, or in the future beyond that.
Let me say at once—and here I am at one with what has been said by various speakers about the attitude of all the Churches—that the Roman Catholic Church recognises the rightness of responsible parenthood by parents everywhere. That is true, irrespective of population problems. Anybody who has a number of children and is acquainted with the problems of young married people would agree that, even if the world food supply increases ten times faster than the rate of the world population, these issues still lie at the doorstep of all of us. Therefore, let there be no doubt in anybody's mind that this principle of responsible parenthood is accepted as, in that sense, family planning.
The Roman Catholic Church denies, and has always denied, the rightness of contraception. By "contraception" is understood any deliberate intervention in the act of intercourse, or in the body's reproductive functioning, precisely in order to render voluntary acts of intercourse infertile. That is a definition which, I need hardly say, I have drawn up with some advice, because one must be careful in one's use of words. But I do not want the House to think that I am speaking officially for anybody, and if I am repudiated to-morrow I hope the people. I am afraid I did not take
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things. But I believe that that particular definition would be accepted as good. For nineteen centuries the Catholic Church has maintained this attitude to contraception. In the early centuries, coitus interruptus was the common method, and a doctor friend of mine tells me that it is much commoner to-day than I supposed. Then there were the sterility potions which women drank to prevent pregnancy, and which we find condemned in the writings of the Fathers. They were the things which developed from the 19th century, when all sorts of new methods began to come up for consideration. As each of these different methods has been proposed, the Roman Catholic Church has replied that it is morally unacceptable when used in a contraceptive sense. That, therefore, is a consistent line of policy.
However, in order to understand why the Catholic Church has condemned, and still condemns, contraception, I hope the House will allow me to range a little wide and to look for a moment at the sources for the Church's authoritative teaching in moral matters. These are two-fold. I can speak only for my own Church, but at any rate here there are two sources. First, revelation by God to man in Holy Scripture—for example, the ten Commandments in the Old Testament, and the teaching of our Lord and the Apostles in the New Testament. Secondly, there is the continual search for a further understanding of Truth through man's own God-given power of reason. So there is revelation and reason. From these two sources—and here I should think nobody would disagree with me—we believe we know several things about man. We know that he is born with the power to act responsibly and to love. We recognise his tremendous power to dominate the world, and at his best to control himself. That is the first thing —the tremendous potential of man. But also we recognise his great weakness through his fallen nature and, thirdly, we are aware of the Divine help which is available to every human being if it is sought.
In addition, we recognise—and here again I think that I am saying what is accepted by all Christians—that even when aided by God the vast powers of man are subject to certain limitations through our being, after all, creatures.

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We have not absolute power over our own life, and we certainly have not absolute power over the lives of others. We have not absolute power to give life, and all these considerations are bound to be the starting point of any Christian discussion on our subject to-day. But we have to go further than that: that is just the starting point. Another question then arises— and this divides some Christians from others. As we try to work out the consequences of this standpoint we search for indications of God's will in the Holy Scriptures and in human nature itself, and still we may reach differing conclusions.
A noble example of an attempt to arrive at the truth on this subject was the discussion at the last Lambeth Conference which was referred to this afternoon in that important speech by the right reverend Prelate the Lord Bishop of London. It was a very deep study of the whole matter, and with much searching of conscience. The final conclusion was a careful one, endorsing family planning
"in such ways as are mutually acceptable to husband and wife in Christian conscience."
That was the decision of the Anglican Churches, and I respect very greatly what went to form that decision. But the presuppositions of the Roman Catholic Church are bound to be rather different. We regard our Church as divinely founded and guided to sate-guard, to interpret, and to clarify truths for mankind, some of which we cannot reach, at any rate with any certainty, by unaided human reason. It does not absolve us from using our reason to the utmost extent. This does not mean that in my Church we would claim that at any time it is in the least likely that the whole truth about a matter of this sort is going to be pronounced officially. In the first place, there is the use of human reason in applying general principles to any particular case. But even in the doctrine of the Church there is an evolution as new knowledge is acquired, and as changing circumstances enable further implications to be seen; this process of continual evolution and the fresh study of new truths being caught sight of as new situations are investigated. All this has been going on with particular intensity in this very matter of the control of
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population whose gravity, of course, my Church, like all serious people everywhere, fully recognise.
Last week the Pope spoke on this question, and perhaps the House will allow me to quote a passage or two, although I cannot quote as much as I think would be appropriate. The Pope said:
"It is an extremely serious problem. It touches the source of human life. It is an extremely complex and delicate problem. The Church must also affirm its own concern, that is, God's law as interpreted by the Church. and the Church must proclaim this law of God in the light of scientific, social and psychological truths, which lately have come in for new and ample study and documentation."
I should like to repeat the emphasis laid by the Pope on
"scientific, social and psychological truths which lately have come in for new and ample study and documentation."
He said last week:
"It will be necessary to look carefully at the theoretical and practical development of the question. And this is what the Church is actually doing. The question is being considered as amply and deeply as possible, that is, in the most serious and honest way demanded by such an important matter. We hope soon to conclude these studies with the collaboration of many distinguished scholars."
I thought it was right to repeat all that, and also to quote one more sentence. He said:
"But meanwhile we frankly say that so far we have no sufficient motive to regard as superseded or not compulsory the rules outlined by Pope Pius XII in this regard. Therefore they must be considered valid at least until such time as we may conscientiously feel obliged to change them."
Noble Lords must form their own opinions as to whether that foreshadows a large change. I myself believe that it would be misleading the House to interpret this statement as an indication that there will be any fundamental change in the sense of a reversal of the Church's teaching. In fact, the Pope warned us against this interpretation. But I repeat: faced with recent developments the whole question is now being carefully studied in the light of what are admittedly new factors and what would seem to be called a new medical situation.
My Lords, I must say a few words about the pill, although I am sure that doctors and other scientists present will

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point out to me that it can be rather a misleading term. It is a rather omnibus expression which could cover a good many different drugs; but this is obviously one of the new factors under consideration, though I do not for a moment say it is the only one. Let me say, first of all (and I have no doubt that doctors present will entirely support this approach), that it would be wrong to expect the Catholic Church, or indeed any Church, to underwrite or to bless any particular drugs or their uses. All the Church will do in a matter like this is to pronounce on the morality of a medical hypothesis. In other words, the Church does not say, and I am sure would never say, that a particular pill would have a particular medical effect. She says to the doctors: "Assuming that it will have the medical effect you attribute to it, so-and-so is our judgment of the morality or otherwise of using it in that way." But one thing that is quite certain is that the Church will not come forward and recommend a particular pill only perhaps to find it discredited on medical grounds.
Let me just remind the House of what, in fact, is already permitted by the Catholic Church. The use of the so-called pill, on which we agree with non-Catholics, is the correction of menstrual disorders, including the attempts through a course of treatment to give subsequent regularity to a woman with irregular cycles. This can obviously be of benefit to some married women who are hampered by irregularity of cycle from making adequate use of the rhythm method. As the House is aware, the rhythm method is accepted by our Church as morally right. In our view, it respects the indicated order, to use that rather technical expression, in human nature, while we consider that contraceptive use of a pill, for example, violates human nature. I would remind the House that a good deal of progress has been made in recent years in the use of this method, and no doubt we can go into that aspect on some other occasion.
But let me remind the House that while the therapeutic use of a drug of this sort, something of the type of the pill, is permitted under a statement of Pope Pius XII in 1958—a statement which does not seem to be in this respect as well known
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as it might be—any attempt to use these pills as contraceptives was firmly forbidden by Pope Pius XII. The question of what is and what is not a contraceptive use is no doubt one of the points, I should assume one of the main points, now under discussion. But even with the expert advice available to me it is not easy to put an issue of this kind in a nutshell. But to me, as a layman, the supreme test seems to be whether a particular use can be said to be in accordance with human nature, or if this other language is found more helpful, whether it can be said to be in accordance with the dignity of the human person. If it is in accordance it might be accepted; if it is not, in the view of the Church, it would be forbidden.
My Lords, I must come to the end. One of the main problems in the whole of this complex matter is certainly that of education—I mean education in the widest sense: an education for life as a responsible human being, with particular regard to life as a parent imbued with a sense of responsibility for marriage and for the family. Here, in this ideal entertained so strongly by my Church, we are all at one. And it is here, above all—and I am not now speaking, as your Lordships can imagine, off the cuff, although I have no authority to say this—that we Catholics can already see a change of emphasis in the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church. In a sense, much more important even than this tremendous issue of the regulation of birth is the fact that there has always been in the Church's teaching an extraordinary optimism, a great belief in the capacity of man to attain self-mastery with the help of God. But so often in the past, the emphasis, especially among the moral theologians, of my Church—and it may be in other Churches, too, though of course I cannot speak for them—has been on the negative side: on the avoidance of this or that; on the wrongness or sinfulness of this or that form of behaviour, which has sometimes been stressed to the exclusion of everything more positive and inspiring.
The greatest capacity of the human being, the capacity for love, seems too often to have been ignored by the moral theologians who have laid down the rules. But this is changing, and changing faster than a few years ago I should

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have thought possible. There are a number of theologians who perhaps should be especially mentioned, so that history may recognise those who have played the chief part in this development. Father Joseph Fuchs, of the Gregorian University, and Father Bernard Haring, of the Lateran University, are outstanding; but there are others. Above all, there has been the inspiration of the late Pope John XXIII, who has been saluted everywhere throughout the world for his creative lovability that reached out to all mankind. I must not presume to suppose that in anything I have said I have lived up to the spirit of Pope John XXIII, but if I have even in the smallest degree conveyed the new spirit, I hope that my message will linger for a while with the House.
7.7 p.m.
BARONESS GAITSKELL: My Lords, I, too, am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, for initiating this debate and for his interesting, lucid and comprehensive speech, with which I wholly agree. This is a subject about which I have always felt very strongly, religiously though not theologically. This debate follows logically, almost relentlessly, on the debate of a week ago on United Nations Aid. One could argue that it should have come before it.
I am afraid that this afternoon your Lordships have been pelted with statistics and quotations, and I hope I shall not fire more than my fair share of these projectiles. It is inevitable on a subject like this, when we have to go to the fact finders, the economists and the sociologists who have investigated conditions in Asia, Africa and Latin America. It is difficult to find a dissenting voice among them. These experts display a gloomy unanimity in their conclusions about the conditions necessary for the developing countries to raise their very low standard of living in the next 20 or 30 years. To-day, the most vital solution they advance is population control.
All the economic help and efforts to give these people a better life are annulled by the increase in their population, the number of mouths to feed, children to educate and jobs to find. Incidentally, while we are on this subject, I may say that half of the children in the world have never seen the inside of a school.
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The population explosion is the great new problem of the 20th century. Until now famine and disease have kept a balance between birth and death rates. All aid founders when the number of people goes on multiplying yearly at the present rate.
I should like to quote Ian Little, who has written on the subject of United Kingdom aid to Africa. He says:
"£1 million of Government money spent on intensive research into birth control methods, with emphasis on their applicability to underdeveloped countries, might do more for economic development than the entire world aid programme to date".
And then he adds:
"All aid will probably turn out to have been wasted if birth rates are not soon reduced…the Treasury and its Ministers, who are supposed to see that the taxpayers' money is not wasted, should be begging the U.K. Department of Technical Co-operation to spend at least£1 million a year on research relating to birth control."
These are not the words of a travelling journalist shattered by his first encounter with massive poverty. This is the considered judgment of an eminent economist after visiting Africa.
With such increases in population as exist to-day we shall soon be back to the death rates of the last century, in spite of all the palliative measures we are taking. The fact that these measures actually help to increase fertility puts an added brake upon progress. None of the voluntary and Government-aided programmes of family planning welfare match the need. Even in the countries where the Government has adopted a birth control policy, as in India, not enough money is being spent on the projects. And here I should like to point out to my noble friend Lady Summerskill that it is because neither those Governments nor the affluent societies are helping in this respect that the results are not good enough.
Robert Neild, another economist, says that in the next thirty years, if the number of people in India continue to multiply at the present rate, India will need to absorb an increase of 70 millions in its working population; that is, a labour force equal to the total present labour force of the United States. The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations in 1961 estimated that 500 million people to-day suffer from hunger and another 1,000 million

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from malnutrition. How, in contemplating these figures, can anyone wish to deny to the poorer people of the world our knowledge and practice of family limitation? A sample survey in this country showed that birth control in one form or another covered almost all of the married population—87 per cent. Surely what is good for the affluent society is desirable and essential for the underdeveloped one.
My Lords, a tremendous drive is needed to help all Asian and African countries where birth control is Government policy, in order to make their efforts properly effective. No one has suggested compulsory birth control. There is no law which forbids or even discourages people anywhere from having as many children as they desire or are capable of having. No one slips a piece of contraceptive advice into the pay-packet of a low-paid worker after he has had seven or eight children. The Family Planning Association, a completely voluntary association, has never tried to influence people who do not believe in, or are precluded by their religion from, spacing or limiting their families. So it is really astonishing and somewhat tragic that in this day and age a harmless phrase such as:
"That the United Nations give technical assistance as requested by the Governments for national projects and programmes dealing with the problem of population"
was deleted from a United Nations resolution, because, I am told, of pressure from Roman Catholic communities. And I think it is even more tragic because I understand that Roman Catholics are not against family planning as such. If it is only method which divides us, surely a way will be found, man's ingenuity will find a way, a safe and reliable and dependable way, of achieving this.
The figures of the increase in world population are so astronomical that they are hard to assimilate or digest. It is still harder for them to register emotionally because of what they add up to in human misery. We tend to insulate ourselves from their implication, for our own peace of mind. In the next twenty years we are going to be affected by this problem in Britain. Another 3½ million people in the South-East of England will bring home to us some-
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thing of the size of the problem in the South-Eastern parts of the globe. But to-day our responsibility is for the developing nations, where there is only a limping rise in the standard of life, despite all our efforts in aid. And I am very glad that the Government have decided to help them with this aid. Only the United Nations can organise, on the scale that is needed, the many methods of dealing with, and the research for a solution of, this gigantic problem of the population explosion.
Finally, too many people in the world to-day cannot see a future for their children which holds out enough hope of sufficient food, a job, education and all the good things of life which parents in this country can hope for and count on for their children. Among the poorer countries in the world the population problem is volcanic and grows daily. It does not wait on the deliberations of politicians or prelates.
7.16 p.m.
LORD BRAIN: My Lords, I do not propose to trouble your Lordships with more population figures, for that aspect of the question has already been dealt with very fully by the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, whom I, too, should like to thank for putting down this Motion and bringing this urgent matter to your Lordships' attention. The Motion speaks of the need "for practical measures to help member nations". I would begin by asking what evidence there is that member nations desire such help.
Last month I had the privilege of opening a conference which took place across the road at Church House. It was a conference of delegates from one region only of the International Planned Parenthood Federation, which is world wide. It was the region which covers Europe, the Near East and Africa. Delegates from 46 nations attended, including a few guests from outside the region. Africa was represented from North to South, together with most Mediterranean countries. From Eastern Europe the delegates came from Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia, and all the rest of Europe was represented except for Spain and Portugal.
Here then was a subject which could bring together South Africa and the other African nations, Egypt and Israel, Turkey, Greece and Cyprus, and Eastern and

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Western European countries, to sit down together for friendly joint discussions. Our visitors from outside the region included representatives from Canada, the United States and Cuba. This, clearly, is an issue which transcends political differences and, to an increasing extent I am sure, religious differences, too. And the type of representative those countries sent was significant. The delegates were not all drawn from small enthusiastic minorities. Fourteen countries sent officials belonging to or appointed by their Ministries of Health or Ministries of Social Affairs. Two sent their deputy Minister of Health, and one the Under-Secretary of State from that Ministry. And this is not surprising, in view of the fact that 16 Governments in the Federation provide direct support for family planning, and in many more countries municipal support is provided. Several countries are ahead of our own in offering family planning facilities as part of their National Health Service.
It is significant, too, that technical aspects of birth control, though they were, of course, discussed, occupied by no means the whole of the time of the Conference. The delegates were broadly concerned with personal and social aspects of the sexual relationship, and particularly with what could be done to combat the present high rates of illegitimacy and abortion in many countries. To talk about the population problem in terms solely of food supplies is doubly inadequate. First, quite obviously, much more than food is needed to support life. Already we are beginning to hear about water shortages. Problems of irrigation may arise in connection with agricultural needs; but the needs of industrial man for water are enormously greater, and where industrialisation has to play a part in raising standards of living, large water supplies will be required, and some parts of the United States are already worrying about water shortage.
I was glad to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Sandys said about another aspect of the population problem which had not previously been discussed—namely, the effect of crowded communities upon the people who live in them. The large modern cities, where the inhabitants are herded together in millions, have grown up haphazard, and largely for economic reasons. I believe
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we know far too little about the effects of such a mode of life upon the development of the human spirit. I should like to quote a few sentences from a recent book called "Too Many Americans" by Lincoln and Alice Day. They say:
"Growth in our society has increased the impersonal quality of many of our social contacts. Communities have more residents, doctors more patients, teachers more students, business men more customers. In the process, the relative importance of the individual is reduced and the competition for recognition heightened. One has contact with more people, but the contacts themselves are more fleeting, more devoid of meaning."
Impoverishment of human relationships is not easily measurable, but I believe we are seeing its effects in the unhappiness, the sense of insecurity and other disturbances of feeling from which some inhabitants of our large cities suffer. I do not suggest that this is inherent in city life, because I do not think we know enough about its causation, but at least we might hesitate before greatly multiplying the scale of the problem when we have not yet discovered its solution.
What I said about the members of the Europe, Middle East, and Africa region of the International Planned Parenthood Federation is equally true of its national members in all parts of the world. Here, then, is a world organisation embracing all nations, with a few exceptions of religious origin, which voices the concern of the peoples of the world over the population question and what it means in terms of human welfare and personal relationships. Why, then, some people may ask, is there any need for United Nations action? The answer is simple. As we know so well, many of the world's nations are poor, and though they are doing their best, as I have shown, to pool their information and co-ordinate their scientific resources, this cannot be done adequately at the national level. We need an international body, sponsored by the United Nations Organisation, to collect all available demographic information (and promote the search for it when it is not available), take into account present and prospective supplies of food and water and the economic and cultural needs of growing populations, and review all current scientific work on population control.
I know that the United Nations is already doing something to fulfil these

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needs, especially, as we have heard already, through its Population Commission and the Population Branch of the Bureau of Social Affairs; and, as we have been reminded, there is to be another World Population Conference sponsored by the United Nations and six of its specialised agencies in 1965. But all this, though certainly valuable, is concerned with diagnosis and not with treatment, and the world needs a combination of the two. If this is to come about, the more enlightened and farseeing nations must take the initiative, and the past record of Her Majesty's Government in this matter is not a happy one. But I am glad to see signs of a change of heart. I particularly welcome what the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, said about the Department of Technical Co-operation.
At this moment the application of the International Planned Parenthood Federation to be recognised by the United Nations as a non-governmental organisation is under consideration. The Admissions Committee has recommended by a majority vote that its name be included on the Secretary-General's register. This application was strongly supported by the United Kingdom, but equally strongly opposed by France, whose opposition secured the downgrading of the Federation from the category "B", which it hoped to obtain, to the inferior degree of recognition implied by being placed on the Secretary-General's register.
This question comes before the Economic and Social Council which meets in Geneva on July 13. Here is a major opportunity for Her Majesty's Government to use their influence. I am glad to know that they have undertaken to try to secure for the International Planned Parenthood Federation recognition in category "B", and I hope that they will do all they can to persuade other delegations to support this, too. This will be a beginning, and a most encouraging one; but I hope that Her Majesty's Government will not think that they can then relax. I am afraid I cannot follow the argument of the noble Earl—I hope I misunderstood him—which was that because some nations may not need help, we are not to try to provide it for those who do.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: Is the noble Lord referring to me?
LORD BRAIN: No; to the noble Earl, Lord Dundee.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: I said we should provide it only for those who do, and not try to obtrude our ideas on those who do not want them.
LORD BRAIN: I am glad to hear what the noble Earl says. It is not enough, I am sure, to leave future action to voluntary organisations, patchily supported by State subsidies. Action is the responsibility of the United Nations, which should show that the peoples of the world can co-operate for human welfare and devote their resources to the health and happiness, instead of to the destruction, of mankind.
7.28 p.m.
VISCOUNT HANWORTH: My Lords, it seems to me that this subject really falls under three headings. First, we have the figures of the world population increase. I think they have been given in a most conservative manner this afternoon: nobody has really thought much about extending the graph, and the figures which have been quoted have been assessed on the present birth rate. But if we are to continue to improve and increase the medical help given to some of these countries, the chances are that the population will continue to increase at an even greater rate; for we must remember that it is not the birth rate which is causing the increase; it is the reduction in the death rate. But, even then, I am not certain that the physiological maximum birth rate is in fact being encountered under the present conditions. I am not an expert and would not comment on this point, but it seems to me that there is a real possibility of the rate of population increase becoming even greater in the next few years.
I do not think that anybody has seriously disputed what the figures are or that this represents a serious problem. The nearest anybody got to doing that was to remark, as I was going to myself if they had not done so, that a few years ago Britain was threatening to have an ageing population because the birth rate had reduced. But this was a relatively small amount, and I think that always the possibilities of a change in this birth rate were envisaged, certainly in a country such as this where there are so many factors which might affect it. We should

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be quite wrong to imagine that something will happen which will improve matters in the Far East countries. The only things I can think of which may happen in this respect are a plague, or pestilence, or national disaster or possibly war.
The next factor one considers is how serious the position is. Everybody has said that in fact it is. Some have tended to play this down. There are a number of factors to consider, one of the most important being the food situation. Nobody has convinced us that food production is capable of expanding at a rate which can improve the present conditions, remembering, of course, that nearly half of the world's population is at present undernourished. Quite clearly, there are places in the world where it is quite impossible, with our present scientific knowledge, to increase the food production to any great extent at all.
The next vital factor to consider is perhaps employment. India has already found, making its maximum efforts, that it cannot create more than a certain number of new jobs a year, and this is falling far below the actual population increase. To do anything more about this problem requires a great deal more capital than they have, or, for that matter, than anybody is going to provide them with. We also should remember that our efforts to raise the standards of living in these countries, or their own efforts, are being completely stultified by these population increases. In fact, their effect, despite the best intentions, is if anything worsening, and certainly not bettering the standards of living.
It seems to me that something must be done. We cannot just go on hoping for the best, because short of a miracle or disaster—and I think noble Lords should face the matter quite clearly—it does not seem that there is going to be very much alleviation of this situation. If a population is increasing, let us always remember that it is terribly difficult to reverse the process. We in England saw this very well ourselves a little time ago, realising what it would mean in terms of the effect of an ageing population. There are also a number of other unfortunate effects. Looking at our history, we also know that where there have been economic pressures this has almost always, or very often, led to war. We hope that war is
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a thing of the past, we hope that there will be no nuclear war, but we shoul1 be unwise not to realise that this population pressure could possibly bring about another war.
To turn now to methods which might be used to alleviate this situation, nobody has suggested that we should force anything on anybody. We have merely said in this Motion that we should be prepared to provide the help if they require it. One speaker pointed out that the various methods of birth control had not been especially effective, and doubted whether it was possible for them to be so until the level of the standard of living had been raised. Many of us feel that it is impossible to raise the standard of living without doing something about controlling the population—in other words, there is a completely vicious circle. And the least vicious part of this circle, I should have thought, was to tackle the population increase by birth control and other methods.
It is not true to say that the efforts to control population in some of these countries of the East have been completely ineffective. They have had quite an important effect in both Hong Kong and Singapore. It seems to me that there is no reason to suppose that, with the Government of the particular country concerned doing what they can to educate and change people's ideas—call it propaganda, if you like—such measures should not be able to produce at least an important effect.
It has also been said that there is no completely satisfactory method of birth control, and that most methods have various disadvantages possibly from a medical or other point of view. It is true to say that nobody quite knows the effect of continuing to take a pill over protracted periods of longer than two years. But let us remember that there is nothing we can do on medical lines without some slight element of risk. It does not matter whether it is an aspirin, which has now been found in many people to produce the possibility of internal hæmorrhage, or some more drastic drug, each has its own risks. What we do is to decide whether in the circumstances the risk is worth taking to alleviate a particular disease. When one comes to consider this population explosion, knowing that it entails

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famine, infanticide, abortion, and terrible living conditions for the children, one ought to be able to take what is assessed as the very small risk which is involved in the use of a number of these methods of birth control.
Another suggestion made is that the countries of the West should be able to raise the standards of these Eastern countries by providing capital and helping them to increase their food supply and standards of living. But many of us feel that this is pouring money into a bottomless pit and that it will produce no good results. I think we are entitled to feel that a country must help itself by doing something about the birth control problem. I say with all reverence that there is a phrase that "God helps him who helps himself"; and I think that one is right to regard this problem from that point of view.
One comes to the very difficult question of religious objections. I greatly admired the way in which the noble Earl, Lord Longford, represented the feelings of the Catholic Church on this subject. I respect these views, however much I personally should not agree with them. But one has to consider the point that many of us who also are religious, or who have strong moral principles, feel that this raises an issue, and that we must do something with birth control methods to help these nations. We feel this just as strongly as those who feel that it is wrong to provide them. I think we represent the majority. In fact, according to the Gallup Poll which was quoted earlier on, by far the larger majority is in favour of providing these facilities; and I believe that we should be quite wrong not to do so. I would also say to the Government that, just as it has often been said that Britain should be a leader to the world, I hope that though there is a minority here, and it is a religious minority, they will nevertheless have the courage to press on with such a vital world problem, and not sit on the sidelines trying to avoid offending anybody.
7.41 p.m.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, by the time this stage in the debate has been reached all the relevant points have been paraded before your Lordships, and all
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the substantial facts have been brought out. I am not myself so vain as to think that I can produce anything original or any facts of any substantial importance which have not been mentioned by other speakers. I can almost hear your Lordships saying, "Then why speak at all?" I suppose the answer, really, is that when one has been here so long and listened to so many speakers and wished to comment on so many of the remarks, it is very difficult not to get up and speak. Therefore I hope that those of your Lordships who are left will bear with me for a few minutes while I do, in fact, make some comments.
I have long ago abandoned the idea of addressing to your Lordships the speech which I so carefully prepared: I felt all along, as soon as I saw my position on the list, that it was most unlikely that there would be anything new left to say. If your Lordships will allow me to do so, I should like to pick out what seem to me to be the most significant points which have come out in the debate. I should say that the first point which has been a sort of "throb" throughout the speeches in this debate is the extreme urgency of this problem. From the very beginning, with the admirable address of the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, right up to the speech of the noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, who has just resumed his seat, I think this has appeared in the great majority of the speeches, and there really cannot be any question about it.
The more we have heard, the more facts and the more points, the more clearly that fact has appeared, although I was a little sorry to find that there were a few speakers who rather played down the urgency of this matter. It is like standing round a house when the place is going up in flames, and arguing about whether this method or that is going to be effective, when something quite obviously ought to be done and if it is not done very quickly the house will be burnt down to the ground. For example, the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, took a rather negative attitude in that way. I suppose it is right that a cold douche should be poured on us from time to time, as she did, even if it is only to make those who have fire in their bellies react. I was glad to see that some

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people like the noble Lord, Lord Casey, who addresses us too seldom, did react in a very forthright way in an admirable speech.
If I may say so, I thought the noble Earl who speaks for the Government made some very good points, but he seemed to me to be trying to take up rather a neutral position. I do not think much of the argument about duelling. As your Lordships know, one must take a stand about this sort of thing at some time or another, and in the end we took a stand about duelling—possibly rather late. In my view, the world has got to take a stand about this business if the world is going to survive, and I think that came out very clearly in the various speeches which were addressed to your Lordships during the afternoon.
There is the problem of the world's food supply, which I was glad the noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, referred to in his speech. In his opening speech the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, brought out the fact that the food supply in the developed countries has not even been keeping up with the growth of the population in those countries, where to a considerable extent birth control is practised. It is all very well to bring in places like the United States and Canada, which are still largely undeveloped countries, and say "On that basis we are still ahead." As the noble Baroness, Lady Summer-skill, reminded us, the late President Kennedy said, "We could just keep India and these places going with what we are producing in the United States." But is that going to be so thirty or so years hence, which is the time we were asked to look at, when the population will have increased four times? Does anybody seriously suggest that America and Canada are going to increase their food supply on that scale? No, my Lords. The obvious fact is that in this quite short period which, as I think the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, said, our grandchildren are going to see, there is going to be widespread starvation throughout the world; and if something very drastic is not done—and soon—hundreds of thousands of people will die. So it seems to me quite clear that this is a matter of enormous urgency.
The second point that I would underline is that this is an international prob-
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lem. That, I think, has come out again in almost all the speeches. In the words chosen as the title for an interesting book by a well-known American author, Mr. Springfellow Barr, written in the early stages of this discussion soon after the war, "We are all citizens of the world", and we have to realise that fact in discussing this very urgent problem. No doubt the problem will be solved, if it is solved at all, in different ways in different areas of the world. But, quite obviously, we shall fail in the long-term solution if we forget our common humanity, and the fact that we are all in this business and have to solve it together. I agree very much that the differing situations in the differing areas call for different sorts of treatment, and I find myself in complete sympathy with those who have said that a great deal more research is required, a great deal more intensive research, devoted to the situation in the different areas.
In this connection, I very much welcome the initiative of the Family Planning Association in starting their international campaign, in which the noble Lord who introduced the Motion is playing such a prominent part. I felt that my noble friend Lord Longford rather sneered at the work of the Family Planning Association. I am not very closely connected with it; I am connected with it to the extent of welcoming its work, and I feel that the way in which the noble Lord, Lord Brain, in particular, has built it up over these last years has been a magnificent achievement.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord—
LORD CHORLEY: I am sorry that the noble Earl was not here—
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: No, but I caught the word "sneer". I paid tribute to the dedicated work of these people. If that is sneering, then wait till the noble Lord really wants me to sneer at something. Then I can tell him.
LORD CHORLEY: I am very glad to know that the noble Earl did not sneer at it, but it seemed to me that he was going very near it when he was talking about the unmarried. After all, the noble Earl must agree that all the efforts of his Church, and of everybody else's

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Church, over all these years have had very little effect on fornication. There is a natural proclivity for human people to get together, whether or not they are in wedlock. Is it not just as well that they should not produce illegitimate children? That is what my noble friend is really asking for. They are going to produce these children.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether he personally is in favour of giving—
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: Fornication?
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: No, I will not say that. That again would be sneering: I must keep well on the other side of that. But is the noble Lord in favour of giving birth control advice and assistance to girls who are unmarried and have no intention of marrying? Let him "come clean".
LORD CHORLEY: Yes, I certainly am. It is common sense, surely, that you should not have all these illegitimate children produced in this way, as they are bound to be. This is going to continue, quite obviously. The noble Earl knows that just as well as anybody else knows it. The result is going to be illegitimate children, if they do not understand how to prevent it. I should have thought that that was just common sense.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: This is the last time I shall interrupt, but will the noble Lord say why the Family Planning Association, to which he has paid these magnificent tributes, did not accept his view and do it themselves?
LORD CHORLEY: If they had been there and heard me, perhaps they would have done—but I am not speaking for them; I am expressing my own view about this matter.
However, I should like to complete this little bit of my speech. I nearly always find myself crossing swords with the noble Earl when we are engaged in discussions of this sort, but I should like to continue the tribute which I was paying to the noble Lord, Lord Brain, and the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, for the magnificent work they have been doing
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in the Family Planning Association over these years. I am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Brain, is not here now, because I should have liked also to congratulate him on being elected President of the British Association, which is a mark of distinction which has not, I think, been achieved by many Members of your Lordships' House. We have among us, fortunately, scientists and medical men of the highest eminence and distinction, but few of them, if any, I think, have previously had the distinction of being the President of the British Association, one of our outstanding scientific organisations.
If there is anybody in the House who was present at the recent annual meeting of the Family Planning Association he must have been very much encouraged by the report which was given on the success so far achieved in a number of parts of the world with this international campaign. The noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, slightly sneered (if I may use that word again), saying, "A little bit here in Chile, a little bit here in some other place—what does that amount to?". But this effort has been going for only a very short time—
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord what contribution he has ever made to family planning in this country?
LORD CHORLEY: I have supported it for a long time—
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: In what way? Has it been a contribution every year?
LORD CHORLEY: In speeches all over the place, and I have been a Vice-President of the Family Planning Association itself for quite a long time. I am not going to be put down by the noble Lady. The noble Lady comes up and says that the whole of the medical profession condemns the ring pessary. It has not done so by any means. There are many doctors I know who do not condemn it. In fact, it is one of the few ways of providing for the feckless type of individual who cannot use the more ephemeral methods of birth control. This new method, which she was not prepared to accept, seems to me

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(although I am not myself pretending to be a medical man), and seems to many of my medical friends, to have great possibilities for success.
The third way in which I feel this debate has made a considerable contribution to the discussion on this subject is that it has brought out (and I think this appeared particularly well in the excellent speech of the right reverend Prelate the Lord Bishop of London) that this is essentially an educational problem. And in my view it will be solved, in the end, only by educational means. There are no positive sanctions that can be used to enforce birth control—and, even if there were, it would probably be wrong to use them—although I think we shall have to develop a much more positive and dynamic approach to this problem than has so far been evident in the speech from the Government and in the speeches of a number of other noble Lords who have addressed the House this afternoon. Undoubtedly, education in regard to this matter is of the greatest importance, but it is of the greatest difficulty when one considers the low standard of literacy and education generally in so many of those parts of the world where this education is particularly necessary.
I found myself very much in agreement with the noble Lord, Lord Casey, when he said that we ought to do a great deal more to support the struggling Governments of India and Pakistan in their efforts to make their policy of family planning in those countries, which are the black spots of this problem, more successful, instead of giving them the rather lukewarm support which they have received during these last years. I suppose that the most persuasive type of education is the fact that, in countries where birth control is being practised, where the family is planned in this way, it is quite obvious to everybody that the health and welfare of a family is enormously increased. That is undoubtedly the reason why, in a country where Roman Catholics and others live together, such a large section of the Roman Catholic population are, in fact, practising birth control at this present time. The more the value of such planning can be brought home to the people in these other parts of the world, the more progress birth control will make.
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Unfortunately, of course, the very powerful persuasion of some of the great religious bodies has been thrown into the scales on the other side. One can quite understand how this has come about: it is of historical origin. The hostility of the Roman Church is shared by other Churches, like the great Hindu religion, because in early days the Church had to devote its energy to protecting the very existence of the population, of the tribe, of the nation, against its external foes. It was essential, when war and plague were so prevalent, that a strong population should be built up; and in this way a dogmatic pattern has been formed which, quite naturally, subsists in these Churches. As the right reverend Prelate the Lord Bishop of London pointed out, this situation has now ceased to exist, but it is very difficult to destroy a pattern which has once become established. Nevertheless there are signs that this is happening.
I think that any objective person would be bound to admit that there has been very considerable movement in the Roman Catholic Church over these last years, even if one does not go so far as has been suggested quite recently in the newspapers. At any rate, there can be no doubt that from positive action it has turned to a rather negative one in recent years. I do not wish to push this point any further, but if these great religions of the world could be brought in behind this movement for family planning, as I hope to goodness they will—and, if they are not, it is going to be a sad look-out for the world—then undoubtedly it will be possible to make very much quicker and more effective progress in spreading the policy of family planning throughout the world. Not only should we find ourselves able to keep these great masses of people at a decent subsistence level, but we could then begin to build up for them a really wholesome and decent life. And that, in my view, is, at the end of the day, the most important argument of all in favour of family planning: that it enables one to improve the standard of living; to carry it beyond mere subsistence, mere clothing, mere housing, and to make life a fine and beautiful thing; to make life more than just possible—to make it, as I think Aristotle said, good. It is for that reason that, at the end of the day, I think one must support this Motion.

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To return to the first point I made, the point of urgency, I remember that quite 40 years ago H. G. Wells, who was one of the most acute social observers that this or any other country has ever had, took birth control rather as the acid test. He said, "Modern civilisation will founder or will go forward, according to how this problem is answered". Everything that has happened from that day to this seems to me to have borne out that very profound diagnosis by that great writer and sociologist. The debate we have had this afternoon seems equally to have borne it out, and we have come now to the crucial stage when H. G. Wells is to be tested.
8.0 p.m.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, if one penetrates to the very end of the trade routes, as far away from civilisation as it is possible to get, the last two evidences of civilisation which are on sale, I am told, are boxes of matches and packets of Reckitt's Blue. You may well wonder why packets of Reckitt's Blue arc on sale at the very end. The answer is that they are believed to be and are used as abortifacients. It is thought that if you dissolve half a tablet of Reckitt's Blue in half a pint of water and drink it, it will act as an abortifacient. This is believed by many of the so-called primitive people who desire to achieve what we would call birth control. I mention this because we have had so much in this debate suggesting that primitive people are ignorant and incapable of thinking things out and working things out for themselves. In this case, they happen to be wrong. Reckitt's Blue is completely useless as an abortifacient and has no effect at all. But primitive people do think things out and behave in a very much more reasonable way than has been sometimes suggested.
I think the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, ought to be very pleased indeed with the result of his Motion. I think we have had a good debate. We have had first-class speeches from my noble friend Lady Summerskill and my noble friend Lady Gaitskell. With both of them I find myself in complete agreement, and, if I may say so, particularly with some of Lady Summerskill's remarks on the subject of contraceptive methods. I notice that my noble friend
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Lord Chorley appears to favour the plastic spring or coil which is the latest form of in-dwelling birth control appliance, which has certain advocates.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, may I interrupt? The noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, was saying that medical opinion was united on this, as I understood it. I am saying that it is not. I know doctors who take another view.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: My Lords, if I might "barge in" on this, surely the noble Lord knows that doctors are never united on anything.
LADY SUMMERSKILL: We each speak for ourselves.
LORD TAYLOR: On this occasion, my Lords, we are united.
LORD CHORLEY: Only you two.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, we happy two are united on the subject of the uselessness of this particular form of birth control and the undesirability of using it. Anything which acts as an in-dwelling abortifacient is much to he deplored.
We have had the very interesting speech of the right reverend Prelate the Lord Bishop of London, and the equally interesting speech of my noble friend Lord Longford. and it begins to appear as though what Lambeth thinks to-day, Rome will be thinking to-morrow; and this is a most encouraging situation. And, so far as I can see, it has all been brought about by the pill. I remember that in the life of Gilbert and Sullivan there was one subject that Gilbert always wanted to write about, a lozenge which changed your personality, and Sullivan always headed him off and tried to push him on to subjects like the House of Lords and the Tower of London. I am no great friend of Dr. Pinkus's pill; and I agree with my noble friend Lady Summerskill that it is unproven as a safe contraceptive, and for primitive people it is not a very desirable thing. Nor is it good for malnourished people, because it depends for its efficaciousness on being given at certain times in relation to the menstrual rhythm. Primitive people are frequently suffering from malnutrition and consequently their

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menstrual rhythm is irregular. Therefore, as a method, it is not in my opinion greatly to be advocated. But it appears to have had one interesting side-effect—namely, it has put my noble friend Lord Longford in a very difficult dialectical spot because it works both as a contraceptive and also as a therapeutic agent, and this has perhaps achieved more than all our arguments.
Nevertheless, it has been most delightful to discover how much nearer agreement we are now than we were two or three years ago when we debated this subject. I think there is a great growth of agreement, and I think again that the noble Lord, Lord McCorquodale of Newton, can congratulate himself on having reached that satisfactory situation. But I think the best thing he has achieved has been the statement from the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, about the Government attitude. I, like my noble friend Lord Listowel, attribute great importance to what the noble Earl said in his statement of policy on behalf of Her Majesty's Government. He said that we have advocated in the United Nations the taking up of an attitude in favour of United Nations Organisation giving the technical information to member States which desire it; and, having failed to achieve that, he has said we are prepared to do this by bilateral technical aid ourselves; and I do not think any one could ask more than that.
My Lords, a great deal has been said about research and the desirability for research; and it has even been suggested that there has been some withdrawal of research knowledge from the people of India and Pakistan. I do not think this is true. Nobody is withholding any information at all. It is true that research in this particular sphere is not being pressed forward on a very wide front, but a good deal is being done, and everything that is being done is certainly immediately available to the technical people in India, Pakistan, Ceylon and elsewhere. It has been said that this is a great world problem. It is certainly a great Commonwealth problem, and I have often felt how nice it would be if, in due course, we were to have one or two representatives of every Commonwealth country sitting in your Lord-
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ships' House and perhaps coming for one fortnight a year for a group of Commonwealth debates. I would hope that they might comprise not only men but women, for this problem seems to me to be something that the women of the world have more right to speak about than the men.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: Both have an equal right.
LORD TAYLOR: My noble friend says that both have an equal right; but I am prepared to say that women have the greater right because they have to do all the hard work and run the danger.
LORD LAWSON: And the nursing.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: And the labour pains.
LORD TAYLOR: Yes, my Lords, the lot. I think that for men to offer moral pronouncements on the subject of birth control is a bit presumptuous unless they have consulted fully first with the women. It is an odd fact that almost all the great pioneers of human thought, not all but most of the great prophets, have got only a half-truth. It is certainly true of Marx and certainly true of Dr. Freud and also of the Rev. Dr. Robert Malthus, F.R.S., who thought population tended to outpace food production so that death by poverty, starvation, disease or war was necessary to restore the balance. That was a half-truth only. It was based on incomplete knowledge. He could not see the full picture, because he was looking at the Western world of the 1830's and did not know what was going to happen. What happened was very different from what he expected. He was witnessing what was called the second phase of population in Britain, which was the phase of rapid growth. We now know that if we can develop prosperity in any society, the population increase slows down and in due course the birth and death rates come to something near a balance which we should call reasonable.
LORD CHORLEY: It has not happened in the United States.
LORD TAYLOR: I would consider the United States to be in a state of near-balance as compared with India, Ceylon, Pakistan and the rest. The rate of increase in the United States is a very

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small one, as it is in these Islands. I should certainly not regard it as a gross state of imbalance. If all the world could achieve what is being achieved in the United States and Britain, we should have no real problem.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, the noble Lord is not meeting my point. The increase of population has gone up in the United States during the last 20 or 30 years as the country has become richer, which is contrary to the argument the noble Lord is putting forward.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, if the noble Lord will wait, he will see what I am trying to argue and that what I am saying, is valid. The first phase of population in Britain lasted until about 1730. Up to that time, we had a birth rate of 40 per 1,000 and a death rate of 35 to 40 per 1,000 per annum. We were in a state of near balance. But it was a pretty miserable situation. Forty births and 40 deaths per 1,000 meant an infant mortality of something like eight or nine deaths out of every ten children born. Phase two started about 1730 and went on until 1880. It coincided with industrialisation and, even more important, with the beginnings not of medical improvement, but of sanitary improvement, of sewerage and water supply. The birth rate stayed at 40 but the death rate came down to about 25. The result was a rapid increase in population. That is the phase in which these countries are at present but they have a much bigger basic population to deal with. This is the phase which shook Malthus so much and shakes us so much in looking at these countries.
The third phase was when the birth rate started to come down from 40 to 25 or so and the death rate went on falling. That happened in Britain between 1880 and 1930. Since then, both have evened out. We are now at a 15 to 18 birth rate and a death rate of about 12. So we are not quite in balance, but something pretty near, and as good as we can do from the point of view of civilisation. Exactly the same picture has occurred in France and Germany and in Western Europe as a whole. So far as we can see, there is no difference between Catholic countries and Protestant countries in this respect. It has taken us
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200 years to go through this cycle. The Slavic countries are getting into the beginning of phase three. Though their net population is still increasing, the net increase is coming down.
The problem is: can we help to speed up this cycle in the developing countries, in order to get through phases one, two and three more quickly than we were able to do? The Answer is that we know now how to do this, but it is difficult, as has emerged from this debate. It has been done in one country with dramatic speed, as my noble friend Lady Gaitskell has said, and that is Japan. I will come to this extraordinary story in a moment.
There is a whole host of factors involved in getting the birth rate down. It is not just a matter of providing family planning machinery and clinics. The most important factor is delay in the age of women having their first child. If a delay can be achieved in the age at which a woman has her first child, most of the problem is solved, simply because the fertility of women goes down so rapidly after the age of about 25. And this is done without any change in behaviour on the part of the man. He can go on behaving exactly as he did, but the woman's power of producing is that much less. So, with a late age of marriage and with no mechanical or medical contraceptives, countries have achieved a low birth rate. The problem of India—and the Indians know this full well—is the child marriage of girls, the universality of marriage and the non-marriage of widows. As a result of the non-marriage of widows, widowers tend to marry young girls, who are extremely fertile and go on having children; but widows, who are relatively infertile, do not marry again, so that the whole pattern of fertility is increased.
I have no doubt that our recent spurt in the birth rate was largely due to an increase of early marriages in this country. I wondered a lot why this increase in early marriages occurred, and so far as I can gather from the young people it was largely a reaction to their feelings about atomic war. They thought that their changes of survival were comparatively remote, that the world was going to go up, and they thought they would like to have something of a

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married life before that happened. I believe that this is why so many young people got married so much earlier ten years ago, and I should not be a bit surprised, now that the climate of opinion about atomic war is changing, if we do not see people being a little more sensible, as I should think, and not getting married until they are 24 or 25. I think that this would be all to the good.
As I said, my noble friend Lady Gaitskell spoke on Japan. This is an extraordinary story demographically. Japan is a little country the same size as the State of Mantana—that is to say, about 143,000 square miles, as compared with our 94,000. Incidentally, we are the same as Minnesota. We have 59 million people in our country and Japan has 93 million. The speed of increase of the Japanese population in the immediate post-war period was such that if it had happened to us in this country we might well have had to decide that very drastic measures would have to be taken. Their density of population is higher than ours: 642 people per square mile, as against 552 people per square mile in Britain. They were in balance as regards their population up to the year 1868—that is, as long as they did not have their industrial revolution.
As my noble friend Lady Summerskill said, they achieved this by a combination of abortion and infanticide. This was the classical method of classical Japan of keeping down their birth rate up to the time they started their industrial revolution in about 1870. Then they went ahead, in typical Western style, increasing their population, so that from 32 million they were up to 55 million by 1920. And they had the sort of trouble which India is now going through, but in a much smaller area, including the rice riots of 1918. But somehow they got through it all.
Then phase three, the slowing-down phase of increase, started towards the end of the Second World War. The birth rate started to fall, and the rate of increase declined. But by this time there were 72 million people in Japan. Then, between 1945 and 1950, they had another enormous spurt in birth rate. It was due to the return of the soldiers from the war. They had a baby boom just like ours. Their birth rate was 34 per 1,000, and their infant mortality rate was going
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down. In this period of five years their population went up by 12 million, to 84 million. By this time they were getting quite scared, and in 1948 the Japanese Diet passed their eugenic protection law to permit induced abortion and sterilisation, and also to make possible the use of the official machinery for propaganda about birth control.
The effect of this (I am only describing what happened; I am not condoning it) was that in the first year there were 200,000 official abortions. In 1955 there were 1,200,000 official abortions—a tremendous figure. I understand that it went down last year to about 900,000; but that is still an enormous figure. At the same time, the use of contraception has greatly increased in Japan. The extraordinary thing is that the Japanese now have their birth rate down to practically the same level as ours—namely, 17·55, which is only half what it was in 1947. In spite of that, their population in the next ten years will go up by 6 million—of that we can be fairly sure—compared with the 12 million growth that I described in the five years of their peak period. But they have by these brutally tough methods defeated the population explosion, and they have done it in fifteen years.
I do not think it is for us to criticise the Japanese about their abortion law. They have had their history of abortion as a common practice up to 1860 or 1870, and they have not a great deal of guilt feeling about it. In many ways it is arguable, as a purely scientific policy, that abortion is less objectionable than sterilisation; because although people claim that sterilisation can be reversed, in my experience it cannot be: it is just nonsense. Once the tubes have been tied in either sex, the chances of undoing this are virtually zero. But with abortion it is possible for a woman to have more children. That does not excuse it, of course—it merely explains the situation a little more clearly.
I want to mention one more point which I think is of great importance. The fall in 1880 of the British birth rate, and the fall in the French birth rate, which started in the early 1800's, occurred long before mechanical or chemical contraception became widespread. It was not due to sexual abstinence, but to the widespread use of the process known as coitus

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interruptus, which my noble friend Lord Longford said his Church condemned, and has always condemned. Over a large part of Europe this has been the commonest method of birth control. For most of the population it is simply withdrawal. It is still used, so far as I know, by about 25 per cent. of couples in this country. The only country that has got rid of it (if that is the right way to look at it) is the United States, where it is thought to be used by about 2 per cent. of the people. I was brought up to believe that this was a very bad thing to do from the point of view of the psychological position of the marital partners. My French friends say that I am wrong. It is widely practised in France, and they say that if it is properly practised, no harm occurs from the mental point of view to either of the marital partners. I can only say that it is done, without any apparatus at all, by people of remarkable degrees of primitiveness in other respects.
For most people the world over the size of family is, I am convinced, a rational family judgment based on consideration of the social and economic position. Here I agree entirely with what my noble friend Lady Summerskill said: that what really matters is the social question, whether it pays to have children. If there is a high death rate and there is no social security in old age, so that sons are essential to keep one when one is old, it is common sense to go on having children until you have enough sons. And people do this the world over. But given the chance of bringing up a relatively small family in good health, and given some economic security for old age, the people themselves will choose to have small families.
I can give your Lordships figures for the optimum family size. The sort of family wanted among the upper educational groups of the Indian people who have been asked is, broadly speaking, a small family of two or three children; and so it goes down. I could give exactly the same sort of figures for Japan. This is the sort of family that they want to bring up. I can give the same figures for Britain in April, 1964. Here is the choice of the British people: 46 per cent. say that the ideal family size is two children; 27 per cent. say three children; and 16 per cent. say four children. There are clearly some—but they are not statis-
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tically significant—who want large families; but the average choice of family size in Britain is 2·6 children.
I have already said—but I should like to repeat it—that in my view it is presumptuous for men to pontificate about family planning. This is a matter for women to decide. In the developing countries of Asia the women are not necessarily downtrodden by the men. They often look after the family money, but on intimate matters they will not go against their men. So the men have to be convinced.
As regards the attitudes of the great religions of the world towards birth control, at the end of the nineteenth century there was nothing to choose between the Anglican Church and the Church of Rome. The interesting thing we have heard is how the Church of England has changed, and we see how the Church of Rome may be going to change—I will not put it higher than that. Islam is changing. There was a Congress at the Islamic University in Egypt to discuss this question, and they decided that birth control was justified as a method of dealing with poverty, mental health, or for other humanitarian reasons. As a result, our Indian and Pakistan friends can with good heart go forward with family planning programmes. I believe that in Pakistan the women have been the fighters to get family planning established. Among the countries of the Far East who are not interested in this subject, or are actively opposed, are the Philippine Islands, which of course are predominantly Catholic; Burma, which is itself underpopulated: and Indonesia (where there is a mixture of Islam and Roman Catholic) which is, officially, uninterested.
It is worth remembering that the success of birth control and of family limitation all over the Western World has been achieved almost entirely without Government support. It has been done by the people of the Western World themselves: by their making the choice, whether they used rubber, mechanical devices, coitus interruptus, or whatever it was. They have, in fact, done this, and I have no doubt that a sufficiency of people in these developing Eastern countries will be benefited by family limitation in the fullest sense of the

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word, and will be able to bring up better families if they are small. And they will do it.
I must say that I regard the Motion itself as unexceptionable but limited. One feels that there is more important aid and other kinds of aid that we can give. It is true that the Eastern countries are receiving a great deal of aid from the West on this subject, but it is mainly from the Ford Foundation, as one noble Lord mentioned, from the Population Council, and other great American Foundations. I am equally certain that noble Lords are right when they say that exhortation from the West is regarded as highly invidious, patronising and offensive, and can easily be misconstrued. Their real problem is their shortage of trained people for help in developing and evaluating family planning programmes. Already, the World Health Organisation can help in evaluation, which is no more than a proper population study. The United Nations should be able to help in teaching their teachers to teach family planning if the people want it. I hold, with the Anglican Church, that this is really a matter for each individual family to decide. But I do not see why anybody should be denied this information. Already two demographic research centres, one in Bombay and another in Santiago, in Chile, have been set up by the United Nations, and, clearly, the more there can be in the way of the regional meeting to which the noble Lord, Lord Brand, referred, the better and more helpfully these things will be able to develop.
In conclusion, I roust say this. If we are to achieve the necessary agricultural and industrial development of the developing countries; if we are to achieve a proper level of education for them, so that the ghastly position to which my noble friend Baroness Gaitskell referred, of half the children in the world not knowing what the inside of a school was like no longer obtains; if we can make sure that children get their schooling and go on at school, and, above all, if the girls get schooling and stay on at school, there will be no population problem. I believe that it is on achieving these things that we must put our greatest emphasis and to which we must devote our greatest energy.
8.34 p.m.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SOUTHWARK: My Lords, as the noble Lord
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sits down, may I say that although it has not been possible for me to he present at this debate to-day, except in these last few moments, nevertheless my noble friend the right reverend Prelate the Lord Bishop of London has kept me informed of what has been happening, and I have learned the general drift of the debate. For what it is worth, I should like to say that, speaking from this Bench, I endorse and support everything that has just been said by my noble friend Lord Taylor. As I look across the House, my one regret is that my other noble friend, Lord Morrison of Lambeth, is not present to hear such an important speech. I should have thought he would regard it as his duty to be present. Having said that, I endorse all that has been said. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Morrison of Lambeth, will read, mark and inwardly digest what has been said in the debate.
8.36 p.m.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: My Lords, I agree with the right reverend Prelate who has just come in in endorsing practically everything that has been said by the noble Lord, Lord Taylor. I am particularly glad to have heard his speech because it was so sensible and scientific and has put this matter in the right perspective and proportion. He was so right when he pointed out that family planning in Western countries has not been achieved as a result of effort on the part of Governments but by the people who have made the decision for themselves. As for his remarks about India, of course we must all be conscious of the fact that India is spending millions of pounds in an attempt to get about 5 per cent.—which is all they can touch of the population—to learn about these matters, whereas far better results could be achieved if it were possible simply by persuading people to marry a little later.
I am grateful to the noble Lord for making these observations, and many others which he made. The only slight criticism I feel of what he said was that I can imagine other possible reasons for early marriages besides the fear of having a hydrogen bomb dropped on us. I think there are other reasons for it. It is a point which I am making merely in a conversational way, because the noble Lord's speech was so interesting. It is perfectly true, of course, that

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if they marry later they have not such frequent fertility, but at the same time—though I cannot justify this—I think we may find, when we look into it, that women who marry at 25 now tend to have larger families than people of the same age who married in the 'twenties and 'thirties. I do not think it is entirely due to early marriages that our birth rate is going up.
I am not going to say anything more. I am glad that I spoke earlier, partly because I think we owed it to your Lordships to state early in the debate what the Government's ideas were on this subject, so that the debate might not proceed in ignorance of what we were proposing to do. Also, I cannot help hoping that by doing so I may have perhaps shortened the debate a little, because our estimate of the time at which it would end was about an hour or one and a half hours later than now. I have noticed during the debate perhaps a slight undertone in most of the speeches—all of which have been excellent—of what I would call insular Imperialism. We cannot get rid of the idea that when there is a world problem, we are the people who should say how it should be solved, and everybody else in the world should do as we tell them. I have no doubt that there is something admirable in this attitude. The noble Viscount behind me said that we ought to be leaders, and I certainly think we ought to have the ambition of being leaders in what we think is right; but, in the 1960s the people of this world do not want to be bossed or led by Britain or by America or by anybody else. They are glad to have our friendship and to have any aid we can give them, but they have their own ideas and do not want us to run their affairs or to formulate their policies.
VISCOUNT HANWORTH: My Lords, if I may interrupt the noble Earl, I should like to make it quite clear that I did not suggest that we should lead them or cajole them in any way. I was merely suggesting that we should provide a lead in giving any information for which they might ask.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: Yes, but do not let us over-estimate the results of what we are capable of doing. Some
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of your Lordships have suggested, for some reason or other, that I was trying to play down the results of our willingness to give aid in connection with family planning. I do not want to play down at all. I think we should like to give what help we can, but the fact is that we can give actually very little and we have not had one single request for this aid since we let it be known that we were willing to give aid if we were asked for it. We have let a number of the Commonwealth countries know—India, Pakistan, Malaysia and Ceylon—that we are willing, but so far they are not interested. We can quite understand that because, after all, there is little we can give them.
Here perhaps I might take the opportunity of answering a particular question that was put to me by the noble Earl, Lord Iddesleigh, and the noble Earl, Lord Longford, about sterilisation. They wanted to know whether we were going to pay for experts who would go out and teach sterilisation to the Indians. I will try to answer the question, although I have not been able to get any official verification. If I make a mistake perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, can correct me because he knows much more about medical law than I do. I think I am right in saying that in this country there is no law against sterilisation as there is against abortion; that is to say, you cannot be prosecuted for sterilising someone.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, as a matter of fact, there is an ancient law, the law of mayhem, which stops us from sterilising people unless there is a medical reason for sterilising. So, if a patient goes to a doctor in Britain and asks to be sterilised, the doctor normally refuses to do so, and the patient quite often goes off to another country and is sterilised. Of course, if there is medical need for sterilisation, then it is done.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: I am most grateful to the noble Lord. I know that doctors would not sterilise unless there was a good health reason, and they would not do so simply in order to enable the sterilised person to avoid having children. I do not know whether there have been any prosecutions under this law of mayhem. I thought the real point was that in this country it was

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part of medical ethics that sterilisation should not be Performed unless there was some good medical reason, but I may be wrong about that.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, I was of the opinion that if a woman pressed a doctor to sterilise her for social reasons, and he did so, the law is such that her husband could bring an action for assault against the doctor.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: I suppose that is not so in other countries. I do not know whether it is so in India. I should have imagined that if a doctor went to India he would take the same view about sterilisation as he took here; but it is so unlikely that the question would arise at all, because sterilisation is such a simple operation and the Indians know perfectly well how to do it. It is hardly conceivable that they would ask for an expert to be sent out all the way from Britain, at considerable expense to the British Government or to them, in order to teach them something which they already know perfectly well how to do. So I do not think the question is really a very real one.
In my own remarks I made some attempt to point out that we ought not to assume that oar own ideas which nearly everybody in this country entertains and takes for granted are shared by the rest of the world, and that of course includes the Catholic world. I think your Lordships appreciate the position of the noble Earl, Lord Longford, and the noble Earl, Lord Iddesleigh, who have spoken so well to-day from the point of view of the Church of Rome. I was in my remarks trying to do justice in advance to their position.
The noble Lord. Lord Chorley, got things completely the wrong way round. My point was that the Roman Church was against duelling and was also against birth control. When the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, says we had to take a stand against duelling.— which we did, and stopped it—of course, the answer is, Yes, and maybe in another two generations we may take a stand against birth control, in both cases coming back to the teaching of the Church of Rome. That is the point I was trying to make.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, may I venture to say that it was
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about the best point made during the whole day.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: I am very much obliged to the noble Earl. Does he mean my point, or that of the noble Lord, Lord Chorley?
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: That of the noble Earl, Lord Dundee.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: What we cannot do is to impose our own moral and social ideas, at least not all at once, upon the rest of the world, and we have to act with tolerance and circumspection in these matters.
The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, who apologised for not being able to remain here, particularly asked me to reply to one point. He wanted to know whether we were going to press the World Health Organisation to take a more active line in this connection. It may be a good thing that the World Health Organisation should be persuaded to do this, but it is a terribly sensitive subject for the World Health Organisation, and I do not know that we should achieve any good by pressing them to try and to adopt an active attitude, which might result in a great many of the Catholic and other members resigning and breaking up the organisation.
That is all that I think your Lordships would like me to say now, and I will conclude by telling my noble friend Lord McCorquodale of Newton that I agree with him that it is the United Nations which is the best medium for action in this matter. We can, perhaps with the help of our friends like the Americans, do far more through the medium of the United Nations than by any kind of bilateral action. It may be that the United Nations is also the best medium through which the right kind of research is carried out. We have certainly taken note of what the noble Lord, Lord Casey, said about this subject.
I think our line probably should be to try to get research carried out to fulfil the purposes which are asked for by the underdeveloped countries. That should happen in the United Nations. It is through the United Nations that the kind of progress which is the only useful kind will be made; progress which is the widest possible consensus of opinion among all different types of countries of the world including we hope the Communists,

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Africans and the Catholic countries whose position at the moment it is possible may be modified, although I am not making any prediction about that.
8.49 p.m.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: My Lords, it only remains for me to thank your Lordships, which I do with the utmost sincerity, for having taken such a distinguished part in what I consider to have been a fine and interesting debate. We had from the right reverend Prelate, the Lord Bishop of London, and the noble Earl, Lord Longford, two profound and obviously tremendously thought-out exposès of the positions which the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church at present adopt. I thank them both for having taken so much care to prepare statements which are of the utmost interest and importance, and I am very grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Longford, for his speech.
From my own point of view, I am highly gratified with the debate, for, with the exception of two noble Lords of Roman Catholic persuasion—and the slightly lukewarm attitude, as I think Lord Chorley described it, of the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill, which I believe was on our side but not so vigorously as some expressed it—I think we have had a unanimous acceptance of this Motion in the terms in which it has been put before the House. I am particularly grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, for announcing what I think is a very important step forward on the part of Her Majesty's Government. He announced it in terms which are probably less urgent than the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, would have wished, but, speaking as he did for the Government, I can quite understand that.
I would say that I am delighted that Her Majesty's representatives are going to press for this matter in the United Nations. It was very nearly carried last time. I am informed that the Economic and Social Committee accepted the principles we have endeavoured to put here. It was not carried only because some clever people realised that if it was to be passed as a matter of urgency in the Assembly it would need to have a two-thirds majority and not a simple majority.
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I am informed—I have not been able to check whether it is right—that on that vote, which was actually the crucial one, on whether it was an urgent or an ordinary motion, Her Majesty's Government failed to vote. I do not know whether that is true and I have not been able to check it, but that was what I was informed.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: The crucial vote was 34 to 34, with 29 abstentions. The United Kingdom delegation voted for it.
LORD McCORQUODALE OF NEWTON: That was the crucial vote when the Assembly came to this point. But the actual fact was that it got put down as of such importance that it had to have a two-thirds majority and we had no hope of getting it. But I think we—that is to say, the people who are interested in this matter—will need only a simple majority in the Assembly next time; two-thirds is very difficult to get. I am very pleased with the noble Lord's assurance that, so far as Britain is concerned, we will once again endeavour to get what I regard as essential things through the United Nations.
I would thank all those who have taken part in the debate, but at this late hour you will not wish me to elaborate and praise you all. I was delighted, and all my friends would have been, with the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Gaitskell, with the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Casey, and with many others whom I should like to mention. I think we have had a worthwhile debate. I believe it has been a very valuable debate. I only hope the country outside will take some notice of it. If I may make one small point, it is this. It was mentioned that India was spending a vast amount of money on family planning. India is not spending a vast amount of money; it is spending as much as it can afford, but it is not a vast amount in view of the problem facing India. But that is only a minor point. I thank everybody for having taken part in this debate. I hope that the United Nations may take some notice of it, and I beg leave to withdraw my Motion for Papers.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

NATIONAL PROVIDENT INSTITUTION BILL [H.L.] SAINT DIONIS BACKCHURCH CHURCHYARD (AMENDMENT) BILL [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to.
  REGULATIONS ON DIMENSIONS AND WEIGHTS OF VEHICLES
  REGULATIONS ON DIMENSIONS AND WEIGHTS OF VEHICLES