Sitting of 25 November 1982

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[MR. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS
LONDON TRANSPORT (LIVERPOOL STREET) BILL
Read the Third time, and passed.
BRITISH RAILWAYS (LIVERPOOL STREET STATION) BILL (By Order)
Order for Third Reading read.
To be read the Third time upon Wednesday 1 December at Seven o'clock.

Oral Answers to Questions
  NORTHERN IRELAND
  Mr. Speaker: I appeal, once again, for brief supplementary questions.
  NORTHERN IRELAND

    Northern Ireland Act 1982
    Mr. Stan Thorneasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will introduce legislation to repeal the Northern Ireland Act 1982.
    The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. James Prior): No, Sir.
    Mr. Thorne: As we cannot force people to be free, when does the Secretary of State expect to bring together representative groups throughout Ireland with a view to discussing a united and independent Ireland at an early date?
    Mr. Prior: The Government remain committed to the principle of self-determination, which was made statutory by the Northern Ireland Constitution Act 1973. The Assembly elections showed conclusively that the majority of voters favour the maintenance of Northern Ireland as part of the United Kingdom. That remains the main plank of the Government's platform.
    Mr. Molyneaux: If the Secretary of State does not intend to repeal the Act, will he amend the legislation that was passed by Parliament on the mistaken assumption that the minority, as defined by the Secretary of State, would participate in the Assembly?
    Mr. Prior: No, Sir. Nor do I think that there was any such assumption by Parliament.
    Mr. Molyneaux: There was.
    Mr. Prior: It passed the Act and sticks by it.
    Rev. Ian Paisley: In view of the election of five members of Sinn Fein, which is dedicated to the use of the
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    Armalite bullet as well as the ballot box, does the right hon. Gentleman agree that he needs to redefine what he means by widespread community support?
    Mr. Prior: No. There are several ways in which widespread community support can be defined. I suggest that the Social Democratic and Labour Party is an important part of that.

    Youth Opportunities Programme
    Mr. Haynesasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many people are currently engaged in the youth opportunities programme in Northern Ireland.
    The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. Adam Butler): The youth opportunities programme in Northern Ireland is being phased out and replaced by the youth training programme.
    At the end of October 1982 there were 5,412 young people still engaged in the youth opportunities programme. The new comprehensive youth training programme, under which schemes generally began on 20 September, has got off to an excellent start, and by the end of October 6,417 young people were in training.
    Mr. Haynes: Is the Minister aware of reports of a lack of consultation with the trade unions and education boards about the employment of youths in those schemes?
    Mr. Butler: There has been no intent not to consult. I agree that the trade union movement declined to take part in the Manpower Advisory Council, which is especially involved with the youth training programme. I am glad that, as a result of recent consultations, that will change. The full participation of the trade union movement in, and its support for, the programme is essential for the programme's success.
    Mr. Fitt: Does the Minister agree that the figures he has given are utterly derisory as there are 130,000 unemployed people in Northern Ireland? Does he agree also that it was the absence of any schemes to give employment to disaffected youth in Northern Ireland that led to the very problem that the Secretary of State has condemned—the complete alienation of young people in Northern Ireland, especially those in my constituency?
    Mr. Butler: My figures about the youth training programme are extremely encouraging. Next year, everyone in the 16 and 17-year-old age group will either be in full-time education, or have a job or, if they wish, participate in the youth training programme. That is excellent news.
    Mr. McCusker: With regard to what the hon. Member for Belfast, West (Mr. Fin) said, what is the Minister training those young people for?
    Mr. Butler: It is an easy jibe to ask what is the good of putting those people in the programme if there is no job for them at the end of it. I recognise that even at the end of the programme there will be some who do not immediately get a job.
    It is clear from the operation of, for example, the youth opportunities programme that such schemes, especially the new youth training programme, which is more comprehensive and thorough than previous ones, prepare young people better for their adult and working life. With

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    regard to the prospects for Northern Ireland industry, we shall have a considerably better trained work force that should be more attractive to inward investors.

    New Industry
    Mr. R. C. Mitchellasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what steps he is at present taking to attract new industry to Northern Ireland.
    Mr. Adam Butler: The Industrial Development Board maintains a continuous drive in search of new investment in the United States of America, Japan, Scandinavia, Great Britain and elsewhere in Europe. The United States of America offers the best prospects at present and our representation there is being strengthened. The board's promotional efforts are supported by visits by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and myself, and we have both been in the United States of America within the past five weeks.
    Mr. Mitchell: Does the Minister agree that the recent report of the Select Committee on Industry and Trade seems to show that the Republic of Ireland has been more successful in attracting industry than have the British Government and their agencies in respect of Northern Ireland? Why is that? Does the hon. Gentleman agree that a reduction in unemployment would probably be the most beneficial thing to happen to that unhappy place?
    Mr. Butler: For some years there has been more investment in the Republic from America and Great Britain than there has been in Northern Ireland. If one wants one reason for that, it is the image of Northern Ireland in the minds of would-be investors. However, that image is improving. The Industrial Development Board was established to provide the most efficient machinery with which to attract inward investment. We have a good package of incentives and I intend, as the relevant Minister, to see that those incentives are put to good use.
    Dr. Mawhinney: Does my hon. Friend agree that unless the two communities in Northern Ireland show a willingness to work together through the Assembly, private industry will have no incentive to invest in the Province?
    Mr. Butler: There are plenty of encouragements for private industry to invest in the Province, such as the quality of the work force and the financial incentives. However, I agree that if those representing the two communities could work together, both within and without the new Assembly, it would be a great help.
    Mr. Soley: Is it not political and economic nonsense that two boards—one north and one south of the Border—are trying to outbid each other for new investment? Will the Government make a new approach to the newly elected Government in Dublin with a suggestion for an all-Ireland economic development council?
    Mr. Butler: No, Sir.

    Assembly
    Mr. Lathamasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he will make a statement on the new Assembly; what initial programme of work he envisages being undertaken; and when it will first meet.
    Mr. Winnickasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the current position of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
    Sir William van Straubenzeeasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he will make a statement on the working of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
    Mr. Prior: The first meeting of the newly elected Assembly took place on 11 November. The Assembly electe 1 the hon. Member for Down, North (Mr. Kilfedder) as its Presiding Officer and I congratulate him on his election to this important and responsible office. A Procedures Committee was then appointed by the Assembly under the chairmanship of the Presiding Officer. and I understand that it is due to report today. My ministerial colleagues in the Northern Ireland Office and I loos forward to establishing an effective working relationship with the Assembly, especially through its six statutory Committees. As the House knows, I shall be meeting the Assembly on Tuesday 30 November to discuss security.
    Mr. Latham: Is my right hon. Friend aware that even those who, like me, view the Assembly with a degree of enthusiasm that is just about detectable under an electron microscope nevertheless welcome his decision to talk to the Assembly next week about security? Will my right hon. Friend be able to announce any tough new measures to the Assembly to deal with murder and terrorism, as some certainly seem to be needed?
    Mr. Prior: I am grateful for the rather lukewarm support that my hon. Friend has given to the Assembly. I shall speak to the Assembly next Tuesday, with its permission, and I had better keep my remarks until then—.[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] Well, all right, but I have nothing new to announce except the British Government's contin al efforts to combat terrorism wherever we can.
    Mr. Winnick: What will the Secretary of State's attitude be towards those Assembly Members who have decided to boycott it? Will he have any talks with those Members? Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that one of our criticisms of the constitutional proposals that he put before us was that there was no all-Irish dimension? Will he promise the House that once the elections in Ireland are over there will be talks with the new Government to see what can be done about future and further progress in Northern Ireland?
    Mr. Prior: I have already had talks with the SDLP and would welcome further talks with it as and when it is convenient and right. All Members of the Assembly will have the opportunity to raise constituents' problems with Ministers, as requested and required. The question of wider talks with the new Government in the South will have to be considered when that Government have been formed. However. I hope that we shall be able to have good relations with whatever Government are set up.
    Sir William van Straubenzee: Have not successive Governments urged supporters of the IRA to proceed not through the bullet, but through the ballot box? However strongly one opposes the IRA's methods and policies—and I certainly feel strongly about them—is it not curious to suggest that the fact that some of its supporters have been elected is in itself a criticism of the Assembly?
    Mr. Prior: That certainly cannot be held to be a criticism of holding free elections. The more that we can hold free elections in Northern Ireland, the better it will be for the people of Northern Ireland and the more likely we are to turn people away from the Armalite rifle and towards the ballot box and true democracy.
    Mr. Flannery: Is it not a fact that, no matter how well intentioned the Government are, the minority community will have no part in the Assembly? Is it not also true that some of us, including myself, warned the Minister when discussions took place at the very beginning, that those pople would not take part because they had told us so? As a result of this ploy, is not the situation worse than it was before? Did not killings start immediately after the elections took place, when a degree of legitimacy had been given to the IRA because of the mass vote of the minority community for Sinn Fein?
    Mr. Prior: I entirely refute the second part of the hon. Gentleman's question. Those who have studied Northern Ireland over the years know that the killings did not start after the elections. Regrettably, they have been going on for a very long time. We have always known that the SDLP would find it difficult to join the Assembly. However, I hope that the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends will do their best to encourage the SDLP to play a full part.
    Mr. Michael McNair-Wilson: If my right hon. Friend's intention in the Northern Ireland Act was to restore a measure of local government to Northern Ireland, how long can he allow one minority party to stand in the way of the democratically expressed wishes of the vast majority of those living in the Province? Will he therefore reconsider his earlier answer about not amending the Act, at least in the near future, if that boycott continues?
    Mr. PriorNo, Sir. could not possibly reconsider amending the Act in that respect.
    Mr. Nicholas Winterton: Why not?
    Mr. Prior: Unless there is widespread acceptance throughout the community in Northern Ireland for what we are seeking to do, and for devolved Government, there is no chance of creating the political stability that we all desire.
    Mr. Nicholas Winterton: What about democracy?
    Mr. Prior: That is the basis upon which the Government set out the Northern Ireland Act, and that remains the position.

    United States of America (Visit)
    Mr. Adleyasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on his recent visit to the United States of America.
    Mr. Robert Atkinsasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on his recent visit to the United States of America.
    Rev. Martin Smythasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what contacts with United States authorities he had on his recent visit to that country bearing upon allegations that the Central Intelligence Agency has been involved with supplies for terrorists operating in the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Prior: I visited the United States of America from 14 to 22 November. I addressed several influential audiences, gave a number of radio, television, and press interviews, called on the deputy Secretary of State, Mr. Kenneth Darn, and undertook some industrial development business.
    I sought to inform those I met about the current political situation in Northern Ireland, to promote the advantages of Northern Ireland as a location for inward investment and to re-emphasise earlier appeals for Americans not to give political, financial or moral support to organisations associated with the use of violence in Northern Ireland.
    During my discussions with Mr. Dam I received the strongest possible assurances that the United States authorities would continue to pursue and prosecute those engaged in sending arms illegally to Northern Ireland.
    Mr. Adley: I thank my right hon. Friend on behalf, I am sure, of the vast majority of people in Great Britain and, I hope, in Northern Ireland, for the efforts that he and his predecessors on both sides of the House have put into their jobs. There has been constant carping in the House about the efforts of successive Governments who have tried to solve that difficult problem.
    Is my right hon. Friend aware, and does he believe, that the American Government are aware of the widespread disgust felt in this country at the behaviour of both the jurors and some of the acquitted in a recent New York court case? Can he, through the Foreign Office, bring to the attention of the American Government the feeling of many of my constituents, and others, that unless the American Government are more supportive of the Government we shall continue to see a growth of anti-American feeling?
    Hon. Members: Too long.
    Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member has been very unreasonable.
    Mr. Prior: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for what he said. The American Government are aware of the strong feelings that have been expressed on this side of the Atlantic. They share our disappointment at the outcome of the court case. Just as in this country the Executive and the judiciary are separate, so the American Government can do no more than make certain that the evidence produced at the courts is the best available. The FBI does all it can to prevent the supply of arms.
    Mr. Robert Atkins: Did my right hon. Friend see reports when he was in the United States about the president of Noraid, Mr. Flannery, who, when asked during the court case whether it was true that he had been running guns to terrorists in Northern Ireland for the past seven years, denied that and said that he had been doing so for over 20 years? Does my right hon. Friend think that more should be done to persuade ordinary, decent Americans, of whatever national extraction, not to give money to or support Noraid?
    Mr. Prior: Everything must be done to persuade the American public not to support Noraid. That was one of the purposes of my visit. I am also certain that the United States Government intend to prevent by any means they can cash reaching Noraid. They have already taken court action to force Noraid to comply with the Foreign Agents Registration Act and register as an agent of the Provisional IRA.
    Rev. Martin Smyth: I acknowledge the steps that have been taken by the FBI to prevent arms smuggling. Will the Secretary of State admit that the recent acquittal in the New York court, which resulted from claims that the CIA was involved, confirms beliefs already held and gives moral backing to the IRA terrorists? I accept that a President can be unaware of CIA activities, but will the Secretary of State say what representations have been made to the United States authorities about such allegations?
    Mr. Prior: That was obviously a matter that came up during my talks. I am satisfied that the CIA was not and is not involved in the smuggling of arms to Northern Ireland. The State Department described the allegation as ludicrous, and that remains the position.
    Mr. Eldon Griffiths: I have seen how much good my right hon. Friend's visits to America have achieved. Will he encourage other people, not merely politicians but professional people—nurses, teachers and even police officers—to go to the United States and explain to the American public that all people of all religions wish the trade in arms to Northern Ireland to stop?
    Mr. Prior: Yes, Sir. The more people who go, the better it will be, provided that when they go they do so in the right spirit and use the most suitable words to appeal to a sceptical American audience.
    Mr. Cryer: When the Secretary of State goes to America, or meets American industrialists will he make it clear that much more stringent criteria will be applied to ventures such as that of De Lorean, that where the taxpayer supports such a venture with a majority shareholding, the taxpayer will retain majority control, and that the Government have set their face firmly against ownership by American companies to which money can be apparently siphoned off in large quantities?
    Mr. Prior: Yes, Sir. There is no doubt that whenever I can I make that point forcefully.
    Mr. Concannon: In spite of the difficulties about security in America—I know the difficulties of getting through to certain people, especially on the west coast of America—and the terrible economic position, can the Secretary of State say anything about any success that he had with inward investment? Are public investment and Government participation still his economic policy for Northern Ireland?
    Mr. Prior: It is not the easiest time to attract American investment. There is a serious recession there at the moment and they are not thinking about a great deal of overseas investment. As my hon. Friend the Minister of State said this afternoon, we believe that we have an excellent package that should attract investment. It has to be stringently controlled, as I said to the hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. Cryer). We shall have to look at our package to see whether we can make it rather more suitable. We must continue, even during this period of recession, to keep the minds of American industrialists in touch with Northern Ireland so that when they pull out of the recession they will invest.

    Republic of Ireland (Contacts)
    Mr. J. Enoch Powellasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what contacts have taken place in the last month between officials of his Department and those of the Republic of Ireland.
    Mr. Prior: There have been a number of routine contacts between my officials and their counterparts in the Republic of Ireland on a wide range of practical day-to-day issues of common concern.
    Mr. Powell: Do any of the Secretary of State's officials have authority to discuss with the officials of the Republic the Anglo-Irish dimension and the establishment of an Anglo-Irish parliamentary tier?
    Mr. Prior: No, Sir, not without my permission.
    Rev. Ian Paisley: When will the Secretary of State put pressure on the new Government in the Republic about the vexed position of extradition? The European Parliament has now decided that those participating should sign the convention on terrorism, and the Republic is the odd man out. Can the Secretary of State put pressure on the Government of the Republic to do something about that?
    Mr. Prior: I have noted the hon. Gentleman's remarks. We had better get the fresh Government first.
    Mr. Soley: After yesterday's election in the Republic, will the Secretary of State take the opportunity to approach the new Government to discuss the possibility of an all-Irish dimension to the Assembly? Ultimately, that is the only way that we shall make it work.
    Mr. Prior: In due course we shall have to discuss all matters with the House, the Northern Ireland Assembly and the new Government of the South.

    Plastic Bullets
    Ms. Harmanasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many rounds of plastic bullets were fired in Northern Ireland in the last six months; how many injuries resulted; how serious the injuries were; and how many deaths resulted.
    Mr. Canavanasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what complaints he has received about the use of plastic bullets in Northern Ireland.
    Mr. Prior: Since 1 June 1982, 370 plastic baton rounds have been fired by the security forces in Northern Ireland and three people are believed to have been injured by them. There have been no deaths caused by baton rounds during that period.
    Since the beginning of this year I or my Ministers have answered 19 questions in this House or in another place on the subject of baton rounds. In addition, I or members of my Department have replied to 35 letters; not all were complaints.
    Ms. Harman: Will the Secretary of State tell the House whether any and, if so, how many members of the security forces have been prosecuted or disciplined for breaching the regulations on firing plastic bullets? The regulations say that plastic bullets should not be aimed above the waist. The 11 deaths from plastic bullets were all the result of injuries to the head and chest.
    Mr. Prior: I cannot give the hon. Lady precise figures. In a recent case two soldiers were prosecuted, tried and

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    acquitted. That case is now closed. I assure the hon. Lady that, for a whole range of reasons, the tightest control is now exercised over the use of plastic baton rounds.
    Mr. Canavan: As 14 people, half of them children, have been killed and hundreds more seriously injured by rubber or plastic bullets over the past decade, why has not one single soldier or policeman responsible been convicted of murder, manslaughter or even improper use of these lethal weapons? Instead of turning a blind eye to the murder of little children, is it not time that the Secretary of State imposed a complete ban on plastic bullets, along the lines of the recent Labour Party conference decision?
    Mr. Prior: The hon. Gentleman should take on board the fact that if young children are used by others to form a riot or to give protection for others in a riot, they are bound at times to get hurt—
    Mr. Canavan: So the right hon. Gentleman kills them.
    Mr. Prior: The right thing to do is to keep young children away from a riot. The security forces have an extremely difficult job. They do not enjoy the task that is set them. They are there to protect all the people of Northern Ireland.
    Mr. Canavan: They are not there to kill children.
    Mr. Prior: They do their job to the best of their ability. They need to have additional protection at this time.
    Mr. Molyneaux: How many rounds of high velocity lead bullets have been fired at the security forces in the past six months? How many injuries have those bullets caused? How serious were those injuries, and how many resulted in death?
    Mr. Prior: I cannot give the answer now. If the hon. Gentleman will put down a question on the matter he has raised, I shall try to answer it. I am not certain whether he is talking about high velocity lead bullets or 45-grain plastic baton rounds. I can perhaps reply to the hon. Gentleman in a separate answer.
    Mr. Molyneaux: High velocity lead bullets.
    Mr. Stokes: Would it not be better if the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms. Harman), whose voice has been heard so often since she entered the House, gave her support to the forces of law and order in Northern Ireland in the same way as we presume she supports them in her constituency.

    Homeless Persons
    Mr. Tom Clarkeasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many homeless people were housed by the Northern Ireland Housing Executive in Northern Ireland during 1981.
    The Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. David Mitchell): The precise figures sought by the hon. Gentleman are not available, but I understand from the chairman of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive that during 1981 the executive provided housing in 870 cases where the applicant was homeless, was under immediate threat of homelessness, or was placed in an extremely difficult or dangerous situation because of civil disturbance.
    Mr. Clarke: Does the Minister agree that there is strong feeling that these matters are being made more
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    difficult because they are caught between two Departments? Will he consider placing statutory responsibilities on the Northern Ireland Housing Executive to clarify matters?
    Mr. Mitchell: A code of practice to clarify any areas of uncertainty is expected to be published by the end of March next year. It is a high priority of the Housing Executive to house the homeless.
    Rev. Ian Paisley: I recognise the needs of Belfast in respect of the homeless, but will the Minister keep in mind the other urban areas outside Belfast, where there are also homeless people?
    Mr. Mitchell: There are 10,000 re-lets a year available to the Northern Ireland Housing Executive in the Province outside Belfast as well as within it. This should ensure adequate opportunity for rehousing people in rural areas where the need arises, provided they are prepared to go to an area where accommodation is available.
    Mr. McCusker: Will the Minister confirm that there are at least 1,000 empty houses in my constituency, many of them built within the past 10 years? Is he aware that the Housing Executive, with his approval, would be happy to give them away?
    Mr. Mitchell: I cannot comment on the wishes of the Housing Executive about giving the houses away. I can confirm the figure that the hon. Gentleman has given of the number of empty houses in his constituency. We are seeking to dispose of them. As they are public property, they are not available to be given away.
    Mr. Fitt: Will the Minister accept that the re-development programme taking place in the city of 13elfast means that those on the homeless register who have never had a home occupy low priority? Is he aware that some of these people have had their names on the homeless register for years? Cannot he make a more equitable allocation of houses in redevelopment areas to help those who have never had a home?
    Mr. Mitchell: Absolute priority is given to the homeless by the Northern Ireland Housing Executive. If the hon. Gentleman has a particular case in mind and writes to me, I shall take up the matter with the executive.

    Social Democratic and Labour Party
    Mr. McNamaraasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he next hopes to meet the leaders of the Social Democratic and Labour Party.
    Mr. Prior: I met them earlier this month and there are no immediate plans for another meeting, but I am always ready to talk to that party's elected representatives.
    Mr. McNamara: Does not that reply and the Secretary of State's attitude show that he has accepted completely the Unionist veto and mean that there will never be any power sharing involving the minority? Does it mean that the Government are not prepared to make any gesture to the minority to try to get them to participate in the Assembly?
    Mr. Prior: These are very difficult matters. It was laid down carefully in the Northern Ireland Act that there would have to be widespread acceptance throughout the community if there was to be any transfer of powers. That

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    remains the position of the Government and of this House. I should have thought that it would be to the great benefit of all the parties in Northern Ireland for them to play a part in the Assembly and to seek gradually to move on toward some form of devolved administration.
    Mr. William Ross: When the Secretary of State meets the leaders of the SDLP, will he draw to their attention the fact that if proportional representation had not been used in the recent elections Sinn Fein would not have been elected and the SDLP would have been in a stronger electoral position?
    Mr. Prior: That is a point that the hon. Gentleman will no doubt make to them.
    Mr. Budgen: If, within the next six months, a majority of the Members of the Assembly ask for powers over security, what will be the Secretary of State's answer?
    Mr. Prior: "No", Sir.
    Mr. Stephen Ross: Is the Secretary of State aware that it is the wish of many hon. Members, certainly those on the Liberal Bench, that the SDLP should play its proper part in the Assembly? We hope that he will convey that message to its leaders. Will the right hon. Gentleman also correct the impression put about by the BBC, among others, that there is no Catholic representation in the Assembly? Six of the 10 Alliance Members are Catholics.
    Mr. Prior: Six Members of the Alliance Party who are Members of the Assembly are Catholics. They are playing an important part in the Assembly. I still hope that at some future date other people will join.

    Capital Underspending
    Mr. Dubsasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what is his latest estimate of the capital underspending in 1982–83 on housing and other environmental projects; and if he will seek to reduce it.
    Mr. David Mitchell: I do not at present expect that there will be any capital underspending on the housing programmes in 1982–83. Capital underspending on other environmental projects is expected to be relatively small.
    Mr. Dubs: Does the Minister agree that the high level of unemployment and the poor housing conditions throughout Northern Ireland point to the need to increase capital expenditure? Will he take steps to tackle the problems there by doing so?
    Mr. Mitchell: The Housing Executive capital programme will amount this year to £169 million, in addition to which £34 million will be available in grants to the private sector. Housing associations are spending £29·5 million. These are high figures. The building programme in Belfast is the largest since 1875. I hope that the hon. Gentleman and Opposition Members will feel that this is some progress in the direction that the House would expect.
    Mr. Soley: Does the Minister accept, unlike his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment, that capital investment involves revenue expenditure'? Will he bear that fact in mind in planning expansion, especially in housing, where 37 per cent. of building firms are working at under half capacity.
    Mr. Mitchell: The number of people unemployed in the construction industry in Northern Ireland has fallen by
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    about 2,000 during the past 12 months. That shows that our capital expenditure programme is creating jobs on the ground.
    Rev. Ian Paisley: Will the Minister tell the House what is happening in the negotiations about the £18 million that was to come from the European Community for housing in the Belfast area?
    Mr. Mitchell: That is a different question. If the hon. Gentleman will table it, I shall endeavour to answer it.

    Political Initiatives
    12. Mr. Stanbrookasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he proposes to take any further political initiatives in Northern Ireland.
    Mr. Prior: The Government will continue to seek to give the elected representatives of the people of Northern Ireland a greater say in their own affairs in a way which is acceptable to both sides of the community.
    Mr. Stanbrook: As my right hon. Friend's latest initiative has proved abortive, will he now abandon it, and also all thoughts of a parliamentary tier—which can only encourage those who want a united Ireland—and instead provide Northern Ireland with the long period of stable government that it badly needs?
    Mr. Prior: I hope that my hon. Friend will give me some support in helping to provide the long period of stable government that Northern Ireland needs. I do not believe that the way he suggests would bring that about.
    Mr. Concannon: I regret that the SDLP is not playing its full part in the Assembly. Am I right to assume—as I hope I am—that the cross-community support part of the Act remains valid, and does that mean that the SDLP plays its part in that cross-community support whether it is in or out of the Assembly?
    Mr. Prior: That part must be valid, because it is part of an Act of Parliament. In answer to what the right hon. Gentleman said about the SDLP being outside the Assembly. only if the SDLP came into the Assembly and played its full part there would it be possible to find out whether there was the amount of cross-community support that was necessary for devolved government.
    Mr. McCusker: I am one of those who ensured that the Secretary of State would have the pleasure of an early opportunity to speak to the Northern Ireland Assembly. Bearing in mind what he said about security a few minutes ago, and that he said that he had nothing new to say to the Assembly, what does he hope to achieve on Tuesday afternoon?
    Mr. Prior: That remains to be seen. As the hon. Gentleman was one of those who asked me to attend, perhaps he, too, should wait.
    Mr. Nicholas Winterton: On the subject of initiatives, will my right hon. Friend answer directly the question that was posed to him a little earlier by the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell)? Has my right hon. Friend given permission for any of his officials to indulge in discussions about the Anglo-Irish dimension? Will he give the House a direct answer to that question?
    Mr. Prior: In the past, of course I have. At the moment no talks are going on.

    Assembly Elections
    Mr. Parryasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the outcome of the recent elections to the Assembly in the Province.
    Mr. Prior: The people of Northern Ireland have elected those whom they wish to represent them and the Assembly has now met. For the first time for eight years Northern Ireland has a locally elected Assembly which can get to grips with the Province's problems, not least in the economic sphere.
    Mr. Parry: Does the Secretary of State agree that the non-participation by the SDLP and other minority parties means that the Northern Ireland Assembly is now a dead duck? Will he say what new positive initiatives he has in mind?
    Mr. Prior: Hon. Members do neither their own cause not the cause of Northern Ireland any good by seeking to undermine and forecast events in Northern Ireland long before they are proved. I suggest that what is needed is a bit of patience, understanding and help.
    Mr. McNamara: In an endeavour to help the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, may I ask him to tell the House what initiatives he now has in mind for power-sharing, a parliamentary dimension, and an Anglo-Irish and a North-South dimension to encourage the SDLP to come to the Assembly?
    Mr. Prior: It would be far better to allow things to settle down. I shall report later to the House.

    Unemployment Statistics
    Mr. Skinnerasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many people are currently unemployed in Northern Ireland; and what percentage of those have been without work for more than one year.
    Mr. Adam Butler: At 11 October 1982, it was estimated that there were 113,700 unemployed claimants in Northern Ireland, of whom 43 per cent. had been continuously claiming unemployment benefit for more than one year.
    Mr. Skinner: Will the Minister's Department use the same fiddling techniques that have been adopted by the Secretary of State for unemployment for the figures for Great Britain as a whole and try to get the figures down by meddling with the books? Will the Minister bear in mind that if it is right and proper for this Government to allocate large sums of money to the Falkland Islands, a colony, it might be right and proper to allocate the same sort of money on a pro rata basis to another colony, Northern Ireland?
    Mr. Butler: No, Sir. The House knows very well that Northern Ireland is not a colony. Equally, those who take any interest in Northern Ireland affairs know that it is an area of the United Kingdom that receives the highest per capita subvention from the Exchequer.

  PRIME MINISTER

    Engagements
    Mr. Cunliffeasked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 25 November.
    The Prime Minister (Mrs. Margaret Thatcher): This morning I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House I shall be having further meetings later today.
    Mr. Cunliffe: Is the right hon. Lady aware that the mean and niggardly intention of her Government to claw back £90 million from pensioners in 1983 is meeting with widespread criticism and resentment among the British people, including the working population, to whom she referred in a reply to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition last week? Is she further aware that it has been made clear that people will accept the additional financial burden? In view of that, does not the right hon. Lady think that she would be wise and prudent to abandon the whole despicable measure?
    The Prime Minister: There is little that I can add to what I said before. The 11 per cent. in pension and benefits increase that takes place this year adds £375 million in respect of pensions over and above what would have been necesary to keep them in line with inflation. If one takes the figure of 11 per cent. for all the benefits this year, it has added about £700 million to the bill. This is an addition, not a clawback. For next year, decisions will be taken at the time of the Budget. As the hon. Gentleman knows, in a full year there is a contingency amount of about £180 millon. How that amount is disbursed will not be decided until the Budget next year.
    Mr. David Steel: Does the Prime Minister recall the manifesto commitment
    "We shall cut income tax at all levels"!
    Is she aware from the figures that were announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer yesterday that that pledge has been redeemed only for households where the weekly income exceeds £587? When will the right hon. Lady extend that to all other levels, at which most people exist, particularly the poorer people?
    The Prime Minister: As the right hon. Gentleman knows, my right hon. and learned Friend substantially reduced the standard rate of income tax. I look forward to hearing from the right hon. Gentleman precisely what cuts he proposes to enable us to cut income tax further.
    Sir Anthony Kershaw: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that this year we shall export 31 per cent. of our products and that half of that will be to the European Community? Would it not be absolute folly to withdraw from the European Community, thus making it even more difficult to increase pensions as we have done this year?
    The Prime Minister: I confirm that we export about 31 per cent. of our GDP. We are an exporting nation. About 43 per cent. of our exports go to the European Community. Because of our membership we attract a large amount of inward investment and a large number of jobs. Any suggestion that we withdraw from the European Community would dislocate our trade and cause dismay and concern to industry and to those whose job it is to create wealth and jobs.
    Mr. Alfred Morris: Will the Prime Minister take time today to ask the South Atlantic fund when it will make direct payments to Service men who were disabled, in many cases severely, in the South Atlantic conflict? Moreover, is it not despicable that the Ministry of Defence

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    should have been clawing back the London weighting allowance from severely disabled ex-Service men during periods of hospitalisation?
    The Prime Minister: I have already been in touch with the South Atlantic fund to ask what is happening about those who are disabled. As the right hon. Gentleman will be aware, the fund has made about £1·9 million immediately available to those who are disabled. It has paid out temporary sums varying from £2,000 to £20,000 to some of the disabled until the final assessment can be made. I am already in touch with the fund about whether further capital sums should be paid out. It assures me, as I believe it has assured everyone, that every need of those disabled in the Falkland campaign will be fully met.
    Sir William Clark: Will my right hon. Friend have time today to look at public expenditure? Does she agree that if public expenditure were increased this year by £5,000 million, rising in year five to £18,000 million, that would lead not only to massive inflation, but to massive rates of interest, the collapse of sterling and a return to being under the control of the IMF?
    The Prime Minister: I agree with my hon. Friend. It would do just that, but that is what one would expect from the Labour Party.
    Mr. Geoffrey Robinsonasked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 25 November.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Robinson: Is the Prime Minister aware that British Leyland has a purchasing policy of going abroad as much as possible—although it was saved by the intervention of her Government and the previous Labour Government—and is now putting in grave, if not mortal, danger the motor components and machine tool industries that supply British Leyland? In the light of the miraculous effect that we saw after the group of eight descended on No. 10, will she call on the 10 major suppliers of machine tools and components to British Leyland and agree a programme with them whereby British Leyland will buy British, and if Government support is necessary, will she commit herself to that?
    The Prime Minister: British Leyland will also have to consider the price at which it can sell its products. I hope that people will buy British, but I do not say that to protect any kind of inefficiency. If we are to buy British, we have a right to expect that British components will be fully up to the price competitiveness and design of those from overseas.
    Mr. John Browne: Despite the problems that are facing various of the international financial centres, will my right hon. Friend please assure the House that under no circumstances whatever will Her Majesty's Government tolerate an extra-territoral freeze on financial assets in the British branches of foreign banks, as took place in the Iranian asset freeze?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is talking about attempts to exercise extra-territorial jurisdiction on this country by overseas Governments. We shall continue to resist attempts by overseas Governments to apply their jurisdiction to the United Kingdom.
    Mr. George Cunningham: Has the Prime Minister read the text of the answers given to me by Treasury Ministers in the past three days about tax burdens? Does she agree that, as a matter of fact, a reduction in the basic rate of tax of 9½p in the pound would be required to get us back down to the tax burdens that she started with in 1979?
    The Prime Minister: If that is the reply given by the Treasury, it is obviously correct. I should also like to know from the hon. Gentleman, bearing in mind that expenditure has to be covered by tax or by borrowings at a reasonable interest rate, precisely what measures to cut public expenditure he will support to get income tax down to the level that he desires.
    Mr. Brinton: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Labour-controlled GLC has spent over £500,000 on its political magazine The Londoner, over £300,000 on political campaigns and £220,000 on minority groups such as the English Collective of Prostitutes, Lesbian Line, and the Teenage Gay Rights Group? Does my right hon. Friend agree that this is a waste of money, particularly when it is combined with roaring rates that are driving industry, jobs and people out of London?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is correct. It is a disgraceful waste of money and a disgraceful imposition of increases on the tax burden, especially for small businesses.
    Mr. Raceasked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 25 November.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Race: During the course of the day, will the right hon. Lady take the advice of a former Conservative Prime Minister, Mr. Harold Macmillan, who said in the debate on the fair wages resolution in the House of Commons that the resolution was: The great protector of the standard of life of the mass of the working classes. Will the right hon. Lady tell the House why she is seeking to abolish this piece of legislation and why she thinks she knows better than Mr. Harold Macmillan?
    The Prime Minister: There is something even more fundamental than that. The protector of the standard of life is the capacity to produce goods at a competitive price and of a design that will sell. There is no other protector for our country as a whole.
    Mr. John Townend: Will my right hon. Friend take time today to turn her attention to the deteriorating situation in Zimbabwe? Is she aware that public support for the large-scale financial support that we give Zimbabwe could rapidly disappear if that country were to go along the road to a one-party dictatorship and cease to respect basic human rights?
    The Prime Minister: We are especially concerned about some of the reports of the absence of human rights for some of those in the air force who have been detained, and we are concerned about reports of torture of those people. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made strenuous representations to Mr. Mugabe when he was in Zimbabwe. We are always concerned about failure to observe or uphold human rights, especially as we made provision for this in the constitution that we gave to Zimbabwe.
    Mr. Foot: Although it seems evident that the right hon. Lady is determined not to answer any questions, particularly if they touch upon her election promises, may I ask her whether she has now had time to consider the deplorable answer that she gave me on Tuesday about the deployment of the MX missiles by President Reagan and the Government of the United States? It is being said on the other side of the Atlantic that Congress should ask again and again whether the United States needs a weapon that buys so little time and ignites so many risks. That is the view expressed by the New York Times. Is she prepared to let this new impetus be given to the arms race without the British Government having anything to say on the matter?
    The Prime Minister: The MX missile was sanctioned by the Carter Administration. The proposed deployment of 100 MX missiles is only half of what the Carter Administration envisaged. With regard to the relative numbers of inter-continental ballistic missiles, the United States has 1,052 and the Soviet Union 1,398. If we take total strategic systems, including submarine-launched ballistic missiles, the United States has 1,958 and the Soviet Union, 2,704. I wish that the right hon. Gentleman was as concerned for our defence as —[Interruption.]
    Mr. Foot: I am extremely concerned, as I imagine every sane man and woman in this country is to stop the nuclear arms race, which is the biggest threat to the world. So far the right hon. Lady has shown not the slightest interest in such matters. When the United States Government take a step that could give a great impetus to that race the right hon. Lady comes to the House and says nothing about it. Is it not a fact that President Carter's proposals about these missiles were very different from those that President Reagan has now authorised? Is it not the fact also that many spokesmen for President Carter and his party in the United States have condemned President Reagan's proposal? Is it not the case that, as I have said, the New York Times agrees—[Interruption.] I know that the Conservative Party has never shown much interest in this matter, but the Labour Party will try to stop the arms race. Has the right hon. Lady had any discussions with the United States Government on this most important new weapon that is being introduced into the arms race?
    The Prime Minister: We have not had discussions recently. We stand by multilateral disarmament as the way to reduce nuclear weapons, unlike the right hon. Gentleman, who has been naive enough to support unilateral disarmament. I remind the right hon. Gentleman that it is President Reagan who has put forward proposals for multilateral disarmament, both for nuclear and conventional weapons. We are awaiting a response from the Soviet Union. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will turn his criticisms to the Soviet Union instead of the United States.
    Mr. Foot: I am quite prepared to direct criticisms on these matters at either the United States Government or the Soviet Government. We want to discover whether the British Government have any policy on these matters. The right hon. Lady's answers show that she is prepared to let
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    this new breed of weapon be established without any voice from Britain whatever. When will she do her duty on these issues?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman knows that we fully support multilateral disarmament. We totally criticise the Soviet Union's deployment of SS20s on a colossal scale. I have never heard the right hon. Gentleman criticise that. [Interruption.] We totally criticise the Soviet Union's possession of a stockpile—[Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Order. The Prime Minister must be allowed to continue. I have said before that disagreement is no reason for shouting down, especially in this place.
    The Prime Minister: We totally criticise the Soviet Union's possession of a stockpile of chemical weapons to which Britain has no reply. Our policy is to have a balanced reduction of armaments on a multilateral basis, which must be verifiable. That is the only sure way to peace and security. The right hon. Gentleman's policy would put peace at risk.
    Mr. Foot: I must correct the right hon. Lady because she obviously has not studied the matter. I and my hon. Friends have frequently criticised the establishment of the SS20s by the Soviet Government. She should withdraw her remark. However, I am more concerned to pursue the other matter. When will the right hon. Lady say anything on these matters that happens to be slightly different from saying "Ditto" to President Reagan?
    The Prime Minister: I am delighted to hear that the right hon. Gentleman criticises the SS20s. Therefore, I hope that he will criticise the Soviet Union for putting them in place and direct his attention to that. I have now heard him criticise them for the first time.
    I hope, too, that the right hon. Gentleman will agree that we should have every bit as much strategic nuclear weaponry at our disposal as the Soviet Union, every bit as much intermediate nuclear weaponry at our disposal as the Soviet Union, and that we must negotiate to try to reduce conventional weapons. Our policy is clear and sound—multilateral disarmament on a balanced and verifiable basis. I hope that he will accept and agree with that. It would be a great advance.
    Mr. Molyneaux: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In view of the heated exchanges and scenes of the past five minutes, would you consider leading a sizeable deputation of right hon. and hon. Members from this House to visit the Northern Ireland Assembly to demonstrate how reasonable that Assembly can be?
    Mr. Speaker: Order. I do not require help on that one. I know the Speaker of that honourable House and I therefore understand why its Members are in such good order.
    Mr. McNamara: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. Will you also recall that because of policies adopted by the Government the loyal Opposition in that honourable House do not feel that they can take their place.
    Mr. Speaker: Order. That would make for a peaceful life.

Business of the House
3.35 pm
Mr. Michael Foot: Will the Leader of the House state the business for next week?
The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. John Biffen): Yes, Sir. The business for next week will be as follows:
MONDAY 29 NovEMBER—Second Reading of the Telecommunications Bill.
TUESDAY 30 NOVEMBER—Second Reading of the Police and Criminal Evidence Bill.
Second Reading of the National Insurance Surcharge Bill.
WEDNESDAY I DECEMBER—There will be a debate on steel, on a motion for the Adjournment of the House.
The Chairman of Ways and Means has named opposed private business for consideration at seven o'clock.
THURSDAY 2 DECEMBER—A debate On the expansion of cable systems.
The report of the inquiry into cable expansion and broadcasting policy, Cmnd. 8679, will be relevant.
FRIDAY 3 DECEMBER—Privates Members' motions.
MONDAY 6 DECEMBER—Opposition day (2nd Allotted Day). Subject for debate to be announced.
Mr. Foot: May I thank the right hon. Gentleman for the two responses that he has made to my requests over recent weeks—first, for the provision of a day to discuss cable systems. I am glad about that. The Government are wise to let us have a full debate on that before they make any decisions about how they will proceed. Secondly, I am glad to have the offer of Government time for a debate on steel. However, can the right hon. Gentleman guarantee that the Minister will make a full policy statement at that time? We would obviously wish to have that. Further, may we have the debate on fisheries that we have asked for on several occasions?
There are two other matters that I wish to put to the right hon. Gentleman. There has been a written answer about the proposed privatisation of Companies House. It seemed a strange way to make a statement. That the Government should consider privatising Companies House seems to me to be an extraordinary decision. For them to half-announce it in a written answer is equally extraordinary. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will say something on that.
Will the Prime Minister make a statement about the rearrangements of her staff at No. 10 Downing Street? I know that the right hon. Gentleman may not have heard the latest announcement on what appointments are being made there, but it seems to us that there should be a statement from the right hon. Lady to the House about that. I presume that she will be making a statement when she has completed those changes.
Mr. Biffen: As to the right hon. Gentleman's last point, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister will have heard what the Leader of the Opposition has said. She has said that she will inform the House in the usual manner, which in this instance will be in answer to a parliamentary question.
The right hon. Gentleman will appreciate that the matter of Companies House will be before the House on the Adjournment on Thursday 2 December. However, I take note of what he has said and will inform the relevant Minister.
1012
I stand by the commitment that has been given on a debate on fisheries, although the question of timing is one that we shall further consider.
As the right hon. Gentleman has said, the debate on steel will take place very much as a result of the many requests for it that have been made in the House, especially from the Opposition Front Bench. The timing of the debate will not fall in such a way that will enable my right hon. friend to make a definitive policy statement, because discussions are continuing. In particular, the Government are still considering options with the chairman of the British Steel Corporation. No decisions have been taken. When they have been taken, there will be a Government statement and an opportunity for a debate. Meanwhile, the House will have an opportunity next Wednesday to express its views on this important subject before decisions are taken.
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his remarks about the cable debate.
Mr. Foot: May I raise one or two additional matters in the light of the right hon. Gentleman's remarks? I appreciate that the steel debate will take place in Government time. If the right hon. Gentleman gives a guarantee that we shall have a further debate on the issue at a later stage, I think that we shall be able to accept his response on that basis.
It is absurd to imagine that an Adjournment debate can deal with the privatisation of Companies House. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will examine that proposal afresh.
I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman has been able to meet our proposals by announcing debates on two issues. I hope that he will be able to meet the request that we have made on a number of occasions for a debate on security at a fairly early stage. I think that he suggested last week that he fully agreed that that should happen.
Mr. Biffen: The request for a security debate should be pursued through the usual channels. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will find helpful the comments that I have made about that. I note what he has said about Companies House. I have been reasonably forthcoming on the issue, but I shall discuss it with the relevant Minister.
Mrs. Jill Knight: Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that before Britain signs the draft convention on the law of the sea there will be a debate in the Chamber? Is he aware that considerable anxiety is being expressed at the suggestion that recommendations will be put before the Cabinet and that the matter will be decided without a debate?
Mr. Biffen: I shall draw to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs the anxieties of my hon. Friend. I know that it will be his concern that the House should be informed. I cannot at this stage guarantee a debate.
Mr. Lewis Carter-Jones: Will the right hon. Gentleman give a guarantee that he will find a brief moment to allow us to debate the rehabilitation of Service men who have been severely handicapped both in Northern Ireland and on the Falkland Islands?
Mr. Biffen: The hon. Gentleman raises an important matter. It is one that can be pursued by hon. Members. I cannot guarantee any time for a debate, and certainly not next week.
Mr. Robert Maclennan: As there is some sign that the Government are reaching their conclusions on the future of the fast reactor programme, will the right hon. Gentleman say whether a statement will be made in the House, following which questions can be put to the responsible Minister, if a conclusion is reached?
Mr. Biffen: That will be a most important decision that will merit a statement in the House.
Mr. Kenneth Lewis: Does my right hon. Friend realise that he is in danger of creating a Guinness Book record for the number of Second Readings that are being introduced at this time of the year? Will he tell me the reason for the rush?
Mr. Biffen: It is just possible that later in the year my hon. Friend will look back with great gratitude to the way in which Government business is being handled.
Mr. William Hamilton: Will the right hon. Gentleman arrange for a statement to be made next week by the Solicitor-General for Scotland on police intervention in industrial disputes? Is he aware that there will be a real row in Fife early next week as a direct result of this stupid policy?
Mr. Biffen: I understand that the matter is shortly to come before the Sheriff court and is now sub judice.
Mr. Julian Amery: May I reinforce what my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Mrs. Knight) has said about the importance of having a debate on the law of the sea before the Government take a final decision? It would be intolerable for a great maritime nation like the United Kingdom to put its signature to such an important document without having had the opportunity of hearing the views of both sides of the House.
Mr. Biffen: I appreciate that. I do not want to diminish the profound significance of the subject. However. it k the sort of issue which is normally discussed through the usual channels. I hope that my right hon. Friend will allow me to rest on that score.
Mr. Dennis Skinner: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider having a statement made on the arrangements which have been made and which are being discussed between the Bank of England and the clearing banks with Argentina for rescheduling debts and for establishing a sort of cooling-off period for the repayment of certain instalments? This is especially important because the Bank of England appears to be prepared to use the lifeboat scheme at a time when the French are selling Exocet missiles. It is possible that the arrangements that are being made to bail out the Argentine economy by the Bank of England and the clearers will result in the Argentine using the money to buy missiles from the French.
Mr. Biffen: I shall draw the attention of my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer to what the hon. Gentleman has said.
Mr. R. A. McCrindle: May we be assured that there will be a statement next week by the Minister for Trade on the GATT discussions at Geneva or, better still, a debate before Christmas on free trade versus import controls, which is an issue that appears to divide the House?
Mr. Biffen: I am sure that my hon. and learned Friend the Minister for Trade will be anxious to make a statement to the House the moment that it becomes appropriate to do so in the light of the progress of the GATT talks. I am sure that my hon. Friend will have noticed that there is the prospect of a debate on trade protection when private Member's motions are taken on Friday next.
Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours: Does the right hon. Gentleman recall that last week I asked him to arrange for a statement to be made on Companies House? Is he aware that the statement was not made and that yesterday, in a written reply, the Government announced their intention possibly to proceed with the privatisation of Companies House? Will he arrange for a Minister to make a statement next week prior to my Adjournment debate on Thursday of next week?
Mr. Biffen: I note what the hon. Gentleman says. I think that he will appreciate that there were exchanges between the Leader of the Opposition and myself on the very topic that he has raised. I cannot go beyond that.
Mr. Nicholas Winterton: Does my right hon. Friend accept that the House of Commons is a debating chamber and not only a legislative chamber? I do not wish to take up the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Stamford (Mr. Lewis), but will my right hon. Friend be more forthcoming in responding to the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. McCrindle) about a general debate on trade? It is an issue of extreme importance to industry and employment. To say that it can be discussed when the House considers a private Member's motion on a Friday or Monday is not good enough. Will he give an undertaking that a general debate on trade, which affects the life of every man, woman and child in Britain, will take place in Government time in a mid-week debate?
Mr. Biffen: I cannot give an undertaking that there will be a debate in Government time on trade next week. However, I am fully aware of the importance of the topic. My hon. Friend is long enough in the tooth to know perfectly well that a good debating speech can be made as effectively in private Members' time as in Government time.
Mr. Loan Evans: It has been announced that the Prime Minister is to have senior advisers on foreign affairs and defence as well as an adviser on economic matters. There are implications in the enlarging of the Prime Minister's office. Are we to have a statement about these developments?
Mr. Biffen: No. I think that they are healthy developments, and I am sure that the House and the nation will come to appreciate them.
Mr. John Watson: Has my right hon. Friend had a chance to read the recent report of the Select Committee on Social Services on the age of retirement? Can parliamentary time be made available for a full debate on the topic before too long?
Mr. Biffen: I think that the House and the public would like some time to digest the very important recommendations that are made in the report, which touch on the conduct of economic policy. It is important for Select Committee reports to be interwoven into our debates as a matter of course.
Mr. James Callaghan: Further to the question of my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition about the privatisation of Companies House, Cardiff, will the Leader of the House confirm that such legislation will await the result of the next general election? If he will say that, it will greatly assist my candidature.
Mr. Biffen: I realise that the right hon. Gentleman's candidature is in need of assistance. I will generously consider anything that I might do to that end.
Mr. Michael Latham: To help the Leader of the Opposition, will my right hon. Friend consider publishing the figures regarding the staff of the Prime Minister's office, the Central Policy Review Staff and the Cabinet Office because I believe he will find that they have fallen considerably since the Government came to office?
Mr. Biffen: There is clearly a great spirit of charity and help in the Chamber at this moment. I would not wish to disturb it and so I will consider the matter.
Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse: Since in the lifetime of this Parliament the only debate on the plight of the disabled in Britain has taken place in Opposition time, when may we have a full day's debate in Government time to discuss the plight of these unfortunate people?
Mr. Biffen: As the hon. Gentleman said, the House has had a valuable debate in Opposition time. I cannot offer time for such a debate either next week or immediately thereafter.
Mr. Ivan Lawrence: Has my right hon. Friend had time to reflect upon and perhaps reconsider the rather unhelpful answer he gave me last week when I called attention to the inability of the European Parliament, of this Parliament and even of the Government to veto edicts by the Commission which were delegated European legislation and the effect that that would have on established procedures and traditions in this country? Is not this matter rather more important than one insignificant Back Bencher's campaign and should it not attract the attention of the whole House of Commons?
Mr. Biffen: I would never dream of designating my hon. and learned Friend as an insignificant Back Bencher. If I heard his words correctly, what he is proposing would amount to a fundamental amendment to the European Communities Act 1971—
Mr. Lawrence indicated assent.
Mr. Biffen: I notice that my hon. and learned Friend agrees with me. It is not a matter that I can resolve by question and answer on a Thursday afternoon.
Mr. Robert Kilroy-Silk: As the House has consistently shown its repugnance of judicial murder, will the Leader of the House ask his right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary to make strong and powerful representations to the South African Government to commute the death sentences recently passed on three individuals?
Mr. Biffen: I will, of course, refer the hon. Gentleman's request to my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary. I know from the voices echoed in the Chamber that he carries many hon. Members with him.
Mr. Anthony Beaumont-Dark: Is my right hon. Friend aware that it is rumoured that heads of nationalised industries are soon to receive a 15 or 20 per cent. pay increase in contrast to the 3 to 5 per cent. increases that we are rightly inviting other people to accept? May we have a statement soon so that the important matter of the advisability of having one law for one group of people and one law for another can be debated in the House?
Mr. Biffen: If we had a debate every time we heard a rumour, we would be absolutely gorged with words. I shall certainly draw the attention of my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer to my hon. Friend's anxieties.
Several Hon. Members rose—
Mr. Speaker: Order. I propose to call those hon. Members who have been standing. If hon. Members are brief, I shall be able to call them all.
Mr. Doug Hoyle: Will the right hon. Gentleman arrange for a statement to be made on the Government's biotechnology programme? It is an extremely important subject and at stake is a £40 billion world-wide market. The House should have an opportunity to discuss the Government's totally inadequate response to this glorious opportunity.
Mr. Biffen: I cannot accept the hon. Gentleman's allegations about the Government's inadequacy, but I realise that he has raised a matter about which concern is felt throughout the Chamber. I will certainly draw the attention of the relevant Ministers to his point.
Mr. David Young: May we expect a debate before Christmas on the economic future of the Falkland Islands? If not, when may we expect such a debate? will the right hon. Gentleman give a categoric assurance on behalf of the Government that no economic commitments will be entered into by Her Majesty's Government on the Falklands' economic future until such a debate has taken place?
Mr. Biffen: I recognise that there is great interest in having such a debate, but as to the timing of it I cannot give the hon. Gentleman a specific date.
Mr. Stan Thorne: In view of the increasing anxiety in the British aerospace industry, will the Leader of the House arrange an early debate so that some of the issues can be clarified?
Mr. Biffen: It will not be possible in Government time. At the moment, we are fairly heavily committed with Government business, but I do not deny the importance of the topic. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will find ways of making his voice heard on it.
Mr. Tam Dalyell: I wish to hark back to the crucial question asked by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition about the advisers in Downing Street. Is the Leader of the House aware that at 9.55 pm last night I received from the Prime Minister an answer to a written question announcing that Sir Anthony Parsons had been appointed as from 1 April 1983? It is all very well for the right hon. Gentleman to say to my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdare (Mr. Evans) that this is a healthy development, but does he realise that this will set up in Britain a third Foreign Office? First, there is the official Foreign Office, secondly we have Robin O'Neill—
Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must not make his argument now. He is asking a business question about next week. He cannot argue the case now.
Mr. Dalyell: My business question is that the second Foreign Office of Robin O'Neill and Brigadier Gurdon—
Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must ask a question about business next week, or I shall have to move on.
Mr. Dalyell: Will there be a statement on the implications of having not only advisers but staff at sub-ambassadorial level set up at Downing Street? That is something new for the British constitution.
Mr. Biffen: I cannot help the hon. Gentleman in the sense that I can go no further than the answer I gave to his right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition.
Mr. Bob Cryer: In view of the exchanges earlier this afternoon, may we have an early debate on nuclear disarmament, particularly in view of the resolution passed recently by the United Nations on a nuclear freeze? We could then have an opportunity to deploy the arguments which demonstrate clearly that the Americans have a two to one advantage over the Soviet Union in strategic warheads and theatre and tactical nuclear weapons, and we would not have to rely on outbursts of fake indignation and fake statistics from the Prime Minister.
Mr. Biffen: The hon. Gentleman is correct in saying that the issue of nuclear policy will be of lively concern in the Chamber and to the nation at large as we approach a general election. In that sense, I hope he does not believe that I alone can supply time to debate these matters.
Mr. Robert C. Brown: Has the Leader of the House seen press reports this morning which refer to a veto on seal skin imports into Britain which would appear to show that the Government are more interested in Canadian public opinion than in British public opinion? May we expect a statement next week from the Minister for Trade about a ban on the import of skins from seals which have been brutally murdered in Canada by hunters?
Mr. Biffen: I will certainly represent that interest to my hon. and learned Friend the Minister for Trade.
Mr. Harry Ewing: Further to the question of my hon. Friend the Member for Fife, Central (Mr. Hamilton) about the proceedings in Kirkcaldy sheriff court on Tuesday of next week, is the Leader of the House aware that he is technically correct in that the matter is sub judice until Tuesday, but could he give an assurance that the Solicitor-General for Scotland will make a statement about the circumstances in which the 12 laboratory technicians working at the Victoria hospital in Kirkcaldy were arrested? Is he aware that this was purely an industrial dispute and that the circumstances in which the 12 laboratory technicians were arrested were very mysterious? Going beyond the court hearing on Tuesday, which I accept is sub judice, will the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that the Solicitor-General for Scotland will make a statement to the House?
Mr. Biffen: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman has confirmed that the matter is sub judice. I am sure that he will appreciate that I as an Englishman and a layman would be diffident about going beyond that. I will refer the hon. Gentleman's points to the Solicitor-General for Scotland.

Arms Depots
3.59 pm
Mr. Frank Haynes: I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 9, for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely,
"the security concerning arms depots in Britain".
I am sure that you, Mr. Speaker and other hon. Members are concerned about the falling down of security procedures in Britain. On a number of occasions recently Ministers have been questioned in the House about all aspects of security. In the past few hours, in the county of Nottinghamshire, people have managed to walk into an arms depot, help themselves and walk out again without being seen. These depots contain explosives, hand grenades and the like, but it seems that the security system is not what is should be, particularly in Nottinghamshire.
I suggest that you, Mr. Speaker, and the House would welcome a debate to try to deal with the problem and to improve the necessary security procedures. I thank you for giving me the opportunity to express that view.
Mr. Speaker: The hon. Gentleman gave me notice before 12 o'clock midday that he would seek to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 9, for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that he thinks should have urgent consideration, namely,
"the security concerning arms depots in Britain".
The House will have listened with concern to what the hon. Gentleman said. It will also be aware that it has instructed me to take into account the several factors set out in the order but to give no reasons for my decision.
I listened carefully to the hon. Gentleman, but I must rule that his submission does not fall within the provisions of the Standing Order and, therefore, I cannot submit his application to the House.

BALLOT FOR NOTICES OF MOTIONS FOR MONDAY 13 DECEMBER
Members successful in the ballot were:

Mr. Doug Hoyle

Sir William van Straubenzee

Mr. Charles R. Morris

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Ordered,
That, at this day's sitting, notwithstanding the provisions of Standing Order No. 4 (Prayers against statutory instruments, &c. (negative procedure), Mr. Speaker shall at Ten o'clock put any Questions necessary to dispose of the Motion relating to Road Trafic and shall then put forthwith the Questions necessary to dispose of the Motion relating to Lorries, People and the Environment and of any Amendments thereto which have been selected by him.—[Mr. Lang.]

SCOTTISH AFFAIRS
Ordered,
That the matter of the Hunter Report, being a matter relating exclusively to Scotland, be referred to the Scottish Grand Committee for their consideration.—[Mr. Lang.]

Heavy Lorries
Mr. Speaker: I have selected the amendment in the name of the Leader of the Opposition to the Government motion. I understand that the prayer is to be moved formally. We shall then discuss both issues in the general debate, and the voting at 10 o'clock will be according to what has been before the House.
Mr. Roger Moate: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May we have clarification of the voting procedure at 10 o'clock? As there is a prayer and a motion, will the vote be taken first on the prayer? If the prayer is carried, will there then be a vote on the amendment and on the motion?
Mr. Speaker: Order. There is no need for nodding heads. The question was addressed to me. The answer to the first question is "Yes". On the second question, there will be a vote on the amendment to the motion.
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Motor Vehicles (Construction and Use) (Amendment) (No. 7) Regulations 1982 (S.I., 1982, No. 1576), dated 4th November 1982, a copy of which was laid before this House on 12th November, be annulled.—[Mr. Booth.]
4.4 pm
The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr. David Howell): I urge the House to support the Government motion and to reject the Opposition amendment and the prayer.
The Government's basic approach to the problem of heavy goods traffic on our roads starts from the proposition that over many years not nearly enough has been done to control lorries or to ease the conflict between industrial needs and a decent environment. I recognise that nearly 10 years ago legislation known as the "Dykes Act" was put on the statute book as a result of the assiduous efforts of my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow, East (Mr. Dykes). That Act affected lorry routeing, but the powers were not used nearly vigorously enough. We believe that those powers are only a part of the far more comprehensive approach that must be adopted to deal with the whole problem.
There should, therefore, be no mystery or wonderment in any of our minds at the way in which concern has grown immensely over the years, and at the resentment caused by lorry traffic on our roads in our towns and villages. There is no mystery about that. We are dealing with the quality of people's lives in the places where it affects them most—in their homes, where they seek peace and quiet, and in the communities in which they live. There cannot be a constituency in the land that is not affected by the damage, danger and disturbance caused by heavy goods traffic.
The problem did not begin with the Armitage report on "Lorries, People and the Environment". It goes back many years. In the past two decades, there has been a vast increase in the amount of container traffic moving towards the ports, especially those on the east coast and the south coast. It has increased in a way that could scarcely have been imagined before the container revolution. On some of the roads worst affected there have been very grave difficulties. If my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State catches your eye, Mr. Speaker, she will wish to say something about some of those roads at the end of the debate.

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I think that all hon. Members recognise that the pattern of road freight that has now developed cannot be radically reversed. The mass of freight journeys will continue to be by road. More than 80 per cent. of all goods traffic now goes by road, and three-fifths of that is carried on very short journeys of under 30 miles. Of course we should like to see more freight carried by the railways and I shall refer to the potential for that, but, for the vast majority of journeys, there is clearly no alternative but to cope with the problem of heavy road freight traffic.
Mr. Sydney Chapman: My right hon. Friend has said that 80 per cent. of all freight traffic goes by road. Will he confirm that the proportion that goes by rail must still go part of the way by road from the railway siding to the point of distribution?
Mr. Howell: Clearly, many shipments require first a road transfer to rail, then a rail journey and then another transfer to road. There is, however, some direct movement from warehouse to quayside. That is very welcome and I shall have more to say about it later.
My point is that the problem of heavy freight road traffic is already with us. The problem lies in the unacceptable impact of existing vehicles on our roads and in our towns and villages. It has been getting worse and the Government take the view that we should now deal with all aspects of it, including existing vehicles, to bring about the better conditions that we must achieve.
The Government's approach was foreshadowed in the White Paper a year ago, which in turn drew on the Armitage report. The proposals that we now put forward have been greatly developed and strengthened—rightly, I believe. It is our view not only that we should implement the bulk of the Armitage report but that we should go further. Comprehensive action is required in three main areas—in improving lorries, controlling where they go and better enforcement of stricter standards of control of heavy vehicles.
The Government have said that they will not permit an increase in the size of lorry trailers. On the contrary, we propose strict new controls on height and length. No lorry larger than those already in use will be permitted on our roads. The regulations against which the Opposition are praying bring in those strict controls. The Government have insisted on safer vehicles with sideguards, and rear under-run guards. That is an important and overdue development. When I talk about existing vehicles I mean that almost all new vehicles must carry sideguards down to the 3·5-tonner. The Government have also said that they will enforce mud spray protection. Mud spraying is most unpleasant when one is trying to overtake a vehicle on a motorway or when it passes through a narrow street. We hope that it will be mandatory by 1984.
As to maximum loads and weights, we have rejected the four-axle 34-tonner because we believe that it would do more damage to our roads. We have rejected the increased maximum weights for drawbar trailer combination lorries that cause special concern. We have also rejected the 40 tonne maximum weight, but we have proposed a maximum of 38 tonnes only if vehicles have an extra axle to spread the load. I know that that is not the common limit proposed by the European Community, but we have chosen 38 tonnes and we intend to stick to it.
Mr. Anthony Nelson: When my right hon. Friend says that the Government intend to stick to that
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maximum weight, is he giving us a firm assurance that if the measure goes through the Government will not come back later to ask for higher limits? Can he also assure us that if a proposal is made at the European Commission for a standard 40-tonne limit we shall use our veto?
Mr. Howell: I am giving a firm assurance that a full load of 38 tonnes is the maximum that the Government can accept. We do not accept the higher limits proposed by either the European Commission or any other European body. We also reject the higher limits on axle weights, because they would not be acceptable on our roads.
Mr. Alexander W. Lyon: Is that not a similar assurance to that given the last time the weight limit was increased? Did not the Government assure the House on that occasion that lorries with larger capacities would mean fewer lorries on our roads? In fact, there has been a great increase in lorries.
Mr. Howell: During the years there has been a reduction in the overall number of lorries. However, in due course, I shall deal with the amount of freight that can be carried in those lorries and consider whether the damage per tonne carried is reduced by our proposals. I believe that it is, and I shall put some figures before the House. My hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Mr. Nelson) was right to establish that that is the Government's firm position.
Our proposals will not mean increased trailer dimensions. However, we must accept that it cannot make sense to allow existing trailer sizes to be three quarters loaded rather than fully loaded. That is bound to mean, for a given amount of freight, more journeys and more damage. It will mean more part loads and more lorries being sent back to the quayside to pick up extra loads. That is how business is carried on and it is bound to continue unless we allow a larger load to be carried in existing trailers.
Road damage is a crucial factor in the proposed changes. The existing trailer loaded to a maximum of 38 tonnes with an extra axle will do no more damage than the 32½-tonner. That does not mean that I condone the serious damage caused by the 32½-tonners. I shall say something about it later. Overall, for each tonne of freight carried, the new five-axle requirement must mean much less damage, because 38 tonnes can be carried with the same average axle weight as the 32½-tonne vehicle.
Mr.RoyHughes: Does the Secretary of State recognise that there is considerable anxiety in South Wales about the Severn bridge? Does he have any new information for the House about this vital matter that affects our economy? There have been suggestions that tolls should be scrapped because they reduce the free flow of traffic, and any hold-ups on the bridge could cause further damage to its structure. What is the Secretary of State doing to expedite the repairs to the bridge? Does he have any information about a second crossing?
Mr. Howell: I have no new detailed information on the Severn bridge, but the new proposals will make no difference to it. The repairs and any further changes, which I shall discuss with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales, will cope amply with either five-axle 38-tonne vehicles or existing vehicles. I hope that that answers the specific question of the hon. Member for Newport (Mr. Hughes).
Mr. Robert Banks: The second axle—the tractor axle—at the front of the vehicle carries a heavier burden and the new limit will increase the weight on that axle by 3 per cent. That in turn would cause 10 per cent. more vibration than on existing lorries.
Mr. Howell: The weight on the drive axle will be increased by 3 per cent., but the weight on the other axles will be reduced. The reason for the increase is to achieve overall balance and stability. However, the overall axle weight is fractionally less than in the 32½-tonne vehicles. As vibration is caused by the overall axle weight, the problem would be no worse and for every tonne of freight carried it would be slightly better.
Mr. Douglas Jay: Will the Secretary of State give way?
Mr. Howell: The problem with bridges is especially serious—
Mr. Jay rose—
Mr. Howell: I have given way many times and I must now continue with my speech. I am sure that the right hon. Member for Battersea, North (Mr. Jay) will have an opportunity to speak later.
The bridge problem is especially serious because of the present lorry traffic. We all recognise that. The problem of bridge damage must, and will, continue to be tackled. The Association of County Councils is rightly worried about that. I believe that it is correct when it says that
"damage to bridges will not be increased by these proposals".
It was talking about the Government's lorry package and the statutory instrument that we are debating.
The Association of County Councils, whose members are the main highway authorities of the country responsible for most bridges and roads, and the planning authorities for the entire nation, welcomes, with provisos, the Government's proposals overall and the proposals on lorry weights. We should take that view into account. The right hon. Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth) in a statement the other day said that the ACC opposed the proposals. That is not correct. It welcomes the proposals and recognises that while there is a problem of damage to bridges by lorries, the damage will not be increased by the proposals.
Therefore, all in all, the new vehicles on our roads will be more efficient, do less damage and be better loaded. They will be safer, not just in the equipment that I have described—the sideguards and the rear under-run guards, which are overdue—but in braking capacity. The lorries will be quieter by three decibels next April. There will be a further reduction in 1984. I should like to press on to far quieter lorries as fast as possible. The Government are now contributing £5 million towards research contracts that are necessary to accelerate the introduction of the really quiet lorry.
We have already taken steps to see that heavy lorries pay their full road costs through taxation and that the most damaging vehicles, which are not necessarily the largest, carry the most tax, which is important.
Mr. Jay: If the Secretary of State is satisfied that the increase in lorry weights from 32 tonnes to 38 tonnes, with the five axles, will not do more damage to the roads, why is he opposed to increasing the weight to 40 tonnes or 44 tonnes?
Mr. Howell: Because the standard axle weight, and the overall road damage potential of the 40 tonne lorry, is larger. If the right hon. Gentleman studies the research documents that have been provided in the Armitage report he will see that it is larger. It is right that 38 tonnes should be the maximum average axle weight that we should allow on our roads. Nothing larger should be permitted.
I have described the characteristics of the vehicles that we need to see, which will be better and which in many cases will do less damage than some vehicles on our roads now. I shall now refer to where the lorries go. Much more needs to be done and is being done to separate lorries from people. We require, and are building, many more bypasses. Work on 40 more has started in the past year. Over 180 trunk or local bypasses are under way. The whole bypass programme is now very large. There is no slippage in our programme.
Sir Peter Mills: How can my right hon. Friend expect somebody like me, with a constituency such as Devon, West, with the A30 and all the problems of Sticklepath and Okehampton, to support the Government's measures? The people are suffering. There has been a delay of three years on a bypass. That is just not good enough.
Mr. Howell: I fully share my hon. Friend's view about the problems in the South-West and in his constituency of Devon, West. If adequate preparation had been made four or five years ago, my hon. Friend would now be getting the roads that would provide relief from the present appalling problems. I sympathise with my hon. Friend, but unfortunately I cannot reverse and unscramble the past. We can take steps to see that he and his constituents are better done by in future.
Mr. T. H. H. Skeet: May I ask my right hon. Friend whether he is acquainted with the situation in Bedford, which is a town of 100,000 people, but is bisected by two major roads, the A428 and the A6? The heavy lorries have to cross the pavements to get round the corners. It is an urgent problem. I ask my right hon. Friend earnestly to ensure that before anything is done, Bedford is considered.
Mr. Howell: As I have said, my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State will comment on some of the major difficulties, where traffic has been allowed to build up. My hon. Friend knows of my personal concern about his problem. He can be sure that I have it very much in mind.
The fact is that 220 towns and villages will receive relief from through traffic in the next four to five years. County authorities will be going ahead with 35 local bypasses this year and a further 35 next year. I have recognised that in some areas, particularly with roads leading to ports where there has been a vast growth in container traffic, there are serious problems. I know that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will mention some of the cases that concern hon. Members.
Mr. Dafydd Wigley: Will the Secretary of State give way?
Mr. Howell: I shall refer to lorry routeing because—
Mr. Wigley: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The Secretary of State for Transport is addressing the House, but I believe that he does not have responsibility

1025
for transport in Wales and Scotland. Will there be a statement about figures for Wales and Scotland, or do the figures that he has given apply to those countries as well?
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Paul Dean): Order. I cannot help the hon. Gentleman. This is not a point of order. However, no doubt the Minister heard the hon. Gentleman's comments.
Mr. Howell: I can tell the hon. Gentleman that the regulations that are being debated and the humble Address that has been moved relate to regulations that cover Wales and Scotland as well as England.
Mr. Roger Moate: May I ask my right hon. Friend a general question about the bypass programme? No one doubts my right hon. Friend's determination to go ahead with that programme. He accepts that it is an integral part of the package for heavy lorries. Will he explain the logic of going ahead with heavy lorries now when, under any programme, it must be decades before we complete the bypass programme? Surely, in the interests of people, my right hon. Friend must do the two together. Today's timing is wrong.
Mr. Howell: My hon. Friend may not accept—but I believe it to be so—that the 38 tonne lorry on five axles is no worse for the roads than the 32½ tonne lorry. Because of the freight that it can carry it will lead to less damage on our roads. In addition to all the other things that are necessary, of course bypasses and new safety provisions are necessary. It would be wholly wrong if we were not to press ahead on all the things that can reduce the damage on our roads and increase the quality of the vehicles as fast as possible. I do not understand my hon. Friend's view that those benefits of increased lorry controls and stricter controls on dimensions, length and so on, for the first time, should be held up. That would not benefit anyone suffering from the effects of heavy lorries.
Mr. Bob Cryer: Will the Secretary of State give way?
Mr. Howell: The hon. Gentleman will concede that I have given way a great deal, which is right, because this is a matter of great concern, but I should like to continue with a major part of my speech on lorry routeing. Perhaps later the hon. Gentleman will catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
We have taken a tougher stance than in the past on lorry routeing. The Government believe that it is vital for local authorities to do a thorough job in imposing controls. As I have said, the authorities have powers to do so under so-called Dykes Act. However, we believe that they should be used more vigorously. We are using transport grant to see that they are.
Some counties are doing better than others, but overall there are now 2,300 schemes in England and Wales. I shall publish a record of those schemes as soon as the details are complete. Therefore, we are beginning to see the response that we want in that area. We are also introducing lorry action areas to help badly affected places. There was some doubt about the idea at first but there has been a positive response to them and local authorities have put up 60 schemes this year that the Government will support.
We should also consider moving traffic on to the railways where that makes sense—normally for longer-haul journeys. The Government welcome the transfer of freight to rail. That is one reason why we have increased
1026
the maximum grant rate to 60 per cent. for building railway facilities alongside factories and warehouses. Indeed, today I am announcing two more schemes, one of which alone will eliminate 10,000 lorry journeys a year to east coast ports.
It must also be made clear, however, that to win more freight, the railways must be efficient. They cannot expect to get a larger share of freight by artificial protection. I do not believe that British Rail wishes freight to be won in that way. It must be won in fair competition. The higher maximum grant rate will help but it is the efficiency of the railways that will pull freight back on to the railways. I should like that to happen.
Mr. David Stoddart rose—
Mr. Howell: I should like to deal with the third part of our approach. I have already mentioned vehicles and our intention to improve them so that there will be less damage to roads and stricter controls. I have also dealt with keeping lorries away from people. The third approach is tougher enforcement. It is useless having tougher restrictions unless they can be enforced effectively.
Mr. Hugh Dykes: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Howell: As I have mentioned my hon. Friend I shall give way.
Mr. Dykes: With regard to the second of those elements, does my right hon. Friend concede the vital necessity of increasing the concept of limits on access? Does he agree that although there are about 850 schemes under the legislation of 1967 and 1973, access has scarcely been reduced at all, and that it must be if heavier lorry weights are introduced?
Mr. Howell: Yes. My hon. Friend is entirely right, just as he was right to introduce the Heavy Commercial Vehicles (Controls and Regulations) Act 1973. I concede that more remains to be done with regard to access limitations.
This year, we have doubled spending on weighbridges. We are stepping up enforcement and recruiting more traffic examiners. The numbers have risen. Vehicles can be and are prevented from moving on until the load is reduced to the proper limit and offenders can be and are prosecuted and fined. The maximum fine for a single offence will increase next year from £400 to £1,000. It will increase under the provisions of the Criminal Justice Act 1982.
The Magistrates Association is also considering advice that penalties for vehicle load offences should reflect the large commercial gain to be had from overloading and the damage that that causes to roads. Those are welcome developments. They will do much to prevent the overloading of vehicles which is a serious matter.
The gains to our environment from the changes that I have described are badly needed now. They are also obvious. With fuller loads, British Steel, for example, tells me that it will run 130,000 fewer lorry journeys a year. It needs the benefit of the cut in costs, and the benefit from 130,000 fewer lorry journeys to the environment is obvious. Sainsbury's reckon that four lorries can serve a supermarket if they can be fully loaded with the same sized trailers whereas it now takes six to do that job. BICC says that it could reduce its number of lorries by up to 25 per cent., depending on the size of the package of goods.

1027
Therefore, we have the chance to have better but not bigger lorries that do fewer journeys and bring less damage and disturbance. We should take that chance. I do not claim that it is a cure for an appalling problem that has been allowed to develop for years but it is a start.
Mr. Dudley Smith: My right hon. Friend knows that I am far from happy about the increase but it has been strongly represented to me that the change could help towards a substantial improvement in the economic recovery of the West Midlands—goodness knows, it is badly needed—and in the rest of the country as well. Can my right hon. Friend assure me that that improvement will take place as a result of the proposals?
Mr. Howell: Yes. Industry can unquestionably gain from the proposed changes. That should not be prevented. It is understandable that we hear a great deal from Opposition Members about jobs and employment. I look forward to hearing how the right hon. Member for Barrow-in-Furness will reconcile that attitude with his opposition to the regulations. There is no doubt that the regulations will release immediate new orders throughout the lorry, trailer and components industries. They will open up export markets that are firmly closed at the moment and from which the present rules exclude them.
Truck and trailer manufacturers are at a low ebb and are being forced to impose redundancies. Every one of them wants the changes that we are proposing so that they can create new jobs, win new orders and prevent foreign competition from rolling in over them. It will almost certainly do that otherwise. Moreover, fuller loads will permanently cut transport costs. That is especially important for people in the more distant areas such as the South-West, the North-East and the North-West who have longer freight journeys to their markets. A vote against these measures is bound to be a vote against existing and new jobs.
That is not just the Government's or the employers' view. It is shared by the unions. The Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers vigorously supports the proposals. It has made the gains for a cleaner countryside, the gains for industry and the danger that it will otherwise be rolled over by Japanese competition, and the gains of greater export promise absolutely clear in a widely circulated pamphlet. I should like to know how the Opposition Front Bench can oppose measures when the damage of so doing is obvious, not only to those who argue in favour of them but to employers, operators and those who work in the industry. They have made their views clear to Opposition Back Benchers and I do not understand how the right hon. Member for Barrow-in-Furness can oppose measures when their benefit to jobs is so clear.
Mr. Gordon A. T. Bagier rose—
Mr. Howell: No, I shall not give way. I have given way a great deal. Industrial gain was not the only argument in favour of the proposals. Nevertheless, we should do all that we can to cut industrial costs. That must be right. We cannot tell industry with one breath that it should be competing more and then in the other prevent it from cutting its costs.
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The Government case is different. It is that every measure that is proposed helps the environment and helps tackle what was becoming an intolerable situation for the environment. The anxiety throughout the country about large vehicles that are too noisy, dirty and dangerous and travel on roads that were never designed for them, and, in some cases, were not even designed for the motor car, is understandably deep. The Government share that anxiety. Unlike our predecessor, we are determined to do something about it.
The Government have listened closely and responded to many of the worries that have been expressed. They are understandable. No one can question the Government's commitment to tackle the problem or the actions that we are taking. That is in stark contrast to the Labour Government who offered a few airy-fairy thoughts but did nothing to tackle the steadily worsening problem for which attention is long overdue.
In successive debates I have listened to the Opposition's views and arguments. If they prevail, they will stand directly in the way of a long overdue improvement in the lorry problem in the countryside and in our towns. They will also stand directly in the way of giving crucial help to industry and employment. Therefore, the Opposition's views are profoundly misguided and should be resisted. The Government are tackling a deep and long-neglected grievance in this island through the new lorry controls, and Parliament should support them wholeheartedly.
4.39 pm
Mr. Albert Booth: I rise to support both the Prayer and the amendment to the Government motion.
I usually enjoy debates, but I come to this debate much more in sorrow than in anger. I listened with concern to the Secretary of State, who sought to cite those outside the House who support him in the proposition to put heavier lorries on our roads. The right hon. Gentleman will recall that, following the decision of the House to reject the Armitage report, the Government gave an assurance that they would consider the representations made on the issues raised by that report. They have done so.
The Association of Metropolitan Authorities has told the Government that it bitterly opposes the proposals, and it has no doubt listened carefully to the technical advice of the county surveyors and bridge masters of different areas. The Association of District Councils is also against the proposition. The Secretary of State will not be surprised to know that his rather selective quotation from one part of the Labour Party in no way alters the Labour Party's broad view, which is one of complete opposition.
The Secretary of State must answer not only to the Opposition and to the representative outside bodies that I have mentioned, but to the House. He must have some regard to the decisions of the House. Next week, it will be 10 years since the House made its first most important decision about the way in which we should deal with lorries. The House was concerned about the effect of three previous increases in lorry weights and it debated that issue. It is interesting to reflect on what the Conservative Front Bench then said. The right hon. and learned Member for Hexham (Mr. Rippon) was then Secretary of State for the Environment and he said:
"I believe that the scale of our landscape and of our towns and villages is such that we cannot indefinitely allow these lorries, of whatever weight or size, to chunter through villages and along country roads."

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More significantly, the right hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton), who was then Minister for Transport Industries spoke in that debate. He told the House of the effort that he had made on behalf of this country at the European Conference of Ministers of Transport. He said:
"I have pressed in particular three arguments: first, the unrewarding and higher expenditure on maintaining and strengthening roads and bridges; secondly, the intrusion upon the environment in terms not only of physical damage but also of congestion, noise and fumes; and lastly, I have even used the argument, old-fashioned though it may seem to some, that people find these larger vehicles offensive and do not want them—a view which is, I am sure, widely shared in Europe."
That was the view of Conservative Members 10 years ago. Of course, a party is entitled to change its view in 10 years. Indeed, a party is the more entitled to press that view in the House if it has an electoral mandate for it. In the past decade I have not seen any assurance in the Conservative Party's manifestos that a Conservative Government would put heavier lorries on our roads. I would appreciate a little more consistency from the Conservative Front Bench. I would respect its view more if it adopted a clear line on where its sympathies lie and on where its policies are intended to lead us, instead of introducing heavier lorries and then saying that it appreciates the concern for all the damage that has been done.
Today, the Secretary of State is engaged in a most amazing act of conversion. He is asking the House to reverse two clear and firm decisions. The late Tony Crosland moved a motion on 29 November 1972. The House took a clear-cut decision. The motion simply states:
"this House, mindful of the environment, is against bigger and heavier lorries."—[official Report, 29 November 1972; Vol. 847, c. 511-559.]
There can be no doubt about the view of the House on that occasion. Indeed, there is no doubt about what the view of the House was when the Secretary of State published the Armitage report. I appreciate that the current Secretary of State has inherited the problem. He has had to decide whether to proceed with his predecessor's proposals. However, he cannot be unaware of the fact that the view of the House is clearly on record.
Quite remarkably, the Secretary of State is now asking us to subscribe to the proposition that, by increasing the maximum permitted weights of lorries, we can simultaneously make them less objectionable to people and less damaging to our environment, create more jobs, have more new roads, relieve communities of the problems of heavy traffic, make lorries quieter and safer and encourage freight shipment from road to rail. Those are the terms of the right hon. Gentleman's motion. Given his incredible claim, we are entitled to ask where he finds the evidence to support the idea that a 38 tonne lorry on our roads will achieve all of those benefits. We do not need to look into a crystal ball, because we can read the history books and the evidence of Armitage. We know what happens when heavier lorries are introduced on to our roads.
Every previous increase in the maximum weight of lorries allowed on our roads led to the introduction of more and more heavier lorries. A greater proportion of freight has been carried by road following such increases.
Mr. Ted Leadbitter: My right hon. Friend has demonstrated the historical shifting of feet. That cannot be denied or rebutted in any way, but the Secretary of State has now given a firm undertaking about
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a future stance. He has said that it will not be the Government's intention to increase the lony weight from 38 to 44 tonnes. However, the right hon. Gentleman is not in a position to give that undertaking, because he has not got the authority to do so. He cannot pre-empt a future decision. In addition, he has even got his simple arithmetic wrong. He said that under the new legislation a company could run four lorries, fully loaded, better than six lorries. If he does some simple arithmetic he will discover that that cannot be done.
Mr. Booth: I shall go into some of the arithmetic of the proposition. However, I shall not rest on that paint now. I simply invite the House to consider a matter about which there can be no debate. I refer to what has happened when heavier lorries have been introduced. I shall cite three significant examples of increases in lorry weights. In 1955 there was an increase to the 24 ton, four-axle lorry. At that time, lorries of over 5 tons unladen and under 8 tons were considered to be heavy lorries. The number of them increased from 26,000 in 1955 to 41,000 in 1960. The figure had leapt to 76,000 by 1965, and by 1970 the number of lorries in that category had increased to 132,000.
The next significant increase was the four-axle articulated lorry, which is regarded as the juggernaut of today. That was introduced in 1964. Lorries with an unladen weight of 8 tons were the heavy lorries of those days. In 1965 there were 24,000, in 1970 there were 55,000, in 1975 there were 96,000 and in 1979 there were 121,000 heavy lorries.
I would not claim that the only reason for that massive increase in the amount of freight carried by lorries was the bigger lorries. Of course, other factors, such as roadway construction, existed. However, I believe that had those lorry weights not been increased there would not have been such a great increase in the number of heavy lorries on our roads or in the amount of freight transported by road.
By 1972 we had the four-axle rigid 30-ton lorry on our roads.
Mr. Kenneth Carlisle: I appreciate that the right hon. Gentleman is interested in jobs. In that respect does he not think it important that we keep in step with our European competitors? Should we not give our lorries and manufacturers a chance to compete?
Mr. Booth: I should have some sympathy with that view if it were carried objectively across the whole area of transport. If we want to compete with our competitors in Europe we should do what was done in France and West Germany. They took steps to ensure that a higher proportion of freight was carried on the railways than is the case in this country.
Mr. Cryer: Will my right hon. Friend note that, as lorry usage and weights have increased, far from the Secretary of State's dubious proposition that jobs would be developed and preserved by increasing lorry weights further, the import of heavy lorries for use on United Kingdom roads has steadily increased so that over 50 per cent. of new registrations are for imported vehicles? That was not true 10 years ago.
Mr. Booth: There has been an increase in imports, but that is not peculiar to lorries. There has been massive import penetration in manufactured goods. However, by increasing lorry weights we have not increased the proportion supplied by British lorry manufacturers

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The Secretary of State has made an amazing claim that he is not proposing to increase vehicle sizes. There has been an increase in size with every increase in weight and this occasion is no exception.
In 1955 the maximum width of heavy lorries permitted on our roads went from 7ft 6in to 8ft. In 1964 it went to 8ft 2½in. The length of rigid lorries was increased in 1964 from 30ft to 36ft lin. In 1955 the length of the articulated lorry went from 33ft to 35ft. The story of their growth continues. In 1964 they went up to 42ft 8in and in 1968 to 49ft 2½in. Under these regulations their length will increase to 50ft 10in.
The Secretary of State distorts beyond recognition the meaning of the English language when he says that the regulations will not result in bigger lorries on our roads. One only has to read the regulations to see that, if they do nothing else, they increase the maximum legal length of the articulated lorry—now known as the 32½-tonner—from 15 metres to 15½ metres. How can the Secretary of State say that a 15½ metre articulated lorry is no bigger than a 15 metre articulated lorry?
Mr. Terence Higgins: Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that a lorry that is only ½ metre bigger—that applies only to the front end of the lorry—will be environmentally better or worse?
Mr. Booth: For reasons that I shall come to, I believe that the bigger lorry is environmentally worse, but not solely on that ground. In 1964 we were talking about a much smaller increase of 2½in, but the increases have continued bit by bit. In 1955 we were talking of a 6in increase. From that time lorries have grown to the 15½ metres that is now proposed. Since 1955 there has been a massive increase in lorry sizes, and that has created massive problems.
Mr. David Howell: I know that the right hon. Gentleman would not wish to distort or change what I said. I said most carefully that there is no proposal to increase the dimensions of lorry trailers. For the first time the regulations contain a restriction on length. If the right hon. Gentleman opposes that, he opposes a restriction on the length of lorry trailers. There is a proposal for strict control of both the length and the height of trailers. If the right hon. Gentleman is talking about the extra 19in on the cab for insulation and safety, he knows perfectly well that the majority of cabs now made have that extra 19in, and some have been running on the roads. It is correct that enforcement has not been efficient enough in the past, and I am anxious to increase it. The regulations merely reflect the fact that there are a great many lorries on our roads of dimensions identical to those proposed under the regulations. There is no increase in the lorry trailer dimensions.
Mr. Booth: That is different from the claim of the Government Front Bench in the previous debate. We are now told that there is to be no increase in the length of trailers, although there is an increase in the overall length of lorries. The Secretary of State has mentioned trailers. May I draw attention to the amended regulation No. 19 of the Motor Vehicles (Construction and Use) (Amendment) (No. 7) Regulations 1982? That regulation allows the weight of a trailer that has axles at least 3 metres apart—a
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trailer that does not form part of the articulated vehicle—to be increased from 16,260 kg to 18,000 kg. The Secretary of State needs to explain the fact that he said that such vehicles would be no more damaging to the road. How can a trailer that does not increase in length or in the number of axles carry loads that increase from over 16,000 kg to 18,000 kg without becoming much more damaging to the roads?
The Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mrs. Lynda Chalker): The regulations are technical, and it might help the House if I explain the passage to which the right hon. Gentleman has just referred. He is right that in item 3 of the table to be found on page 15 of the regulations there is an increase to 17 tonnes with the proviso that the vehicle has a relevant train weight of more than 32,520 kg. The increase from 16,260 kg to 17,000 kg is to allow the operator to move his load up to 17in either side and still remain within the maximum axle limits that have been set.
Obviously one could not have a total of 17 tonnes on the tractor axle and 22½ tonnes on the trailer axle because that would go beyond 38 tonnes, and that is not possible. The technical regulations must give the operator the flexibility to allow the operator to move his load and remain within the individual axle weight limits for each of the five axles. That is why the 16,260 kg has been increased to 17,000 kg.
Mr. Booth: With great respect, the hon. Lady is reading the wrong part of the regulations. Regulation 19(b)(iv) states that
"where the distance between the axles is at least 3 metres and the vehicle is a trailer"
the weight goes to 18,000 kg, not 17,000 kg. That is an increased weight in a vehicle of the same size.
Mrs. Chalker: I thought that the right hon. Gentleman had used the figure of 17,000 kg because the 17,000 figure on the page to which he referred is the only change from the existing regulations. The figure of 18,000 kg in regulation 19(b)(iv) exists in the 1978 vehicle regulations.
Mr. Booth: In that case, the hon. Lady should have corrected the mistake in the explanatory note. The point I make is borne out on page 19 where it is stated:
"The maximum permissible weights for trailers not forming part of an articulated vehicle are increased in a case where the distance between the axles of a trailer with two axles is at least three metres from 16,260 kilograms to 18,000 kilograms."
It is an increase in trailer weight. The Secretary of State has confirmed that I was right in saying that the overall length of the vehicle is increased. I hope that the hon. Lady will confirm that I am right in saying that the maximum permissible weight of a two-axle trailer that does not form part of an articulated vehicle is increased.
I hope that she will also confirm that if the logic of the Secretary of State on the damage comparisons in the Armitage report in respect of the 38 tonne articulated vehicle is applied to the trailer, the trailer becomes a massively more damaging vehicle upon our roads. There cannot be a shadow of doubt that the increases appear in the regulations.
Much more arguable is the effect of the regulations on manufacturing and operating practices. It is part of the Secretary of State's argument that more jobs will be provided because people will immediately start to build new lorries. Yet the regulations appear in such a form that it will be possible to use existing tractors with three-axle

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trailers. There is no need to build new tractors to gain the 38 tonne advantage under the regulations. What is certain is more noise, more vibration, and more exhaust gas from the same tractors coping with much heavier trailers.
Mr. Tim Sainsbury: The right hon. Gentleman may not be aware that for some categories of goods—food is important in the lorry trade—modifications are required to the trailer before retailers can take advantage of the increased permitted gross weight. Companies will not wish to undertake modifications at an expense, which admittedly is not exorbitant, if they bring no advantages.
Mr. Booth: I accept that companies do not wish to be involved in unnecessary expense. The hon. Gentleman supports my argument. It is because companies do not want to be involved in additional expense that they will be tempted to use their existing tractors and to tow three-axle trailers carrying 38 tonnes with all the adverse consequences that I have mentioned. This casts the gravest doubt on the suggestion that 38 tonners introduced under the regulations will create more work for the lorry industry.
Mr. Sydney Bidwell: Is not the essence of the issue the inadequacy of existing roads rather than speculation about increased tonnage in decades to come? If, as appears inevitable from Select Committee evidence, there will be need for massive public expenditure on the reconstruction of existing roads, especially motorways. because of the havoc wrought by existing 32 tonne vehicles—notwithstanding the intervention of the hon. Member for Faversham (Mr. Moate), if he is listening, about the time factor in providing bypasses—the Government, especially this one, with their philosophy of minimum public expenditure, will never be able to cope with the problem should they continue in office.
Mr. Booth: I could not agree more. The overwhelming majority of people, realising the ability of the road system to cope with the 32½-tonner, are apprehensive about the Government's proposition to introduce the 38-tonner. It is worth reflecting on the road damage caused by running three-axle trailers. Anyone who has visited centres where three-axle trailers operate will see that they suffer massive tyre scrub problems. On tarmacadam roads in cities, during warm weather, they tear the road surface to pieces.
When the Secretary of State seeks to claim that the loading effect of the spread to the five axles is a factor to be regarded as conclusive in protecting the roads from damage, he ceases to study with any care the real proposition about damage due to axle weight. The logic and the arithmetic of the fourth power rule makes it clear that the most heavily loaded axle causes the most damage. Once any higher load is put on the drive axle, this inevitably causes more road damage. If the fourth power rule is accepted, a 10-tonne drive axle causes 16 times as much damage as a 5-tonne axle.
The Under-Secretary shakes her head. She does not understand the argument about fourth power or about Armitage. She may wish to intervene to say that I was right about the increased weight of trailers and to confirm her misunderstanding of the heavy axle weight ratio.
Mrs. Chalker: I should like to draw the right hon. Gentleman's attention to the explanatory note and regulation 19 where he and I seem to be at odds over the
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18,000 kg. I was absolutely right in saying that the increase to 18,000 kg. for the weight of the trailer alone relates to drawbar trailers. It has nothing to do with what we are talking about. My right hon. Friend said at the start of his remarks that there would be no increase in the drawbar trailer combination to 38 tonnes. The 18,000 kg. refers only to drawbar trailers.
The right hon. Gentleman has asked about the fourth power rule. The fourth power rule does not apply to any individual axle. The internationally accepted method is to take the sum of the fourth powers of each individual axle. This gives the damage number contained in table 40 of the Armitage report. If the right hon. Gentleman studies that, he will see why the damage number for the five-axle 38-tonner is below that for the four-axle 32½ tonner. It is clear. It is internationally accepted. The figures have been published for over two years.
Mr. Booth: I am sorry but the hon. Lady is wrong. She can read the Armitage report. She has not read it. In calculating the damage number, Armitage did not relate it strictly to the sum of the fourth powers of the axles, as the Minister asserts. Armitage reasoned that if lorries had bigger net weights, fewer lorries would be needed. Armitage said that it was not fair to determine the damage numbers by comparing the sum of the fourth ratio of the axles. Rather, one should divide the sum of the fourth power of the axles by the net weight that the vehicle could carry, multiply by 1,000, and that would give the damage number. So the hon. Lady is wrong when she says that the damage numbers relate to one another in the ratio of the sum of the fourth powers of the axles. Armitage never claimed that, and it is not true.
However, I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her statement that regulation 19 refers to trailers of drawbar combinations. I shall study her statement carefully. I stated the words of the regulation. I did not say "drawbar combinations". I said "trailers not forming part of an articulated vehicle". Those were my words, and I think that they are correct. The 18,000 kg refers to those trailers.
I want to pursue the question of the axle weight damage. It does not matter whether one takes the sum of the axles if one adds the sum of the fourth powers. Clearly, if one axle is much heavier than the others, that axle will add the greatest amount to the sum of the fourth powers. It must do so with large vehicles with drive axles of more than 10 tonnes.
One of the great services which Sir Arthur Armitage and his committee did for heavy lorries was to expose the extent to which the heaviest lorries on our roads fail to meet their track costs. They expose the fact that the lighter lorry and the car are subsidising to a large extent the heavier lorries. The Department of Transport's estimate of the amount of subsidy in 1982–83 for 32½ tonne lorries is about £1,134 per vehicle. That is the subsidy that they receive towards their track costs from other road users. It means that a total subsidy is being paid to the users of the heaviest lorries of about £86 million per year. I cannot imagine any other country devising a scheme which gave the greatest incentive in tax relief—in fact, a subsidy—to people who operate the heaviest lorries, while penalising in taxation the people who operate the lighter lorries.
Armitage called for the complete elimination of the subsidy at the earliest opportunity. The Government have not responded. The Government have introduced two

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Budgets since then—three, if one includes the October mini-Budget—but they have not attempted to eliminate the subsidy. Incidentally, Armitage also calls for the inclusion of a calculation of accident costs in road track costs. That, too, has been completely ignored by the Government.
I want to say a word about the Secretary of State's claim about the roads programme in general, and bypasses in particular. I remind him of what his predecessor did to the bypass programme in his White Paper. In 1980, 34 bypass schemes were withdrawn or suspended in the Government's White Paper. Two more were suspended in 1981. Among those that were withdrawn or suspended in the 1980 White Paper were the Milford bypass, the Saltford bypass, the Barton bypass, the Axminster bypass, the Whitchurch bypass, the Preston southern bypass, and others. I could go through the whole list, if the House wished. However, perhaps the House will take my word for it that 34 schemes were withdrawn in 1980 by this Government.
In 1981, a further two bypasses were suspended. On 25 October this year, the Secretary of State put out a press statement in which we learnt that five of the 36 that had been withdrawn or suspended were to be restored. In the same press statement, the Secretary of State said that a further eight new schemes would be added to the programme—not immediately, of course. Most of them are to be built by a successor Government, who will be committed to restoring them to the programme in 1986. The net effect of this Government's actions on the bypass programme is to reduce by 23 the number in the programme that they inherited. We have 23 fewer bypasses as a result of this Government's actions.
Those of us who study transport matters know that—this is not a party political point—expenditure on roads in this country has fallen over a considerable period. It has fallen in motorway and trunk road construction from £635 million—these are 1980 survey prices—in 1975–76 to £342 million in 1981–82. There has been a drop in expenditure of £193 million on new road construction. The share of new road construction borne by lorry fuel tax and excise duty has also fallen from about 26 per cent. to 21·4 per cent. The amount that the Government are paying towards maintenance is almost static, at a time when it is clear that many of our motorways are having to be resurfaced before the end of their design life, not as a result of bad motorway design—far from it—but because the number of maximum axle weights has increased much faster than anyone ever imagined would happen when the motorways were designed.
Mr. Chapman: May I say, as the previous Minister's parliamentary private secretary, that I think the right hon. Gentleman is being a little unfair in talking about the reduction in the number of schemes going ahead in 1980. Will he admit, on reflection, that those schemes were dropped in 1980—temporarily, I hope—because there was not the remotest possibility of their being built with the resources provided by the Labour Government? That is the position that was taken following 1979, and that is why this Government felt that it was better to be honest and not pretend that the schemes had the remotest chance of being built with the resources that were then being made available.
Mr. Booth: I did not want to make a party point at that stage. I was talking about what happened over the lifetime of two Governments. I was generous enough to take a period, from 1975–76 to 1981–82, that covered both Governments, merely to make the point that there was a substantial drop over that period in the amount spent on major road, motorway, trunk road and bypass construction. The reasons for taking all the bypasses out of the programme is a matter that can be argued in the House. The Government are saying, "Let us have heavier lorries and more bypasses," when in fact they are reducing the bypass programme, even over the past three years.
Mr. David Howell: We all recall that when the IMF—the bailiffs—came in there was a devastating cut in the road programme. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will note the figure, because it is a fact, that today spending on the trunk road programme is 19 per cent. up in real terms on the level that we inherited in 1978–79.
Mr. Booth: I am sorry that I cannot confirm that. One reason why I cannot do so is that the Government are not prepared to answer questions at the moment on the costs of the road programme at steady based prices. I have the last figures that the Government were prepared to publish on that, which do not allow me to check the Secretary of State's point. However, the Secretary of State's point is irrelevant to the essence of the argument. He cannot deny, and no hon. Member can deny, that there has been a substantial drop in the amount spent on roads over the period that I have quoted, or that the number of bypass programmes has also dropped. That is crucial to the whole argument.
Unlike other countries which have experience of running heavier lorries, we rely to an enormous extent on shifting freight by road. France and West Germany shift between 43 per cent. and 44 per cent. of freight by road. Here the figure is 77 per cent. I have been asked why, but that would tempt me into a debate on the rundown of investment in British Rail. Another reason is probably that the other countries do not subsidise heavy lorries and put a tax on freight.
Mr. Frank Hooley: Is there not another very important point—that in the other countries, waterway transport has not been neglected as it has been for 50 years in this country?
Mr. Booth: I agree with my hon. Friend. It is remarkable that we, an island race, move such a small proportion of our freight by water.
The offer of more for the railways by way of section 8 grants for new sidings is one with which we are sympathetic. However, in the last year for which figures are available, only three section 8 grants have produced additional rail siding connections.
The combined effect of all these considerations is that none of the cosmetic promises—of pie in the sky and jam in the future—about the improvements that might come about can carry any weight. The anxiety that properly exists as to the dangers of greater congestion, more noise, smoke and vibration is as real as ever, and has increased. If the motion goes through, it will not be the last. It will not satisfy those who will continue pressing, inch by inch, tonne by tonne, to put up the size and weight of lorries. It will whet their appetite for further increases. This is the thin end of the wedge.

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I end with a reminder that Armitage called for an absolute reduction in the adverse effects of lorries
"on people and the environment."
As a result of the Government's action, lorries are taking priority over the consideratons of people.
Several Hon. Members rose—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Many hon. Members are hoping to speak. I appeal for short speeches so that fewer hon. Members will be disappointed.
5.24 pm
Sir Julian Ridsdale: In spite of the gloom of the right hon. Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth), I am prepared to accept what my right hon. Friend said—that the spending on the programme of trunk roads is 19 per cent. up on 1979. Harwich is an important link, particularly, as my right hon. Friend said, as the container traffic to the east coast ports is increasing. People in my region know how much they have benefited by the opening of the northern Colchester bypass. This is why the words of the Government motion make it easier for me to accept what is for many people the difficult decision to approve the heavier lorry maximum. The Government's motion states that it is the intention of the Government to build
"more new roads and by-passes, to relieve the community of traffic".
I accept this and I am glad that it is the intention of the Government. People in my area have benefited from this recently by the opening of the new bypass.
I am also glad that the Government intend to have more control over the routes that lorries take and over where they park. This is important, especially as the type of traffic that we have to the port sometimes takes short cuts through scenic country routes, and is dangerous for them.
The other point in the motion, which helps me to support the Government, is their intention to give
"more attractive grants to encourage freight shipment by rail."
Harwich, which I represent, contains the railway port of Parkeston, so I am naturally concerned about what grants the Government have in mind. From what I heard the Secretary of State say, I should like to press the Government to give further consideration to more investment in the rail ports, because this will relieve roads of heavy traffic. If this is the Government's intention, does this mean that they will have another look at the investment in train ferries? I know that this is connected with the privatisation of Sealink, but it is an important point that we must try to encourage more traffic to go through the rail ports. I hope that the Government will examine this again carefully.
Mr. Stanley Newens: The hon. Gentleman mentioned Harwich, and I gather that he is supporting the proposal. Is he suggesting that the majority of people who live in Harwich will welcome the increase in the size of vehicles going through their streets?
Sir Julian Ridsdale: We are hoping for a bypass very soon, but I shall come to the hon. Gentleman's point in a moment. We should encourage more heavy traffic to go by rail and we should see what investment we can make to help this. A long-term intention must be to try to get more industry near to ports and to encourage coastal shipping. I am delighted that there is a link between Teesside and Harwich. The development of this type of project is most important.
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I welcome the intention of the Government to build more bypasses, but I should like to give them a warning. They should be careful not to encourage the proliferation of small ports near a major port, and therefore at its expense. In my constituency, permission has been given to develop two small ports, which will mean the building of two more bypasses. The environment will be spoilt by heavy lorries going through narrow streets of villages, and money might be held back for a bypass to the main port of Harwich, which urgently needs one.
Although this is what happens in my constituency, I feel that it reflects what is happening elsewhere. The two bypasses for the small towns would not be necessary without the proliferation of ports. I urge the Government to invest in major ports such as Parkeston because this will ease the heavy lorry problem considerably.
Is there an overall plan for productive public investment for roads and ports? The speedy building of a bypass for Harwich and Dover ports is vital, particularly with the increased lorry weights. It must take priority in the scheme to modernise the port. All this is delayed by the need to obtain finance for a big scheme to fill in land near the port. That is an admirable scheme for private or public investment but up to now we have been trying to get private financial aid. I hope we succeed. However, I ask my right hon. Friend to keep a fatherly eye on this scheme and help speed it up as much as possible. There is an increasing demand from shipping to use the port, which means that we must also make the bypasses a priority. We should do all that we can to extend the use of the port to heavier traffic in order to take it off the roads. Nevertheless, bypasses are vital. The time will shortly come when the M25 link will be completed, following which we must press ahead with the Chelmsford bypass link. Why stop there? Let us have a proper motorway link to the port of Harwich. That can and should be done as soon as possible.
Above all, I ask my right hon. Friend to reconsider the investment that should be made to take traffic off the roads on to the railways and to consider the modernisation of ports. We are trying to do as much as we can by private enterprise, although there are delays because of financial problems. The second stage of the bypass is vital for the ports of Dover and Harwich. The Labour Government's delay in coming to a decision over those ports has prevented progress which should have been made a long time ago. I hope that we can now go ahead. It is with those thoughts in mind that I shall support the Government in what they are doing, although I know that it is a difficult decision for many hon. Members to make.
5.31 pm
Mr. Gordon A. T. Bagier: I shall speak briefly this afternoon. 1 must declare an interest in that I am sponsored by the National Union of Railwaymen. Therefore, some of my remarks will be directed to how the proposals will affect British Rail and my colleagues and union members who work there.
I think that it is with deep regret that the Government have felt it necessary to bring forward the proposal to increase lorry weights to 38 tonnes at this time. I have no doubt that many Conservative Back Benchers will have emphasised the dangers that will result to their villages and the environment. I doubt whether the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues will be able to convince anyone that the heavier lorry will somehow improve the

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environment, increase job availability and cause less damage to the roads. They certainly will not convince the public. They will have an uphill job in selling such a message.
One can only accept the right hon. Gentleman's undertaking this afternoon that he will go no further than the 38-tonne limit on the basis that he is a sitting tenant. There is no guarantee that a future Secretary of State will not increase the loading limit to 40 or 44 tonnes and move in the direction of the EC general loading standards. That is the suspicion of the public at large and of many hon. Members.
One is bound to be suspicious of moves to create heavier lorries on what I would call an almost false prospectus. I do not believe that the right hon. Gentleman has an earthly chance of convincing a sizeable number of his Back-Bench colleagues about the rightness of this measure. I understand their loyalty to the Government and probably many Conservative Members will vote in the Lobby tonight, but I should not be surprised if many do not.
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the shifting of freight and how it would affect jobs. He studiously omitted to say anything about the effect on British Rail. British Rail has already said that on its estimation the loss of freight will be somewhere in the region of 3¼ million tonnes—a lost income of between £40 million to £60 million.
The right hon. Gentleman has not said how I can explain to the members of the NUR the benefits of the measure to their employment and future. The bulk of the traffic that will be shifted on to the roads will be the heavy. dirty materials such as scrap, aggregate and coal. It is difficult to understand how the right hon. Gentleman will justify that to the areas which will see the unloading of traffic from the railway on to the roads.
I want to put one small but important point before the Minister tonight. At the moment most of the traffic that British Rail is worried about losing is that which would be dealt with by tipper lorries. There is a distinct worry about the safety of tipper lorries throughout the country, particularly articulated tipper lorries. At the moment there are about 13,000 30½ tonne rigid tipper lorries dealing with the sort of traffic that is being carried by British Rail.
Current legislation allows articulated tipper lorries up to 32½ tonnes—an increase of 2 tonnes. It has not been felt reasonable to take advantage of that increase because of the design costs. However, even more important, it was thought that it should not be done because there is a distinct question mark over the safety angle of articulated tipper lorries. The evidence produced in that quarter is quite astounding.
At the moment about 13,000 rigid tippers, 11 metres long, with a gross weight of 30½ tonnes, could under the regulations be replaced by a 38-tonne articulated tipper lorry, 15½ metres long. With an additional payload of about 7½ tonnes, it is not only a distinct possibility but a probability that there will be a movement towards the much bigger articulated tipper lorry.
The safety of the 32½ tonne lorry is already under question. A report has been produced by Dr. R. C. Keen of Bristol polytechnic. It was prepared at the request of a large mover of scrap material, who found from his own
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experience that articulated tipper lorries used on uneven ground were dangerous because the roll-over risks were high.
When representations were made to the Department of Transport, I would not say that it was not interested, but it was felt that it was not its problem because the roll-over risk occurred off the highway. It was unlikely that such lorries would topple over while they were on the highway, but it was suggested that they were dangerous when they discharged their load. Interest has now shifted to the Health and Safety Executive, which is deeply interested and worried by developments in this area.
If there is this increase, the safety aspect will take second place. I earnestly plead with the right hon. Gentleman to consider the regulations seriously with a view at least to confining the weight of articulated tipper lorries to 32½ tonnes. That would be a move in the right direction, which the Health and Safety Executive would welcome.
There was a serious accident last month at Grassmore, North Wingfield, Derbyshire, where, unfortunately, a driver working for the firm of William Tory Ltd. was killed while attempting to get out of his cab as it was turning over. Details of several such accidents have been researched by Dr. Keen and as a result he has put forward strong proposals. When the Under-Secretary of State replies, I hope that she will say that she will consider banning 38 tonne articulated tipper lorries. Such a ban would be a tremendous advantage to British Rail and would reflect the worry and anxiety that is felt about the safety of these lorries.
I am convinced that the main reason why the Government are going ahead and planning the implementation of the proposals is the pressure that they have been under from the Road Haulage Association. I can understand that. The association is interested in creating conditions in which its members will make as much profit as they can. I understand that it will go down every avenue in pressing its proposals one of them being that of the House. However, I do not believe that the Government will be able to sell this package to Mr. and Mrs. General Public.
Reference has been made to the damage that heavier lorries are likely to do to our roads. The members of the Select Committee visited Bristol last week and talked to representatives of Bristol council. They were worried about damage to pavements. It seems that lorries spend more time on the pavements than on the roads in the lovely city of Bristol. Damage is caused because lorries cannot negotiate certain corners in our cities.
The Government talk about constructing bypasses round small villages and towns and creating long runs for lorries. Have they considered why lorry drivers sometimes turn off the bypasses? The answer is fairly simple. Sometimes lorry drivers want to go to the loo, to have a cup of tea or to refuel their lorries. Facilities of that sort are not found on the bypasses. A driver will get to know that he can pull off the bypass and proceed to a pleasant small village which has a little cafe in which he can relax.
Mr. Robert C. Brown: My hon. Friend has rightly made great play of the roll-over tendency of certain lorries. Does he agree that roundabouts constitute a major hazard? I have in mind the Denton Road, Silverlonnen and Springfield Road area of my constituency. It will be another three or four years before

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the western bypass is available. Does my hon. Friend agree that with five roundabouts on that stretch of road, the enormous juggernauts that are proposed will he prone to major accidents?
Mr. Bagier: I know my hon. Friend's constituency well because I live quite near it. I am aware of the example that he has given. We saw the churned-up roundabouts and pavements during a recent visit to Bristol. There is some concern also about bridges, but it is played down. The Avon county council said that it was worried about well over 1,000 bridges. Its representatives told us that the council is considering no-go areas for lorries. Have the local road haulage associations considered the impact on the living of their members if widespread no-go areas are put into operation by the Avon county council? This could happen because of the danger that is foreseen when the heavier lorries travel along its roads and cross its bridges. It is a difficulty that the associations and the councils will have to face. British Rail has estimated that it will cost about £60 million to strengthen its bridges.
I said that I would be brief and I have tried to advance my arguments succinctly. I plead again with the right hon. Gentleman to give serious consideration to articulated tipper lorries and not to allow their weight to be increased to 30 tonnes because of all the associated dangers.
5.45 pm
Mr. Robert Banks: I am grateful for this opportunity to intervene—I hope briefly—in this debate. I listened very carefully to the speech of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, and he listed a number of improvements which I am sure the whole House will have wanted to hear. I am bound to say to him that I do not believe that these improvements can be judged as a panacea for allowing heavier lorries on our roads.
We start, in my view, from a very bad position. I am sure that the whole House will agree that the sight of large lorries struggling through high streets, vibration damaging our buildings, the smell of fumes in built-up areas and lorries struggling through our country lanes, are all matters that need to be dealt with and are long overdue.
One other matter is the question of spray from lorries on motorways. I sometimes wonder how it is possible for any vehicle to pass one of these lorries during difficult weather with any sort of visibility. Therefore, I welcome these measures, but what I say to my right hon. Friend is that these are measures which do not justify the introduction of heavier lorries.
I referred to the problem of vibration. I have in my constituency the beautiful old town of Knaresborough, one of the gems of this country. Knaresborough suffers from vibration, as many other towns do. Our bypass for Knaresborough and Harrogate is not due to be started until 1986 or 1987 yet we are in these regulations proposing that heavier lorries should be implemented directly.
The Armitage report refers to "our limited knowledge" of the problems of vibration. I am bound to say that I am not convinced that these heavier lorries will cause the same vibration as 32·5 tonne lorries. I am of the opinion that there is a case, made out by experts, that greater vibration will result—perhaps 10 per cent. That could have a considerable impact and cause damage where lorries are passing through a town, particularly where there are ancient buildings.
It is difficult to find any part of rural England that is not trampled by the bulk and belching fumes of heavy lorries,
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however occasional. There is no doubt that agriculture has a particular demand for larger lorries, for transporting feedingstuffs and fertilisers to ever-increasingly larger farms. This is, of course, significant. But how is any authority to ban lorries from these narrow lanes or, indeed, to ban heavy lorries from going along farm drives and doing considerable damage? We do not know specifically what sort of damage we can expect from the proposal for heavier lorries.
In the whole of North Yorkshire there is no single road or track or lane to which a lorry cannot have access. If we are, therefore, to go down the road of banning lorries—everybody wants to see them out of the way—how are we to police such a policy? This is a matter that I should like to draw attention to, and particularly having regard to the transportation of sugar beet.
The point has been made that this is an opportunity for industry, particularly in the Midlands, for which I have the greatest possible sympathy, to take advantage of the construction of new lorries to meet this demand. But how sure can we be that we shall not have a flood of lorries coming into the country from those manufacturers on the Continent who already are tooled up to construct them? Can we be sure that heavier lorries above the proposed limit already in service on the Continent will not, in fact, be coming into our country the moment that these regulations are implemented, if they are? I suspect that there will be cases where lorries will be coming into this country perhaps overweight in view of their extra capacity. I should like my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State, in her reply, to give specific attention to this matter of checking the weights and dimensions of lorries at the ports.
I have considered this matter with the utmost care, and I am bound to say that on this occasion I cannot support the Government in the Lobby tonight.
5.49 pm
Mr. John Cartwright: I accept at the outset that a case can be made for the heavier lorry. I could not follow all the technical arguments between the two Front Benches, but heavier lorries may well do no more damage than those that we already have. That judgment, however, depends on technical evidence and the public are extremely
sceptical— often with good reason—about that kind of technical advice.
The Government are on stronger ground when they say that heavier lorries will mean more efficient operation for the road haulage industry. I notice, however, that the argument that heavier lorries will mean fewer lorries does not loom so large now as it did in the past. Indeed, an editorial in Commercial Motor on 13 November took a very different view on the introduction of heavier lorries when it said:
"Unlike David Howell, we cannot see any reduction in the numbers of vehicles on the road as a result."
We should heed that warning.
If the public are to accept heavier lorries, there must be a compensating package of environmental protection measures to improve the current situation. The package that the Government now offer is a good deal better than that proposed in the White Paper of December 1981.
I particularly welcome the greater availability of section 8 grants to railways and waterways I wish that we had done more about that in the past. I especially welcome the idea of attracting more freight to the waterways

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because I live in and represent a riverside constituency in south-east London. I believe that the Thames is London's most under-used asset. An increasing quantity of goods is unloaded at Sheerness and Dover and then trundled into central London on juggernaut lorries when it would surely be more sensible to bring it into the heart of our city on that great, broad unused highway—the river Thames.
The Government package as a whole, however, is neither strong enough nor certain enough to meet the situation. If we support the Government today, we can be absolutely sure that heavier lorries will result. The environmental improvements and protections that the Government offer, however, are far less certain. Some necessary actions are not mentioned at all in the Government's document. Others are mentioned in the vaguest of terms, and for others the time scale for implementation is positively leisurely compared with the size of the problem.
On noise, for example, we all welcome the three decibel cut next April, but very few of our constituents are likely to notice a cut of that order in the streets in which they must live. The Government's proposals for major reductions are all in the future. The Government statement says:
"The Government's aim is to reduce the perceived noise from new heavy lorries to less than half its 1981 level"—
that sounds fine, but when?—
"as quickly as practicable".
That sounds a good deal less clear-cut or certain.
What about the quieter lorry—the QHV90 with a noise level of 80 decibels like the private car—which was promised for the 1980s? It seems that we are now talking about the 1990s. It should be made clear that we want far more rapid and determined action from the Government on noise.
The hon. Member for Harrogate (Mr. Banks) rightly referred to vibration. That is hardly mentioned in the Government's latest statement. The White Paper of December 1981 made the extraordinary statement, "people dislike vibration". I suggest that they more than dislike it. They believe—with good cause—that it damages their property and it certainly makes life in many areas quite intolerable.
Mr. Harry Greenway: The hon. Member for Woolwich, East (Mr. Cartwright) represents an urban area of London, as I do. Does he agree that in practical terms vibration means that people's homes are frequently shaken so badly that the plaster falls and the owners are put to considerable expense? With great respect to my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate, (Mr. Banks), I believe that this problem is often greater in urban than in country areas since housing is so much more dense.
Mr. Cartwright: I agree entirely. The damage caused is considerable and tangible, and the owner usually has no redress against anyone. There is also the question of the quality of life. Some people are greatly upset by constant vibration and it certainly makes life in many urban areas utterly intolerable. Any attempt to tackle environmental improvement must include effective measures to deal with vibration.
On enforcement of safety and loading standards, it would be churlish not to welcome the Government's statements about providing more weighbridges and more
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traffic examiners, but we are entitled to ask, "How many, when, and will there be enough?" The Association of Metropolitan Authorities suggests that 25 per cent. of vehicles inspected are already found to be overloaded. Will that be any less true of 38-tonne lorries? If lorry traffic increases, will future enforcement procedures be any more effective than in the past?
On routeing, I am glad to see that there is to be relief for 220 towns and villages, but we are told that this will take four or five years. The Council for the Protection of Rural England states:
"A Civic Trust survey showed in February 1982 that of the 551 settlements on trunk roads needing bypasses, 284 were not in the future programme. Moreover no assessment has been carried out of the number of settlements on local roads that need bypasses."
That certainly leaves a great deal to be done in the provision of bypasses.
What about those urban areas where bypasses cannot be provided and the routeing of lorries is extremely difficult in practice? Traffic coming through south-east London from the Kent ports and the docks at Tilbury to what is left of our industrial areas has to pass through residential and shopping centres. I agree entirely with the hon. Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Bagier) that this traffic spends a great deal of its time not on the road but on the pavement. Moreover, when the main roads are congested it seeks out "rat-runs". As fast as local authorities block those rat-runs by weight restrictions and so on, the lorry drivers find new ones. It is impossible to keep up a constant battle of this kind to force lorries out of residential areas in many of our major cities.
Long-distance goods movements are not the only problem. In south-east London there has been an explosion in the growth of warehouses. This means that heavy lorries make often quite short journeys carrying goods to and from warehouses throughout the city. That is all in addition to the longer-haul traffic that warehouses attract from further away.
The Government have said that where there is no other solution the problem in urban areas must be tackled by "lorry action areas". That is a fine-sounding title. It sounds vigorous and full of power and activity. It seems, however, that the Government have got no further than consulting about the criteria for the definition of lorry action areas. The Government's statement as to what action there will be sounds incredibly tentative. It says:
"Measures such as noise insulation and road resurfacing could be implemented in those areas to give relief from the worst effect of heavy lorry traffic."
Again, the situation demands far more concrete and definite action.
Mr. Greenway: On action areas and bypasses in London, one also has to contend with the Labour-controlled GLC, which has a deplorable record on road maintenance. Clearly we cannot expect to obtain bypasses from the Government for all our constituencies. The only bypass that is likely to affect my constituency will bypass Hayes and Southall and pour 22,000 more vehicles per day, including scores of heavy lorries, into Northolt, because the GLC insists on terminating the bypass at the White Hart roundabout in Northolt. That is entirely unacceptable for a highly residential community. That is why I must oppose the Government tonight.
Mr. Cartwright: As you have appealed for short speeches. Mr. Deputy Speaker, I had better not follow the

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hon. Member for Ealing, North (Mr. Greenway) through the highways and byways of Hayes and Southall, attractive though the prospect no doubt is.
The Government appear to be relying on the existing powers of local authorities for local controls. Those powers in the past have been extremely ineffective. I have good reason to doubt that they will be any more effective in future.
I wish to refer briefly to the problem of the lorry when it is parked. The lorry is not only anti-social when moving but equally anti-social when parked. In my experience, it is usually parked not outside the driver's home but outside someone else's home. It is usually parked not in the leafy suburbs or the owner-occupied areas but on the council estates. All the action on overnight parking bans looks good on paper but is difficult to implement in reality. The enforcement agencies find it difficult to carry on patrolling whole areas to seek out—
Mr. Arthur Lewis: I am much obliged to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. I should like to develop the issue of parking. We have similar problems in our constituencies. People cannot go in and out through their own front doors. They cannot go to bed at night or get up in the morning because of the noise. What is worse—this is no laughing matter—the ambulances and the fire brigade cannot get through to deal with emergencies. This, again, is confined to working class areas. Put the lorries in the Mall or outside Buckingham Palace and the Government would find ways of stopping it.
Mr. Cartwright: That is a tempting line of argument to follow.
Mr. John Home Robertson: Answer!
Mr. Cartwright: I sometimes suggest that the lorries should be parked in Blackheath. Then the lorry problem would be solved rapidly. I agree with the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Lewis). Lorries present a visual intrusion when parked outside people's homes. They also cause nuisance when a refrigerator runs all through the night or when a lorry pulls away at 4 am and wakes up the entire street. I understand that drivers must have somewhere to park their lorries but if the Government are seriously tackling this problem they should be providing more lorry parks, not on the edge of cities, but near where the drivers actually need them.
Mr. Arthur Lewis: There is no money available.
Mr. Cartwright: The Government have a case when they say that 38 tonne lorries will not make the present position worse but that is not the point. In many parts of the country the present position is unacceptable and intolerable. If the Government are anxious to introduce heavier lorries we have an opportunity to wring from them effective environmental protection. We have proved that because the Government have brought along a better package this time than they did last time. But they have not yet given us enough in terms of environmental protection. We would be foolish to give up until we have obtained a very much more convincing programme than has been set out before us today. That is why my right hon. and hon. Friends will vote against the Government tonight.
6.2 pm
Mr. Terence Higgins: As in previous debates on this subject, I must declare an interest as a director of a company that has operations which include road transport.
I should like to refer immediately to one of the points made by the hon. Member for Woolwich, East (Mr. Cartwright) about Blackheath. Heavy lorries are not only in Blackheath, they are all over Blackheath. They totally foul up, in many instances, the rush-hour traffic coming into central London. I hesitate to pursue that point because I wish to avoid speaking for too long. I agree with what he said about the need to restrict the parking of heavy lorries, particularly on other routes as well as in the back streets.
This is a highly emotional and technical issue. I should like first, to refer to a point made by the right hon. Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth) who spoke from the Opposition Front Bench. He knows as well as I that the debate is not about bigger lorries. It is fundamentally a debate about heavier lorries. The increase in size, which he mentioned, is on the cab only and is about half a metre. He is equally well aware that the fact that the size increase is to be permitted on the new lorries will make them more environmentally acceptable, quieter, more manoeuvrable and safer.
It is true to say that over the past two years most hon. Members have received a great many representations from all possible points of view on this issue. It is therefore worth stressing at the outset that we have now moved, and my right hon. Friend has now moved, substantially away from the position originally recommended by Armitage, particularly with regard to lorry weight limits. It would have been wrong to go along with what Armitage put forward. To allow an increase in weight on the existing four axle combination from 32½ tonnes to 34 tonnes, let alone 38 tonnes, would have been damaging. I am glad that my right hon. Friend has not gone along with that proposition.
The right hon. Member for. Barrow-in-Furness will also know from questions I have tabled that it would have been quite wrong to increase the weight of drawbar combinations. That would have led to a great deal more of them on the road. They are appalling and a major contribution to danger on the roads. Therefore, I am glad that my right hon. Friend has not agreed to that proposal.
My right hon. Friend has only been prepared to allow 38 tonne combinations on five axles. That is a reasonable compromise if there is to be any increase in weight. However, three axles at the front and two axles at the back are a better combination than the two axles at the front and three axles at the back, even with regard to the fact that there are thicker tyres than normal on the wheels of the three rear axles. Incidentally, I note with interest that the regulation does not define thicker tyres. Perhaps the Minister will clarify that later. We must recognise that, although they look worse, the three axles at the front and two axles at the back combination is, I hope, probably better environmentally. My right hon. Friend will consider—I had representations on this matter only esterday—whether the three axles at the front and two axles at the back combination rather than two axles at the front and three axles at the back should be encouraged by less unfavourable tax treatment. I hope my right hon.

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Friend will bear that in mind and also re-examine the whole question of lorry taxation. We have not gone far enough in that respect in covering track costs.
My right hon. Friend has done the right thing with regard to lorry weights. He has been much more restrictive than Armitage, and, at the same time, he has given some scope for a reduction in the overall damage done to roads.
This brings me to the question whether there will be fewer lorries on the roads as a result of the weight increase than would otherwise be the case. The issue must be examined in terms of a particular level of economic activity. That is common ground between us. I am doubtful whether the reduction in numbers will be as great as is sometimes supposed, not least because lorries start off full but very often the amount of load is reduced as they go along and therefore the lorry quickly returns to a weight of 32½ tonnes. Only on long runs will there be a substantial reduction in the number of lorries on the roads.
Will the change in weight result in any significant shift from rail to road? I am very doubtful whether it will. The rail traffic at the moment is largely composed of goods that are convenient to transport by rail, particularly coal, steel and other such heavy items. However, I believe my right hon. Friend should examine the point made from the Opposition Benches about the tipper-articulated lorry and whether an increase in its weight limit would result in any significant diversion from rail to road. I welcome my right hon. Friend's proposals for increasing the grant to help traffic on the railways. That is the right balance at present.
The increase in the bypass programme is important. I have spent most of the past 10 years trying to stop what was said to be a bypass coming to Worthing. All the four routes put forward by the Department went right through the middle of Worthing. I have finally managed to stop any such so-called bypass, so my problem now is to get a real bypass around Worthing. My hon. Friend, the Under-Secretary, who is to reply, knows that I am anxious to achieve that.
There is a danger that we spend too much on bypasses at a given moment of time but not enough on preparing for bypasses so that we do not have sufficient bypasses on the shelf if economic circumstances enable us to go ahead and build more. We need a store of bypass projects that have gone through those terribly time-consuming but wholly justified inquiries. My right hon. Friend should examine carefully the allocation of resources in that respect.
I welcome the fact that the increased weight lorry must have greater safeguards, such as backguards and sideguards. I hope that we shall make progress towards measures for preventing spray, which is very dangerous.
After two years of receiving representations—it is strange how these things happen—I received a representation only recently about the enforcement of penalties for overweight lorries. The representation suggests that the courts allow a margin of error and do not necessarily prosecute the drivers of overweight lorries unless they are 5 per cent., or in some cases 10 per cent., over the weight limit. It is important that the Government, by whatever means may be available, should ensure that all cases of overweight lorries are prosecuted. There is no argument in favour of a 5 per cent. or 10 per cent. margin. If we ensure that all drivers of overweight lorries are
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prosecuted, we may find that, despite the proposed weight increase, overall actual lorry weights on the roads will decrease.
I must stress that the penalties for overweight lorries are not sufficient, even when the law is enforced. We need powers to ensure that an overweight lorry is taken off the road and cannot return until its weight has been reduced below the legal limit. Such increased penalties would be a bigger deterrent than almost anything else. Word would get back quickly to Dover and the Channel ports where lorries enter the country.
Many court cases concern repeat offences. We should seriously consider taking action to ensure that if an operator is found repeatedly to be over the weight limits, his licence is placed in jeopardy. We must have more effective penalties. If we had, the total package of proposals put forward by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State would stand a good chance, not only of improving the future position, but of improving the present intolerable situation.
I am glad that my right hon. Friend spoke about the future. Having got this weight increase, it would be wrong to say, "Let us allow pressure to build up and then have another increase later." It is not possible for Governments to bind their successors absolutely. None the less, a clear declaration by this Government that this is the end of the road for increases in heavy lorry weights is very important.
6.13 pm
Mr. Gareth Wardell: My interest in the subject stems from the surgeries that I hold throughout my constituency. Not one day goes by without a constituent or a group of constituents complaining to me bitterly about the impact of the heavy lorry on their lives. Local authorities in Gower have made representations to me about the Government's misguided proposals to raise the maximum permitted lorry weight to 38 tonnes.
The last page of the Department of Transport's pamphlet "Lorries, People and the Environment: The Government's Policies in Detail", which was published on 4 November, states that Armitage proposed the raising of section 8 grants that are currently 50 per cent. and that the Government accept the proposal. The maximum grant has now been raised to 60 per cent. The Armitage report recommended that the standard grant under section 8 should be raised to 60 per cent. Nothing in the pamphlet refers to the fact that Armitage recommended that the Department of Transport should be prepared to pay grants of up to 80 per cent. where environmental factors justified such a high rate. The omission from the pamphlet may not have been deliberate. Perhaps it is the unintentional consequence of the pamphlet's brevity. However, if the Government accept that recommendation, we can look forward to fewer lorries on our roads and a higher proportion of freight being carried by rail.
The existing maximum lorry weight is 32·5 tonnes. We must ask the Government whether the maximum weight should be increased, given the current limits. According to Armitage, the number of lorries that jack-knifed in fatal and serious accidents fell to 174 in 1973. I cannot tell the House about the corresponding figures for 1973 to 1979, because in a written reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen (Dr. Thomas) on 16 December 1981 the Secretary of State for Transport said that figures for before 1979 could be obtained only at disproportionate cost. However, in reply to me on 15 November, the Department

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of Transport stated that in 1981 196 lorries jack-knifed in fatal and serious accidents. That figures does not give us much comfort. The Government have not advanced a proposal to fit anti-wheel locking devices to prevent jackknifing.
In the year ended 31 March 1982, 20·67 per cent. of heavy goods vehicles failed the first part of the annual Department of Transport test. That represents 107,984 heavy goods vehicles. That is worrying, especially the high proportion of vehicles that failed because of unsatisfactory brake performance.
The pamphlet does not mention the speed of heavy lorries. I understand—the Secretary of State will correct me if I am wrong—that the maximum speed of heavy lorries on all roads except motorways is 40 mph. Perhaps my experience is unique, but I do not often see lorries travelling below that speed on our roads. On motorways, the speed limit is 60 mph.
What about overloading? In the county of Gwent in South Wales the number of goods vehicle drivers prosecuted for excess weight offences rose from 260 in 1978 to 514 in 1980. It was no surprise to learn from page 38 of the 1981 report by the chief inspector of constabulary that, in a joint operation between the Gwent police force and other forces adjacent to and including the M4, they found, among a variety of offences, serious cases of mechanically defective and overloaded lorries.
My conclusion is that hon. Members welcome any steps by the Government to increase the safety of the 32·52 tonne articulated lorry. If the Secretary of State would care to fit five axles on the 32·52 tonne articulated lorry, that would be a sensible change and the current road damage would be reduced.
However, we must not allow the Government to use measures such as the fitting of sideguards to heavy lorries to form, to use a rugby football term, the dummies that we bought from the Government, while the Secretary of State for Transport scores his 38 tonne try under the posts. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Harrogate (Mr. Banks) is not present. I wanted to say to him that I look forward to his assistance in the Lobby in achieving that end.
6.21 pm
Sir Anthony Royle: Most of the speeches in the debate have had a constituency flavour. It was refreshing to hear the speech of the hon. Member for Gower (Mr. Wardell), which had less constituency flavour than most of the others. I have much sympathy for his comments about jack-knifing. That is a worrying aspect of the problem. I hope that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State will answer that point in her reply.
The hon. Member for Woolwich, East (Mr. Cartwright) made a good point. I appreciated it as another riparian constituency Member. I represent the river constituency of Richmond, which is a little more upstream than his area. I support the suggestion that more use should be made of the river Thames. Anything that will get even one lorry off the roads of London and put its load on a barge on the Thames would meet with the approval of my constituents as well as the hon. Gentleman's. A major national artery runs through my constituency—the south circular road. At the moment that road includes much of the traffic going from the north and centre of England to the south coast ports. Before the M25 is completed, those vehicles are travelling along the south circular road.
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My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary paid a visit to see for herself the present problems on that road. Hon. Members have mentioned lorries mounting pavements. They are constantly on pavements on the south circular. Most of the road in my constituency is no wider than the distance between the sword lines in the middle of the Chamber. That causes me much anxiety, my constituents trouble and traffic congestion. In a Adjournment debate in June I pressed the Minister to take action to deal with the problem.
We suffer not only from the south circular in my constituency but from other roads, such as one in Petersham. A major eighteenth century sewer collapsed and for 18 months the road was out of use and blocked. Many people were diverted for miles around. The area is only eight miles from Hyde Park corner. The underground sewerage system could not take the weight of heavy lorries and collapsed. There is also congestion in Barnes, which is in a suburban area, but is like a small village. It has narrow streets and has suffered viciously from heavy lorries.
The package that has been introduced today includes five points that I welcome. First, there are the regulations to make lorries safer and quieter. That is of assistance to my constituents. It will also be of great value nationwide. Second, more control over routes is to be welcomed. Third is special assistance to areas that are most affected, and fourth is the fact that there will be no increase in size in articulated lorry trailers. That is important. The Secretary of State was pressed on that matter. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have had meetings with the Secretary of State and hon. Members who have spoken so far in the debate have all welcomed that aspect of the package. Fifth is the decision to ban any lorries that are larger than those already in use. I welcome all those elements.
The weight increase that has been finally announced by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State after much coming and going, discussion in the press and rumours that no announcement would be made have shown that we have done much better than Armitage. We have come down from the Armitage recommendations. I was in the House when the statement was made on the Armitage report. Hon. Members on both sides of the House left the Chamber fairly convinced that it would be difficult to make the Government budge from the Armitage recommendations.
We then heard rumours that we would get a 40 tonne limit. That concerned many of us. We pressed the Secretary of State not to go for 40 tonnes. Finally, the decision was announced a couple of weeks ago that the limit would be 38 tonnes with a maximum of five axles. He also made the important announcement this afternoon that there would be no higher limits. He gave us a firm assurance about that, which virtually committed his successors—as far as successors can be committed in our system of government—not to come back to the House with a proposal to increase that limit. It is much to be welcomed.
I think that it can be divined from the comments that. I have made so far that I would prefer a 32 tonne weight limit. However, with the five points that have been pressed by so many people and conceded by the Secretary of State, combined with the 38 tonne limit, I am prepared reluctantly to support the package.

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The Secretary of State was prepared to react to the views of hon. Members on both sides of the House. Every hon. Member has a problem with heavy lorries in his constituency. It would be an odd constituency if he did not have a problem. All of us are concerned and worried about it. I welcome the fact that Ministers have agreed to shift, although I fully realise that Opposition Members and some Conservative Members would have liked the Secretary of State to go further.
There is a comparison to be made. Since the early 1960s in Richmond we have had a major problem caused by the noise of aircraft landing at London airport. I remember when the jumbo jet was introduced. A friend of mine in my constituency said recently that there was a local outcry when the jumbo jet was introduced. People said that they would be drowned in noise when these huge aircraft flew overhead. However, the introduction of the jumbo jet meant that larger aircraft were flying overhead with more passengers and quieter engines and that there was a lower growth in movements, than we would have had if we had continued with the old 707 and equivalents which used to fly overhead on the way to London airport.
There is a slight hope—I would not put it higher than that—in what my right hon. Friend has announced and expanded upon, that the package might end up by providing us with quieter and safer lorries with better and more efficient equipment, plying our roads with full loads rather than half loads. Perhaps there will not be as many as there would have been in 10 or 15 years' time if the package had not been introduced. I am prepared to give the Secretary of State the benefit of the doubt today.
There are just two other questions that I should like to ask my right hon. Friend. I did not notice any comment in his speech about his plans for responsibility for the control of roads in the Greater London area. I raised that matter with him in an Adjournment debate in June. My hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, North (Mr. Greenway) mentioned it in one of the interventions that have been continually made throughout the debate.
The time has come for the Secretary of State to make an announcement about his plans for the control of the road system in Greater London. Why is it impossible for me to ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State or my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State about a major national artery such as the south circular road in the House? The reason is that responsibility lies with the GLC over the river and it does nothing about the problem. The GLC is irresponsible about roads in London. The time has come for responsibility for major roads in the middle of London to go to the Department of Transport. Responsibility for minor roads should go to the local authority—the Greater London borough concerned. If my right hon. Friend could announce plans to introduce such measures as soon as possible, they would be greeted most favourably by all who represent London constituencies. I hope that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State will mention that in her reply.
My right hon. Friend did not mention taking action to relieve the traffic problem on the south circular road or to take other decisions on inner city routes. We have often discussed the matter. I have also raised it with his predecessors. It is difficult to find a solution to the problem
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of the south circular. It is a major artery that runs amidst heavily built-up areas. Nevertheless, something must be done.
I do not believe that any careful thought is going into the problem except to say that any increase of traffic on the south circular will be picked up on the new M25. That may be true, but there should be deeper thought on the matter. Planning for action that will be taken not merely by the present Government—it cannot be solved overnight—but in four or five years' time. A scheme to relieve the intolerable pressure throughout South London that is caused by the build-up of traffic should be devised. Any comment that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State might make about this would be greatly appreciated, not only by myself but by other hon. Members who have the misfortune of trying to cope with the ever increasing build-up of traffic on that road.
For the reasons that I have given, I shall support the Government tonight, but I shall not cease to put pressure on them to continue to look for solutions to the appalling traffic problems that we all face.
6.32 pm
Mr. Stephen Ross: I am unequivocally an unrepentant conservationist and as such I should like as much freight traffic as possible to be conveyed by the railways. I know that the Secretary of State would also like that to happen—so did Armitage.
Why, then, are the Government demanding that rail freight makes a profit while allowing the subsidy on the heaviest high mileage lorries to rise to as much as £6,000 each per year? There is no support for the transfer of more heavy freight from the railways to roads. I am alarmed at the prospect of that happening, as it was outlined in yesterday's The Guardian. That newspaper carried a report saying that the railways expect another £40 million loss on freight traffic if the regulations are passed.
How does the Secretary of State propose to prevent such a transfer of traffic? It is no good intoning the usual platitudes about competition and market forces, the failure to tackle the problem of the taxation of the heaviest lorries—which are those which compete with rail freight—and properly to enforce the law concerning safety and operators' standards distorts the competitive framework against the rail system.
It is especially worrying that, although the taxation of heavier lorries has been restructured, the full recommendations of Armitage—that the subsidy to heavy lorries should be eliminated—have been ignored. Moreover, nothing has been done to include the public costs of accidents and damage to underground services in those calculations. May we please have some reassurance that those recommendations have not been lost sight of? May we have some idea of when they might be put into effect?
Much is made of the benefits of heavier lorries to industry. Armitage referred to between £120 million and £130 million a year but that included 44 tonne vehicles. It also suggested replating the existing maximum weight namely the 32·5 tonne articulated lorry to 34 tonnes. As matters stand now, the increase in weight will be smaller, drivers will almost certainly want higher wages and there will have to be more expenditure on roads and bridges.
How much benefit, therefore, will the consumer feel? I suggest that he will notice two things—bigger lorries and more lorries. Why bigger? Because for some classes of freight—bulk materials such as gravel, for example—the

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operator will swap his rigid tipper for an articulated combination which can be up to 40 per cent. longer. The hon. Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Bagier) dealt with that matter earlier. I hope that the Secretary of State will make some move to stop that happening as, thankfully, he has done with regard to drawbar combinations.
Why more lorries? Because, inevitably, heavier lorries will mean further abstraction of railway traffic. That has happened before and it will happen again if, as we all hope, the economy starts to grow. If the Secretary of State does not agree, perhaps he will tell the House the year in which there will be fewer heavy lorries as a result of the regulations unless, of course, that is the consequence of the wholesale destruction of manufacturing industry, towards which the Government's policy in the past three years seems to have been hell-bent.
We are also told that the regulations will provide more jobs. Where? That will not be in the road haulage industry if we are to believe that there will be fewer lorries. Nor do I believe that there will be many more jobs in vehicle construction. Foreign supplies already have 60 per cent. of the market and will take advantage of the opening that has now been made for them. The opportunity will not I fear be taken up as it should be by our own manufacturers, although there might be a short-lived boost for trailer manufacturers. Nor is there much evidence to suggest that industry will become more efficient.
In some cases, such as the movement of bulk liquids, there will be advantages but are they sufficient to justify the damage to roads and the environment that the increase in heavy lorry traffic will bring? The carnage on roads that is partly due to the lack of proper law enforcement has not been mentioned much. Maintenance of law and order means that citizens are safe from robbery and violence. The Government have substantially increased spending on police but law and order also means the enforcement of traffic regulations. The right hon. Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) dealt with that matter. I refer to the enforcement of traffic regulations against the dangers that are created by lorries that are badly maintained, overloaded, speeding, running over unsuitable roads, throwing up a blinding spray, are not fitted with proven safety devices such as under-run guards and anti-lock braking devices and are driven by men who are working excessive hours.
Since the Government came to power, the number of enforcement staff has been reduced in the drive against Civil Service numbers. I have the figures here. I shall not waste the House's time by reading them. The numbers have dropped. They are beginning to increase but are still below what they were when the Government came into office. If I am not challenged on that point, I shall not give the figures.
Safety enforcement in road haulage is a bad joke. There are virtually no checks at nights or weekends. The operator standards in road haulage should be raised urgently. Why has the Secretary of State still made no move to enact the recommendations of the Foster report? As an immediate step, will the Secretary of State restore the numbers of traffic and vehicle examiners and say when he intends to implement the recommendations of the Foster committee? Those recommendations have wide support among the responsible majority of the road haulage industry. The Secretary of State's predecessor deferred action to await the conclusions of the Armitage inquiry.
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Much mention has been made of bypasses. I shall not spend too much time on that matter. Nevertheless, local authorities and statutory undertakings also say that the increases in heavy lorry traffic will make it necessary to spend huge sums of money on strengthening bridges.
The hon. Member for Harrogate (Mr. Banks I spoke about Knaresborough which is a beautiful town with a number of bridges and big viaducts. The hon. Gentleman spoke of the problems of vibration in that area. He is absolutely right. Where is money to be found to strengthen those bridges? It would be nonsensical, for example, if the railways were made to pay to strengthen bridges for the benefit of competing road hauliers. The Secretary of State gave an assurance that the increases would be limited to 38 tonnes and I, like other hon. Members hope that that will be honoured. However, we are also worried about the effects of some of the heavier axles that are common on the Continent. For example, France allows 13 tonne axle weights. Will the Under-Secretary of State give an assurance that lorries with such axles will be kept away from our roads and bridges?
Mrs. Chalker: Yes.
Mr. Ross: The Under-Secretary's "Yes", is on record. To many people it seems grossly unfair that the heavy lorry operator should get his way with bigger, heavier vehicles and that all the costs and safeguards should come along much later, if at all. The public will bear the extra costs of road construction and maintenance in the absence of a revision of taxation. We shall wait and wait for new bypasses. Some of them, will not be built until the turn of the century. We shall probably wait for efficient sprayguards, quieter lorries and better enforcement. On this issue, we on this Bench—such as we are—say that we are on the side of the public—[Interruption.] There are not all that many Conservative Members present either. If the public were asked about the 38 tonne lorry there is no doubt that they would overwhelmingly support our viewpoint and say that this is riot the time for such action. The Government should introduce improvements and law enforcement first and they might then give this matter some consideration. We say bypasses, quietness, safety and law enforcement first—larger lorries second.
Just what is life worth to the resident on a main road leading into a city? It is probably best to stand on the Archway Road on a wet Sunday afternoon if hon. Members want proof. Indeed, the Archway is probably one of the best arguments for saying that we should not come out of the EC. Virtually every lorry on that road is on its way to the Continent. Lorries pass at two-minute intervals. It is the most appalling place and one can only imagine what the people in that area have to put up with. Nearby Millbank is also pretty ghastly.
I have not, for once, spoken about my constituency. What is the Isle of Wight going to do about 38 tonne lorries? The situation is bad enough as it is. We cannot build a bypass. Lorries will come to the Isle of Wight because there are firms there such as Tesco and International Stores in situ. We shall have to put up with them. A previous Conservative Administration passed a resolution asking for the Isle of Wight to be exempted. If there is any way of doing that, such as through a lorry abatement order or the Dykes Act, may we have such protection? Such heavy lorries will not do us any good whatsoever.

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The argument is not about efficiency. The average load factors of heavy lorries are around 50 per cent., and better organisation in the industry could probably increase efficiency far more than heavier lorries. The argument is about quality of life and I submit that it is time to call a halt to the growth in lorry size. The motion before the House amounts to a eulogy of self-congratulations on the part of the Government about new bypasses, more jobs, greater efficiency, environmental benefits and greater road safety. The only certain fruit of the proposals is heavier lorries. Once they have been introduced, all the benefits will be consigned to the pending tray in the Department of Transport until they are dusted off the next time the road haulage lobby wants an increase. This time, we must have the amelioration first.
6.43 pm
Mr. Tim Sainbury: The hon. Member for the Isle of Wight (Mr. Ross) made one good point about the number of safety inspectors. I am sure that that will be welcomed in all parts of the House, and I hope that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will respond to it. I do not challenge the hon. Gentleman's belief in conservation, but, judging by what he said, I challenge his understanding of the interest of the consumer, commerce and industry. His understanding of that seems to be about as good as his counting of his colleagues. He said "We on this Bench" when he was sitting in solitary splendour. He may be equally bad at counting the number of lorries that pass by.
For once, the hon. Gentleman did not make a constituency speech other than to say that it was impossible to bypass the Isle of Wight. It is possible to sail round it, but perhaps that does not count. Understandably, most hon. Members have raised constituency points. We all have a constituency interest, as my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Surrey (Sir A. Royle) said. In Hove, our concern is certainly no less than the average, because the A27, a major trunk road, runs through a built-up area. We also get most of the traffic that goes to and from that flourishing small port, Shoreham harbour.
I agree with those who have said that, however many bypasses are built, the concern about lorries, people and the environment will continue. In my constituency we are awaiting the outcome of an inquiry into a proposed bypass that could take away much of the constituency's heavy traffic. We hope that there will be an early finding. Whether or not the bypass is built, there will still be a great deal of lorry traffic in Hove and Portslade because the factories, warehouses, shops and houses generate it. The effect of it on the people and the environment will largely depend on four factors. The first factor, size, creates the most confusion, although it should not. I cannot believe that the minor change in the size of vehicles that is proposed by the regulations will be detectable by the average observer. Indeed, it may not be detectable even to the more expert observer.
Mr. Moate: The reason for insisting that the vehicles will be bigger—even though one might readily accept that the extra length is fully justified and in no way detrimental—is that those in favour of the change constantly say that the vehicles will be no bigger. Technically and factually they will be. They can be 1ft 6ins longer.
Mr. Sainsbury: I was not saying what my hon. Friend has accused others of saying, but I said that the change was so small that the average observer would not notice it, particularly as it effects the traction unit and not the trailer. Most observers are offended by the size of the trailer.
The second factor, noise, is far more important. Three decibels may not seem much on paper but it sounds a lot. A welcome improvement has been made and I look forward to the further improvements forecast in the regulations. They will be of immense help to those who live, work or shop near to the pasage of lorries. The third factor, safety, is equally important. The improvements in braking standards and spray suppression can only be welcomed as most helpful. Opposition Members—particularly the hon. Member for Isle of Wight—are concerned about the numbers. As has been said, it is self evident that fewer vehicles will be needed for any given level of goods traffic if those vehicles can carry heavier weights. Perhaps that can be most clearly demonstrated by considering the lorry traffic involved in food distribution.
Perhaps I should make clear an interest that is fairly well known to hon. Members. I am a director and substantial shareholder of a very large food retailer, J. Sainsbury PLC. However, my remarks are equally true of all other food retailers and about retail distribution generally. In its brief on this issue, the Retail Consortium said:
"The retail industry is so structured that the only practical method of distribution of goods is by road. Warehouses tend to be on the edge of towns and shops situated in the high street. Efficient distribution particularly in the food sector, relies largely on heavy lorries making deliveries."
I am convinced that all British industry will benefit from the Government's proposals. However, no industry is more dependent on road transport than the wholesale and retail food distribution industry. The experience of the company of which I am a non-executive director shows that the numbers issue can be clearly explained. It can be convincingly demonstrated that there will be a reduction in the number of lorries. J. Sainsbury has about 8·5 per cent. of the British retail food market. The co-operative movement as a whole is the largest retailer of food, but J. Sainsbury is the next largest in the United Kingdom. It does not require a great knowledge of mathematics to realise that if the figures that I have given are multiplied by 12, one obtains the equivalent figures for the whole of retail food distribution. The company has to get 90 million items—cans, bottles—into its stores each week for resale to customers. That represents about 3 million cases of "Coke" or bacon and so on. Most of those goods have to go first to a warehouse from either the point of importation or manufacture before they are transhipped to stores. The warehouses may be owned by the company or a distributor. That applies to most retailers and explains why, in round terms about 15 per cent. of the price of a basket of food reflects the cost of wholesale and retail distribution.
There is a well-known brand of baked beans which is manufactured largely in Wigan. My company distributes them to customers largely in the South and the Midlands. We are faced with the problem of getting the baked beans from Wigan to those customers. They go by lorry and each lorry carries 10 pallet loads of baked beans. That is a great deal of baked beans. I can assure the House that with a 38 tonne limit that same lorry, which will be no bigger

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although it may have a fifth axle, will be able to carry 14 pallet loads of baked beans. It does not require a great knowledge of mathematics to realise that there will be fewer lorries carrying that well-known label on their sides bringing baked beans from Wigan to the hungry southerners.
Mr. Alexander W. Lyon: Surely that assumption is made on the basis that the market remains exactly as it is. If Sainsburys opens up shops, as it is in the middle of York, it will increase its needs for further deliveries. That means that it will want to have two 38 tonnes loads. We shall have two lorries instead of one. That is what happened in the past. Why should it not happen in the future?
Mr. Sainsbury: I shall avoid discussing the suitability of the location of a proposed store with the hon. Gentleman.
It is obvious that there will be no more lorries. No more food will be sold because lorries are allowed to go round fully instead of partly loaded. I do not believe that the most optimistic of Heinz marketing men imagines that there will be many more baked beans sold in the South as a result of this proposal.
The economies that I have mentioned relating to goods inward will apply to the further stage of distribution—from the warehouse to the store. The company about which I have been talking operates a fleet of over 400 of its own lorries. A steadily increasing proportion of those vehicles—already over 150—is over 30 tons gross weight. They carry 42 roll pallets. Roll pallets are small pallets with wheels on each corner and two metal frames, and have the advantage of not being too big or heavy to be pushed around the sales area of a retail store while the goods are put on display. They are commonly used in the retail trade.
With a simple modification those same size lorries will carry the equivalent of 62 roll pallets instead of 42. For that reason, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said, one of J. Sainsbury's average sized stores will be able to be replenished daily by four instead of six lorries.
I assure the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr. Leadbitter) and any other hon. Members who have doubted that fact, that for a substantial number of distributors—I believe the same goes for manufacturers—the proposed changes will reduce the number of lorries needed to carry the same amount of goods. By modifying existing lorries and replacing older ones, the company has said that there will definitely be savings in distribution costs of nearly £2 million within two years. Competition in the food distribution industry is such that the greater part. if not all, of those savings are bound to reach the consumer.
The community will gain from the reduction in the number of vehicles. I assure my right hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) that there will be a reduction for J. Sainsbury, and I know that that will apply to others involved in food and retail distribution.
Mr. Dykes: The House will have found that analysis interesting, although it is theoretical. Are not those arguments more applicable to the own-account operators, like my hon. Friend's company, but not to the industry generally? Any increase in weight provides a once and for all significant boost for productivity potential which brings
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in small operators with their own lorries and more juggernauts on the road. Is chat not likely to outweigh any reduction in the own-account operators' vehicles?
Mr. Sainsbury: I do not agree with my hon. Friend because it costs £35,000 or more to put a heavy vehicle on the road and operate it for a year. For economic reasons every effort is made to keep down the number of vehicles. Whether one is distributing on one's own account or to other outlets the benefit remains.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Worthing said that there would be no benefit if one was on what is called a "milk round" dropping goods at a number of stores. If one can start with the equivalent of 62 roll pallets of goods in the vehicle instead of 42 the same benefits accrue to the milk-round vehicles as accrue to vehicles going to one store to drop the complete load.
No more food will be eaten because of the suggested changes. The same amount of goods will have to be carried, but they will be carried by fewer lorries using less fuel and making less noise. Industry and commerce have suffered from uncertainty about this matter for far too long. That uncertainty has led to delays in placing orders for lorries. That applies to my company. It affects the interests of vehicle manufacturers in the Midlands.
I believe that the Government's proposals will benefit the consumers, industry and the environment because there will be fewer lorries for any given volume of trade. I have no hesitation in supporting the proposals.
6.57 pm
Mr. Les Huckfield: I am a sponsored member of the Transport and General Workers Union. The opinion I shall advance is not solely that of the Transport and General Workers Union but also of its members who represent the bulk of lorry drivers who will be asked to drive the heavier lorries. I am sorry that Conservative Members have not placed more emphasis on drivers' views. In fact, I have hardly heard them mentioned at all, although Conservative Members have extolled the benefits of heavier vehicles.
This debate is about heavier vehicles and also about a position that is currently difficult to control. When the Minister winds up I hope that she will say that it is difficult to tell the weight of a lorry now when the goods are in an enclosed container. Not only can one not determine the distribution of the load within the container; one often does not know what it contains. Even now the de facto gross vehicle weight in many cases may be more than 32 tons.
There is a great difference between what the regulations say and what the actual carrying capacity unenforced tends to be. If there is to be art increase in the legislative weight to 38 tonnes gross vehicle weight, the de facto overall weight—because the law is not enforced sufficiently—could, in many instances, be higher. It is ironic that some of the overloading and some of the convictions for overloading occur when rail-borne Freightliner containers are put on the road. Many rail freightliner depots do not have proper weighbridges.
Conservative Members argue that the number of heavy lorries will not increase. It is already the case that the number is ceasing to increase at the previous rate. The reason for this is the downturn in the economy. With the collapse of the nation's manufacturing base, there has been no increase in demand for road haulage carrying capacity.

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The hon. Member for Hove (Mr. Sainsbury) talked about baked beans from Wigan. They are actually produced not in the Wigan constituency but in the Ince constituency. That traffic may be carefully controlled and, I hope, from his point of view, a growth sector. It does not reflect the overall road haulage situation. Many general haulage fleets have been taken off the road or have been reduced because of lack of growth in the transport sector, especially road haulage, as a consequence of the lack of growth in the rest of the economy. I am not sure where the increased demand is supposed to be coming from.
Hon. Members such as the hon. Member for Hove seem to think that the increase in gross vehicle weights will mean a reduction in the overall number of heavy lorries. I value highly the opinion of the editor of Commercial Motor, who said on 13 November:
"Unlike David Howell we cannot see any reduction in the numbers of vehicles on the road"
as a result of 38 tonners. That is the view of one of the main road haulage periodicals. It is not the view of an uninformed novice.
I had hoped to hear Ministers make suggestions for improving fleet utilisation. It is through improved fleet utilisation and a reduction in the percentage of empty running that a more effective contribution can be made to reducing the number of heavy goods vehicles. As the Under-Secretary of State must know, the main difficulty over improving fleet utilisation and decreasing the percentage of empty running is that ownership in the road haulage industry, thanks to denationalisation, is very fragmented.
How on earth can fleet utilisation be increased and empty running diminished when there are large numbers of small operators? To bring down the number of heavy goods vehicles, the Government should concentrate on improving clearing house and backloading facilities. Now that there is a more liberal transport regime that enables own account operators to do more backloading, this is an area in which the Government should be carrying out a study if they wish to bring down the number of heavy goods vehicles.
As the most effective parts of the Transport Act 1968 have not been implemented, there is a need to see whether that Act has had the effect of increasing the amount of backloaded traffic. Far too many of the contributions from Conservative Members reflect, like the Armitage report, the operators' view. Should not more attention be paid to the view of customers and the environmental view? There have been some precise quantifications of the benefit to operators. I should have liked to see more precise quantifications of the benefit to consumers and to the environment. I have seen no quantification of the so-called "social" benefits.
I am sorry that the right hon. Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) has left the Chamber. The right hon. Gentleman is a director of a firm with a large parcels collection and distribution centre in the Nuneaton constituency. When he talks about the length of the cab, he means really that an extension to the front of the cab will lead to far more sleeper cabs. This is a development to which the Transport and General Workers Union is totally opposed.
Heavier vehicles are being put on the road without adequate overnight parking facilities or overnight
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accommodation facilities for drivers. This means that the alarm clock will become just as much a part of drivers' equipment as the tachograph has unfortunately proved to be. I hope that those Conservative Members who urge an increase in cab lengths will also be insisting on increased facilities for drivers. Unless that happens, more drivers will have to sleep in lay-bys.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth) was right in his interpretation and verification of the fourth power formula. That is an AASHO formula from the United States. I should have thought that there would now be enough British evidence about the additional damage caused by increased gross vehicle weights. Traffic has been using motorways in this country for nearly 25 years. I would have thought that it was now possible, instead of relying on German or United States experience, to carry out a much more precise British cost benefit study of heavy goods vehicles, especially in relation to the heavier axle weights.
The Under-Secretary of State quoted from the explanatory note. The hon. Lady knows that none of what she stated means a thing unless there is the means of enforcing the distribution of weight on a drawbar trailer or an articulated trailer. Half the trouble is that the Government's proposals for two axle tractors and three axle trailers are probably one of the worst axle patterns for achieving a good distribution of weight. How will the hon. Lady stop the overloading of the second axle on the tractor unit?
The right hon. Member for Worthing made a good point. A three axle tractor will, of course, achieve better weight distribution. The pattern chosen by the Government means that it will be difficult to enforce the law over the distribution on drawbar trailers and particularly on articulated trailers.
I hope that the hon. Lady will accept that it is a matter not just of the number of axles but of the distribution of weight on the axles. The only way her Department has of weighing the vehicles accurately is by shunting them backwards and forwards over weighbridges which are far too small and totally antiquated. Until the machinery is sensitive enough for vehicles to be weighed per axle, she knows that much of what she has said tonight simply cannot be enforced. It is a matter not just of quoting from a nice technical explanatory memorandum but of her Department having the technical means at its disposal to enforce weight distribution. At present it does not have those means, particularly for the second axle.
We can all talk about bypasses. I hope that even this Government have sufficient sense to build bypasses anyway. I imagine that many of the bypasses of which the Secretary of State spoke would have been built anyway. I am surprised that the hon. Member for Harwich (Sir J. Ridsdale) was not more tough with his Front Bench. He should have said that he would not vote for this proposal unless there was a bypass. He should have taken a much more stringent attitude. After all, Conservative Members know that once the next public expenditure review appears, bypasses will be easy to cut. So the Secretary of State's catalogue of bypasses does not cut much ice with me.
The hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Ross) was right to talk about the powers of local authorities to enforce penalties and regulations. As far as we can see, those powers will not be changed. I should have liked local authorities to be given increased powers to enforce what

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I shall call the Dykes Act. The Act of the hon. Member for Harrow, East (Mr. Dykes) was a good piece of legislation. We thought that many more local authority powers would follow to enforce it—but no. The hon. Lady talks about "lorry action areas". To me, that sounds very vague. It is all very well to talk about lorry action areas, but it would be better to know which and where they will be.
I come back to what I said earlier. If this regulation is to be enforced, and if it is to be enforced by officers in the hon. Lady's Department, she will need many more officers than she has now, and she will need many more weighbridges. At docks and warehouses drivers often have to make substantial detours to find a weighbridge, and even then it may not be open. So even the most diligent driver, trying to keep within the drivers' hours and comply with all the regulations, often has to go out of his way to make sure that he has the correct weight.
Apart from the Netherlands, we are the only country in Europe which does not have a strictly regulated road haulage regime. In France, West Germany and most European countries, with the exception of the Netherlands, tariffs are regulated and access to the industry is regulated. In this country, once a person has obtained his operator's licence, little can stop him from putting more and more lorries on the road. We are not talking about a system where, by just increasing weights, we know exactly what will happen. We are talking about increasing gross vehicle weights in an extremely unregulated atmosphere with an extremely unregulated tariff regime. That is why I do not blame my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Bagier), who expressed fears on behalf of his union.
I find it difficult to accept what the hon. Member for Hove said about baked beans coming down the M6 and the M1, because that is a controlled and a controllable situation. It is a regular flow. In fact, it is a timetabled flow. I know some of the drivers who are involved in it. Indeed, it is a computerised operation. There are not many road haulage operations that can be carried out in that way. Most operations are more fragmented and difficult to time and control.
Mr. Sainsbury: The hon. Member will recall that when I spoke of the flow of baked beans from Wigan or Ince down to the South, I said that it reflected only part of the pattern of the retail distribution of food. That was the flow from the point of manufacture into the warehouse. A much more important part of the distribution pattern is from the warehouse to the retail store. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will appreciate that total distribution of food in this country is a substantial generator of road traffic. The savings are there to be had, and will be taken advantage of in that industry.
Mr. Huckfield: I shall not pursue that argument, because I have spoken for too long already. In fact, the hon. Member for Hove has just admitted that what we are talking about tonight is not just a road haulage operator's decision. We are talking about a change in overall transport policy. The hon. Lady and her Department should understand that. We shall be talking about a shift from rail to road, a model shift, and my union opposes it not only because it is a transport policy change but because it has undesirable effects elsewhere. I hope that all my right hon. and hon. Friends, aided and abetted—I
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hope—by several Conservative Members, will do all that they can to prevent this measure from going through tonight.
7.16 pm
Mr. David Crouch: We seem to be having a high tea debate, with baked beans going backwards and forwards up and down M1 and M6. I am glad that we were not fed a diet of fish fingers as well, by the 40-tonne load.
As we speak tonight, sometimes mentioning constituency interests, may I read a letter that I received yesterday from the Association of Kent Amenity Societies, telling me what to do in this debate. At the end, it contained a formidable sentence:
"We look forward to perusing Hansard after the debate."
Here we stand, in this difficult position. We have to satisfy our Front Bench, ourselves and, of course, our constituents. It is not a light matter.
When the idea of heavier lorries was first mentioned by the Secretary of State a year ago, I fired a shot in his direction, not to hurt him but to halt him.
Mr. John Home Robertson: A plastic bullet?
Mr. Crouch: No, it was not a plastic bullet. I meant just to miss him. I said, firing from the hip—using a phrase in haste—that I was "implacably opposed" to the whole idea. It was a phrase in haste that I chose wisely. I was not alone, of course. That shot, supported by a fusillade from around me—not just behind me, but in front, too—stopped him in his tracks. It stopped him for a year. He has thought again. He has come forward with some new ideas about improving lorries, controlling their standards and improving their safety. Above all, he has come forward with ideas on improving the roads.
Armitage was about people and the environment, as well as about heavier lorries. That is what concerns me and what must concern us all. Some of us may be haulage contractors or in the food distribution business, or thinking of the progress of British industry. We cannot ignore what Armitage reminded the public and the House about, as it studied this change. We have to be concerned about the effect on the environment and on the people.
There are moments when I do not hate heavy lorries, for example when I can pass them on motorways, particularly on three-lane motorways. We are blessed only with two-lane motorways in east Kent. I do not hate heavy lorries when I find that they are well driven, no doubt by the members of the union of the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Huckfield). Often, they are well driven, and driven with proper consideration to other road users. Sometimes they are among the best drivers in the country.
However, on narrow trunk roads, winding uphill and down dale, I hate these heavy lorries. I hate them blocking the way in our country towns, in the village high streets and our narrow country lanes. I hate them when I see the damage that they can do to our country roads. In my constituency for some idiosyncratic reason, both the entrances to Canterbury are restricted because of road works. For nearly two years the A2 was pulled up because it collapsed under the weight of the vehicle traffic, which was underestimated when the road was made a few years ago. To complicate the problem still further, the A38 has also been pulled up, and that is the other entrance to our small city.

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I hate heavy lorries when they are involved in accidents or they scrape round roundabouts, bumping into motorists, pushing them into the side, knocking cyclists over, or just cutting into the barrier at the roundabout. It is and was because I did not hate them completely that I did not say that I was completely against them when I said that I was implacably opposed to these measures. I was just against the heavier lorries on the wrong roads.
I have received much support for my views from people everywhere. They are people who are concerned about our way of life, rather than just about our industrial and economic success. That point of view represents an important element in a civilised society. They saw something false in the argument that heavier meant fewer. They doubted the Minister's ability to keep the lorries off our narrow roads and lanes, and to support and back up the 1973 Dykes Act. I sat on the Committee and I gave all my support to that worthwhile measure.
People doubted whether the Act would get support, usage and enforcement by local authorities, backed by the Minister's authority. Their concern was also shown because they felt that the juggernaut—I do not mind using that word—was already big enough and heavy enough. Both Armitage and the Minister's White Paper a year ago expressed concern about braking effectiveness and the relative safety factors of vehicles as they are today. In particular the White Paper pointed out that there would be a relative increase in severity in accidents involving heavy lorries if we went for the heavier weights. In a rather frightening sentence, it suggested that the accidents would be "marginally more serious". The report did not brush aside the fact that accidents would be more serious. They would be more serious, but perhaps only "marginally" more so. This gives us pause for thought and the public the right to be concerned.
The public's concern has had an effect on me. I realised that I had touched a nerve in the electorate. There was widespread support for my hesitation to support the Government and for my resistance to the Government's measure. Other factors were at work as well. Quite apart from the Minister's rethinking in the past 12 months, and the other factors, are a whole series of initials that come across one's path, such as the CBI and the CIA. The latter stands for Chemical Industries Association, an industry in which I must declare an interest, and which did not neglect me. There is also the FTA, the RHA, the BRF and the SSMT.
In a nutshell, I was lobbied and lobbied heavily. They came to see me and I went to see them. I went to see the new lorries under manufacture, as I wanted to see that side of the coin and to see whether the new lorries would be safer and better constructed. I saw the provision for two-tier beds. I went to the motor show as well, having not been for years. I did not go to see the cars but to see the trucks and trailers. I have talked to drivers.
The hon. Member for Nuneaton is correct to remind us not to neglect the drivers, because they play an important part in the whole business of transport. There is a case for heavier lorries. The truck industry, as has already been mentioned, needs resuscitation as it is depressed. However, the restrictions and regulations for lorries still need strict and rigid enforcement. Sideguards, rearguards and anti-spray guards have all been promised. Better
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brakes, suspension to reduce the amount of throbbing and vibration, and quieter engines have all been mentioned. They are things that we must have.
We must ask the Government, if they get the measure through tonight, not to forget these cries for the other side of Armitage, which must be brought in. We need more effective checking and control, as has been said. I have done some checking of the weighbridges in Kent, and found two. I went to one, which was an axle weighing machine, which was quick and efficient. We should have hundreds more, but we have only about 200. We could have many more, and they are not difficult or expensive to install. We need all these things to ensure observance of the safety regulations. The Dykes Act must be enforced by local authorities.
Responsible men and women in the truck industries, manufacturers and hauliers, accept these points. Some have written to me to say how much they accept their responsibility towards others. They must learn, too, that if they get what they want tonight, they will have to live with the community. They cannot just ride away into the dusk and say how happy they are to have got the 38-tonne limit. They have a duty to live with the community and with society and to respect people in the way that they behave and observe these regulations.
We must have the right type of roads. The Secretary of State has done well to propose more and more bypasses. Our protest and resistance has had its effect on the Minister and on his colleagues. However, the Secretary of State must now deliver the goods. We often hear talk of the new motorways and bypasses. All too often, they could be castles in the air. I was dismayed to hear that in 1980, 36 bypasses had been taken out of the programme. I am not suggesting that this will happen, but I hope that my right hon. Friend knows that today, if the Government get this measure, we must have the roads that he has promised us and more, and they must not take years to appear.
I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State means well. He has been shaken by the feelings expressed to him from all over the country, but he must prove to us that he has the Chancellor right behind him with the bags of money necessary to implement his programme. The money must be there. The Department and the county councils must work to new types of priorities and get on with the job. This is particularly so in the South-East, which is the most neglected area of Britain for road development. The infrastructure in the South-East is ridiculous. Our road system in Kent is a disgrace. Getting out of London and down the Old Kent Road, through Deptford and across Blackheath to Falconwood and Welling, before one reaches a dual carriageway is a Victorian experience.
One goes down the A2 only to find that the motorway peters out 22 miles short of Dover and becomes an A road again. There is not a dual carriageway for the whole of its length. My constituents are not prepared to go on putting up with that.
However, the real problem is not the road to Dover, it is where the motorway ends 22 miles short of Dover. the road forks and the left hand fork goes to Thanet, Margate and Ramsgate—the second most important passenger port across the Channel after Dover, carrying much freight and passenger traffic and generating much traffic on the A299, the coast road. It is only 18 miles long and without doubt it is one one the most dangerous stretches of road in Britain. Multiple crashes are the order of the day. I know

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it backwards. I have lived on it for 17 years. Particularly at weekends and in the summer, death and injury are regular tragedies on that murderous road. I have told the Secretary of State about it and the Under-Secretary of State has—and I thank her for it—taken the trouble to come and see it for herself.
I know that the Department has prepared plans to make the road safer by turning it into a dual carriageway at a mere cost of £24 million for 18 miles. That is possible because there is little urban crowding on the road and masses of space to build another lane—not a motorway, just a dual carriageway, a trunk road. It is an easy conversion whch requires only the go-ahead from the Minister. I do not ask for it tomorrow or even next year, but I want a little hope tonight for my constituents. So far, the Minister has refused.
The Department seems to be prepared for the tragedies to continue, but I am not. I cannot live and watch the continuing tragedies of so many accidents on a road designed over 50 years ago when Britain's vehicle population was about 1½ millon. It is now over 20 million vehicles.
I have a duty to my constituents. This is not a minor road. It carries dense and dangerous traffic. However, the Department has hinted to me that it is neither dense nor dangerous enough to merit a dual carriageway. The irony is that that was not always the Department's view. In 1970 I went to the Department of the Environment to see a new young Minister and asked him for the modernisation of the A2 from the point 22 miles short of Dover. His officials turned to him and said that the A2 did not merit improvement because two thirds of the traffic took the other road—the Thanet Way to Ramsgate and Margate. I am glad to say that that Minister overruled his officials and told them to go back and think again. He is now the Secretary of State for the Environment. He has done very well. I ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport to do likewise now.
For my part, I will, as one of my hon. Friends has said tonight, make that dreadful step and give the Minister the benefit of the doubt. I shall cross from resistance to support him and the Government tonight. He has come a long way in the past 12 months with his bypasses and his regulations and I shall not lie down in front of his juggernaut any more. However, I must ask him to remember my constituents because they are expecting him to help them in return by agreeing to make the Thanet Way a safer road as a dual carriageway.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Ernest Armstrong): I make a further appeal for brevity! Without it several hon. Members who have a strong interest in the debate will be disappointed.
7.32 pm
Mr. Alexander W. Lyon: I share with the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch) the honour of representing one of the two provincial centres of the Church of England. I also share with him a deep hostility to the proposal to increase lorry weights, partly because of the nature of the constituencies that we represent.
The only difference between me and the hon. Gentleman is that my hostility remains implacable and his has been dissipated by the appearance of the Under-Secretary of State to look at the problems in his constituency, though she did nothing about them. That is
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too light a price to pay for his vote. It may well be that he will be a little surprised at the reaction that will follow in his constituency when it is recognised that he has sold his birthright for such a small mess of pottage.
The case against the Government's proposal was made effectively by my right hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth). The proposal does not hold water. It cannot be suggested that a proposal to increase either the size or the weight of lorries in the past has ultimately led to a reduction in lorry traffic. It is true that there has been some slight reduction in recent years because of the reduced growth in the economy. However, one day there will be a Labour Government—next year I expect—and there will be an increase in economic growth. When that happens, it is inevitable that there will also be an increase not only in general lorry traffic but in the supply of baked beans to Sainsbury's.
The right hon. Gentleman seems to have forgotten that when people have more money in their pockets they also spend more on food. Indeed, they spend more money on all kinds of things. If there is a growing economy, there will also be the need to carry more freight. I would prefer that to be carried by the railways. The Secretary of State, who said that he shares that ambition, would do better to raise the cash limit on British Rail to allow it to invest more in the provision of freight traffic.
As has been suggested, new schemes are being proposed with the use of a specially designed tipper lorry on British Rail which will allow it to compete more effectively below the 200 mile mark, which is where its competitive effectiveness now ends. In doing so, it will be able to carry a good deal more freight than is now carried by lorries.
Nevertheless, I anticipate that the growth of lorry traffic will continue. It will not be reduced simply by allowing lorries to carry greater weights on the proposed axle limits. Therefore, that strand of the argument does not carry any weight.
The Armitage report was originally promoted on the basis that we had to achieve uniformity with the standards required in the Common Market. That no longer carries any weight because we will not allow 44 tonne lorries, only 38 tonne lorries.
In recent months, because of the lack of jobs in the West Midlands, we have heard a great deal about the idea which the Minister spoke about with such passion. It had not occurred to anyone previously, but it is now thought that if we change the nature of the lorry there may be more orders for the West Midlands lorry manufacturers.
If that were true, it might be desirable. However, there is no sign that the British lorry industry is competitive enough to deal with the competition from some of the Swedish and German manufacturers. When British Leyland brought out a lorry only two or three years ago, it was heralded as a great breakthrough, but it did not do very well in competition with Volvo or any of its major German competitors. I do not believe that it will now. If lorry weights were to remain at 32 tons there would still be the possibility of selling more lorries if activity revived and people were able to invest. That case is not made out, and I do not need to stress my reasons for that because they have been made in other speeches.
I want to address myself for a few moments to the problems of my constituency because it is relevant to the general issues that arise. I represent one of the great cities of Europe in which the lorry is becoming an increasing

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plague upon the residents and a considerable danger to the conservation of one of the most beautiful cities in Britain. If that danger is to be eliminated, it must be by controlling the use of lorries, particularly their size and weight.
When people say, as the Minister said to almost every hon. Member who interrupted him, "Don't worry about it, boys, we shall provide a bypass", I must point out that York has a bypass. In 1966, when I became a Member, my first move was to go to the then Minister of Transport to tell him that I wanted a bypass. The York bypass was built in 1972. I was grateful for it, but it went only halfway round the city. I still need a bypass for the north side of the city to get rid of the A19 traffic. The southern part of the bypass removed a substantial number of lorries but only 20 per cent. of lorry traffic inside the city. The rest of the lorry traffic was internally generated or was delivering to destinations within the city.
When we have 38 tonne lorries, they will travel along the bypass until they come to the nearest access road. They will then enter the city and travel past my constituents' houses as they proceed to deliver at the place where they make the Yorkie bar, or whichever bar the lorry driver eats. These lorries may deliver to National Glass, which has recently decided that no longer wants its sand to be transported by British Rail. Apparently, it will have it transported by large lorries. I suppose that this will mean that 38 tonne lorries will be travelling past my constituents' houses.
How am I to tell my constituents that all will be well when the northern section of the bypass is built? It will take only a small amount of the total traffic. I still want the northern section, so I do not want the Minister to cancel the project. I cannot pretend to my constituents that that bypass will solve the problem. Therefore, I do not accept the suggestion that we can overcome the problems of heavier lorries by building more bypasses. Bypasses help in some circumstances—for example, villages where there is not internally generated traffic—but they do not help much in a city such as York.
Mr. Dykes rose—
Mr. Lyon: We tried to use the hon. Gentleman's Act—the Dykes Act—to overcome some of the problems before the building of the northern section of the bypass. The traffic that is generated in the Teesside area travels down to Hull. When I visited the Minister of Transport in 1967 the official told me, "You cannot have a bypass that encircles the city. It will not matter about the northern section because the traffic from Middlesbrough to Hull will go down the A1 and along the M62, when we build the M62. We shall do that anyway, so do not worry about that." Therefore, like a silly little man—I was naive about such matters in those days, but I have become a good deal more cynical since—I believed him. My hon. Friend the Member for Westhoughton (Mr. Stott) is right to guffaw. I should never have believed him.
When the M62 was built, the lorry drivers came down the A19 through my constituency and out of it on an inadequate road to Hull. They did so because they wanted to cut time. That was in their interests and in the owners' interests. The owners did not want their drivers to use the M62 because that meant spending a few more pounds on the cost of transportation.
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We in York tried to do something about that. We tried to use the Dykes Act. We tried to stop access for through lorries anywhere within the area of the A19 from Middlesbrough, the A1 and the M62. We proposed the largest lorry-free area in Britain, so we were told. The North Yorkshire county engineer was implacably opposed to it—and when he said "implacably" he meant it. He did his best to stop us, but the citizens of York applied pressure. We even had Conservative councillors saying that lorries should not come through the city. In the end North Yorkshire established a committee, which finally acceded to my constituents' request. It was proposed that we should have a lorry-free area.
What happened? The county engineer contacted his mates in West Yorkshire and Humberside. Those two organisations, which had no reason to be interested in the lorries running down the Al, suddenly started making pretentious noises about how it would not do to have the lorry-free area that we proposed. The Minister was also got at. He was told that if lorries were taken off the A19 it would have to be de-trunked, whatever that means.
At that stage the lorry drivers entered the controversy. They were much more forceful than anyone else. When they started telling Conservative councillors in North Yorkshire that it would cost a bob or two to use the Al and the M62, they did not like it. As a result, the scheme was stopped. That was democracy in action. Those who suffered most from lorry noise and those who would have had to pay the extra cost if it had arisen—they were prepared to pay it—were frustrated in their efforts. In the end, there was an inbuilt group of resistance composed of the county engineer and the freight operators. That group ensured that they did not get their way.
Mr. Dykes: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way after his fascinating description of the York scheme. Paragraph 227 of the Armitage report states:
"There is a great deal of local restriction on lorries under the Dykes Act and other powers. It would be easy to underestimate the large number and variety of such restrictions."
Much depends on how determined a local authority is to serve the interests of the local population. However, the main purpose of my intervention is to ask the hon. Gentleman whether he agrees that if hauliers, the haulage industry, the operators and the own-account operators are to get the enormous benefit that will flow from an increase in weights, notwithstanding other restrictions on dimensions, they must accept the overwhelming requirement of much more transshipment and restrictions on access?
Mr. Lyon: In theory that must be right, but in practice that will not be the result. In practice the lorry owners will continue to say, "In these economic conditions we must cut every cost if possible. If there is a way of getting freight between A and B more directly, that is the route that we want to take." They will continue to apply pressure. The hon. Gentleman should not be as naive as I was in thinking that the owners will see the sense of his argument. We must determine whether we shall impose the obligation that he has posed on the owners.
Those of us who are opposed to the regulations, if we are successful in stopping the introduction of larger lorries, might add to the unit costs of transportation. Perhaps we shall lose some jobs, but I doubt whether that will happen. What does society want? What is it that we are after? We could probably provide a few more jobs if we increased

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prostitution or if we started making more bombs to be blown up somewhere else. There are so many objectives that can be espoused if the aim is to increase jobs or profit. However, most of our constituents do not want a society that relies so heavily upon large juggernauts. Surely we want to provide a quality of life for them on the understanding that they may be willing to pay a little more to have it. We should provide a quality of life for them that they will enjoy. That is the balance that must be struck.
There is a balance to be struck between the environment in which we live and the advantages that we can give to the economy of freight operators by introducing heavier lorries. I believe that that balance weighs heavily in favour of retaining the present quality of the environment. We should not exceed the present limit of 32·5 tonnes by one tonne.
7.49 pm
Mr. Michael McNair-Wilson: I agree with the final comment of the hon. Member for York (Mr. Lyon), but I disagree with his suggestion that the Secretary of State for Transport in the Labour Government established the Armitage inquiry purely because of Britain's membership of the EC. In fact, the then Secretary of State for Transport was under pressure to consider the introduction of heavier lorries. Rather than make a decision himself, he set up a committee to tell him what he should do. He left a very unattractive nettle for someone to grasp. I congratulate my right hon. Friend on grasping that nettle in the way he has and on finding a compromise between protecting people and the environment from over much intrusion by heavy lorries while giving industry and commerce the benefit of larger and more economic vehicles, which, in turn will enable them to be more competitive.
No hon. Member really doubts that the increase in the weight limit from 32½ tonnes to 38 tonnes, provided the heavier lorries run on five axles and thus do not do more damage to our roads, will mean other than that operators possessing those vehicles will be able to reduce their transport costs and compete on a more equal footing with their Continental competitors.
Mr. Alexander W. Lyon rose—
Mr. McNair-Wilson: I will not give way. So many other hon. Members wish to speak that to do so would be grossly unfair to them.
Our decision to introduce the regulations—I believe that there will be such a decision later tonight—will help a wide spectrum of industry and the retail trade to hold down transport costs, with benefits for everyone, not least the housewife.
As an agricultural merchant in my constituency wrote to me:

"If Parliament wishes to have a more efficient transportation system, then the arguments which are geared to heavier and not larger lorries must be listened to. The increasing of weight will save this Company"—
the company is called H. Dolton & Son Ltd.—
"many thousands of pounds … The saving in our energy costs would be towards 10 per cent.… This saving would be passed on to the customer so benefiting them in the end, and making us more competitive with the competition of other Common Market Countries."
The issue of competitiveness has been raised by the General Council of British Shipping. It makes the simple point that companies handling containers, exporters and
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container operators will now find that, as a result of these heavier vehicles, they will be enabled to load their containers closer to the maximum weight of 30·5 tonnes, which a standard 40 ft container can carry, whereas at present they are limited to only 22 tonnes. They will be competing on a much fairer basis with their Continental rivals.
It has already been said that the decision to allow heavier weights on five-axle vehicles must mean a boost for the sale of heavier commercial vehicles. None of us can doubt that that will be good news for our lorry manufacturers, who have seen a fall of about 65 per cent. in sales of heavy goods vehicles between 1979 and 1981.
I welcome the proposed improvements in safety standards—the sideguards, the rear under-run guards, the new braking standards and the investigation into spray suppression. Like so many other hon. Members, I too, have been blinded by the spray from a heavy lorry on the M4 in wet weather. All hon. Members will agree that to pass a lorry in those circumstances is to take one's life into one's hands. I welcome the fact that the lorries will be so marginally larger that we will not, in fact, notice that difference. As has been pointed out, the difference lies in the tractor of the articulated vehicle.
I welcome the reduction in lorry noise. However, I hope my right hon. Friend will forgive me if I remind him that in the Wilson report on noise of July 1963—nearly 20 years ago—Sir Alan Wilson proposed that motor cycle noise should not exceed 90 decibels at the A rating and other vehicles, including lorries, 85 decibels at the A rating. Now, 20 years later, we are not even getting down to the proposals in Sir Alan Wilson's report of 1963. I welcome the noise improvement in the regulations but I beg my right hon. Friend to press the industry to go faster in the direction of quieter vehicles.
Whether we were arguing about increasing the weights of the vehicles which we will allow on our roads or whether we were simply arguing that we should maintain the status quo, as so many Opposition Members have contended, heavy lorries are generally unpopular and the regulations will not change that. One of the reasons for that unpopularity is that heavy lorries have to use roads that are wholly inadequate for them. That state of affairs will remain for many years to come, despite the higher priority for bypass schemes.
I wish I could say tonight that the solution to that problem lies in attracting more freight on to the railways. As one who wanted to see the freightliners run by British Rail rather than by the National Freight Corporation, I do not have to defend my argument when I say that I no longer believe that that option is really available to this nation. I want to see as much traffic as possible travel on the railways but to believe that the railways can take back what they have lost to road transport is to wish for the moon. That moment is not going to come and I do not believe that British Rail believes it will come.
A moment ago I referred to the higher priority now being given to bypass schemes. I make no apology for referring to the proposed Newbury bypass. We want that bypass and we want it now, but we have been told that we must wait until 1986 before we will have it. In the meantime, we want to feel that the Department of Transport is sufficiently aware of the problems in and around Newbury. We are not conviced by its consultation document that it is as conscious as we would wish of the

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growth to the east of Newbury around the town of Thatcham. It is expanding not only in population but industrially.
I cannot in any way be other than delighted that in my constituency we are building something to be called the Royal Berkshire industrial centre. We have many claims for factory space on it, but it will generate a great deal of traffic, as will the new population in Thatcham. For the Department to tell us that the eastern route, which it might have considered has been ruled out without giving us in West Berkshire the opportunity to discuss that proposal, makes us feel that the Department is not as sensitive to the needs of West Berkshire and the problems in and around Newbury as it should be. If my right hon. Friend ever chooses to come to Newbury at peak hours he will be amazed by how heavy is the congestion on the A34. Something must be done about that and soon.
If I am worrying about the proposed new bypass, may I also tell my right hon. Friend that just north of Newbury, on the A34 at Gore Hill, he will find an even worse traffic problem. The A34 suddenly changes from a dual carriageway into a single carriageway although his Department, in its document about the Newbury bypass, described the A34 as forming
"part of the key route between the industrial Midlands and the South Coast including the important ports of Southampton and Portsmouth."
If the Department means what it says it cannot continue to leave the Gore Hill stretch of the A34 in its present state. I hope that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State will be able to give us in West Berkshire some hope that a road improvement plan will be introduced in the near future.
As I have said, if we imagine that our trunk road network is now adequate, except for the villages and towns that have not yet been bypassed but are to be bypassed in the future, we deceive ourselves. Many hon. Members have referred to the need to examine our whole road network. In saying that Britain does not yet possess a strategic network of roads, I believe that I say no more than the truth.
The British Road Federation estimates that £5,000 million needs to be spent on trunk roads alone to provide the roads needed for economic recovery. We all know that in the six years since 1976 overall expenditure on roads decreased by 30 per cent. and road construction by 40 per cent. Local authority expenditure also declined, although traffic increased. In the financial years 1982–83 and 1983–84 the Department is spending an extra 11 per cent. in England, but is that enough? The Government wish to encourage capital expenditure to improve the nation's assets and to help employment, so where better than on the roads?
I am sure that my right hon. Friend has seen the study by Cambridge Econometrics which suggests that an increase of £500 million in civil works such as road, water and sewerage works would produce 40,000 jobs in construction and 20,000 in the construction supply industry. Those jobs could be achieved at a cost of £2,300 each, compared with the £3,100 for a job through equivalent spending on employment subsidies, or £5,000 for an unemployed person.
My right hon. Friend has the opportunity to set in hand a new spending programme on the roads which would
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create new jobs and new national assets at a time when contractors' prices are both competitive and unexpectedly low. That network of roads would relieve many of our people of the environmental disadvantages of heavy lorries while providing our transport industry with the means to be really efficient and economic.
8.2 pm
Mr. John Home Robertson: The House has been taken on an interesting excursion into the highways and byways mainly of the South and South-East of England and I have been struck by the enormous difference between circumstances on the roads in the South of England and those with which I am familiar in Scotland.
The Scottish motorway network, such as it is, is completely detached from that of the rest of the United Kingdom. Heavy lorries must therefore pass through constituencies such as my own if they are involved in commerce between what is left of the industrial area of Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom.
In 1979, the people of Scotland voted to set up a Scottish Assembly to be responsible for subjects currently devolved to the Scottish Office. From the point of view of my constituents and others suffering from road haulage related problems in Scotland, it would be far more constructive if the debate on these matters in relation to Scotland could have taken place in a Scottish Assembly in Edinburgh. Incidentally, I wonder where the Scottish Office Minister with responsibility for roads and the environment is today. He has not been present for any part of the debate.
We have heard some emotive speeches, particularly from Conservative Members. The hon. Member for Harrogate (Mr. Banks) talked about juggernauts going through sleepy villages. Before I became a Member of Parliament, I used to drive a lorry. I do not know whether I am the only hon. Member who still holds a current heavy goods vehicle driving licence, but I assure the Minister that I never went looking for villages to drive through. I tried to get to the nearest trunk road and to stay on it until I was as near as possible to my destination. It is a pity that lorries and lorry drivers have been portrayed as such bogies by some hon. Members.
Having said, that, however, I believe that there must be effective designation of lorry routes. There is certainly confusion about the suitability of some roads, especially when drivers are unfamiliar with the area. Only three weeks ago, close to my home, a driver who was a stranger to the area drove a fully-laden 32-tonner over a bridge with a weight restriction of five tons. Miraculously, he got over the bridge and the bridge is still standing, but the lorry finished up in a neighbour's garden because the driver failed to negotiate a corner. Clearly, that road was not suitable for that kind of vehicle, but the driver concerned was unaware of the fact. I am sure that the situation would be improved by better signposting and the provision of better maps for drivers and haulage managers.
Clearly, a larger and better trunk road network is needed throughout the United Kingdom. I am perhaps more familiar with the problems than many hon. Members as my constituency contains a 55-mile stretch of the A1. To the credit of successive Governments, a number of bypasses have been or are being constructed on that road so that virtually all the communities in my constituency will have been bypassed within three or four years.

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Nevertheless, the road is still painfully inadequate. In the whole of that massive constituency of two former counties, there are only two miles of dual carriageway and there is no satisfactory east-west road.
The House will appreciate that such a long stretch of single carriageway is severely congested with heavy lorries, especially as a result of construction work for the Torness power station. Many hon. Members have referred to the need to transfer loads from road to rail. The Torness power station will involve the transport of nuclear waste and fuel within a few years, and its construction phase involves moving a massive amount of aggregate, cement and engineering materials. The power station site is within a few hundred yards of the east coast main railway line, but despite representations by many people during the planning process, all those materials have been going in by road, and none by rail.
Mr. James Hamilton: I know a certain amount about the Torness power station project. Some of the components must travel by road because they are too large to be transported by rail.
Mr. Home Robertson: My hon. Friend's point it partly relevant, although a significant number of the large components to which he refers are coming by sea. I was referring to the transport of gravel, cement and similar materials.
My constituency is a typical rural area. Its industries include quarrying, agriculture, fishing, forestry, saw mills and paper manufacture, all of which produce relatively bulky and comparatively low value products and all of which are now facing severe difficulties. They depend on road transport. Most of those commodities would certainly be more conveniently handled by rail, but that point is academic. There is no railway station in the Borders region of Scotland. Five former counties, including the entire constituency of the right hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. Steel), and Berwickshire in my constituency have no railway station. Although that argument may have been valid at one time and although I agree that it would have been better had those industries been served by rail, it is no longer possible because successive Governments have closed the railway lines. We are left entirely dependent on road transport.
I accept that lorries are not objects of great beauty, but they are vital to the economy of rural Scotland. Heavier, 38-tonne gross lorries will be even less beautiful. We all accept that, but we have the wretched things on the roads already, for the most part running underloaded. As they are underloaded, many of them are running uneconomically. There are more potential 38-tonne gross lorries on the road than there need be because they are running at only 32 tonnes gross. That problem has led to more congestion on the roads, certainly in my constituency, and probably every bit as much wear and tear on the roads as if the lorries were fully loaded at 38 tonnes gross.
I wish to protect lorry drivers' jobs and I am also desperately concerned about the economy of rural Scotland, which must depend on economic road haulage. Remoteness makes transport costs much more significant to industries in Scotland than in most other parts of the United Kingdom. I fear that heavier lorries may be necessary to prevent Scotland's rural economy from dying. That is why I have serious misgivings about the amendment tabled by some of my right hon. and hon.
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Friends. I do not trust this Government to keep their undertakings on the environmental protection of the country, and I shall certainly not vote with them, because I should not wish to give them a free hand in any respect. However, when my hon. Friend the Member for Westhoughton (Mr. Stott) replies, he will be speaking to at least one floating voter on the Opposition Benches.
8.11 pm
Mr. Anthony Nelson: It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Home Robertson). I did not expect to hear defectors or potential rebels among the Opposition on this occasion, but the hon. Gentleman spoke with vigour and sincerity about his constituents' interests. He spoke with logical persuasion about the case for making greater use of lorries that can carry heavy loads. Like him, I represent a constituency with a large rural area and I suspect that many of our constituency problems are similar.
From that starting point of representing a rural constituency, I address myself to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. If there is one issue on which my constituents are united and on which they feel most strongly, it is their opposition to heavier lorries. I have several times, both in the House and in public, expressed my deep anxiety and reservations over the proposals in the Armitage report about heavier lorries and, more recently, in the Government's response to that report, which was substantially to increase lorry weights. Like so many of my hon. Friends, I have had many representations from constituents. A variety of amenity groups in my constituency represent ancient and historic towns such as Midhurst and Petworth, and bodies such as the Chichester Society seek to maintain the fabric and preserve the architectural heritage of my constituency's main city, Chichester. Chichester has many of the characteristics described by the hon. Member for York (Mr. Lyon) and my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch). Those lobby groups, environmental groups and amenity societies have not been slow to bring to my attention their grave anxiety about the effect of heavier lorries on the environment. Many constituents who live in villages and who feel beleaguered because of the effect of those large lorries on the quality of their lives have written to me. The most fearsome group—the group that no Member of Parliament can afford to ignore—and the one that has been most vociferous in its representations is the Women's Institute. We ignore the views of the Women's Institute at our peril. All the branches in my constituency were united in condemning the initial proposals for heavier weights.
There is a major problem with credibility. The Government have tried, rightly, to base their judgment and proposals on a careful analysis of the Armitage report. They have brought forward proposals designed to increase the efficiency of the transport industry, which they hope will regenerate industrial growth. Yet, however much one tries to persuade people that heavier lorries will mean fewer lorries, one is not believed because of what happened in the past. The tables in the Armitage report show that the heavier categories of lorries have increased year by year.
All other things being equal, it is undeniable that if the maximum weights of lorries are increased there should be fewer lorry movements. But other things are not always equal, and the lorry movements on our roads are much more a function of economic activity and the network of

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retail distribution than of lorry weight loads. In the past, the Government and reports such as Armitage have been wrong to state definitively that heavier lorries will mean fewer lorries. It does not necessarily mean that, and it would be much better, when one is trying to persuade the public that the weights are acceptable, if those who propose the change would come clean on that matter.
We have heard and read many times that the changes will not mean an increase in the size of heavy lorries. However, they do, and I do not regard 1½ ft extra as inconsiderable. Many of those who examine the total length of vehicles will feel that they are larger. If one sees the length of vehicles trying to negotiate narrow streets and corners in towns such as Petworth in my constituency, one can readily understand that people will notice the extra length.
Lorries already form a visible blot on the environment. They are disproportionate to the architecture of the towns through which they pass and many of the communities that they serve commercially. That difference in size is objectionable to many and it affects their assessment of their quality of life. I was an overt critic of the Armitage proposals and the Government's response to them, but, like my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury, I must recognise that the Government have responded to the concern expressed by me and many other hon. Members. It would be churlish of us not to recognise that now.
Many hon. Members were worried about the Government's initial response, which seemed to suggest that an increase in four-axle vehicles to 34 tonnes and of five-axle vehicles to 40 tonnes would be acceptable without having a major detrimental impact on the environment. However, many of us continued to stress to the Government that the proposal would be unacceptable politically in areas such as the one that I represent. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Sectretary of State, who has had a difficult job during the past year, for the way in which he responded to the views expressed on the matter. His proposal is that there will be no increase in the weight of four-axle vehicles and that the maximum weight will now be 38 tonnes, instead of 40 tonnes, as was proposed previously and the 44 tonnes proposed by Armitage. That is real progress. We know that in politics one must strike a balance, so a concession will be necessary from those of us who wish to give the Government the benefit of the doubt.
My remarks have little to do with the fact that some weeks ago the Government announced an important new bypass in my constituency, because I have pressed for a change for some time. The residents of Westhampnet were delighted by the news.
I say to my hon. Friends who may still be questioning which way they should vote, although I suspect that there are few present now, that I believe that what has been proposed is the best deal that we shall get. Therefore, we should accept it. I say that because we now have a firm assurance from my right hon. Friend that this is the last time that the Government will propose increases in lorry weights. When I asked him specifically whether the Government would use their veto and influence to prevent the European Council from moving from a draft directive to a mandatory directive for the member States on this issue, he gave the House a full reassurance.
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There is a real danger that if we do not accept these proposals, although the Government, have made major concessions to those of us who were concerned about the original heavy lorry weights, this or a future Government will return to the House with a proposal for higher lorry weights. Therefore, while the going is good we should accept the deal that has been offered.
The package that has been presented is genuine and marks a victory for those who have campaigned strenuously, whether inside or outside the House. We have nothing to be ashamed of tonight if we support the Government's proposals.
We cannot ignore the fact that we live and trade within Europe and that the measure has beneficial implications for industry and commerce, particularly vehicle manufacturers. However, like some of my hon. Friends who have spoken in the debate, I reiterate the strength of feeling that the Government must follow through on the environmental aspects of the package. We do not simply want the heavier weights to be agreed tonight and to find thereafter that many other aspects, such as spray suppression, changes to lorries and improvements in the roads programme, are forgotten or delayed. Those are vital aspects of the issue and the only means by which we shall be able to deliver the issue in our constituencies.
With regard to the road building programme, I, like others, welcome the Government's commitment and the high priority that they give to improving bypasses in many of the towns that are worst affected. However, I believe that there is and could have been a possibility of higher public expenditure on the capital roadworks programme. The "Roads for England 1982" paper states that the cash allocation for the current financial year for new construction and improvement is £522 million. I believe that I am right in saying that that is a reduction on the allocation in the White Paper
"Policy for Roads: England 1981"
which stated that the actual expenditure would be about £15 million higher.
We are told in the autumn statement that there is to be no change in the expenditure White Paper proposals for the roads programme next year and that that will enable the momentum of the present roads programme to be continued. However, given the lower than expected outturn for the public sector borrowing requirement and the prospects of falling inflation and more expenditure flexibility next year, it would be worth while to consider the prospect, and for the Secretary of State to argue the case with the Treasury, of increasing the size of the roads programme and bringing forward many of the schemes that will radically alleviate the problems of heavier vehicles and increasing traffic in many of our towns and cities.
Mr. David Howell: I am listening closely to my hon. Friend's speech, which contains much wisdom. I am grateful for some of the things that he has said. With regard to the road building programme, one of the reasons why the volume of roads being built is increasing is that the taxpayers' pound is buying more road, that is to say that the bids are coming in cheaper, so more roads can be built for the same amount of money. My hon. Friend may like to know that since the Armitage report, we have added bypasses to the trunk road programme to the value of £200 million and approved transport grants of £245 million for local bypasses. I hope to approve an extra £154 million for

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1983–84. That is big money. As I said in an earlier intervention, there has been a substantial real increase in trunk road expenditure since the Government came to office. I said in that intervention that it was 19 per cent. I should have said 17 per cent. That is the considerable real increase since we came to office.
Mr. Nelson: I am much obliged to my right hon. Friend. I would not wish to hold back from paying a tribute to the way in which he has been able to maintain an increase in the roads programme during the Government's period of office.
That is effective expenditure in terms of alleviating the level of unemployment and gearing up recovery in other sectors of the economy. In considering any future flexibility that he might be able to negotiate with the Treasury, my right hon. Friend should remember that there is more that can and should be done. If we are to sell the package of heavier lorry weights in our constituencies it will be helpful to reiterate the good news that my right hon. Friend has given us on public expenditure and bringing forward the roads programme. However, many of us feel that still more could be done.
I give a slightly guarded but, for the first time, sincere, welcome to the Government's proposals, which I shall support.
Several Hon. Members rose—
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Ernest Armstrong): Order. The Opposition Front Bench spokesman is hoping to catch my eye at 9 o'clock, so extreme brevity is required if many hon. Members are not to be disappointed.
8.27 pm
Mr. Frank Hooley: There has been a great deal of ambivalence in many of the speeches of Conservative Members. Many hon. Members are extremely uneasy and alarmed about the proposals that we are debating but have decided, for various reasons, that they had better support the Government.
It is ironic that in this day and age, when there is more concern about ecology, conservation and the environment than ever before, the pressure for heavier vehicles should not have been resisted by the Government. The Government might take note of the fact that the ecology movement in one important West European country has now become so powerful that the Green Party and its proponents may hold the balance of power in the West German Bundestag at the next election.
I warn Conservative Members and one or two Opposition Members that if they think that they can dismiss the conservation and ecology lobbies and simply back up the commercial pressures for heavier vehicles, with all the farrago of excuses that are brought forward to defend that, they had better look out electorally as there is a significant electoral kick in this issue.
There have been many comparisons with Europe. Three things must be said. The first is that public subventions to the railway networks in European countries are much greater than the subventions that we give to our railway system. The railways are a more effective means of shifting passengers and freight in Europe than they are in this country. We have grossly neglected the British Waterways for 50 years. Virtually the only significant waterway scheme that has been adopted, certainly since the war, is the South Yorkshire navigation. It took 10 years
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of blood, sweat and argument to get a fiddling amount of money out of the Government for that scheme. Indeed, I believe that we eventually had to get some of the money from Brussels to get it going. That is a significant difference between Britain and the European scene.
There has been much argument about the number of lorries that will be involved. When we are discussing road transport, we cannot just take lorries out as if they run on their own. We must consider the total number of vehicles on the roads and the effect that much heavier, longer and more dangerous vehicles will have on the other 14 million or so people who drive private cars and on the increasing number of people who try to ride bicycles and get not much help from lorry drivers when they do. Merely saying that there wil be a diminution in the number of lorries because there will be heavier lorries is no answer to the traffic problem.
I suggest, subject to verification, that we have the most dense traffic per mile of any industrial country. There may be one or two exceptions, but the density of traffic in Britain is extremely high on vehicle per mile of road calculations. In the light of that, we must carefully examine the proposals for the more dangerous, heavier and bulkier vehicles that are proposed.
Axle loading is, perhaps, the nub of the argument. It is a subject on which there has been much technical whitewashing by the proponents of heavier lorries. It may be that when the vehicle is standing still or moving at an even pace on trunk road, the axle loading over the five axles may produce less damage, or no more damage or pressure on the road surface than the lower weighted lorry. But lorries do not always do that. They stop, start, start on steep hills, go round roundabouts and go round corners. The fact remains that the thrust on the driving wheel to shift the inertia of 38 tonnes has to be greater by any standard than the thrust on a driving wheel that shifts 32 tons.
I do not know the engineering equations which are essential if one wants to work it out, but I should have thought that it was a matter of common sense that if one puts a thrust on a driving wheel, irrespective of how many other wheels there are, to shift an inertia of 38 tonnes, the impact on the surface of the road, however good it is, will be considerably more formidable than the impact of shifting a lower load. I am not an engineer and I do not know the relevant equations, but one cannot say that by spreading the load over five axles the problem has been solved. The problem of changing direction and speed, of stopping and starting, hauling up steep inclines and carrying out the manoeuvres that must be made every day is not solved.
Mr. Spearing: My hon. Friend will be interested to know that his surmise is correct. I once witnessed a heavy lorry starting off from a set of traffic lights. The driver let in the clutch in such a way that the front two wheels left the ground and the notional axle weight on the leading pair of wheels was transferred wholly to the drive.
Mr. Hooley: I am sure that that happens. There is also the assumption that the load will be even in all cases. I strongly doubt whether all lorries are so carefully and prudently loaded that the weight is evenly spread over the five axles.
There is no way in which the Secretary of State can pretend that a vehicle that is several tonnes heavier when

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it is starting, stopping, manoeuvring, backing, going round roundabouts and the rest will do less or no more damage to the road surface than a lorry that is several tonnes lighter.
I shall now deal with checking and controls. The Association of Metropolitan Authorities has said categorically that the existing laws on loading are widely flouted. It claims that in so far as checks have been made—the number is minuscule when compared with the number of vehicles and the mileage that is covered—25 per cent. of the lorries that were checked were overloaded. What evidence does the Secretary of State have, therefore, that all his controls and safeguards will work?
I read an interesting article in the New Scientist a little while ago. I am sorry that I do not have a copy with me. Speaking from memory, I am sure that it said that there is now a code call between lorry drivers—I think that they call it "Mermaid"—whereby lorry drivers can warn each other on their short-wave radios of checkpoints. They then pull in for a rest or take a different road to ensure that they are not embarrassed by the checks. Perhaps that is folklore. I do not know. Such things do not seem unlikely. That is an additional factor in the problem of controls and checks to see whether the laws are being obeyed.
Many hon. Members have mentioned bypasses. I have every sympathy with them. Those such as my hon. Friend the Member for York (Mr. Lyon) and the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch) and all those who represent areas in which there are villages and country towns—of which I am very fond—want bypasses so that heavy lorries do not crash through their residential areas. I have every sympathy with them. However, it is impossible to bypass the West Midlands, South Lancashire or Greater London. Where does the Secretary of State think that the lorries go to?
I accept that lorries do not need to go through villages. On occasion, they may not need to go into the centre of York or Canterbury, but, by gum they must go into Birmingham, Sheffield, Liverpool, Manchester and the East End. That means that they will pass buildings and dwellings that will be affected by vibration, noise and all the problems associated with heavy lorries. Most hon. Members candidly admitted that people dislike heavy lorries. They damage the environment and are unsightly. I am not arguing that we can do without them, because they are necessary. I wonder whether the Secretary of State has found out what restrictions apply on the Continent in relation to night-time and weekend bans, or controls on the use of certain roads. I wonder whether we are using all the techniques for bringing such matters under control that are deployed in other countries. It would be interesting to know whether our controls are as strict, effective and thorough as those employed elsewhere.
Noise and vibration are fundamental problems. Much work has been done on noise, and I read recently that the Germans claim a breakthrough in the design of one of their heavy vehicles. They say that it is substantially quieter than anything else in the world. I have no means of checking that claim, but, if it is true, it is serious for the British lorry industry. If the Germans have produced a heavy vehicle that is substantially quieter than the British product, talk of legislation giving an open sesame to the
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British vehicle building industry could go by the board. We need to know whether the British heavy vehicle manufacturers have had any success about noise.
The Armitage report admits that more research into the effects of vibration is necessary. Vibration is a formidable problem and it will increase with heavier vehicles. I should like to know what the story is. The answer to that is crucial in assessing the damage that will be done to urban areas by lorries. There have been arguments about bridges. The Association of County Councils, which has looked into the issue, claims that at least £100 million additional expenditure would be needed to strengthen bridges. No official assessment has been made about the effects of such vehicles on thin-skinned roads.
We all assume that the lorries will run on motorways and trunk roads, but they will not do so exclusively. They will run on some of our minor roads. What research has been done into the potential damage? More seriously, the Armitage report categorically states:
"Little is known about the effects of lorries on underground pipes and it is difficult to say precisely what would be the effects of heavier lorries in urban areas."
What technical discussions have been held with the gas board, the water authorities and those responsible for sewerage conduits about the impact of heavier vehicles—vibration and weight—on those essential services nearly all of which are buried? Gas and water pipes are extremely important, and I understand that there is a considerable loss of water from fractured water pipes. Fractured gas pipes would be far worse.
I listened carefully to the Secretary of State, but I do not recall that he said anything about consultations with the gas board and water authorities about the effect of those vehicles on the service mains that lie under the roads of our major conurbations. We should be told the results of any studies that there have been.
The White Paper says nothing about damage caused by heavy lorries which stray off the road and may hit or scrape buildings close to the road. That can sometimes cause serious damage and occasionally loss of life. I understand that there are no official records of those incidents. An increase in lorry weights would obviously increase the potential damage to other buildings.
Bypasses do not solve the problem. Lorries do not spend their lives on them. They go into major conurbations to unload. There are few places where factories or steelworks are so neatly and separately sited that lorries do not have to pass people's homes, schools and hospitals. Whatever one does, such vehicles will cause a major environmental impact.
The White Paper is equally silent about how much the community has to spend each year on repairs to street furniture, paving and so on, damaged by the road haulage industry. We are trying to tackle a complex environmental problem with this order, but by no means all the problems have been thoroughly examined.
The Armitage report admits that no technical solution can be found to vibration and damage to underground pipes. I believe that the simplistic argument, that merely by having extra axles the problem is solved, is nonsense. Another problem is created. Three rear axles cannot be articulated. They are rigid. When a vehicle has to turn a corner or roundabout there is a scraping effect on the road surface which is increased by an extra axle and wheels. The suggestion that five axles will solve the problem is simply untrue.

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My hon. Friend the Member for York (Mr. Lyon) suggested that there was a conflict that must be sorted out between the economy and jobs and the environment. To some extent that might be true. If there is such a conflict our failure to resolve it is the result of sloppy thinking or bowing to vested interests. I believe that one could get greater efficiency in the transport system, and probably far more jobs, if the capital that is to be ploughed into making heavier and heavier vehicles was, first, put into the moderisation of the railway system, its sidings and stock and, secondly, put into improving and modernising our waterways which were once almost universally famous. There are possibilities for shifting heavy quantities of goods by the cheapest means of transport in terms of fuel and energy. That is an enormous advantage. It would also produce benefits for the environment if a proportion of the heavy and bulky goods and materials needed by modern industry could be taken off the roads.
The Government have taken a short cut, under pressure from powerful vested interests which are out for their own profit. That is the top and bottom of it. I do not believe that the pseudo-technical glosses that have been put on the regulations are valid.
8.45 pm
Mr. Roger Moate: The hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Mr. Hooley) was right to describe axle damage as the nub of the problem. The most objectionable feature of the regulations is that they permit the raising of the axle weight to 10½ tonnes. If it had not been for that fact, I would have reluctantly accepted the package put forward by the Secretary of State. My right hon. Friend has made progress far beyond Armitage. However, a fundamental failure is his failure to deal with the question of axle loading. I find disingenuous the argument of the Government Front Bench that the new five-axle vehicle will produce an average axle loading of an acceptable level. This is contrary to everything that hon. Members have been told.
There is no doubt that damage is caused by the weight on the drive axle. The regulations permit a 3 per cent. increase on the drive axle which will result in a 14, 15 or 16 per cent. increase—the figures vary—in road damage per vehicle. The only offsetting environmental gain is the possibility of fewer vehicles. That is highly speculative. There are considerable doubts. One has only to examine the history of vehicle weight increases to see that there has never been a reduction of heavy vehicles in such circumstances. I do not believe that it will happen this time.
People are entitled to base their expectations on experience. People's experience entitles them to feel alarmed. Almost every decade, there have been increases in vehicle weights. In 1955, the weight was increased to 24 tonnes, in 1964, to 32 tonnes and now, in 1982, to 38 tonnes. There is already pressure from the Community for 40 tonnes. The Road Haulage Association says that 38 tonnes is not enough wile the CBI says that it is only a step on the road to the Armitage lorry.
It must not be assumed that the pressure will suddenly ease. I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will assert that there is to be no increase beyond 38 tonnes. I am sure that the Government mean what they say. They cannot, however, bind their successors. The only way to ensure that the next step is not taken is by not taking this step.
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The Government have missed an opportunity. It was not necessary to have the 10½ tonne axle loading. I have asked the question frequently, but never had a satisfactory answer. Why has Germany, not renowned for its failure in industrial efficiency and competitiveness, managed on 38 tonnes and a 10 tonne axle loading whereas we choose a heavier axle loading? The only answer that I have been able to obtain is that the Germans cheat. I do not believe that. The Germans have managed to maintain standards that we could have adopted.
One of the notable omissions of the Armitage report was any comparison with the major continental freight system of the United States. That is surely a continent from which we should have learnt. We are, after all, talking about the advantages of transcontinental freighting. On the United States inter-state highway, 9-tonne axle loading is the maximum. Why are we therefore told that 10½ tonnes is of fundamental importance and cannot be avoided? I do not feel that we have had all the facts or that there has been a proper examination. The cost of going for 10½ tonnes is excessive and that weight will be highly damaging to the environment.
Let us consider the costs. My right hon. Friend has not told us about the costs of maintaining and strengthening our bridges. So far it has been denied that there will be any significant costs. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister, in winding up, will tell us about those costs. The county surveyor spoke of £100 million, and British Rail published a figure of £60 million. We have an admission from the Government that there will be some cost for strengthening the larger-span bridges. So the amounts involved are substantial.
Against that, I do not doubt that there will be savings to industry. It would be foolish to deny that certain major fleet operators will be able to operate fewer vehicles. However, I am sure that that will be offset by expansion by other fleet operators who, through cheaper rates, will expand their fleet operations. Nevertheless, in some areas it will be beneficial. There is no point in arguing about that. After all, Armitage spelt it out. He took into account all the industries, and the figure came out at about £150 million, give or take a few million. So the savings are there. However, we must relate that to 13½ billion of total road freight expenditure. That puts the matter in perspective. Certainly there will be benefits, but, equally, there will be major disadvantages.
There are environmental gains in my right hon. Friend's package. Many of them are in the future, but the heavier lorries will be in the present. My right hon. Friend rightly stressed the importance of enforcement, but we are entitled to ask, "How real are his proposals? How significant will they be?"
Then, too, there is the number of enforcement officers. We have been told that there they are to be substantially increased. I should point out that in 1979 there were 237 traffic examiners, while in June this year the number was down to 193. So my right hon. Friend has a long way to go, even to catch up on the position three years ago. If enforcement is to be meaningful, we shall have to tackle those numbers.
There is also the number of weighbridges. I am told that we have about 800 weighbridges or axle measuring implements at present, but perhaps one quarter of them will not be able to cope with the new heavier lorries. So

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there will be a net loss straight away, which will have to be offset by real determination on the part of my right hon. Friend to ensure strict enforcement measures.
I was pleased to see that the package contained the limitation to 32 tonnes of the towbar combination. That is good, because the road train, if it had expanded greatly on our roads, would have been something of a horror to the British motorist.
Another horror which my right hon. Friend has not dealt with is the articulated tipper. Why, if he dealt with the drawbar combination, did he not deal with the articulated tipper in the same way and limit it to 32 tonnes? The average British motorist will see these articulated tippers, which are much longer and larger than the current rigid bulk carriers, as a menace on the road. I do not want the Conservative Party to be the party of the articulated tipper. We should not encourage the trend to articulated tippers. The carriage of bulk aggregates will damage British Rail. My right hon. Friend should deal with that by putting the weight limit back to 32 tonnes.
I conclude on bypasses, which I consider to be the main issue. We are faced now with an unamendable regulation. I, for one, will vote against it, and I shall vote for the Prayer tonight. I shall do so reluctantly, because my right hon. Friend has gone half-way. Of course, he should have gone the whole way. It is beyond comprehension to the British public that we were presented with an Armitage package not very long ago, in which bypasses were an essential feature, yet within a short time the Government come along with heavier lorries, and expect us to believe that somehow the bypass problem has been solved, or is likely to be solved. It is inconceivable and, in my view, it is wrong. I accept that my right hon. Friend is doing all that he can to speed up the programme, but there are hundreds of small villages and towns throughout our country with no prospect of getting bypasses in the next decade, or even the next two decades. The country had a right to expect the bypass programme to move forward. We could have waited until it had moved forward dramatically before giving in to the heavier lorries. That is my main criticism.
My right hon. Friend, fighting for transport interests and better roads, and this Parliament, which should be doing the same, should not have been prepared to introduce the heavier lorries until we were certain that we had got the other parts of the environmental package. We could have got a better deal for the taxpayer and for the environment. We are acting too soon and we are not acting in the right way. For that reason, I shall reluctantly vote against my right hon. Friend tonight.
8.55 pm
Mr. Bob Cryer: I draw the attention of the House to the fact that the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments reported the instrument for elucidation, and we raised the question, brought up by my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Mr. Hooley), of consultation. We were not satisfied, but to help the House we published a memorandum, and reported on that ground alone. I should have liked greater detail about the response.
Paragraph 2 of the Department's memorandum points out that the most contentious part of the consultation concerned the proposed increase in lorry weight. This
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attracted a great deal of comment both for and against. We should have liked to see a breakdown of that in detail. The matter is so contentious that the Government should not have brought the matter before the House but should have carried on reviewing it into the indefinite future. They are very good at that when they do not want to do things.
I am concerned that this is not so much a victory for a political decision as a victory for the organised Department of Transport. I have a deep suspicion—arising from the Peeler memorandum, which was leaked many months ago—that a particular scenario was to be followed which would be put into operation.
The Peeler memorandum was a note from Joseph Peeler to Sir Peter Baldwin, the Department's permanent secretary. He wrote:
"For the purpose of this note, it is assumed that we wish … to move, as soon as parliamentary and public opinion will let us, to a maximum gross weight of 38 or 40 tons. Ideally we should do this in harmony with our EEC partners … but there is a strong case for doing it anyway … At the end of the day, recommendations would be made by impartial people of repute who have carefully weighed and sifted the evidence and have come to, one hopes, a sensible conclusion in line with the Department's view."
We find that that scenario has been followed to the letter. It makes me suspicious that when the procedure in that document—which has never been denied as being a genuine Department of Transport document—is followed, it is the country and the House that are being hoodwinked. The scenario has been carefully prepared as a public relations exercise to soften up people to accept something they do not want.
The House is not only concerned about the intrusion of heavier lorries. Incidentally, no research has been undertaken about the effect of the weight proposed. No physical research accompanied the White Paper and was made available to the House. We forget that not only has the weight increased progressively over the past 20 years or so, as both my right hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth) and the hon. Member for Faversham (Mr. Moate) have pointed out. I do not have time to go into the statistics again, but the number of heavier lorries has also increased. What has not been mentioned is that the mileage of those lorries has also dramatically increased. Therefore, the degree of intrusion is all the greater.
The heaviest articulated lorries in 1979 covered 3,200 miles, double the mileage of 1966. Not only shall we get bigger and more intrusive lorries but they will cover dramatically more mileage. The suggestion that half a metre of insulation is necessary to produce quieter lorries is technically unjustifiable because we could achieve that within the existing dimensions by a more effective silencing system if that were required of manufacturers.
A massive intrusion cannot be avoided. The increased weight is bound to cause problems with bridges, particularly those of single span or with separate single spans of more than 14 metres because they will have to carry a greater overall load.
The Secretary of State is under an illusion when he talks about more jobs. According to the figures of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders the registration of new commercial vehicles over the past 10 years show that imports have been the real problem for commercial vehicle markets in Britain. They are now around 50 per cent. whereas 10 years ago they were only a small proportion of the total.

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I endorse the view of my hon. Friend the Member for Heeley that we should divert the money that the Association of County Councils wants for bridges—it supports the Government's proposals—into the railway network to encourage a shift from road transport and not simply use section 8 grants. We should embark on a campaign to regenerate the railway network, particularly when, at the moment, British Rail is preparing a case for the closure of the 80-mile Settle to Carlisle line. That is an important network, a diversionary route from the electrified west coast line, which we should keep. That is the sort of priority that Government policy has resulted in. We should spend more on the railways and prevent any further intrusion of heavy lorries, which is what the regulations will result in.
Mr. Iain Mills: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May I bring to your attention the fact that in the entire debate tonight, and in many previous debates on lorry weights, many hon. Members who hoped to speak have not been able to do so? I understand the difficulty, but I wish to draw your attention to the fact that no hon. Members were called who had either truck manufacturers or truck component manufacturers in their constituencies.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bernard Weatherill): Order. The hon. Member must not challenge Mr. Speaker's selection.
9.2 pm
Mr. Roger Stott: I have some sympathy with the hon. Member for Meriden (Mr. Mills). However, he will realise that in past transport debates I have given time out of my speech to allow other hon. Members to make their contributions. As tonight's debate is so important I feel that I need all the time available to me to deploy my arguments.
I should like to avoid a discussion on simultaneous equations of two unknowns or the fourth power axle ratios, because my right hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth) is much better versed in such matters. Frankly, I do not know a great deal about the technical details.
This has been a wide-ranging and interesting debate on heavy lorries. All hon. Members have rightly deployed their constituency and trade union interests. I should like to take this opportunity to thank the Secretary of State for Transport for tabling a motion that allows the House to discuss this important issue free from normal constraints which would have applied had we just discussed the statutory instrument on its own.
After a previous debate on this subject the hon. Member who has the honour to represent the beautiful Georgian city of Bath (Mr. Patten) said to me in the Lobby that heavy lorries were about as popular as Dutch elm disease. That is an apposite comment, irrespective of which side of the argument one favours.
As has been borne out by speech after speech this evening, it is an indisputable fact of life that heavy lorries, even at existing weights are thoroughly unpopular with the vast majority of our constituents. Therefore, today's debate, centred as it is around the proposals to increase lorry weights, has afforded all hon. Members who have managed to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, the opportunity to debate this important issue with the seriousness that it deserves.
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Starting from the universally accepted premise—I doubt whether I shall be challenged on it—that heavy lorries are a nuisance and are unpopular with our constituents, it would be absurd to believe that we could significantly reduce their numbers. This is because the lorry, as a mode of transport, accounts for the majority of freight and goods shipments made every day throughout the United Kingdom.
The Armitage report states:
"For the first time since the horse dominated freight transport we have a method of transport which provides both trunk haulage and local delivery and collection. The lorry offers a universal door-to-door service for the simple reason that all suppliers and customers are connected to the road system."
I for one am grateful to Sir Arthur Armitage and his team for producing their report, even if I disagree profoundly with the major recommendations. For the first time that I can recall we have a serious academic study of the lorry and its impact on people and their environment. The report contains useful information and recommendations.
The terms of reference were:
"To consider the causes and consequences of the growth in the movement of freight by road and, in particular, of the impact of the lorry on people and their environment; and to report on how best to ensure that future development serves the public interest."
The words "serves the public interest" are important. It is not good enough to claim, as the Secretary of State has claimed today, that by increasing lorry weights British industry will benefit substantially, and hope thereby to buy off the objectors. There is a substantial body of objectors both inside and outside the House and it will not be bought off with a small package of ameliorating proposals of bypasses, noise levels, side guards and spray suppression. That is not good enough.
We have had a number of debates on the main recommendations of the Armitage report. On each occasion the House has clearly indicated to the Secretary of State that to increase the lorry weights as proposed by the Armitage report would be unacceptable. The Secretary of State's predecessor had to accept reluctantly that this House would not wear it. Unfortunately the present Secretary of State had this hot potato dropped rather embarrassingly into his lap on the first day of his appointment to his new job. He has spent the past few months trying to persuade his recalcitrant Back Benchers to accept a lower limit than that proposed in the Armitage report but a higher limit than that which now exists. No doubt we shall see later this evening whether the persuasion has been successful. I have already noticed one or two hon. Members peeling off from their original positions.
A week has not gone by when the Department of Transport has not swamped Members with a plethora of press releases on the virtues of the heavy lorry. I have before me a minor sample from my file of releases that I have collected over the past 12 months. They claim that the proposals will bring savings, control of the juggernauts and put transport on the move. This plethora of press releases emanating from the Department every day of the week was a softening up process.
It is our contention that the arguments that we deployed during the debates on the Armitage proposals still hold good in respect of the proposals that are included in the regulations.

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My hon. Friend the Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Home Robertson) asked me to try to persuade him of the arguments that lead me to hope that he will vote with the Opposition tonight. I shall attempt to do that.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness disputed the Government's claim that the new tax on heavy lorries would make up for the fact that over many years that heavy lorry has not paid its track costs. None of the Armitage recommendations on taxation of heavy lorries has been implemented. The rebasing of vehicle excise duty from unladen to gross laden weight which occurred last month was designed to be tax negative.
My right hon. Friend said earlier that the subsidy identified by the Department of Transport for the heaviest four-axle 30·5 tonne vehicle in 1982 was £1,134. As there are about 75,800 such vehicles, the total subsidy this year is £86 million, but the Department of Transport has altered the method of assessing the lorry, in favour of the lorry. If the calculations had been done in the same way as last year, the total subsidy would be £100 million rather than £86 million. In recommendation 3 of his report, Armitage called for the elimination of the subsidy at the earliest opportunity. As my right hon. Friend said, we have had two Budgets and a new tax regime but the subsidy is twice as large as it was last year.
In recommendation 4, Armitage said:
"The public costs of accidents should be included in the calculation of road track costs."
Recommendation 5 called for a notional element of tax to be included for the damage to underground services. Neither of those two recommendations has been included in that taxation package. We contend that nothing has changed.
The issue of lorry size has been debated at length. Why do the Government continue to say that new lorries will not be bigger? First, they look only at the effects on articulated vehicles and, secondly, they do not consider that a half metre is an increase. I shall take the second point first. In one sense the Government are correct. A statement was made several years ago that more than half of the 32·5 tonne vehicles already exceeded the then limit of 15 metres. Therefore, increasing the length, like increasing the speed limit, is only legalising what already occurs. But a half metre on a 15 metre trailer is an increase in length of 3·3 per cent.
The "articulated vehicle only" approach is extremely blinkered. Lorries at the heavier end can be rigids—11 metres maximum length; articulated lorries—15 metres; or drawbar units—18 metres. Precisely because the weight limit is rising but the length limit remains unaltered, more loads will be volume restricted and operators will switch from short rigids to longer articulated vehicles. That point was made by the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Ross). That will mean a 41 per cent. increase in the length of those articulated vehicles or a 41 per cent. switch from rigids to articulated vehicles.
It is fallacious to assume that there will be no increase in size if the order is approved. My hon. Friends who have contributed to the debate have proved that.
It has been argued that increasing lorry weight will mean a reduction in their numbers. The Government in their original submission claimed that increasing lorry weights would mean fewer lorries. The Government have
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had to amend their original thinking on that matter because Sir Arthur Armitage, in table 38 of his report, made a prediction about lorry traffic. He predicted that lorry traffic of over 25 tonnes was expected to rise from 40 to 58 per cent. compared to the number of lorries operating in 1978. Those results suggest that for every two maximum weight lorries that went down the high street in 1978 there will be three in the year 2000. The general public are upset by heavy traffic. On the Armitage definition of traffic, by the year 2000 we could see an increase in traffic volume of at least 50 per cent. That point was made forcefully by my hon. Friend the Member for York (Mr. Lyon).
My right hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness and my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Mr. Hooley) dealt conclusively with the damage that heavier lorries are likely to cause to our environment. The hon. Member for Faversham (Mr. Moate) underpinned our worries about the increase in lorry weights and especially axle weights. My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Bagier) and the hon. Member for Faversham said that British Rail expects to spend £60 million on bridge strengthening.
In The Guardian yesterday, the Association of County Councils, which the Secretary of State prayed in aid in defence of his package, is quoted as saying:
"More evidence of the cost of heavy lorries came yesterday from the Association of County Councils. In evidence to the Commons Select Committee on transport the Association said that extra work to bridges for which it was responsible would cost £100 million over the next five years."
My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South, who is a distinguished member of the Select Committee on Transport, visited Avon last week with his colleagues. He and my hon. Friend the Member for Newport (Mr. Hughes) informed me that the county surveyor of Avon said that if tonight's proposals go through, 1,100 bridges in that county must be surveyed at enormous cost. They may also have to be improved. I hope that the Under-Secretary of State will answer the questions of my hon. Friend the Member for Newport about the structure of the Severn bridge.
Sir Albert Costain: Does the hon. Member for Westhoughton (Mr. Stott) realise that if those bridges must be strenghtened it will mean more work for the steel industry? He cannot object both to steel works closing and the need for bridge strengthening.
Mr. Stott: I did not hear exactly what the hon. Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Sir A. Costain) said, but to save him from rising again—I have plenty to say—I rest my case on what I said previously.
Enforcement is another important matter. My hon. Friend the Member for Gower (Mr. Wardell) asked some important questions that must be answered. The Government make two principal points. The first is that more traffic examiners are being recruited and the second is that there is a five-year programme for new dynamic weighbridge installation. In April 1979, the number of traffic examiners was 237, but by June 1982 it had decreased to 193. That is a reduction of 18 per cent. The complement—not the staff in post—in October 1982 was 225, which is still 12 below the 1979 figure. The Netherlands has more than 150 controllers who perform a smaller range of duties than those performed in Britain. Our number of inspectors is lamentable.

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Raising the maximum weight limit dramatically reduces the number of weighbridges that can weigh vehicles at or above the new limits. In the Official Report of 27 October 1982, in column 387, it was revealed that there are 856 public and private weighbridges and axle weighers in use. About a quarter of them could not weigh 40 tonne vehicles and the fact that the new limit is just under 40 tonnes, at 38 tonnes, will hardly make a difference. The Government's enforcement proposals appear inadequate because of the imminent loss of more than 200 weighing devices. Enforcement today is generally inadequate, which is hardly surprising because of scarce resources and cutbacks in administration.
I am informed that 19 per cent. of vehicles fail their annual test. We received today, through the post, evidence from the Association of Metropolitan Authorities. The association says:
"There is now ample evidence to show that the existing laws on lorry weights are flouted to a very substantial extent. The extent to which vehicle weighing is undertaken varies considerably across the country and it is patently clear that only a small fraction of the number of overloaded vehicles are identified and prosecuted. Where weighing does occur, approximately 25% of intercepted vehicles are found to be overloaded and a good proportion were overweight to an extent which justifies the serving of prohibition notices."
The Opposition are therefore very sceptical about the Government's package on enforcement.
As to the economic effects of increasing the lorry weight to 38 tonnes, Armitage puts the annual savings at about £125 million. The figure has been revised to about £150 million at today's prices. The Government's own research paper, Transport Research Road Laboratory report SR590, suggests a cost saving of only 6·6 per cent. Even if one gives the Government the benefit of the doubt and agrees that there may be a saving of £150 million, will society or British industry receive that money immediately? No. The TRRL report suggests that it would take more than five years to build up those levels of saving, so the earliest they could now be achieved would be 1988. Since the tonnage lifted by road fell by more than 10 per cent. between 1978 and 1981, and since tonne miles fell by 2 per cent., even this target appears very doubtful.
Improvements in the design of heavy goods vehicles to reduce the risk of serious or fatal injuries in road traffic accidents are long overdue. The Armitage recommendations for the provision of under-run guards, new breaking standards and lorry spray devices were welcomed by many organisations and by all Opposition Members interested in road safety. However, the timing and the technical merit of the regulations that the Government either intend to introduce or have introduced leave a lot to be desired when they are scrutinised closely. The White Paper recommends the fitting of lorry spray devices—a measure that I have long fought for—to deal with the problem of spray thrown up in wet conditions, yet it will be another year or so before we shall have a British standard and even longer before lorry spray devices become mandatory. The safety package that will accompany increased lorry weights will not be complete because of those delays.
One of the most important omissions from the package is the failure to recognise the need to provide front under-run protection of HGVs. I draw the Minister's attention to a recent TRRL report entitled "Fatal accidents in Great Britain 1976 involving HGVs" by B. S. Riley and H. J. Bates. It is a very good document and there are many good
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recommendations in it. In the not too distant future, I hope that front under-run guards will become part and parcel of our everyday life.
Mr. Iain Mills: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that any vehicle manufacturer or user can buy a spray guard now? They are commercially available and have been demonstrated to many hon. Members.
Mr. Stott: I am aware that such products are on the market, but their use is not compulsory and I fear that only one or two operators are using them. They will become compulsory only when a British standard has been fixed, in about two years' time. That is our criticism.
It is not good enough for the Opposition merely to oppose the introduction of heavier lorries. We must seek to provide an alternative policy and strategy. In this context, I recommend the document "Labour's Transport Policy" which has been produced by the TUC-Labour Party liaison committee and to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness, my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) and I made a not insignificant contribution.
The basis of our approach is freight integration, which the Government have ignored. The Government propose instead to increase the basic weight of heavy goods vehicles. Our document stales:
"The basis of our approach to freight transport has these features:
the mass of freight journeys will continue to be transported by road for the foreseeable future, but fair means must be used to get as much freight as possible on to the railway without sacrifices in costs and efficiency;
market mechanisms will not by themselves achieve the best distribution of freight amongst transport modes and the Government has a role in influencing this distribution;
the road haulage industry suffers from over-capacity, operating irregularities and low employment standards, and the Government needs to rectify these conditions;
heavy lorries are damaging to people, the environment and roads, and their use must be carefully regulated."
We propose a more imaginative use of resources. Clearly it it not practicable to take the bulk of the freight off the road and put it on rail, but it is certainly practicable to move 4 or 5 per cent. of it to rail. That would make a significant difference to the way in which British Rail operates. I am told that it needs only 4 per cent. of the freight currently carried by road to be transferred to the railways to make the railway freight business profitable. We should try to achieve that.
As I am running out of time, I must insist that the Government buy copies of the Labour Party document to acquaint themselves more fully with the provisions spelt out in it. It further states that
"our approach would be to:
concentrate on the expansion of rail facilities for bulk, long-haul movement;
encourage the development of trans-shipment depots which link trunk road and rail networks at strategic points in the goods distribution system;
take back-up powers to license the long-distance movement of freight by road;
promote agreements involving major freight consignors and the transport industries so that the needs of industry and the capacity of the railway are synchronised by means of government investment."
A programme of that kind would be of more benefit to the nation than simply increasing lorry weights.
Finally, I am sad to see that only one of the 91 recommendations in the splendid Foster report, commissioned in 1978, on operating provisions for heavy

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goods vehicles has been adopted in the White Paper and the statutory instrument. It would have been far better if the Government had accepted most of the major proposals in that report instead of trying to force the House to accept a weight increase for lorries that is unacceptable not only to the Opposition but, I believe, to the vast majority of our constituents. Therefore, we shall vote against the Government's proposals.
9.30 pm
The Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mrs. Lynda Chalker): Our starting point in the debate has been that existing lorries do too much damage to people and the environment, which is why action must be taken now to put things right. At the end of his remarks the hon. Member for Westhoughton (Mr. Stott) commented on the transfer of 4 per cent. of freight currently carried by road to British Rail. I shall return to that matter in a moment.
I shall concentrate first on what the Government's proposals mean. They mean that we are taking action to control the unacceptable lorry, as it has been doing damage on our roads all these years. We are the first Government to come forward with a package of measures designed to bring that lorry under control. That has never happened before. The one thing that no one can say of this debate is that we have not had for the first time a comprehensive, practical programme that can make a real difference to the quality of people's lives.
Unfortunately, many exaggerations have been made this evening, but that always happens in such debates. However, above all, in my reply I must make a cool and rational analysis. I shall answer as many of the questions that have been asked as possible and write to the other hon. Members.
Let me start with the question posed in an article in The Guardian about British Rail and the effect of the Government's proposals on British Rail. We are not and never have been in the business of artificially protecting any mode of transport from competition, whatever it is. If any mode of transport can win traffic on the basis of better service or lower price, the economy gains, which is a gain for the people.
British Rail, not just the Government, want fair competition. That is why we are determined that there should be fair competition. In the debate we heard a good deal about lorry taxation in relation to British Rail. Many hon. Members have said that they believed that the subsidy to the lorry was what was wrong. That is exactly what was wrong throughout all the period of office of the Labour Government and exactly why the 38 tonne lorry will, from the outset, cover 100 per cent. of the road track costs.
Lorries as a whole cover more than their road costs anyway. There is no subsidy. However, I should like to say one thing to my right hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins), who referred to an incentive for the three-axle tractor as against the two-axle tractor. Both configurations—three-axle tractors and two-axle trailers, and two-axle tractors and three-axle trailers—are permitted by the regulations. I shall draw that matter to the attention of my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
In lorry taxation the aim is that all types of lorries should cover the road track costs. That is why last October the taxation structure changed to the gross weight system.
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That will make it easier for the new structure, which will contain tax incentives to use less damaging lorries with more axles. It will contain that incentive as the lorries will bear a lower tax rate for the same weight. The House can assume that the new tax structure will reflect the lorry track costs. That is exactly what it has been designed to do.
I was asked many times in the debate about section 8 grants. As hon. Members know, the rate of grant for transferring goods from our roads to rail and also to Sealink, Freightliner and inland waterways and estuaries, which can benefit the constituencies of many hon. Members, for example my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Surrey (Sir A. Royle) and the hon. Member for Woolwich, East (Mr. Cartwright), is being increased to 60 per cent. The point of extending that grant is to get off the roads the traffic that can travel by rail and waterway.
Since 1975 there have been 118 section 8 grants at a cost of more than £36·5 million. Two more have been announced today. Now that we have extended the scheme, we hope that there will be more applications for those grants, because that is the way to get the traffic on to the railways, as the hon. Member for Westhoughton said.
It was said in the article in The Guardian that British Rail had suggested that it would lose so much. The gain that it has told us that it will get from section 8 arrangements is 2 million tonnes a year extra, which is almost the same amount as the possible loss from having a higher tonnage of lorry. That was British Rail's comment. The other sector that will be helped by the 38 tonne lorry is Freightliner. That is not my view, it is the view expressed in the Labour Party and TUC policy document.
Mr. Wardell rose—
Mrs. Chalker: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will allow me to deal with the rest of this article. Tipper lorries and their safety have rightly been mentioned. Tipper lorries on roads at the moment are subject to exactly the same safety requirements as other lorries, but there is a recognised problem with the stability of a tipper lorry on a construction site. That is a different matter.
The increased payload can be accommodated on many different existing types of tipper but the regulations will prescribe a minimum length of 12 metres for vehicles that gross 38 tonnes to get the balance of the vehicle right. The hon. Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Bagier) was worried about that matter. We expect most of the new and modified tippers to measure within the range 12 to 12½ metres. Although that is marginally longer than the present 11 metres, longer vehicles would not be safe or appropriate to the industry. That is the industry's view. By having those longer tippers, there will be a reduction in their number and a quarry, for example, could dispatch its product with 23 per cent. fewer 12½ metre articulated tippers at that limit.
Mr. Bagier: I am obliged to the hon. Lady for accepting that there is a danger with tipper lorries. I understand that those lorries are now 11 metres long. Will she undertake, before she agrees to longer lorries, to consider all the danger aspects? There is ample evidence to suggest that they are dangerous at the moment at 32½ tonnes. According to the expert evidence that I have received, the 38 tonnes limit would make them extremely dangerous. Will she undertake to take all the advice that is available before she agrees to the new size?
Mrs. Chalker: I assure the hon. Gentleman that before seeing in the longer 38 tonne tippers, we shall consider what he said, and all the expert evidence. The industry has already said that 12 to 121/2 metre, 38 tonne articulated tippers are the largest that it wants to go to. I undertake to examine the matter in great detail. It is contained in the regulations.
Mr. Moate: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. Is she saying that the maximum length that is permitted by the regulations will be in excess of the length that is regarded as safe?
Mrs. Chalker: No. I am saying that what the industry finds best for its use, and what it will do with the additional weight if the House agrees to the regulations, is to keep vehicles to the 12½ metre limit, which is the limit in the regulations. I shall now deal with weights.
Mr. Stott: I apologise to the hon. Lady for intervening, but there is a point that I must make. I am grateful to her for giving way. She said that in a document the Labour Party had recommended, with regard to Freightliner, that the tonnage should be increased from 32 to 38 tonnes. If the hon. Lady would care to examine that document she would see that it does not say that at all.
Mrs. Chalker: I have not had the chance to read the hon. Gentleman's document yet. It was not that specific document.
Mr. Stott: The hon. Lady referred to a Labour Party document.
Mrs. Chalker: It is a Labour Party-TUC document.
Mr. Robert Hughes: Which one?
Mrs. Chalker: I shall write to the hon. Gentleman when I see it with my own eyes.
I shall now deal with weights, as many right hon. and hon. Members have dealt with them. There is no increase for the four-axle lorries, which would have increased road damage.
Mr. Booth: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Is it in order for a Minister to quote a document as being a document of the TUC-Labour Party when she is not prepared to name the document?
Mr. Speaker: The Minister must take responsibility in that regard.
Mrs. Chalker: I shall send the right hon. Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth) a reference, but I assure him that the document exists. In addition to the fact that there is no increase in the four-axle lorry weight, there is no increase for the drawbar trailer combinations. They are unusual on our roads, but they might have become more popular if the weight limit had been raised. I believe that we were right to reject the increase to 40 tonnes in view of the public concern.
The increase to 38 tonnes in the regulations applies only to the five-axle articulated lorry. That is the heavy lorry that is most commonly used not only in Britain, but in Europe, with which we do so much of our trade. Several hon. Members asked me about the savings on 38 tonne vehicles and the overloading and pressures on axle weights. I shall not go into the arithmetic involved, as I have been asked not to do so, but a 38 tonne vehicle that is properly loaded will lead to a saving of about 20 per cent. in damage to, and wear on, roads. That is not just
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the Department's view. It is agreed by all the bodies professionally concerned with road maintenance such as the Institution of Highway Engineers and the County Surveyors Society.
Those organisations would be the first to object if we proposed vehicles that damaged roads more. Indeed, they objected to the 34-tonne four axle vehicle and we rejected that vehicle. However, they have agreed that the 38 tonne vehicle with our configuration is acceptable, and will give advantages in terms of reduced wear and tear on our roads.
Mr. Les Huckfield: Even the Under-Secretary of State has said that there will not be an increase in weight when the load is properly distributed. If there are no axle load weighing devices or X-ray machinery to see what is inside the containers, how will the hon. Lady know whether the load is properly distributed?
Mrs. Chalker: I shall come to the issue of enforcement in a moment. It is the average axle loading that counts. On a 38 tonne five-axle lorry, it is 7·6 tonnes, compared with the 8·125 tonnes on the present 32·5 tonne four-axle lorry. It is 6·5 per cent. less and those are the internationally agreed figures.
There have been many comments about the damage to roads and bridges. However, the individual 38 tonne vehicle will be no more damaging than the individual 32·5 tonne lorry on our roads today. Four 38 tonne vehicles can do the work of five 32·5 tonne vehicles, which means that the 38 tonne vehicles are 20 per cent. less damaging than the vehicles that they will replace.
Mr. Iain Mills: Is my hon. Friend aware that a two-axle, 16-tonne rigid lorry with a 100 tonnes payload does far more road damage at 11·9 than her proposal at 8·1?
Mrs. Chalker: My hon. Friend is absolutely correct.
Several hon. Members mentioned damage to bridges. For 98 per cent. of our short-span bridges there is no problem with the 38 tonne vehicle. The ACC, which is responsible for the great majority of bridges in the United Kingdom, has told us that the lorries will not be any more damaging to bridges. It welcomes the Government offer to consider sympathetically TSG bids for repairs to some old bridges that have already suffered from the effects of existing traffic, including 32·5 tonne lorries. I can give the assurance that long bridges are looked at one by one. It is essential to consider the balance of traffic and the way in which each bridge is used.
Several hon. Members spoke about noise. Lorries are being made quieter through the reduction next year for the heaviest lorries from 91 decibels to 88 decibels. There will be further reductions down to 80 decibels. The strict test method that will be introduced in 1984 requires the new model lorries to be made quieter by up to a further three decibels. We are determined to set the pace in Europe and we show every sign of being the leaders in quietening lorries. We are, of course, also spending £5 million on speeding up the development of the quiet heavy lorry. That will be of great advantage to this country.
Many people misunderstand vibration. Most vibration is caused by a low-frequency emission that goes down as noise is reduced. Structures that are affected by vibration are at no greater risk from the 38-tonne lorry, subject to the same noise limits, and fewer lorry movements being needed to shift the same payload will reduce the effect of

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vibration. Most people notice airborne vibration. That is why we must have further noise reduction measures in the future to lessen that vibration.
One or two hon. Members have mentioned the problems of underground services. I know that that causes anxiety, but I hope that what I have said already about damage factors will reassure those hon. Members. Our information is that the change in lorry weights will not affect services significantly because it is the total axle loading that determines strain and not the total lorry weight. Many other factors contribute to damage. Armitage found no evidence that lorry traffic was the main contributor. It is something that is continually monitored.
Mr. Hooley rose—
Mrs. Chalker: I cannot give way to everybody who would like to interrupt me.
We believe that the introduction of the 38-tonner will reduce lorry numbers by up to 10 per cent.—8,000 fewer lorries—because the higher weights will minimise traffic. If one looks at all the figures since the mid-1950s one will find that we are moving three times as much freight with the same number of lorries. The Armitage figures for 1979 showed that we covered 64,000 million tonne miles compared with 19,700 million tonne miles in 1953 with the same number of vehicles. We have achieved that only by increasing the amount that lorries can carry.
Many hon. Members have mentioned the dimensions of lorries. New lorries will be no larger in any dimension than existing lorries. It is right that in order to give modern tractor units the extra space for noise suppression and better manoeuvring there should be a 0·5 metre increase in the overall length, but there is no increase in the trailer length. For the first time, the regulations are limiting overall height and length as well as width.
The hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Ross) mentioned safety measures. Everybody has welcomed sideguards, rear under-run guards and spray suppression developments. Everybody, including the Government, wants all safety measures to be developed faster. I believe that they will go a great deal faster than the hon. Member for Isle of Wight said.
I was asked about front under-run guards. The safety measures covered in these regulations are not the end of the story. I fully agree with the hon. Member for Westhoughton that front under-run guards would reduce the tragic consequences of head-on collisions with heavy goods vehicles. There is a good deal of research and development needed before we can specify the technical requirements necessary for a guard that will be effective and a practical proposition for fitting to the front of the vehicle. The Transport and Road Research Laboratory is actively working on that at the moment. In the meantime we believe that it is right to press ahead with sideguards and rear under-run guards, for which we already have the technical specifications, to give greater protection. We shall bring forward regulations on front under-run protection as soon as we have a cost-effective standard.
The hon. Member for Gower (Mr. Wardell) and my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Surrey (Sir A. Royle) expressed anxiety about jack-knifing. That has been a serious problem but from October this year all new heavy vehicles have had to be manufactured to meet new
1096
braking standards which have specific technical requirements to ensure the vehicle's stability when braking, to avoid jack-knifing. That is an advance which many hon. Members, I think, did not expect to see so quickly.
I wish to refer to lorry controls. We have had—in response to our requests—from county councils in their transport policies and plans, no fewer than 60 bids for resources to fund lorry action areas. Of those, 15 come from an authority, the Greater London Council, that opposes these measure, and a further 25 from metropolitan authorities. So much for not wishing to have these matters passed by the House.
On lorry controls, the Dykes Act, as it is known, has laid a framework that can be better activated by the county councils. I wish to see it activated and utilised more fully throughout the country.
Mr. Dykes: I appreciate my hon. Friend's reference to the Act. Will the Government insist on more schemes of restriction of access and more transhipment?
Mrs. Chalker: The Government have taken further measures in the Transport Act this year to deal with the vexed problems of lorry parking and the extent to which an operator can expand his existing premises.
The Government give high priority to enforcement. It is an area in which Civil Service numbers, against the overall trend, are being increased. There will be 225 traffic enforcement inspectors by April and more appointments are envisaged.
A year ago, there were 25 dynamic weighbridges. That figure has already been increased to 35 and another five will be introduced over the next couple of months. We are examining 80 further sites to cater for lorries of the higher weight. We are concentrating on weighbridges at the ports.
On enforcement, we are spending this year £750,000, which is twice last year's figure, and a further £1 million next year. We have effective enforcement procedures. All the powers are on the statute book and overloading offences can be, and are, prosecuted. I intend to see that the powers are fully used.
The increasing number of weight checks shows that more prosecutions are being undertaken every year. We are paying particular attention to foreign vehicles. This year, about 15,000 will have been checked, compared with 11,000 last year.
Many hon. Members have mentioned bypasses. The suspension of some schemes by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr. Fowler) and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) was necessary to provide a realistic programme. They had found, on coming to office, that there may have been schemes in a list but no work had been done upon them. It was misleading to the people involved to say that the bypasses were being prepared. Every scheme now brought back into the programme is under preparation.
Sir Peter Mills: Has my hon. Friend anything to say about the appalling problems of the roads in the West Country, especially the A30?
Mrs. Chalker: I am well aware that my hon. Friend wished to mention the West Country. I shall deal with that matter now. We are currently spending in Devon and Cornwall £60 million on trunk roads that are under construction at this time. West Country Members are

1097
rightly concerned about the provision of suitable highways. Following many years when little was planned for the South-West under the previous Labour Government, we have been encouraging the county schemes as fast as they can be prepared and built. In this year's transport supplementary grant, Devon and Cornwall had the whole of their capital bid, 100 per cent. for each, accepted. I hope to give them substantial allocations in 1983–84. I am grateful to my hon. Friend and other hon. Members for all that they have done in this respect.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Mr. Skeet) asks about his schemes. I have looked carefully at what he wants. He told me firmly that he is not prepared to put up with the lorries going through the centre of his town. I assure him that the plans for Bedfordshire are taking up much of my time at present.
I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich (Sir J. Ridsdale)—[Interruption]—that we shall continue the programme of which he spoke.
I can tell my hon. Friends the Members for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch) and Thanet, East (Mr. Aitken), and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Thanet, West (Mr. Rees-Davies), that we are looking at the new traffic figures for the Thanet Way road. Following my visit to the area, I discussed safety measures that could be introduced quickly on that road, and I hope to have further discussions with Kent on the matter. [Interruption.]
My hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison) spoke of local road investment, [Interruption.] Virtually the whole bid from the county council for capital expenditure has been accepted this year, and I am confident that Wiltshire will get similar support in 1983. [Interruption.]
My hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Irving) is concerned about the traffic in that town. The strategy is to get the traffic out of Cheltenham. That is why the Department's proposal is for trunking the A436 road. My hon. Friend knows that the objections that have been put to this trunking proposal must be examined in detail before a decision is reached.
Other hon. Friends have mentioned roads in the areas. Where a county council is the responsible highway authority, if the county council gives the scheme priority—for instance, in Petworth—it will get support through the transport supplementary grant system.
We agree that the situation with the south circular road is most unsatisfactory. However, I would be pre-empting my right hon. Friend's response to the Select Committee about roads in London if I said more tonight.
The debate tonight has continued to question whether there are benefits to industry. Industry now knows—we hope, as a result of the vote tonight—that it can get on with producing the larger lorry. We shall reduce some of the problems that we have had in the commercial vehicle sector over the past three years. Transport cost savings from the measures in the regulations tonight will also benefit industry—by at least £1½ billion over the next decade, and almost certainly more. The savings in transport costs will meet the costs of safety and environmental measures. There will also be benefits which can be passed on to transport-using industries and to the consumer in lower prices. Every major company with a large transport undertaking has testified to the savings, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hove (Mr. Sainsbury) testified tonight.
1098
The dire position in the truck building industry is one that cannot continue. Production in 1981 was half the level of that in the 1960s and 1970s. Uncertainty has done this to our truck industry. We know that manufacturers will be able to make economies of scale if they can build the same vehicles for both the home market and export. That means building 38-tonners. It is a chance to turn the tide of import penetration. I hope that the House will not tonight go on record as rejecting an opportunity to bring a great deal of industry back to the West Midlands and to the North, not only with new vehicles but with the fitting of side guards on existing vehicles, whose owners decide that they wash to have a gross plating weight of 38 tonnes. There is far more work in that.
We know from many sources that these proposals are wanted. Today in the Financial Times the motor industry correspondent wrote of the improvement of York traffic and York vehicles. That is a bonus of the 38 tonners.
All the measures in the lorry control package combine to give Britain the best opportunity we have ever had to bring the lorry under proper and enforced control, to limit the damage of the past and to bring a new era to road haulage transport in this country.
Question put:—
The House divided: Ayes 232, Noes 295.

Division No. 19]

[10 pm

AYES

Abse, Leo

Dewar, Donald

Adams, Allen

Dixon, Donald

Allaun, Frank

Dobson, Frank

Alton, David

Dormand, Jack

Anderson, Donald

Douglas, Dick

Archer, Rt Hon Peter

Dubs, Alfred

Ashley, Rt Hon Jack

Duffy, A. E. P.

Ashton, Joe

Dunwoody, Hon Mrs G.

Atkinson, N.(H'gey,)

Eadie, Alex

Bagier, Gordon A.T.

Eastham, Ken

Barnett, Rt Hon Joel (H'wd)

Edwards, R. (W'hampt'n S E)

Beith, A. J.

Ellis, R. (NE D'bysh're)

Benn, Rt Hon Tony

English, Michael

Bennett, Andrew(St'kp't N)

Ennals, Rt Hon David

Bidwell, Sydney

Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)

Booth, Rt Hon Albert

Evans, John (Newton)

Bottomley, Rt Hon A.(M'b'ro)

Ewing, Harry

Bray, Dr Jeremy

Faulds, Andrew

Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)

Field, Frank

Brown, R. C. (N'castle W)

Flannery, Martin

Brown, Ronald W. (H'ckn'y S)

Fletcher, L. R. (llkeston)

Buchan, Norman

Ford, Ben

Callaghan, Rt Hon J.

Foulkes, George

Callaghan, Jim (Midd't'n & P)

Fraser, J. (Lamb'th, N'w'd)

Campbell, Ian

Freeson, Rt Hon Reginald

Campbell-Savours, Dale

Freud, Clement

Canavan, Dennis

Garrett, John (Norwich S)

Carmichael, Neil

Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)

Carter-Jones, Lewis

George, Bruce

Cartwright, John

Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John

Clark, Dr David (S Shields)

Golding, John

Clarke, Thomas(C'b'dge, A'rie)

Graham, Ted

Cocks, Rt Hon M. (B'stol S)

Grant, John (Islington C)

Cohen, Stanley

Greenway, Harry

Concannon, Rt Hon J. D.

Hamilton, James (Bothwell)

Cook, Robin F.

Hamilton, W. W. (C'tral Fife)

Cowans, Harry

Hardy, Peter

Cox, T. (W'dsw'th, Toot'g)

Harman, Harriet (Peckham)

Craigen, J. M. (G'gow, M'hill)

Harrison, Rt Hon Walter

Crawshaw, Richard

Hart, Rt Hon Dame Judith

Cryer, Bob

Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy

Cunliffe, Lawrence

Healey, Rt Hon Denis

Cunningham, G. (Islington S)

Heffer, Eric S.

Cunningham, Dr J. (W'h'n)

Hogg, N. (E Dunb't'nshire)

Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (L'lli)

Holland, S. (L'b'th, Vauxh'll)

Davis, Terry (B'ham, Stechf'd)

Home Robertson, John

Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)

Homewood, William

1099

Hooley, Frank

Penhaligon, David

Horam, John

Pitt, William Henry

Howell, Rt Hon D.

Powell, Rt Hon J.E. (S Down)

Howells, Geraint

Powell, Raymond (Ogmore)

Hoyle, Douglas

Prescott, John

Huckfield, Les

Price, C. (Lewisham W)

Hudson Davies, Gwilym E.

Race, Reg

Hughes, Mark (Durham)

Radice, Giles

Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)

Rees, Rt Hon M (Leeds S)

Hughes, Roy (Newport)

Richardson, Jo

Janner, Hon Greville

Roberts, Allan (Bootle)

Jay, Rt Hon Douglas

Roberts, Ernest (Hackney N)

John, Brynmor

Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)

Johnson, James (Hull West)

Robertson, George

Johnson, Walter (Derby S)

Rooker, J. W.

Johnston, Russell (Inverness)

Roper, John

Jones, Rt Hon Alec (Rh'dda)

Ross, Ernest (Dundee West)

Jones, Barry (East Flint)

Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)

Jones, Dan (Burnley)

Rowlands, Ted

Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald

Ryman, John

Kerr, Russell

Sever, John

Kilroy-Silk, Robert

Sheerman, Barry

Lamond, James

Sheldon, Rt Hon R.

Leadbitter, Ted

Shore, Rt Hon Peter

Leighton, Ronald

Short, Mrs Renée

Lestor, Miss Joan

Silkin, Rt Hon J. (Deptford)

Lewis, Arthur (N'ham NW)

Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)

Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)

Silverman, Julius

Litherland, Robert

Skinner, Dennis

Lofthouse, Geoffrey

Snape, Peter

Lyon, Alexander (York)

Soley, Clive

Lyons, Edward (Bradf'd W)

Spearing, Nigel

McCartney, Hugh

Speller, John Francis (B'ham)

McDonald, Dr Oonagh

Speller, Tony

McGuire, Michael (Ince)

Spriggs, Leslie

McKay, Allen (Penistone)

Stallard, A. W.

McKelvey, William

Stoddart, David

MacKenzie, Rt Hon Gregor

Stott, Roger

McNamara, Kevin

Strang, Gavin

McTaggart, Robert

Straw, Jack

McWilliam, John

Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley

Marks, Kenneth

Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)

Marshall, D(G'gow S'ton)

Thomas, Dr R.(Carmarthen)

Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)

Thorne, Stan (Preston South)

Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

Tilley, John

Martin, M(G'gow S'burn)

Tinn, James

Mason, Rt Hon Roy

Torney, Tom

Maxton, John

Urwin, Rt Hon Tom

Maynard, Miss Joan

Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.

Meacher, Michael

Wainwright, E.(Dearne V)

Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)

Walker, Rt Hon H.(D'caster)

Mitchell, Austin (Grimsby)

Wardell, Gareth

Mitchell, R. C. (Soton Itchen)

Watkins, David

Moate, Roger

Weetch, Ken

Molyneaux, James

Wellbeloved, James

Morris, Rt Hon A. (W'shawe)

Welsh, Michael

Morris, Rt Hon C. (O'shaw)

Whitehead, Phillip

Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)

Wigley, Dafydd

Morton, George

Willey, Rt Hon Frederick

Moyle, Rt Hon Roland

Williams, Rt Hon A.(S'sea W)

Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick

Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)

Newens, Stanley

Wilson, Rt Hon Sir H.(H'ton)

Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon

Winnick, David

O'Neill, Martin

Woodall, Alec

Orme, Rt Hon Stanley

Woolmer, Kenneth

Palmer, Arthur

Wright, Sheila

Park, George

Young, David (Bolton E)

Parker, John

Parry, Robert

Tellers for the Ayes:

Pavitt, Laurie

Mr. Frank Haynes and

Pendry, Tom

Mr. Derek Foster.

NOES

Adley, Robert

Atkins, Rt Hon H.(S'thorne)

Aitken, Jonathan

Atkins, Robert(Preston N)

Alexander, Richard

Atkinson, David (B'm'th,E)

Alison, Rt Hon Michael

Baker, Kenneth (St. M'bone)

Amery, Rt Hon Julian

Baker, Nicholas (N Dorset)

Ancram, Michael

Beaumont-Dark, Anthony

Arnold, Tom

Bendall, Vivian

1100

Bennett, Sir Frederic (T'bay)

Goodhart, Sir Philip

Benyon, Thomas (A'don)

Goodhew, Sir Victor

Benyon, W. (Buckingham)

Goodlad, Alastair

Best, Keith

Gorst, John

Bevan, David Gilroy

Gow, Ian

Biffen, Rt Hon John

Gower, Sir Raymond

Biggs-Davison, Sir John

Grant, Anthony (Harrow C)

Blackburn, John

Gray, Hamish

Blaker, Peter

Grieve, Percy

Bonsor, Sir Nicholas

Griffiths, E.(B'y St. Edm'ds)

Boscawen, Hon Robert

Griffiths, Peter Portsm'th N)

Bottomley, Peter (W'wich W)

Grist, Ian

Bowden, Andrew

Grylls, Michael

Boyson, Dr Rhodes

Gummer, John Selwyn

Braine, Sir Bernard

Hamilton, Hon A.

Bright, Graham

Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)

Brinton, Tim

Hampson, Dr Keith

Brittan, Rt. Hon. Leon

Haselhurst, Alan

Brooke, Hon Peter

Hastings, Stephen

Brown, Michael(Brigg & Sc'n)

Havers, Rt Hon Sir Michael

Browne, John (Winchester)

Hawkins, Sir Paul

Bruce-Gardyne, John

Hawksley, Warren

Bryan, Sir Paul

Hayhoe, Barney

Buchanan-Smith, Rt. Hon. A.

Heath, Rt Hon Edward

Buck, Antony

Heddle, John

Budgen, Nick

Henderson, Barry

Bulmer, Esmond

Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael

Burden, Sir Frederick

Higgins, Rt Hon Terence L.

Butcher, John

Hogg, Hon Douglas (Gr'th'm)

Butler, Hon Adam

Holland, Philip (Carlton)

Carlisle, John (Luton West)

Hooson, Tom

Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)

Hordern, Peter

Carlisle, Rt Hon M. (R'c'n)

Howe, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

Chalker, Mrs. Lynda

Howell, Rt Hon D. (G'ldf'd)

Channon, Rt. Hon. Paul

Howell, Ralph (N Norfolk)

Chapman, Sydney

Hunt, David (Wirral)

Churchill, W. S.

Hunt, John (Ravensbourne)

Clark, Sir W. (Croydon S)

Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas

Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

Irvine, Rt Hon Bryant Godman

Clegg, Sir Walter

Jenkin, Rt Hon Patrick

Colvin, Michael

Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey

Cope, John

Jopling, Rt Hon Michael

Cormack, Patrick

Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith

Corrie, John

Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine

Costain, Sir Albert

Kimball, Sir Marcus

Cranborne, Viscount

King, Rt Hon Tom

Critchley, Julian

Kitson, Sir Timothy

Crouch, David

Knight, Mrs Jill

Dickens, Geoffrey

Knox, David

Dorrell, Stephen

Lamont, Norman

Dover, Denshore

Lang, Ian

du Cann, Rt Hon Edward

Latham, Michael

Dunn, Robert (Dartford)

Lawson, Rt Hon Nigel

Durant, Tony

Lee, John

Dykes, Hugh

Le Marchant, Spencer

Eden, Rt Hon Sir John

Lennox-Boyd, Hon Mark

Edwards, Rt Hon N. (P'broke)

Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)

Eggar, Tim

Lloyd, Ian (Havant & W'loo)

Elliott, Sir William

Lloyd, Peter (Fareham)

Eyre, Reginald

Loveridge, John

Fairbairn, Nicholas

Luce, Richard

Fairgrieve, Sir Russell

Lyell, Nicholas

Faith, Mrs Sheila

McCrindle, Robert

Fell, Sir Anthony

Macfarlane, Neil

Fenner, Mrs Peggy

MacGregor, John

Finsberg, Geoffrey

MacKay, John (Argyll)

Fisher, Sir Nigel

Macmillan, Rt Hon M.

Fletcher, A. (Ed'nb'gh N)

McNair-Wilson, M. (N'bury)

Fletcher-Cooke, Sir Charles

McNair-Wilson, P. (New F'st)

Forman, Nigel

McQuarrie, Albert

Fowler, Rt Hon Norman

Major, John

Fox, Marcus

Marland, Paul

Fraser, Rt Hon Sir Hugh

Marlow, Antony

Fraser, Peter (South Angus)

Marshall, Michael (Arundel)

Fry, Peter

Marten, Rt Hon Neil

Gardiner, George (Reigate)

Mates, Michael

Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)

Mawby, Ray

Garel-Jones, Tristan

Mawhinney, Dr Brian

Gilmour, Rt Hon Sir Ian

Mayhew, Patrick

Glyn, Dr Alan

Mellor, David

1101

Meyer, Sir Anthony

St. John-Stevas, Rt Hon N.

Miller, Hal (B'grove)

Scott, Nicholas

Mills, Iain (Meriden)

Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)

Miscampbell, Norman

Shaw, Sir Michael (Scarb')

Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)

Shelton, William (Streatham)

Montgomery, Fergus

Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)

Moore, John

Shepherd, Richard

Morris, M. (N'hampton S)

Shersby, Michael

Morrison, Hon C. (Devizes)

Silvester, Fred

Morrison, Hon P. (Chester)

Sims, Roger

Mudd, David

Skeet, T. H. H.

Murphy, Christopher

Smith, Dudley

Myles, David

Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)

Neale, Gerrard

Spence, John

Needham, Richard

Spicer, Jim (West Dorset)

Nelson, Anthony

Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)

Neubert, Michael

Sproat, Iain

Newton, Tony

Squire, Robin

Normanton, Tom

Stainton, Keith

Nott, Rt Hon John

Stanley, John

Onslow, Cranley

Steen, Anthony

Oppenheim, Rt Hon Mrs S.

Stevens, Martin

Osborn, John

Stewart, A.(E Renfrewshire)

Page, John (Harrow, West)

Stewart, Ian (Hitchin)

Page, Richard (SW Herts)

Stokes, John

Parkinson, Rt Hon Cecil

Stradling Thomas, J.

Parris, Matthew

Tapsell, Peter

Patten, John (Oxford)

Taylor, Teddy (S'end E)

Pattie, Geoffrey

Tebbit, Rt Hon Norman

Pawsey, James

Temple-Morris, Peter

Percival, Sir Ian

Thatcher, Rt Hon Mrs M.

Peyton, Rt Hon John

Thompson, Donald

Pink, R. Bonner

Thorne, Neil (Ilford South)

Pollock, Alexander

Thornton, Malcolm

Porter, Barry

Townend, John (Bridlington)

Prentice, Rt Hon Reg

Townsend, Cyril D, (B'heath)

Price, Sir David (Eastleigh)

Trippier, David

Prior, Rt Hon James

Trotter, Neville

Proctor, K. Harvey

van Straubenzee, Sir W.

Pym, Rt Hon Francis

Vaughan, Dr Gerard

Raison, Rt Hon Timothy

Viggers, Peter

Rathbone, Tim

Waddington, David

Rees, Peter (Dover and Deal)

Wakeham, John

Rees-Davies, W. R.

Waldegrave, Hon William

Renton, Tim

Walker, Rt Hon P.(W'cester)

Rhodes James, Robert

Walker, B. (Perth )

Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon

Walker-Smith, Rt Hon Sir D.

Ridley, Hon Nicholas

Wall, Sir Patrick

Ridsdale, Sir Julian

Waller, Gary

Rifkind, Malcolm

Walters, Dennis

Rippon, Rt Hon Geoffrey

Ward, John

Roberts, M. (Cardiff NW)

Warren, Kenneth

Roberts, Wyn (Conway)

Watson, John

Rossi, Hugh

Wells, Bowen

Royle, Sir Anthony

Wells, John (Maidstone)

Rumbold, Mrs A. C. R.

Wheeler, John

Sainsbury, Hon Timothy

Whitelaw, Rt Hon William

1102

Whitney, Raymond

Young, Sir George (Acton)

Wickenden, Keith

Young, Rt Hon George

Wiggin, Jerry

Wilkinson, John

Tellers for the Noes:

Williams, D.(Montgomery)

Mr. Anthony Berry and

Winterton, Nicholas

Mr. Carol Mather.

Question accordingly negatived.

Heavy Lorries

  LORRIES, PEOPLE AND THE ENVIRONMENT
  It being after Ten o'clock, MR. SPEAKER proceeded, pursuant to the order this day, to put forthwith the Question necessary to dispose of the motion relating to Lorries, People and the Environment.
  Resolved,
  That this House, recognising the need to make lorries less objectionable to people, less damaging to the environment and more economic, thus increasing the competitiveness of British industry and creating more jobs, welcomes and approves the Government's comprehensive package of lorry measures, including more new roads and by-passes, to relieve communities of traffic; regulations to make lorries quieter and safer, to control their size more strictly and allow them to run with fuller loads by increasing maximum permitted weights for lorries so long as they have five axles; more controls on the routes lorries take and on where they park; special assistance for areas most severely affected by lorries; more attractive grants to encourage freight shipment by rail and inland waterways; and tighter enforcement of standards.—[Mr. Lang.]

  LIAISON COMMITTEE
  Ordered,
  That Mr. Paul Dean be discharged from the Liaison Committee and Sir Paul Hawkins be added to the Committee.—[Mr. Lang.]

  SCOTTISH AFFAIRS
  Ordered,
  That during their consideration of the matter of the Hunter Report, notwithstanding the provisions of Standing Order No. 64 (Meeting of Standing Committees), the Scottish Grand Committee shall have leave to sit from Ten o'clock until half-past One o'clock and that if proceedings thereon have not been concluded by that hour, the Chairman shall put any Question necessary to dispose of them.—[Mr. Lang.]

  HOUSE OF COMMONS (SERVICES)
  Ordered,
  That the Standing Order of 15th June 1979 relating to the nomination of the Select Committee on House of Commons (Services) be amended, by leaving out Mr. Paul Dean and inserting Mr. Graham Bright.—[Mr. Lang.]

  Merchant Fleet
  Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Lang.]
  10.15 pm
  Mr. Edward du Cann: It would be wrong for the House to allow the serious and continuing decline in the British merchant shipping fleet to pass unremarked and without a careful attempt in debate to discover, to propose, and to agree upon, remedies. There is an irony in the fact that my right hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton) was making almost precisely the same point some 25 years ago. I am glad to see present my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State, whose character and wisdom I greatly admire. I shall be glad to hear his comments on these matters.
  An all-party defence study group in another place earlier this year used a telling phrase when it referred to marine transport as the free world's Achilles heel. That is true. It is a matter of the greatest concern for our nation in particular. Shipping is essential to Britain for the transport of energy, raw materials and food, for exports and for continuous reinforcement and resupply in war. All life will come to a halt very quickly in our country if shipping flows are interrupted. Britain depends totally on "the safe and timely arrival of our ships"—to use the old phrase—in peace as well as war.
  The structure of our merchant fleet has changed dramatically over the past 20 years. That is inevitable. What is worrying is that the size of the British cargo fleet has declined drastically. So, too, have the numbers of seamen available to man the ships.
  I shall give the House some statistics. The United Kingdom owned and registered merchant fleet totalled 27 million deadweight tonnes at the end of September 1982. That is a reduction of 23 million tonnes deadweight—about 46 per cent.—since the end of 1975. That is a frightening fall in capacity. The truth is that our merchant fleet is in crisis.
  In the past seven years the number of ships flying the British flag has fallen from 1,614 to 913. Every week there are two fewer British ships. We used to have the world's biggest fleet. Now we have been overtaken by Liberia, Greece, Japan, Panama and Norway. British Petroleum, the only major British-owned oil company and one of our largest shipping companies, has decided to get rid of 16 sbips—over one-third of its fleet. Without a strong British merchant fleet, this country will inevitably become increasingly reliant on foreign ships to keep us supplied. That is unacceptable.
  What of defence? Our merchant fleet and our seamen are rightly called the fourth arm of defence. The commander of the Falkland Islands task force, Admiral Sir John Fieldhouse, said at the conclusion of that campaign:
  "I cannot say too often or too clearly how important has been the Merchant Navy's contribution to our efforts. Without the ships taken up from trade, the operation could not have been undertaken, and I hope this message is clearly understood by the British nation."
  The fact that 54 ships of the Merchant Navy were called up to join the task force shows the vital role that merchantmen play in our defence strategy—and 31 merchant ships are still so engaged.
  The Falklands campaign depended on merchant ships. It is not too far-fetched to say that it would not have been possible without BP's ships. Altogether, 12 of them were
  1104
  involved—six are still there—providing a vital fuel line for Royal Navy and merchant ships. Her Majesty's Government, a major shareholder in BP, seem to be indifferent to the effect that the decimation of BP's fleet may have on this country's ability to carry vital oil supplies in peace and in war.
  Although statistically only 5 per cent. of our merchant fleet was requisitioned or chartered, in many cases the ships that were sent were virtually the only ones of their type with the characteristics required for a defence role—tugs, repair ships and deep-sea trawlers, for example. We used three of only nine big passenger ships that we have. The implications are ominous.
  The decline of our merchant fleet, alas, is a continuing one. It involves not only the larger ships. The fishing fleet has also been decimated by the demise of distant-water fishing and the absurd failure—one can call it nothing else—to achieve a common fisheries policy within European Community waters. Fishing vessels and their crews can therefore no longer provide any substantial number of reserves to fulfil war-time tasks in minesweeping and as escorts. The situation is rapidly deteriorating. We are losing men as well as ships. The number of officers serving at sea has fallen from the peak of 36,000 in 1975 to 24,000 today—a decline of one-third. The number of United Kingdom ratings has fallen from 33,000 to 25,000 and 1,000 officers and 3,000 ratings are unemployed. From every point of view of self-interest, we cannot allow this state of affairs to continue.
  Our merchant fleet is not only invaluable to our economic life in peacetime and at war as a carrier. It is a most substantial asset in other ways. It is a huge source of foreign exchange. For the past eight years, United Kingdom owned ships have made a net contribution to our balance of payments averaging £1 billion per year. Thus, United Kingdom ships are the second biggest contributors of invisible earnings to Britain's balance of payments. Capital expenditure by British shipping companies until 1978 averaged more than £l million per day. Recent years, however, have shown a considerable reduction in investment. At current prices, capital investment in 1981 was a mere one-quarter of that in 1975. That means fewer jobs. Today, 25,000 British workers are engaged in building new merchant ships. Three years ago, there were 40,000.
  Another aspect of the problem is competition. By weight, 95 per cent. of the United Kingdom's external trade was moved by sea in 1980. That will always be so because no other form of transport can take the place of maritime transport in that context. Between 1979 and 1980, total imports by weight carried by United Kingdom flag vessels were constant at 31 per cent. However, exports fell from 47 per cent. to 37 per cent. By value, imports carried by United Kingom flag vessels fell from 45 per cent. to 39 per cent. and exports from 52 per cent. to 42 per cent.
  Perhaps there is not much that any British Government can do about some problems—the deepening world recession and the increasing trend towards protectionism in the Third world and the United States of America—however much we may deplore them. But we should put our own house in order. Ship owners and trade unions must agree to cost-effective manning, developing the highest possible productivity in the use of a ship's crew, the interchangeability of ratings, the introduction of the unmanned engine room, flexibility in the technical and

  1105
  supervisory grades, and company as opposed to national bargaining. We must use the industry's seafaring manpower as effectively as possible because the industry's jobs depend upon it.
  The Government must provide a fiscal regime—I say this in advance of the Budget—to encourage positive investment in shipping, free depreciation for second-hand ships and investment allowances for new ships. They will reap the benefit in a greater contribution to our balance of payments, more employment and a more adequate reserve of ships and men for times of emergency. Increased competitiveness is the key to the industry's future success. The Government have a duty to do their utmost to ensure that. Joint efforts by shipping companies, seafarers and the Government can achieve that competitiveness and yield benefits to all.
  Britain has long believed in free trade; and the philosophy has served us well for more than a century. But, alas, an increasing number of our competitors now seem to take the opposite view. More countries wish to reserve a larger share of their seaborne trade to their national lines. That unpalatable practice has spread to the bulk trades. A free trading world is essential to shipping, but the difficulty of getting other countries to abide by the rules is a real one. The Government must be ready with countervailing powers if other countries do not abide by the rules. For example, the Government must resist the nationalist discrimination implied by UNCTAD. They must press to remove the legal uncertainties that will persist until the United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea is ratified. They must make continuing representations against the extraterritorial impact of American anti-trust laws and the appallingly petty restrictions that are now being imposed in hydrography, about which I shall say something on another occasion.
  Above all, the Government must expose the COMECON cost-cutting exercises for the aggressive imperialism that they are. Admiral Gorshkov, whose name will be familiar in the House, said:
  "Soviet seapower, merely a minor defensive arm in 1953, has become the optimum means"
  —we should note those words—
  "by which to defeat the imperialist enemy and the most important element in the Soviet arsenal to prepare the way for a Communist world."
  As the late Nye Bevan said,
  "Why look in the crystal ball when you can read the book?"
  The purpose is plain and it must be frustrated by the Government's determination to defend the interests of Britain and the free world.
  We speak with pride—it is commonplace to do so—of our nation as a maritime nation. The reality is that today we are considerably less of a maritime force than the maintenance of our prosperity and our freedom require. I do not doubt that my hon. Friend will acknowledge the problem. I am sure that he is well aware of it. I call upon him, on behalf of our Government, to undertake determined action to ameliorate it and solve it, and to endeavour, in the nation's real interests, to restore our maritime pre-eminence. I hope that my hon. Friend will have some encouraging things to say to the House.
  10.30 pm
  The Under-Secretary of State for Trade (Mr. Iain Sproat): I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) for raising this matter on the Adjournment. It is a matter of great concern. It is a
  1106
  concern that I share completely. I shall cover as much ground as possible in the short time that is available to me. I hope that my right hon. Friend will forgive me if at times I speak rather fast, but I am anxious to cover as much ground as possible on this extremely important subject.
  Let me review the position briefly. The United Kingdom-registered fleet grew from 27 million deadweight tons in 1966 to its peak of 52 million tons at the end of 1975. Since then it has contracted by nearly 40 per cent. and now stands at 32 million deadweight tons—approximately its 1969 level. But the world fleet as a whole has grown from 544 million tons in 1975 to 687 million tons at the middle of this year. Our share of the world fleet has dropped from 9·7 per cent. to 5·1 per cent. over that period. We still have a large fleet—the sixth largest in the world, as my right hon. Friend mentioned, after Liberia, Greece, Japan, Panama and Norway—but its decline has been very substantial.
  What is happening to our merchant fleet is not, of course, an isolated phenomenon. With the exception of a short-lived recovery in 1980, the shipping industry worldwide has been in the doldrums since the oil crisis of 1973. There have been too many ships and too much subsidised shipbuilding capacity chasing the limited cargoes generated by the slow growth of world seaborne trade. Let me give some facts: 76 million tons of world shipping is laid p—11 per cent. of the world fleet. Bulk freight rates have been cut in half since the last peak in 1980. There is twice as much oil tanker capacity as is needed to carry the world's crude oil. World seaborne trade overall is growing very slowly.
  I wish I could tell the House this evening that there are many and early signs of better times ahead. But I cannot. The world recession, the growth of low-cost competition from the Far East, the limited prospects of growth in seaborne trade, the introduction of new technology and continuing subsidies for shipbuilding in so many countries provide no basis for easy optimism. The shipping industry itself expects to remain in the doldrums until at least the mid-1980s. But the Government are determined not just to stand idly by as mere spectators of this sad scene. No one could be indifferent to the plight of those who have lost their jobs.
  Despite the job losses, however, the industry still employs some 65,000 people. Last year it contributed, as my right hon. Friend mentioned, a net £900 million to our invisible earnings; and this year the vital role that it can play in times of emergency was made very clear by the heroic actions of the Merchant Navy in the Falklands.
  To the deep-seated problems of our Merchant Navy, there are no easy or obvious solutions, but, let me point to some areas where the Government can help. Our successful policies for controlling inflation give direct help to the shipowner in keeping down his operating costs. We have a corporation tax regime that encourages investment in shipping. We fight tenaciously for the interests of the industry in our international dealings.
  I know that all sides of the industry want us to do something more. Unfortunately, if predictably, it is not always the same something.
  I have received fairly recently, at my invitation, from the General Council of British Shipping and from the maritime unions detailed representations and proposals. I am extremely grateful for those responsible and constructive documents. I shall be discussing with the council and the unions all that they have proposed. I do

  1107
  not want to anticipate those discussions conclusively tonight, but it might help if I were to say something about five important areas—defence needs, cargo reservation, flags of convenience, competitiveness and Soviet maritime policy.
  I shall deal first with defence needs. We recognise the vital dual importance of the Merchant Navy as an instrument of trade and as a weapon of defence. The ability of our declining fleet to meet the needs of the Ministry of Defence in times of emergency or war is kept under close and continuing review. The striking conjunction of the Falklands operations and the decline of the fleet naturally makes for grave concern. Our assessment is that defence needs can still be met. This matter is at the heart of our current review of what lessons to learn from the Falklands war.
  With regard to cargo reservation, I believe that it would be deeply wrong to abandon the free trade principles upon which successive Governments have based their shipping policies. When times are hard the benefits of the free trading system can seem remote, especially for those whose jobs are at risk, or have been lost. But we should not allow the recession to become an excuse for adopting narrow protectionist attitudes.
  The benefits of the free market, in shipping as elsewhere, are real and substantial. Were Governments throughout the world to embark upon a round of protectionism and subsidy for shipping, it could only be to the detriment of the United Kingdom industry. Some two-thirds of the industry's freight earnings—more than four-fifths for tankers—come from the cross-trades. These earnings and the jobs they sustain depend vitally on the willingness of other countries to keep their ports open to British shipping. If we close our ports and our trade to others, we cannot expect them not to close their ports and trade to us.
  We and our partners in the European Community have agreed a position on the United Nations liner code that will keep the cargoes that are carried by the fleets of developed countries open to proper competition. We have to carry that forward. We must see that our European partners carry out the letter and the spirit of what they signed. We must persuade the United States of America that our action is an action in realistic defence of free trade and persuade them to uphold free trade in their own shipping relations with Third world countries.
  The fact is that, despite the reduction of the fleet, Britain is still a major maritime power. London is a world centre of shipping. We play a leading role in maritime councils both at Government and industry level. Were we to be panicked into going down the protection road, I have no doubt that others would take their lead from us. The damage that would be done to this country and to world seaborne trade would be vast and irreversible.
  I shall now deal with flags of convenience. Flags of convenience or open registries are regarded by many, particularly some people in the trade unions, with misgivings and hostility. They are attacked for a variety of reasons. Some of the reasons are based on a complete misunderstanding of the vital distinction between open-registry ships and sub-standard ships. The two should not be confused.
  Inability or unwillingness on the part of the authorities of any maritime State to take full responsibility for
  1108
  ensuring that its vessels meet international safety requirements is, of course, highly objectionable, but the proper approach to deal with such problems is through international agreements on safety standards and their enforcement by appropriate port State action as necessary. In the three months since the Paris memorandum on port State control came into force in July, 1,642 vessels have been examined, 558 of them in United Kingdom ports. I welcome that, but it would be a delusion to suppose that the competitive threat from open registries could be explained away in terms of sub-standard vessels and crews.
  It should not need saying, but apparently it still does, so I shall say it again: open-registry vessels are not all substandard. The British flag, indeed, is termed by some as a flag of convenience. It is indeed an open registry and no country is more jealous of its safety record than we are.
  For reasons that I have already explained, I do not believe that our response should be to put up protective shutters. On the contrary, we must and we shall resist action, such as is favoured by the UNCTAD secretariat, that would undermine international investment in shipping and damage the interests of our own fleet which has, of course, been the beneficiary of substantial inward investment. The effect of adopting the measures being promoted by the UNCTAD secretariat and by some people in this country on flags of convenience would be a shatteringly damaging effect on the United Kingdom fleet. Some 45 per cent. of our Merchant Navy is beneficially owned abroad—that is, by owners who use the British flag as a flag of convenience. If one got rid of flags of convenience, one would get rid of almost half the ships and half the jobs in the Merchant Navy. It would be an insane act. I cannot understand how anybody with the interests of the British Merchant Navy and British jobs at heart could advocate such an idea for one minute. I hope that we shall hear no more of it.
  Cost competitiveness will continue to be very important for the fleet. Wage costs for crews from developing countries will indeed, for some trades, pose a crippling handicap, but much of our competition is from developed countries and some of our wounds are tragically self-inflicted. Let me give my right hon. Friend a pair of interesting, illustrative figures, provided to me by an important port user. They are for a medium-sized bulk carrier and are in round terms. The sum for Hamburg, in Germany, is £10,000 and for Immingham, in the United Kingdom, £34,000. Had I time, I could give a dozen similarly worrying comparisons with British costs. We must stop damaging ourselves in this way.
  My right hon. Friend mentioned the problems posed by the Soviet Union's policies. Indeed, I am grateful to him for mentioning them. The present Soviet practices are not proper commercial practices and they pose a threat to fleets such as our own, whose operations are properly commercial. I shall give the House just six examples of how the Soviet fleet does not operate on what we would term a fair commercial basis. First, the funds for shipbuilding for the Soviet fleet all come from the State, not from fleet earnings. Secondly, the Soviet State bears all the loan interest. Thirdly, the Soviet State provides the insurance. Fourthly, the Soviet State sees that bunker costs are about 25 per cent. of what our ships pay. Fifthly, Soviet wages tend to be about one-third of comparable Western rates. Sixthly, the Soviet Union always buys

  1109
  goods on free-on-board terms and sells them on cost-insurance-freight terms. So it is scarcely surprising—although no longer tolerable—that the balance of United Kingdom-Soviet Union shipping operations is 90 per cent.—10 per cent. in its favour.
  Furthermore, in cross-trades the Soviet Union can distort trade by non-commercial under-pricing unjustified by market conditions, often, for example, pitching its prices 25 per cent. below whatever commercial rate is offered by anybody else. The Soviet Union always undercuts it because it is not operating on a proper commercial basis. In February of this year, the Government gave notice to the Soviet Union of our intention to renegotiate the Anglo-Soviet maritime treaty. Officials of the Department of Trade are now in Moscow
  1110
  for this year's meeting of the joint United Kingdom—Soviet Union maritime commission. I assure my right hon. Friend that they will raise, very strongly, the matter of the renegotiation of this treaty.
  I have touched on only a few of the component reasons for the decline of the fleet and on some of the things that we are doing to remedy it. I can promise my right hon. Friend that I hope to come forward with some more measures in the fairly near future that I trust will do something to restore the British Merchant Navy to the position in which both he and I wish to see it.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Adjourned accordingly at seventeen minutes to Eleven o'clock.

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Preamble
The House met at three of the clock (Prayers having been read earlier at the Judicial Sitting by the Lord Bishop of Chichester): The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.

Concorde
The Earl of Kinnoull: 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 will make a Statement on discussions being held between the French Government and British Airways on the future of the Concorde service.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Security (Lord Trefgarne): My Lords, at a meeting on 6th May 1982 the Minister of State, Department of Industry, and the French Minister of Transport discussed a report by British and French officials on the results of joint studies on the future of Concorde. These studies showed that, on the basis of estimates supplied by British Airways, their surpluses from operating Concorde up to the end of 1988 would be more than enough to cover the cost of in-service support of Concorde which is at present borne by the Government. British Airways were therefore asked whether they would be prepared to take on Her Majesty's Government's financial and other responsibilities for in-service support, on the basis that Government funding will cease on 31st March 1983. The airline are considering this in consultation with other interested parties, and expect to let the Government have a definitive reply in early December. The French Government are being kept fully in touch with developments. Tables summarising the British input to the joint studies are available in the Library.
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that very helpful reply. Would my noble friend confirm that Her Majesty's Government will remain flexible on the timing of any handover concerning British Airways and not declare the strict deadline of April 1983, in view of the complexities of renegotiating the support contracts with the manufacturers?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, we have indicated the date by which we would wish to see the handover take place. However, as my noble friend has requested, we shall certainly not be inflexible in the discussions.
Lord Beswick: My Lords, the negotiations are taking place and one hopes that a reasonable result will follow. However, would the noble Lord take the opportunity of confirming the basic belief of Her
972
Majesty's Government in the future of supersonic air transport? Will he not take the opportunity of saying that they do believe that this will be the method of travel in the future, that it will be a big business, and that it is essential, one way or the other, for Britain to remain in it?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, our support for this project is indicated by the fact that what is now happening points to the success of Concorde's present operations and not otherwise.
Lord Harmar-Nicholls: My Lords, can my noble friend tell me whether there was anything in the original agreement which would leave Her Majesty's Government responsible for any penalties if and when they do withdraw from this? Are there any commitments which will not have been fulfilled in the original agreement, or will they be completely free to withdraw without any type of penalty being imposed?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, as I have indicated, this will be a negotiated transfer and therefore there is no question of penalties arising in that context.
The Earl of Kinnoull: My Lords, can my noble friend say what view the French Government will take if British Airways take over the responsibility from Her Majesty's Government and whether Air France will have a parallel responsibility? Secondly, can my noble friend say what is the likely value and use of the stockpile of spares which Her Majesty's Government own and hold at the moment, if no agreement is reached and the Concorde service expires?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, that is not a matter for the French Government specifically, because of course it is an arrangement between British Airways and the British Government. However, we are keeping them closely informed of what we are doing. Whether or not the French Government wish to enter into a similar agreement with Air France is not a matter for me to pass comment upon, but no doubt they will be watching closely what we are doing. As for the future of the spares which are presently, as my noble friend says, the property of the Government, they are one of the matters that will be discussed with British Airways in the context of these negotiations generally.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, apart from the financial problems which I do realise, will the Government do their utmost to keep Concorde flying?—because would the noble Lord not agree that it is a very great tribute to British engineering and that it would be most unfortunate if supersonic flights over the Atlantic had to be abandoned?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I agree with the noble Baroness, but I must say that it is the passengers who will keep Concorde flying and it is the passengers who are indeed supporting the transatlantic services to the extent that makes this transfer viable for British Airways.
Lord Hankey: My Lords, will the Government bear in mind the tremendous importance of keeping together the technologists who understand this type of

973
thing? If the service did not continue, would it perhaps be possible for the RAF to take over these marvellous aeroplanes, because they are certainly the best aeroplanes flying?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, so far as I know there is no Ministry of Defence requirement for aircraft of this kind. However, let me say at once that there is no prospect of British Airways discontinuing these operations. The fact of the matter is that they are at present making an annual operational surplus of something like £7 million, which I am certain ensures the continued operation of these aircraft for many years to come.

British Library: Round Reading Room
3.7 p.m.
Lord Thomas of Swynnerton: 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 what steps they are taking to ensure that the Round Reading Room of the British Library remains a place of reading and study.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, no decision on this matter is required in the immediate future. The reading room in the British Museum building will continue to be used for its present purpose until at least the end of this century.
Lord Thomas of Swynnerton: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for that reply. Recalling that we are later this afternoon to discuss the National Heritage Bill and recognising that the Reading Room of the British Museum is without question a part of our national heritage; recalling, too, that within the next 12 months or so the Government will have to consider what part that Reading Room will play in future British Library plans, will my noble friend ask his right honourable friend the Minister for the Arts whether he could not examine whether the plans already approved and embarked upon for a new British Library could not be so adapted as to serve the existing reading rooms which are much prized by those who read there as not only places of use but places of great beauty?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, it is likely to be several years before a financial decision need be made for the further stages which would eventually allow the Reading Room to be used for other purposes. Decisions on its future use will be made in time to come by the British Museum trustees, who have assured my right honourable friend the Minister for the Arts that they will have due regard to the traditions and associations of the Reading Room. I will, of course, draw my noble friend's further remarks to the attention of my right honourable friend.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, would not the noble Earl agree that, while this is a matter for the trustees, it would be very difficult to separate the books from the readers when the great new library is completed north of St. Pancras? Would they also consider suggesting to the trustees that perhaps the Reading Room—and I am very sympathetic to the noble Lord's Question—could perhaps be used for special exhibitions to celebrate authors' centenaries and so on, as is done so successfully by the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for emphasising the fact that the Reading Room and the books must be in the same place. As regards his second point, I shall ensure that it is drawn to the attention of the trustees of the British Museum.
Viscount Eccles: My Lords, following the question of the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, I should like to point out that I have something to do with planning this move. It is impossible to separate the books into two different collections—one to be left for people to read in the British Museum and the other to be taken to Euston Road. What happens to the Reading Room is a matter for the British Museum trustees. They are very lucky to have that space back.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for underlining what I was saying.
Lord Dacre of Glanton: My Lords, considering that, so far as I can understand, there is no particular problem which is not soluble within the present system, can my noble friend say what is the ultimate, central, overriding purpose of an operation which really transforms the British Museum Reading Room from an historic centre of scholarship into a kind of community centre, thus breaking with tradition and effectively interrupting rather than forwarding the purposes which have made the British Library so useful and famous in the past?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, the great need is to rehouse the British Library, which at the moment is spread over 16 buildings. I was under the impression that the need for a new building to house, in appropriate conditions, the priceless collections of the British Library was not in doubt and, indeed, had been accepted. However, the future of the Round Reading Room must be considered in the light of that fact.
Lord Jenkins of Putney: My Lords, is it not the case that, in this connection, the proposals have commended themselves to successive Ministers and Governments on both sides of the House, and that, if one wished to examine in detail the reasons which one gives for this, one would need to deal with the matter in debate rather than through question and answer?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, who, indeed, has great experience in these matters.
Lord Teviot: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that priority must be given to readers to be able to go and get the books which they require in the shortest possible time? Although I also agree that the Round

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Room is an historic place, is my noble friend also aware of the point mentioned by my noble friend Lord Eccles, that the Library must be practical rather than too traditional?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I agree with my noble friend and am grateful to him for underlining my point.
Lord Thomas of Swynnerton: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the present arrangements are extremeley practical as well as beautiful?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend.
Lord Moyne: My Lords, while it is, of course essential that the new Library should have a reading room, there is always a lack of space in reading rooms. Could not scholars have collections of books on which they are working taken to the Reading Room of the British Museum and find general reference books there, so that they have the necessary accommodation for their researches? Cannot the two things be combined?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, as I said in my original reply, a decision on the future of the Reading Room will not be made for a considerable time. When the final phases of the British Library are completed, which will probably be at the end of this century, then will be the time to see whether or not the reading rooms are adequate.

Messages from The Queen
Lord Maclean: My Lords, I now have the honour to present to your Lordships two Messages from Her Majesty the Queen, each signed by her own hand. The first Message is as follows:
"I have received with great satisfaction the loyal and dutiful expression of your thanks for the Speech with which I opened the present Session of Parliament."
The second Message reads:
"I have received your Address praying that the Summer Time Order 1982 be made in the form of a draft laid before your House. I will comply with your request."

European Assembly Election (Amendment) Bill [H.L.]
Lord Bethell: My Lords, I beg to introduce a Bill to amend the law about the qualification of electors at elections of representatives to the Assembly of the European Communities so as to extend the franchise to British citizens resident in other member states of the European Communities. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a first time.—(Lord Bethell.)
On Question, Bill read a first time, and to be printed.

Greater London Council (General Powers) (No. 2) Bill
Read a second time, and committed to an Unopposed Bill Committee.

Severn-Trent Water Authority Bill
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Aberdare): MyLords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, I do not wish to delay the House unduly on this matter, but there is just one matter which, as I understand that this Bill is opposed and will go to committee, it might be as well should be mentioned in your Lordships' House on Second Reading and. therefore, taken aboard by the committee before it reports back to your Lordships' House.
The Severn-Trent Water Authority, in putting forward this Bill, which gives powers to the authority to construct engineering works along the River Soar in Leicestershire, has been most co-operative in discussing and helping to allay the fears of various national and local conservation organisations about the effects that this scheme might have. The potential for agricultural change, affecting approximately 6,700 acres of agricultural land following improved land drainage, is claimed by the authority as a positive benefit. But we know from other land drainage controversies elsewhere in the country—for instance, the Halvergate Marshes in Norfolk and the River Stort flood scheme in Hertfordshire and Essex—that the so-called agricultural benefits cannot be taken at face value if regionally and nationally important wildlife and landscape interests are to be affected.
Indeed, this is a very interesting Bill to come before your Lordships' House. I think that some time ago it would have been almost unheard of for your Lordships to be likely to pass a Bill which would probably destroy some of the best valley hunting land of the Quorn. But it is not about that that I am particularly raising this matter this afternoon. I am concerned with the landscape and the wildlife considerations.
The point at issue, very brieflly, is that the authority—no doubt perfectly properly—has continued to refuse to make available to conservation agencies and local authorities the cost-benefit analysis being used to support the scheme or, indeed, any economic justification. Indeed, in a letter of 27th September to the Leicestershire and Rutland Trust for Nature Conservation, the authority says:
"I regret that it is not possible to supply you with a copy of the cost-benefit analysis undertaken by the Authority as the information used therein is based on confidential information supplied by individual farmers, the disclosure of which would not only put the Authority in breach of confidence, but also seriously jeopardise the prospects of further cost-benefit investigations being undertaken in connection with other schemes".
One understands that point of view, although I always regard the excuses given for not producing information of this kind with some scepticism. However, the committee which considers this Private Bill really must weigh up the pros and cons. It might

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be hoped that information so far denied to conservation agencies could be made available to the committee by the authority. I hope that the committee may insist on that happening. I hope that your Lordships will agree that this is a worthwhile consideration to put before your Lordships' House and I hope that the committee will take this on board.
Baroness White: My Lords, briefly, I should like to support the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley. As some of your Lordships at least may be aware, the Severn-Trent Water Authority comes quite considerably into the Principality of Wales because of the Severn catchment area. Without detaining your Lordships, I should just like to say that the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, is important and is one that I am sure should be seriously taken into account by the committee which will be working on the Bill.
Lord Aberdare: My Lords, it is true that the Bill is opposed. There are two petitions, but they both relate to the same rather limited point regarding Coates' mill at Loughborough. However, I shall make certain that the general points that have been made by both the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, and the noble Baroness, Lady White, are drawn to the attention of the relevant Committee.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Select Committee.

House of Lords' Offices
Lord Aberdare: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper. I should like to apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Reilly, that his name was inadvertently left off the list when the names of the Offices' Committee were first proposed. I am especially sorry because he is the most distinguished chairman of our Works of Art Sub-Committee. As I am referring to works of art, may I take the opportunity to remind your Lordships that today is the last day for viewing the photographs of the House in session which are available in the Moses Room? I beg to move.
Moved, That, as proposed by the Committee of Selection, the Lord Reilly be appointed a member of the Select Committee on House of Lords' Offices.—(Lord Aberdare.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Consolidation Bills
The Lord Chancellor (Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That pursuant to Standing Order No. 48, the Lords following be appointed to join with a Committee of the Commons as the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills:

Airedale, L.

Alexander of Tunis, E.

Brightman, L.

Caithness, E.

Campbell of Alloway, L.

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Hanworth, V.

Lloyd of Kilgerran, L

Meston, L.

Milner of Leeds, L

Mishcon, L.

Nathan, L.

Stewart of Alvechurch, B.

That the Committee have power to agree with the Committee of the Commons in the appointment of a Chairman; and that a Message be sent to the Commons to propose that the Joint Committee do meet on Wednesday the 8th of December next at half-past Four o'clock in Committee Room No. 4.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to: and it was ordered that a Message be sent to the Commons to acquaint them therewith.

International Transport Conventions Bill [H.L.]
3.21 p.m.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, in the name of my noble friend Lord Bellwin, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. I should like to begin by explaining briefly the background to this Bill. The first international convention dealing with rail transport dates from 1890 when the organisation which continues to administer the current conventions—known from their administrative headquarters as the "Berne Union" Conventions—was set up. The 1890 convention covered the international carriage of goods by rail within Central Europe and was followed in 1924 by a further convention covering the carriage of passengers and their luggage. The United Kingdom acceded to the conventions in 1952 and is currently one of 33 member states now covering Western and Eastern Europe (except for the USSR), North Africa and the Middle East.
The conventions currently in force are the International Convention concerning the Carriage of Goods by Rail; the International Convention concerning the Carriage of Passengers and Luggage by Rail; and the Additional Convention relating to the liability of the Railway for Death of, and Personal Injury to, Passengers. These conventions have been the subject of regular revisions at approximately ten-year intervals.
The rules contained in these three conventions and their four annexes specify the rights and duties of the railway, of passengers and of consignors and consignees of goods. They cover***, for instance, the contract of carriage and the liability of the railway for delay and for death and injury in the case of passengers; and they deal with compensation for loss or damage in the case of goods. The conventions also deal with the relationship with national law and the administration of the international provisions. They will cease to be valid when the new convention concerning international carriage by rail comes into force. This is the Convention Relative aux Transports Internationaux Ferroviaires, otherwise known as COTIF.
The new COTIF Convention, which the United Kingdom signed at a joint Revision and Diplomatic

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Conference in 1980, revises and consolidates these rules by bringing together the three existing conventions and their annexes, together with new institutional provisions, into a single basic convention. It also involves the establishment of a permanent treaty between member states to provide continuity of relations, with a new revision procedure. The convention also sets up a new inter-governmental organisation with legal personality-Organisation Inter Governementale pour les Transports Internationaux Ferroviaires—otherwise known as OTIF to administer the convention. All present member states will be party to this organisation and the administration will continue to be carried out by the existing Central Office for International Rail Transport in Berne; there is no question either of increased bureaucracy or of any financial contribution beyond that which all members are already paying towards the administration of the organisation in Berne.
As noble Lords can see, therefore, the COTIF Convention itself contains no new principles; it is basically a consolidation and updating measure for a long-standing set of conventions on the contractual duties and rights of the railways in respect of international journeys. It does not touch upon any critical financial issues affecting the railways, either nationally or internationally; nor does it institute any new administrative system.
The main purpose of this Bill is simply to give the force of law in the United Kingdom to the convention and thus allow us to ratify it. Its provisions cover the United Kingdom as a whole and will bind both British Rail and also the Northern Ireland Railway. The Bill also makes provisions for the necessary consequential action for dealing with revisions to the convention; and it sets out the relationship with national law on key points such as damages in the event of a fatal accident.
Additionally the Bill makes minor changes to four other existing United Kingdom Acts of Parliament—the Carriage by Air Act 1961, the Carriage of Goods by Road Act 1965, the Carriage of Passengers by Road Act 1974 and the International Carriage of Perishable Foodstuffs Act 1976. These Acts, like the present Bill, give force of law in the United Kingdom to a series of international conventions and provide for a procedure of amendment by Order in Council to take account of revisions to the conventions agreed to by the United Kingdom. With the exception of Section 8A of the Carriage by Air Act 1961 the provisions in question, unlike Clause 8 of the Bill, enable amendments to be made only to certain provisions of the implementing Acts. Such a limitation in the scope of the power to amend is unjustifiable—given first that any revision of the relevant convention to which it is to give effect will have been agreed to by the United Kingdom following the laying of the proposed revision before Parliament; and second, considering that any Order in Council will require the approval of each House of Parliament. The provisions in the Acts in question are therefore brought into line with the drafting of Clause 8 of this Bill enabling any provision of that Act to be modified by Order in Council. The change in the provision in the Act of 1961 is a pure drafting change.
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I should perhaps now deal briefly with a few key points on the drafting of the Bill itself. Your Lordships will have observed that the Bill is short, while the convention to which it gives effect is long (indeed, 900 pages in its full form with all its annexes). It is for reasons of its length, therefore, that the Bill defines the convention by reference to the command paper in which it is published rather than annexing it. I am sure it will be accepted that—unusual though this approach is—it is the only practical way to deal with such a lengthy convention.
I should also like to draw attention to the provisions on fatal accidents which deal with the relationship with the Fatal Accidents Act 1976, the Damages (Scotland) Act 1976 and the Fatal Accidents (Northern Ireland) Order 1977. These provisions are designed to prevent the same person from bringing an action under the convention and under national law in respect of the death of a person; but they do preserve the right to claim damages for bereavement under Section 1A of the Fatal Accidents Act 1976 (or its equivalent in Northern Ireland) or a loss of society award under Section 1(4) of the Damages (Scotland) Act 1976. They also ensure that in awarding damages under the national legislation a court may take account of any payments made under the convention. Although the convention itself provides an upper limit to the amount of damages payable on fatal accidents where a lower limit is prescribed in national law, no such upper limit will apply in the United Kingdom since none is prescribed by United Kingdom legislation.
The final point of detail is simply to highlight an area where this Bill provides a safeguard not provided by the convention itself—in the inspection of luggage. Whereas the convention provides simply for inspection by authorised officials, this Bill ensures that in the United Kingdom luggage may be required to be opened by such an official only in the presence of a constable. Your Lordships may want to note this safeguard. Having said this, I am sure your Lordships will agree that this Bill is non-controversial and provides for the ratification of an important and practical convention for railways, passengers and traders. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(The Earl of Avon.)
3.30 p.m.
Lord Underhill: My Lords, I am certain the House will be appreciative of the explanation given by the noble Earl of the background to the convention and the provisions of the Bill. As he rightly says, it is non-controversial and non-political, so there is no need for me to make what would be a normal Second Reading speech. There are, however, a few technical points about which I should like some explanation.
It is encouraging that a convention which was agreed in May 1980 is now before the United Kingdom Parliament for approval—that is, in just over two years—and noble Lords will appreciate that we take for granted the facilities for travel (for passengers and the carriage of freight between countries) yet it is only by a convention such as this that that can proceed with reasonable smoothness, along with adequate provision for liability for death,

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injury, loss or damage of luggage and freight. I understand from Article 24 that the convention will come into force only when it has been ratified by 15 states. How many member states have signed it, and how many have ratified it at this stage or are in process of doing so?
Clause 2, as the Minister said, makes provision for Orders in Council to be made certifying whether the United Kingdom or any other member state has made a reservation about certain provisions of the convention or has suspended the uniform rules; and that leads me to ask a few questions about situations which could arise in the event of reservations being made by any other state or suspension of the uniform rules. They are somewhat technical matters and if the noble Earl feels they must await the Committee stage, I shall understand, though it may assist the speedy process in Committee if the Minister is in a position to deal with them today.
Clause 5(4) provides that a reasonable fee may be charged for the issue of a certificate which gives the sterling equivalent to the IMF drawing rights in connection with any court award. What is considered arbitration. In the event of the United Kingdom accepting—which it would do if it ratified the convention—but if another state opts out, what would be the position in the event of a dispute arising? Clause 2(2)(b) provides that a member state may make a reservation under paragraph 1 of Article 3 of Appendix A, and that relates to liability in the case of death or injury to a passenger. What would happen should that position arise in any member state? Would the matter be left to the law to take its normal course? Subsection (3) of that clause deals with the suspension of the uniform rules should any member state not accept subsequent amendments to the convention. If the rules are suspended by any state, what is the situation then arising?
Clause 5(4) provides that a reasonable fee may be charged for the issue of a certificate which gives the sterling equivalent to the IMF drawing rights in connection with any court award. What is considered to be reasonable? That is a matter we have frequently debated in this House. Is the noble Earl able to say what would be reasonable in that context, or must that matter be left to the Committee stage?
I was pleased the Minister emphasised that the provision in the Bill regarding the opening of passengers' luggage to verify or check the contents, so far as the United Kingdom is concerned, will be exercised only in the presence of a constable. Should a British passenger be travelling in another state where that provision does not apply, what will be the position should a dispute arise between the passenger and the railway authorities? Again, is that a matter which must be left to the law to take its normal course?
Schedule 1 sets out the provisions concerning fatal accidents in Scotland. Is the noble Earl in a position to say what are the main differences between those provisions and those which apply to the remainder of the United Kingdom? Have British Rail and the Northern Ireland Railway generally approved the contents of the Bill and the convention?
3.36 p.m.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, for his helpful and constructive approach to the Bill. I shall try to answer all his questions in the hope that no further problems will arise in Committee. As I said earlier, we have here a simple Bill which will enable the United Kingdom, by ratifying the COTIF Convention, to continue as a party to adhere to a set of extremely useful and practical rules governing international rail travel. As a result, proper safeguards will be provided for passengers and traders.
To take up the noble Lord's points, of the 33 states covering East and Western Europe, North Africa and the Middle East which have signed the convention, 10 have already ratified, and my understanding is that when 15 have ratified, we shall be able to implement the convention. On the question of the effect of Clause 2 (2) and (3), I should perhaps explain in some detail, not the power providing for Orders in Council to certify reservations made by member states (which, the noble Lord will know, simply establishes the position in the United Kingdom) but the effect of the reservations themselves. Under paragraph 3 of Article 12 of the convention, referred to in Clause 2 (2) (a), a member state may decline to apply all or part of the provisions giving access to an arbitration tribunal in the event of a dispute. There is no question of the United Kingdom declining to apply this provision. A dispute between the United Kingdom and a member state that reserved under Article 12 paragraph 1 would have to be settled by the normal diplomatic processes. Under paragraph 2 (a), disputes between the transport undertakings would be settled by the normal inter-railway processes using the Central Office administrative machinery. In the final event, the railway would have recourse to the courts.
Under paragraph 2 (b)—disputes between transport undertakings and users for any journey begun or ended in the United Kingdom—there should be no problem, since liability is shared between all railways forming part of a journey. The British user may simply take the appropriate action against the British Railways Board, who would deal as they normally would with other parties to the dispute. Even without the simpler procedure for settling disputes under arbitration, users are guaranteed their rights under the convention through the normal legal processes. Under paragraph 2(c)—disputes between users—a United Kingdom resident would have the normal legal remedies through the courts.
Article 3 of Appendix A to the convention permits member states not to apply the convention's provisions dealing with the railway's liability for personal accidents to its own nationals or residents. There can be no question of any member state opting out for nationals of other countries. The United Kingdom itself has no intention of reserving under this provision, and therefore I do not foresee any problems.
The noble Lord's final point on Clause 2 related to the suspension of the uniform rules under Article 20 of the convention. This provides that the uniform rules should be suspended one month after coming into force of any amendment to the convention for traffic with and between member states which have neither ratified the protocol nor notified the Central Office

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that they will apply the amendments. In practice, the General Assembly would not decide to bring an amendment into force before all the important transit countries, such as Germany, had ratified or notified; thus, we believe that no problem will arise. Should a peripheral country fail to ratify, however, the practical approach might have to be that the railway issuing a CIV ticket or CIM document would explain to the passenger or consingee that the rules applied only as far as the border of the country of destination and that therefore extra insurance provision might be necessary.
Turning to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, regarding Clause 5(4), about certificates issued to determine the current sterling value of an International Monetary Fund drawing right, I have to say that the level of fee to be charged for a certificate has not yet been determined, but I can assure the noble Lord that we shall take the greatest care to ensure that in arriving at a figure the term "reasonable" would be properly interpreted, and would take full account of the circumstances in which, and the type of person by whom, such a certificate might be sought.
The noble Lord also asked about the inspection of luggage under the convention. As he has observed, in the United Kingdom a passenger may only be required to open his luggage in the presence of a constable. This is an additional safeguard to the convention itself. which permits railway staff to require the luggage to be opened, and. in the absence of the owner, requires only the presence of two witnesses unconnected with the railway. Outside the United Kingdom a British traveller will be subject to the laws of the country that he is in and the provisions of the convention. The provision in the convention will apply in all member states, and may be supplemented, but not replaced, by provisions in national law. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, will accept that the convention itself provides a basic safeguard and that, beyond that, British travellers must expect to be subject to the laws of whichever country they are visiting.
So far Scotland is concerned, the provisions for damages following fatal accidents on the railway in Scotland are different from those for England and Wales, reflecting the differences in the Scots and English law on damages, but the effects of the provisions in each jurisdiction are very similar. Both prevent a dependant who can bring an action under the convention for financial loss following the death of a passenger, from also bringing an action under existing national law. Both allow a court, in assessing damages in an action under the convention, to disregard certain benefits accruing to the dependant. Both relax the respective systems' rules on multiplicity of actions and allow the courts to take into account damages awarded under the convention when assessing damages in actions under existing law.
The main difference between the provisions lies in the difference between a "loss of society" award in the Scottish provisions and a "bereavement" award in the English provisions. In both cases the right to claim these awards is reserved notwithstanding that action may have been taken under the convention; and the principle behind the two is the same. But the terms are somewhat different. Both restrict claims to members
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of the deceased's immediate family; in Scotland for
"the loss of the benefit he might have been expected to gain from the deceased's society and guidance".
and in England for "bereavement". But the English legislation defines the immediate family and provides a financial limit of £3,500 to the awards, variable by negative resolution of both Houses, which the Scottish legislation does not. Your Lordships will appreciate that that reflects differences between English and Scottish law, rather than different policies.
So far as discussions with British Rail and the Northern Ireland Railway are concerned, I understand that they are entirely happy with the convention and therefore with the Bill. I am grateful to the noble Lord for his helpful contribution, and I hope that I have answered his queries satisfactorily. I commend the Bill to the House.
On Question, Bill read a second time and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

National Heritage Bill [H.L.]
3.44 p.m.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. I am grateful to those noble Lords who have had to listen to me speaking on the transport Bill. I am sure that that is not what they had in mind when they decided to attend your Lordships' House this afternoon. I am happy to have the privilege of introducing the National Heritage Bill to this House. Noble Lords have an active interest in the preservation of our past, and a particular interest in our architectural and archaeological inheritance. Most of us, too, share a wider interest in the display and ordering of our great national collections. I look forward with great interest to hearing the contributions to the debate this afternoon; in particular, the maiden speech of my noble friend Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd.
The Bill falls into two main parts. The first part is concerned with four of our best known and internationally respected heritage institutions: the Victoria and Albert Museum; the Science Museum; the Armouries at the Tower; and the Royal Botanic Gardens. Each is pre-eminent in its field, and is served by experts whose work is recognised throughout the world as authoritative. Indeed, many of us know from personal experience how esteemed are their services. The second part is concerned with the establishment of a new Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings for England, to carry out various functions in England in respect of those parts of our national heritage.
First, I should like to turn to the four national institutions. The Government have been concerned about the differences in management arrangements between our national institutions. Most are already trustee bodies with the managerial autonomy that accompanies that status. They are accountable for their finances, and have scope within the limits of their grants to deploy their resources as they think best. But the scope is not available in the same measure to each of the four. The Victoria and Albert Museum and the Science Museum are currently the direct responsibility of the Minister for the Arts, acting for the Secretary of State for Education and Science. The Armouries in the

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Tower of London are currently the responsibility of the Secretary of State for the Environment, and the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew and Wakehurst Place are the responsibility of the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food.
The main difficulty is one of divided responsibility. The Bill aims to rectify this. At present each controlling Minister of the Crown is answerable to Parliament in detail for policy in these institutions. But this practice is contrary to the present Government's policy of keeping at arm's length from their non-departmental public bodies—a principle which we believe is vital for the integrity of the bodies and the health of their activities. I am sure that this House would agree that it should not expect Government departments to possess the special knowledge required to scrutinise and justify decisions relating to curatorial, scientific and aesthetic responsibilities.
Our predecessors began consultations on the status of the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Science Museum in 1978. We continued the discussions, which culminated in the decision to carry out a Rayner Scrutiny of the institutions last winter. We welcomed the recommendations of the scrutiny, which came down firmly in favour of devolved status, and in May of this year my right honourable friend the Minister for the Arts announced the Government's intention to legislate to establish boards of trustees for the two museums. We selected that option after considerable thought because, in our view, a board of trustees is a most effective way of enabling the museums to be accountable and responsible for their actions. It is the normal form of management in other national museums and galleries, where it has worked successfully for many years. Similar considerations weighed in our decision to confer trustee status on the Tower Armouries and the Royal Botanic Gardens.
Establishment of the new boards will alleviate other problems facing the institutions. All four collections are currently staffed by civil servants, and have had to make their contribution to staff reductions which have been applied to Government departments. Yet the work that they do is quite unlike that of Departments of State, and the services that they offer cannot be directly compared. The proposed change in status will remove the staff from the Civil Service. The institutions will, of course, remain constrained by their overall resource allocations. The Bill is emphatically not a licence for over-staffing, or for disregard of the principles of efficiency. For example, the pay, and hence the grading and loading, of posts will remain under a degree of surveillance by sponsor departments and the Treasury. The new trustee boards will, however, be able, and expected, to use their own professional judgment in balancing the competing demands for their resources, rather than leaving that fundamental policy issue to Government departments. The Government consider that the logical and proper course of action.
Kew perhaps merits a few separate comments. In April this year, the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food announced in another place his intention to consult the interests concerned on the proposal to put the gardens under trustees, and the consultations have revealed a substantial weight of opinion favouring independent trustees. The trustee idea is not a new
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one. As early as 1838, at the time of the Lindley Committee, there was a suggestion that the gardens should be put under trustees, and the idea has since been revived several times. However, no Govermnent before this have been concerned enough with machinery of Government matters to "grasp the nettle" and propose to Parliament the kind of legislation which we are now considering. In our view, as with the museums, independent trustees are best placed to run an institution of this kind and to give the support to the director which he requires in carrying out diverse and important activities in a specialised sector.
Apart from the four national institutions to which I have referred, the Bill also contains provisions enabling the Secretary of State for Defence to grant aid certain designated armed forces museums. These museums already have trustee status but are nevertheless still staffed by civil servants. This places the Ministry in a similar cleft stick to the other sponsoring departments and it is therefore appropriate that the Bill should include clauses to deal with these institutions too. It is intended that no museum would be designated without the agreement of the governing body concerned. Two that are intended to be designated are the RAF Museum at Hendon and the National Army Museum in Chelsea. Others are in mind. However, the majority of service museums are relatively small, unit collections and should not be disturbed.
I turn now to the second main part of this Bill, namely, the provisions designed to establish a new Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings for England. There are few surprises in the proposals. The idea has been very thoroughly canvassed by the Secretary of State for the Environment, first in an outline consultative document which triggered off a valuable debate, and then in a detailed decision document—The Way Forward—which set out his decision to proceed with this proposal and also drew up a blueprint for the detals of how it might work. The Bill very largely follows that pattern.
It is for the establishment in England of a commission with responsibility, first, for the management and maintenance of monuments in the care of the Secretary of State; second, a lively and imaginative presentation of those monuments; third, to make grants to local authorities, private owners and ecclesiastical authorities for the preservation of historic buildings and ancient monuments and ecclesiastical buildings in use; fourth, the coordination of rescue archaeology work; and, finally, advice to the Secretary of State on listing, scheduling and taking monuments into care. The Secretary of State would retain responsibility and be answerable to Parliament for the broad aspects of policy, confirmation of decisions on listing, scheduling and taking monuments into care, and the exercise of all planning functions under the provisions of the Town and Country Planning Acts.
Perhaps here I may pay tribute, first, to all those staff who over the years have made such a contribution to the better preservation and presentation of our heritage in all its forms, and, second, to the members of the Ancient Monuments Board and Historic Buildings Council in England, whose work will be subsumed in the new commission but whose efforts

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will live on and provide the foundation for further progress. In this context I welcome the contribution later of my noble friend the Duke of Grafton.
Let me list the major advantages which the Government see in the proposal embodied in the Bill. First, it reduces central Government functions in an area where these are more effectively carried out by a commission rather than a Government department. Second, the Government look for a more positive and creative approach arising from the fusion of the existing arrangements. At present the Department of the Environment, the Ancient Monuments Board and the Historic Buildings Council are all involved. Bringing them together will create a body which can exert a powerful influence for conservation in its widest sense.
Third, the Government look for an imaginative approach to the presentation of our national heritage and the development of the commercial and tourist opportunities which they present, and a new approach to the educational use of the heritage. I would stress that such changes are not to be made at the expense of the preservation of the heritage. That remains the basic aim. Fourth, the Government look to the new body to tap the abundant goodwill which undoubtedly exists towards the heritage, through private donations, sponsorship, voluntary assistance and in other ways.
All this makes a powerful case for the change proposed by the Bill. However, worries have been expressed and it is proper that those worries should be answered. If I stress certain matters now, I hope it may reassure some doubters. As I have already said, this change does not in any way reduce the Government's ultimate responsibility for, or commitment to, the preservation of the nation's heritage. Some people have talked about this proposal in terms of selling the heritage for a profit. Nothing could be further from the Government's mind. This Government have, I believe, an impeccable record in terms of protection of the heritage.
I know the Secretary of State for the Environment would want me to say that his proposal is in no way intended as a cost-cutting exercise. He will continue to protect heritage expenditure so far as possible from the rigours of public expenditure cuts. The important work of archaeological survey and recording will continue, with Government support through the funding of rescue projects. So will work on historic buildings, including the relisting survey, and in conservation areas, in all of which work local authorities play a vital role. The Government see the new commission as a major force for even better performance than at present in caring for the nation's heritage.
I now turn to the detailed provisions of the Bill. Each of the institutions covered by the Bill has its own distinctive and unique character. They have different tasks to perform and these are reflected in the provisions in the Bill and have to some extent influenced its shape. The Bill must be capable of giving clear guidance to those responsible for carrying its provisions into effect in the future and it has been deemed desirable that each of the institutions concerned should be covered in a separate section. I hope the merits of this approach will become clear as I continue through the main provisions.
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The first two parts of the Bill concern the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Science Museum. Clauses 1 to 7 and Part I of Schedule I relate to the Victoria and Albert Museum and Clauses 8 to 14 and Part II of Schedule I relate to the Science Museum. Reference is also made to these institutions in Schedules 5 and 6 which deal with amendments and repeals. Since provisions for these institutions are similar, I propose for the moment to deal with the Victoria and Albert Museum and to return later to identify the differences in the provisions relating to the Science Museum, the Armouries and the Royal Botanic Gardens.
Clause 1 establishes a board of trustees. Detailed provision as to the board is contained in Part I of Schedule 1. I do not propose to deal at length today with the matters contained in the schedules. This one concerns the detailed aspects of the status, organisation and procedure of the board and the employment of staff. I should stress to the House that the Government do not wish the interests of any of the staff affected by the Bill to suffer by virtue of its provisions, and for this reason each of the new boards and the commission will be required to make a firm offer of employment to each of its staff serving in those institutions on terms no less favourable, taken as a whole, than those applying in the Civil Service. The Bill specifies a period of three months in which the offers are to remain open, to give adequate time for staff to consider them. Discussions between parent departments and their respective trade union sides are in hand to ensure that all necessary aspects have been taken into consideration.
Clause 2 is concerned with the board's general functions. It specifies the board's duties to care for, preserve and augment the collections, to exhibit them to the public and to facilitate access to them for the purpose of research, and it takes into account the educational role of the museums. The Victoria and Albert Museum has performed long and distinguished service in the fostering of the public's appreciation of all matters relating to art and design and it has achieved this through the unrivalled breadth of its collections and the wide range of activities related to them. To these ends, the board may make all manner of contracts and agreements, acquire and dispose of property, and do such other things as may be necessary for the purpose of their functions. Clause 2 also enables the board to look after objects not in their collections on behalf of the Minister of the Crown. Acquisitions and disposals of land may be made with the Secretary of State's consent.
Clause 3 transfers to the board the objects which form part of the present collections, together with the general equipment required for the upkeep and administration of the museum. The transfer is, of course, to include objects which are temporarily away on loan from the museum. Any funds vested in a Minister of the Crown in respect of the museum will become the property of the board, and rights and liabilities attaching to either objects or funds affected by this clause will also be transferred. In certain instances it may be necessary to withhold objects from the general transfer. Provision is made for this to be done by means of an order made by the Secretary of State, subject to a negative resolution procedure of either House.

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Specific provision is included in the Bill to withhold the important collection of objects relating to the first Duke of Wellington and exhibited under the care of the Victoria and Albert at Apsley House. The present Duke and the Minister for the Arts have agreed that the objects should remain in the ownership of the Crown. The day-to-day care of the collection is to be transferred to the board of trustees and the Bill provides accordingly.
Clause 4 provides that, in the case of deeds of gifts and bequests which are drawn up before, but do not take effect until after, the establishment of the board, and which may be in such terms as to otherwise vest property in the Secretary of State for Education and Science, such a gift or bequest shall in fact be to the benefit of the board.
Clause 5 is concerned with the acquisition and disposal of objects by the board. Apart from acquisition by purchase, exchange or gift, a Minister of the Crown may transfer to the board any object vested in him which may be appropriate to the collections. The board is not allowed to sell, exchange or give away an object unless it is a duplicate or is unfit to be retained in the collections and can be disposed of without detriment to the interest of students or the general public. Provision is made for the board to transfer objects to other national museums and galleries which are already enabled under existing legislation to make similar transfers to the Victoria and Albert and Science Museums. Objects which have become useless for the purpose of the collections by reason of damage, physical deterioration or infestation, may be disposed of notwithstanding any trusts or conditions that may be attached to the objects in question. These provisions are similar to those which Parliament adopted, and which have been generally recognised to be appropriate, in the case of the British Museum.
Clause 6 deals with the lending and borrowing of objects. When considering loans, the board is to pay particular attention to requests for loans for public exhibitions. The board is also required to take into account the interests of students and the safety of the objects. Loans are not to be made where they are inconsistent with the terms of trusts or conditions attaching to objects, unless 25 years has elapsed since the objects were acquired by the museum, or unless consent to the loan has been obtained in writing from the donor or personal representative of the testator. The Bill enables the board to accept loans either for public exhibition or for the purposes of research. Clause 7 provides that the expenditure of the board is to be met out of money voted by Parliament.
My Lords, I now turn to the Science Museum, which shares its origins with the Victoria and Albert but which, since 1909, has had a distinguished and distinctive rôle to promote the public appreciation and interest in all matters relating to science and the application of scientific principles in industry. Provision for this museum differs only in so far as there are references to the Patent Museum in Clauses 10 and 11 and Part II of Schedule 1. The collections of the Patent Museum have been associated with those of the Science Museum since 1883 when the Patents Act vested the Patent Museum in the Department of Science and Arts. Over the years, these collections
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have become inextricably merged, but it is necessary to make reference in the Bill to the Patent Museum because it is a legally separate entity.
Clauses 15 to 20, and Part III of Schedule 1, deal with the Armouries at Her Majesty's Tower of London. This museum originated centuries ago as a military store for armour and ordnance. Over time, this store has evolved into a national collection of arms and armour. Trustee status is appropriate for this collection for the same reason as I have already described, and close links with the Royal Collection make it appropriate to provide for one trustee to be appointed by Her Majesty and for the Constable to be an ex-officio trustee. The detailed provisions in the relevant clauses are very similar to those I have already described in detail in respect of the V & A.
My Lords, I turn now to the provisions on the Royal Botanic Gardens contained in Clauses 21 to 26. The individual clauses relating to the Royal Botanic Gardens are in general terms parallel to the provisions for the other trustee boards. Clause 22 lays down the functions of the boards in a way which will enable them to take over the present activities of the Gardens in the fields of research in botany, education, care of a collection of plants and so on, as well as admission of the public to Kew and Wakehurst Place. This clause also makes the necessary provision under which the board of trustees will manage the land concerned, and provides for ministerial control over certain matters; for example, hours of entry and entrance fees. Clauses 23 to 26 follow closely provisions which I have already described.
I turn now to Clauses 27 and 28 and Schedule 2, concerning museums which have a close association with the armed forces of the Crown. The position of the Ministry of Defence differs slightly from the position of the other departments sponsoring this legislation. The majority of its principal museums are already constituted as trustee, or similar bodies, and therefore already have the legal capacity to control resources and employ staff which is being given to the other museums covered by the Bill. Nonetheless, the Ministry wishes to change the basis on which the armed forces museums are currently funded in those instances where it is considered that this would give the larger establishments greater scope to manage their own resources. This will be achieved by means of a grant in aid to cover those staff and running costs which are at present provided in kind out of the general defence budget This will put them on the same basis as the other museums in the Bill. No specific increase in public expenditure is expected to result from this new arrangement. Clause 27 provides that any armed forces museums may be funded in this way. At the moment, most of the larger museums receive a small grant in aid from defence Votes to cover the purchase of exhibits, and it is intended that this will continue to be provided.
Clause 28 allows the Secretary of State to designate certain museums by means of a statutory instrument. It is only the museums so designated which will in future be funded solely through a grant in aid, and the effect of designation is to apply the provisions of Schedule 2 to the body concerned. This will ensure that the position of staff currently employed at these museums as civil servants will not be adversely affected by the change in funding arrangements.

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Specifically, it provides for their continued employment by the governing body of the museum on terms no less favourable than those they currently enjoy, and allows for their continued membership of the principal Civil Service pension scheme. It is very similar to the arrangements made for the staff of the other museums we have discussed. The clause applies only to establishments which actually employ civil servants and does not affect other employees who may be employed directly by these establishments.
My Lords, I have already talked about the policy behind the commission proposal. The relevant clauses in the Bill are Clauses 29 to 32, together with Schedule 3 which makes provision on status, membership and other related matters for the commission. A long and detailed Schedule 4 endows the new commission with functions. The reasons for this rather intricate approach to the new commission is because the new commission largely obtains its functions not by new statutes but by adaptation of functions which at present belong to the Secretary of State. The matter is complicated by the fact that the commission's functions apply only in England, so that the Secretary of State must retain functions in Scotland and Wales. The best way of providing the commission with its detailed functions, stemming from existing statutes, is by detailed amendment of those statutes. I am afraid that this approach produces a very substantial schedule. Incidentally, before Committee stage—in fact, I hope, next week—noble Lords will have available Notes on Clauses which will take them through such a schedule as this and explain to them the purposes of the various paragraphs in it.
Clause 29 establishes the commission and applies the procedural provisions of Schedule 3. Clause 30 gives the commission the purpose of conservation in England of ancient monuments, archaeological areas, and buildings and areas of special architectural or historic interest; it gives the commission the new function of providing education and instruction and enables the commission to receive voluntary contributions and to borrow temporarily. Clause 31 enables the Secretary of State to pay grant to the commission, and Clause 32 confirms that on the creation of the commission, the Historic Buildings Council for England and the Ancient Monuments Board for England will cease to exist.
I said earlier that I did not intend to dwell on the schedules to the Bill. But a brief reference to Schedule 5 may be helpful. This schedule makes certain amendments to the National Gallery and Tate Gallery Act 1954 to place those institutions on the same footing as the other national collections, including those covered by the main body of the Bill, by removing certain requirements for parliamentary approval of certain decisions by the trustees concerning loans from their collections. These unique and stringent controls are a legacy from the 19th century legislation that established the collection in the national galleries. They deal with matters that are more appropriate to the trustees of the institutions concerned. For this reason, the schedule contains provision for their repeal.
My Lords, I hope that I have now said enough to outline the more important aspects of this Bill. It is a
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measure designed primarily to remove the disparities existing in the control and management of some of our great national collections and others of similar standing. It offers a wider framework for co-ordinating future developments and approaches to the protection of our architectural and archaeological heritage. I believe that the Government's desire to provide for the future in this way will be widely shared by your Lordships whose speeches I look forward to hearing later this afternoon. I commend the Bill to the House.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(The Earl of Avon.)
4.10 p.m.
Baroness Birk: My Lords, may I first thank the Minister for explaining so clearly—at least as clearly as he can with this particular Bill—what should in fact be two Bills. So he has now totalled three Bills this afternoon up to now. I do not know what else he has up his sleeve. This Bill, as he said, falls into two distinct parts, one dealing with the museums and the other the new commission. I shall leave the discussion on the museums to my noble friend Lord Strabolgi who will be speaking later in the debate. One personal point I should like to make however is how delighted I am to see that the Armouries Museum is having its own board of trustees. In the days when I was a Minister at the Department of the Environment and visited the Tower of London on many occasions, I always felt that the Armoury was so buried in the body of the Tower of London that it did not really have its own identity and was not always recognised as one of the leading armouries museums in the world.
As the Minister has pointed out, the major innovation in this Bill is the creation of this new Government Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings for England. I am delighted that we are going to have Notes on Clauses, but, with the greatest respect, I do not think that that is good enough. I do not think that one has to prove that one is the "Brain of Britain" in order to read a piece of legislation, although no legislation is ever easy to read. When one gets to the schedules, particularly Schedule 4,I must confess that that is practically incomprehensible.
What I am suggesting is that a Keeling Schedule should be introduced into this Bill. Noble Lords will be aware that the Keeling Schedule—which was named after a memorandum by Mr. Keeling and other private Members of the other place in 1938—amends a Bill so that one can see the references from referred legislation placed within the Bill. The explanation of this is on page 467 of Erskine May. I hope that the Keeling Schedule is adopted, otherwise it is going to be extremely difficult for those of us who are working on the Bill. Also, people who want to understand, whether they are professionals or interested amateurs, will find the Bill quite impossible. I ask the Minister to consider this matter very carefully.
We also need—almost together with this Bill—a consolidation Act to put together all the pieces of heritage legislation which are now mounting up and are all over the place in different Acts. I will not detain the House, but there have been a number of precedents for using the Keeling Schedule, and the most recent one was the Social Security Act 1980. Those of us on these Benches must have some grave

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reservations about the Government's motives in creating a body which, to judge from the Explanatory Memorandum of the Bill, enables the Secretary of State to reduce the number of civil servants by 3,000. But will they not be roses by other names? If not, how are they going to run the commission and museums?
However, I do not believe that this Bill will divide the House on party lines; I think that we shall find, right across the House, that we have agreements or disagreements, irrespective of party. I can see the advantage of a body that is free from close day-to-day Government control, which can take a broad, independent view and which can also harness both creative and commercial elements to it. To be able to do this it must, in the first place, be a strongly constituted commission with obviously a first-class chairman. Then it must have—and this is the 66,000 dollar question—the financial resources sufficient to carry out the work. This is an anxiety that has been expressed by all the amenity groups in the field, the statutory bodies and also numbers of other individuals. I shall return to this in a moment. While responsibility lies within the hands of the Secretary of State, the Government are subject to immediate pressure in this House and another place if questions need to be raised or there is something that Members of either place do not like about what is happening.
From my experience as a Minister in the Department of the Environment, when I had the pleasant but often contentious task of being responsible for the whole area of conservation, I was made aware of two things. The first was that in a very large department one can often wriggle some sums of money along to undertake or finish certain projects, sums which are really financial crumbs in that department but which for an agency could constitute quite a large sum. One has to get over that problem. Secondly, the interest that is shown in the department in heritage depends on the lead given by Ministers. Apart from the Secretary of State, who has shown tremendous concern with the heritage and also a very productive interest in these matters, I do not believe that there is a Minister responsible for what I would call the heritage package, as there was when I was in the Ministry during the last Administration. This can mean an uneven succession. If there is a bleak period when nobody is particularly interested in the heritage and therefore no lead is given, even to those officials who are themselves dedicated—and there are a great many of them—then it can be very bad.
Therefore I have sympathy with the Secretary of State's desire to see many of these decisions on ancient monuments and historic buildings removed to an independent agency. It will give both freedom and inspiration to the safeguarding of our buildings. I do not believe that people will think that the Government are selling off the heritage at a profit. I do not think that the Government have sold anything off at a profit yet, so I do not think they will be selling the heritage at a profit! But a number of concerns have been raised.
The Minister this afternoon spelt out clearly the arrangements about conditions for staff. I put it to him that there is still a great deal of anxiety, and reassurances are needed to be given to the Civil Service unions and also to NALGO, which provide the people
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who are involved in the archaeological digs. If there is not sufficient clarity, this matter should be looked at very carefully in Committee. The Government should initiate discussions at the earliest possible date with the unions. It will be very bad to start off something like this and introduce a sour note.
A number of the points that I am going to make—and other noble Lords may also say this—are about matters that are not in the Bill. It is not so much a question of discussing what is in the Bill, as we are doing, but of referring to the large, rather foggy areas. It is not clear which powers will be reserved to the Secretary of State and which to the agency. For example, will the Secretary of State endorse the commission's recommendations? In that case, how much liaison will there be and how much duplication? How much expert advice will he need in order to check on the commission? I have in mind such matters as appeals from the commission to him on certain things, maybe on listing or other things which do not come necessarily within the planning area which he reserves to himself. All this must be spelt out more clearly on the face of the Bill. Will he stick strictly to planning matters and interdepartmental policies which might cut across some of the recommendations made by the agency and which can only be resolved at ministerial level?
Fears have been expressed by expert bodies, amenity groups and individuals, that such an agency might feel itself pressed to exploit the commercial possibilities of the popular monuments—and I think that the commercial element was mentioned by the Minister—and neglect the unsung parts of the heritage, like rescue archaeology and field monuments.
I should not have thought that that was the intention of the Government, but again I think it needs to be spelled out and is probably something to be put into the Bill itself.
I am very pleased to see that education comes into the Bill and I hope very much that the Heritage Education Group, which I set up under the chairmanship of Lord Briggs and which has been going very well ever since then, will be able to be taken in as part of the commission or of its committees, because there we have a ready-made heritage education vehicle for young people, which is where interest in the heritage must start.
Where you have people such as expert archaeologists, architects and people concerned with nature conservancy and everything else, who are concerned about how this will affect them, one way of reassuring them is by using the committees to the utmost and using them well and properly. It is essential that they should be high-powered, professional and expert, and that men and women who think in terms of innovations should be on these committees and that, if I may say so, as many as possible of them should be still in their first youth. Archaeology, architecture, education and also publicity would be some of the committees concerned, and there could be others. If anybody takes the view that people will not want to serve on these committees unless they are on the commission proper or unless they are paid, I would dispute that. I have always found that if you invite people to serve on a panel or a committee and ask them to do a job, if they are interested and feel it is useful, they will readily do it. Sometimes we do not

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have a complete appreciation of the extent to which people are masochists in doing good works and helping the community.
The local authorities—I am glad the Minister stressed this and I would stress it even further—must be represented on the commission and the committees and they must feel that they are part of this work, because it is through them that so much of the care of the heritage has to be done.
When we come to the palaces and the parks, I know, for instance, that the Tower of London in 1981 achieved £4·329 million in receipts and £617,000 from sales. Of course, it is very tempting to put it over right away into an agency so that it has a money-spinner to start with. I would have thought that the question whether or not the palaces are inhabited is one about which it is not necessary to make a complete distinction; so long as the maintenance is done to the standard employed by the Historic Buildings Council it does not make all that difference. But it does need a lot of consideration and I would suggest that there should be an enabling clause put in the Bill which could be implemented later by order, so that more legislation is not needed.
So far as the Royal parks are concerned—here I speak personally, having been responsible for them from 1974 to 1979—I think they should be left exactly where they are within the department. They are under the bailiff and park superintendents, and I think they are superbly run. Anyhow, it does not seem to fit in with the built heritage. I know that the staffs are unhappy at the idea and I would hope that they could be put out of their anxiety and misery and told that they will be left alone. I am not going to say anything about the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments because I see that the noble Lord, Lord Adeane, is to speak later.
Finally, I turn to the nub of the problem, which is of course finance. I should like to ask the Minister a series of questions. What provision will the Government make to enable money to be carried forward from year to year? I know only too well the Treasury's hearty dislike of such funding arrangements, but really it is time that the Treasury was dragged into the latter half of the twentieth century. They really must budge. This is not a party political point, because they are just the same whoever is in power. I do not think they even notice when a change of Government has taken place. Ministers get sucked into them and just change their personalities; it is quite extraordinary. The Government's consultation paper, however, is absolutely clear on this point—and I quote:
"There will also be appropriate financial arrangements to allow the commission to carry forward unspent money from one financial year to the next".
This is exactly the way that museum purchase grants work.
As the consultation paper recognises, long-term planning and budgeting are essential if the commission is to be successful. It is particularly important in this case because they, and particularly the Historic Buildings Council at the moment, are responsible for long-term repair and even rebuilding work. This must be planned ahead, and one really needs a quinquennial programme in order to be able to carry it out properly.
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It is no good being told about two months before that your next year's grant is going to be X amount of pounds. I hope that when the Minister replies he will be able to be more explicit about the arrangements that will apply than the Bill, or at least will be able to hold out hope for future Government amendments.
A further vital point is that the commission must be allowed to retain any profits made; otherwise there will be little incentive on the very point the Minister himself made about increasing and encouraging commercial initiatives, improving the attractiveness of places and so on. This is something I was trying very hard to do when in the Ministry, but again shortage of funds and of staff in these particular areas of publicity, presentation and so on made it extremely difficult. It is all very well to have the creative ideas—they come free—but when you are trying to put the creative ideas into practice unfortunately they often cost a great deal of money. Unless the commission can retain its profits, then it is going to make it impossible for it to manage or carry out the new task it is meant to do.
If this is agreed, will the Minister then assure us that this will not result in a decrease of the next year's grant in aid? This used to happen. You worked yourself to the bone to get takings up at the Tower or Stonehenge, or whatever, and then you found that because of that you were going to get a bit less the following year. You really had to feel very dedicated to it all in order to do this. I want to see the commission's financial success used in the entrepreneurial spirit which characterises so many of the Secretary of State's actions, so that it is available for conserving the heritage rather than conserving the Treasury by lining its coffers.
On this point of donations and sponsorship, I am afraid I do not believe that private individuals or even companies will donate money to a Government-funded commission. It is like giving it to a Government department. They will not do it. So they must be able to invest any money they want to put in separately, for it to be used for special projects. That means the commission must be able to enjoy the charitable status which is provided in Schedule 5 for the museums and the Royal Botanic Gardens—I found that by skipping through Schedule 4! I wonder why it was not included for the commission? If there is any reason or if it was overlooked then, for goodness' sake, let us put it in so that it can work in the same way as the museums, which set up private funds or private companies for this purpose.
When the National Heritage Memorial Fund was set up after Mentmore and all that (which I will not go into this afternoon) it had an endowment of £12 million. I know that was notionally credited to the Land Fund, but as a result of what happened over Mentmore I set up a committee which led to the legislation and then to the fund. It must give us all great pleasure that the fund has been so successful, and I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Charteris, is to speak later this afternoon.
But it would be wrong to compare them too closely, except that they both need capital endowment, because this is the fusion of two bodies. Unless it can be shown—and the Government can do this through their legislation—that the fusion will produce something better than their working separately within the department as before, it is not worth the effort. In fact, it would be a backward rather than a forward

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step. Unless the basic financial assurances are given during the passage of this Bill, it would be better if the responsibility remained with DOE. But if the economics are properly and adequately worked out, and other necessary amendments—which will certainly arise—are made to the Bill, it could result in a new and healthier prospect for our ancient monuments and historic buildings.
4.31 p.m.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, we have a long and distinguished list of speakers today and I will do my best to set a good example by being brief. We have had a very full, and very necessary, explanation from the Minister, for which I thank him, and the noble Baroness, Lady Birk, has brought to bear her own experience of the whole field—she must be among only half-a-dozen Members of your Lordships's House who have this very wide experience—in the very important speech which we have just heard. But the rest of us will probably want to raise mainly questions and individual points arising from various parts of the field, and we look forward to gaining a lot during this Second Reading debate from the experience that noble Lords have to offer.
We are particularly glad to welcome the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd. He brings some considerable experience not only from his period of time as Secretary of State for Education, but also from looking after the whole business of Leeds Castle. Indeed, I am particularly glad to welcome him, after the years in which he has not attended your Lordships' House, to make his maiden speech, since the number of noble Lords who shared the Conservative Benches in the House of Commons in the 1935 Parliament with my father is getting fewer and fewer. He is a welcome addition and I hope that we shall see him taking part in the proceedings in your Lordships' House very often in the future.
I believe that this Bill achieves a number of worthwhile objects, although it is sometimes very difficult to sort out the principles on which this Government's policies are based. The noble Earl the Minister referred to this Government's policy of keeping certain bodies at arms' length. I wrote that down, because I was finding it very difficult to disentangle that from this Government's policy of getting rid of quangos. Somehow, there seems to be some contradiction between the two; in fact, this seems to be a very great quango-creating Bill, but it is none the worse for that. My party has never been opposed to quangos, which have a great deal to be said for them, and certainly I think that the various bodies set up under this Bill have a lot to be said for them. That is really the only major Second Reading point that I wish to make, but I have one or two queries.
One of the most important tasks that the Victoria and Albert and the Science Museums have had in the past has been to administer the purchase funds given by the Department of Education and Science to disburse to regional museums. It is a task which they have performed extremely well and which, on the whole, the regional museums are very grateful to them for doing. But I am not quite clear who will take on that job under the new arrangements. It would not necessarily seem appropriate for them to keep it. On
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the other hand, the Museums and Galleries Commission is not really equipped to do the same job. Perhaps the noble Earl will inform us about that.
In a small way, one of the more important things that this Bill does is to upgrade some of the service museums. Some of the most important museums in this country are service museums and, on the whole, they have been very well looked after and have contributed quite a lot to the preservation of the past in this country. The fact that they can be taken under the Government's wing in this way is much to be welcomed.
I think that the majority of the discussion that we shall have on this Bill, particularly when we get to the Committee stage, may well centre on the Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings for England. In some ways, it is the most contentious proposal put forward; indeed, so much so that I gather there are already amendments in the offing. I look forward very much to hearing the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Sandford, on this subject, since I gather that there is a draft amendment which the noble Lord intends to put down, to deal with the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments. We in your Lordships' House have become used to Bills having amendments dubbed with the names of their proposers, but until today I had never heard being discussed an amendment in the name of a noble Lord even before the Second Reading has come to pass.
The whole question of the relationship of a Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings for England and the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, and the very repetition of the two titles in the same sentence, raises some of the questions that are necessary. The whole of this business need to be gone into very much more fully. We have had two consultation documents on this matter. The first was rather unpopular and extremely brash, and it was superseded by another which was much more reasonable. But the first consultation document raised certain doubts in people's minds which have not been allayed.
The work done by the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments is well-known. It is academic, it is free, it is open to the public and it is very much treasured by a great number of people, not least by the scholastic community. Any reduction of any of these things, even if it is in the perfectly good cause of trying to make our heritage pay for itself, to a certain extent, is to be deplored. The qualifications of members of the Commission as outlined in Schedule 3(3), with its understandable emphasis on tourism, commerce and finance, raise some questions in people's minds. It is a matter which we shall have to examine with care when we get to the Committee stage.
However, in the meantime, I think it is a pity, as the noble Baroness suggested, that we have two Bills in one. It is a habit of this Secretary of State to produce more than one Bill at a time in your Lordships' House and I think we should prefer it if, in future, we had only one Bill at a time. But compared with the Wildlife and Countryside Bill, which was about five Bills in one, this is not a particularly bad Bill. On the whole, it is extremely welcome. We look forward to a constructive Committee stage in your Lordships' House and in the meantime give it a fair wind.
4.40 p.m.
Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd: My Lords, I am venturing to address your Lordships today for the first time because, as chairman of the Leeds Castle Foundation and working with my fellow trustees, of whom I see several present in the Chamber today, I have spent all my time in the last eight years looking after this beautiful castle in Kent. I believe your Lordships will find that our experience will be useful in considering the Bill, and especially the proposal that a large part of the Government-owned monuments and castles should be transferred to the new commission so that they may be more entrepreneurially managed than is possible by a Government department.
First, however, may I remind your Lordships what we are at Leeds Castle? We are the first of a new breed of stately homes—created by Parliament. It was in Mr. Gaitskell's last Budget that he brought forward the proposal that beautiful and historic houses could, with the same privileges of tax-free transfer as in the case of the National Trust, be given to a Government department, a local authority or the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. Up at once got Mr. Harry Strauss, later Lord Conesford, who told the Chancellor roundly that as an Oxford man he ought to know that the Universities at Oxford and Cambridge were not important; it was the colleges which ought to be the recipients. Also Lord Winterton, the Member for Horsham, said that the Chancellor ought to include local trusts, because the Sussex Archaeological Society looked after Lewes Castle and saved the taxpayers the expense of doing so.
Showing his conciliatory and constructive nature, Mr. Gaitskell recognised the force of the arguments raised in debate, and on Report stage came back with a completely new proposal. This was that the recipient could now be "any body not established or conducted for profit", which meant of course a charity. So in 1974 Lady Baillie was able to set up a charity to preserve Leeds Castle in perpetuity. After a strange lapse of nearly a quarter of a century, we became the first major house to be transferred under Mr. Gaitskell's Budget of 1951. Since then, similar charities have been formed at Arundel, at Chatsworth and at Titsey Estates, and there are several more in the pipeline.
The noble Earl told us that the Government had engaged in a long and careful process of consultation before bringing forward this Bill. Indeed, some of it took place at Leeds Castle when we received the Historic Buildings Council for a residential conference to study the consultation paper. The noble Earl also said—and the noble Baroness, Lady Birk, emphasised this—that after all this consultation there is still a good deal of anxiety. On the one hand, there is the anxiety that some conservationists feel that a more entrepreneurial management might damage the heritage. On the other hand, there are those who wonder whether the Government are going far enough m giving a sufficiently free hand to the new managerial organisation which is going to be set up under the new commission.
I think I shall be able to show your Lordships that Leeds Castle might almost have been designed as a kind of test marketing project for the managerial side of the new commission. To start with, we are half in
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the public sector because we are a trust for the public benefit. On the other hand, we are also in the private sector because we are quite independent and have to rely entirely on our own financial resources and management.
We began, effectively, in 1975 and had the great advantage of having as our deputy chairman Mr. Peter Wilson of Sotheby's, with his superb artistic taste and entrepreneurial flair. He, anticipating the Bill, obtained for us the entirely charitable services of Mr. Leslie Bond, a main board director of the Rank Organisation. The Treasury kindly agreed to the secondment to us of Mr. John Caff who had been the Assistant Secretary at the Treasury in charge of heritage policy. Thanks originally to Mr. Tony Crosland when he was Minister for the Environment, we have received absolutely invaluable informal advice from the officials of the department. Therefore, in a sense, one could say that we have been almost a tiny microcosm of the managerial system to be set up under the commission.
Your Lordships may be interested in the results of our work. During the negotiations with the Treasury in 1974 it was estimated that the annual income from visitors at Leeds Castle would be £9,000. This year, our receipts from visitors will be over £500,000. The exact figure is £541,000. Your Lordships will find that that is 60 times the original estimate of our income, or an increase of 5,900 per cent. Early on, we invested no less than £500,000 in converting a beautiful old barn into a restaurant for teas and meals. Mr. Peter Wilson personally supervised the whole of the dercoration and produced what the Michelin Guide calls une ambiance agréable. This year our turnover from catering will be £600,000. Our gross income this year at Leeds Castle will be £1,750,000.I admit that I was surprised to find that that is not far short of the £1,950,000 which, last year, was the total income of all the beautiful castles and monuments which the Government, under this Bill, are going to transfer to the new commission. However, as your Lordships know well enough, the crucial point is the balance between receipts and income—that which in a normal commercial company would be called the profit and loss account but which we as a charity refer to as either a deficit or a surplus.
In our first two years we had a deficit at Leeds Castle of £200,000 a year. By 1979, we had converted that deficit into a surplus of £100,000 a year. This year, our surplus will be £300,000. That is a favourable turn-around in eight years of £500.000. None of this could ever have been achieved if we had not been entirely free of the kind of rules and regulations with which officials have to struggle at the moment when they are showing the castles of the Government to the nation.
All these surpluses at Leeds Castle have been immediately reinvested in improving the amenities and attractions of the castle. We have created a new garden, designed by Russell Page. We have also made a small herb garden for the blind. We have replanted a vineyard on the same spot where Bishop Odo of Bayeux, after he had been given the castle by William the Conqueror, had a vineyard, which is recorded in the Domesday Book. We have invested in the castle and now have a fine conference centre for our medical research and other residential conferences. We have

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installed ramps and a special lift for those in wheelchairs, and we continue to receive the disabled entirely free of admission charges. Our visitors continually comment on how beautifully the castle and gardens are maintained. We received a civic award for the new kitchen which we have attached to our barn. I have given this account in order, I hope, to demonstrate that entrepreneurial management, far from damaging the heritage, actually has the effect of positively protecting it, because, instead of being starved for funds for adequate maintenance, ample resources become available not only for first-class; maintenance but also for improvements.
I should like to conclude by saying only that the noble Earl has encouraged us today by his speech but that there are still anxieties as to whether the Government are giving the new managerial organisation a free enough hand. If they are not, will it be possible for us to bring forward constructive ideas which they may be able to accept? I believe it is essential to be able to provide for reasonable capital expenditure. I certainly believe, as the noble Baroness, Lady Birk, said, that it is essential that management plans are made for a far longer period than the one year which is so often the time limit within which Government funds are available. Also, I feel that it is very important for the morale of the new management that, if they are successful, the Treasury should allow the money to fructify in the business and not make success an excuse for reducing the grant.
I believe that we shall overcome these difficulties. I believe that the Government want to help us to meet these problems, and so I feel that Government and Parliament together are about to take a very large step in this Bill; a very large step indeed in improving the management of our heritage in a more entrepreneurial way, to the great advantage of the heritage itself, the tourist industry, and the economy of our nation.
4.53 p.m.
Lord Adeane: My Lords, I am sure that the whole House will join with me in offering warm congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd, on his maiden speech, to which we have been looking forward for some long time. I hope that we shall all have the privilege of hearing his extremely wise words on many future occasions.
The Royal Commission on Historic Monuments in England of which I am the chairman, and in which I must therefore declare an interest, is not mentioned so far as I can see in the Bill now before the House. Like Banquo's ghost, it is nevertheless very much present at the feast and two noble Lords have already made two kindly references to it. I make no apology therefore for bringing it into general consideration of the Bill. First, I must make it clear to your Lordships that I am not today seeking to make a case in favour of or against the inclusion of this particular Royal Commission in the new body described in the Bill. Such a proposal is not my business—it is the business of the Government who, very sensibly in my opinion, have left it out. Nevertheless, as there is some similarity between the names of some of the bodies mentioned in the Bill and that of the Royal Commission, whose functions may not be generally known to all noble Lords, it may be
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for your Lordships' convenience if I explain as briefly as I possibly can what the Royal Commission is and what it actually does.
It was set up in 1908 under Royal Warrant and was charged, in the words of the warrant, with:
"making an inventory of the ancient and historical monuments connected with and illustrative of the contemporary culture, civilisation and conditions of life of the people of England from the earliest times; and to specify those most worthy of preservation."
Since then, amendments have extended the commission's scope so that it comes up to more recent years. But that charter is still, in effect, what the commission does. It is a body for recording and assessing—rather an important word in this connection—our architectural and archaeological heritage. It is not directly concerned in any excavation, repairs or preservation, nor in providing money for any of those purposes.
In the world of architecture, churches and cathedrals have received a lot of special attention, naturally, but both great and small secular buildings have also been covered. The commission has always surveyed archaeological sites and now, as I am sure many of your Lordships realise, there is a great deal more archaeology carried on than there used to be. Archaeological field work is widely used as a method of research, particularly from the air. The results of all this research have been by tradition published in White Papers, and in much greater detail in inventories published by Her Majesty's Stationery Office. The speed of such publication has been determined by the resources in manpower and money available to the commission. These have never been lavish and in recent years cheaper and quicker methods have been added to try to convey this information to the public as it has accumulated.
Furthermore, under Section 55 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1971 the commission also has the duty of recording listed buildings once consent for their demolition has been granted. That means that the owner of a building who is in such a situation is compelled by law to let the commission know a month before he starts any major work on pulling the building down.
Since 1963 the Royal Commission has also been responsible for the National Monuments Record, which is housed in London. It is a systematic record of English architecture and archaeology. It is a public archive very much open to visitors, and it receives upwards of 60,000 new items every year. At the moment it deals with 3,000 personal visits and 13,000 inquiries. Noble Lords may agree that this is quite a considerable data base for architects and archaeologists, whether they be civil servants or private inquirers. In addition to all those activities, the Royal Commission is much involved in joining in projects which come from a variety of quarters: universities, local authorities, the Inspectorate of Ancient Monuments, all types of national and local bodies and a good many private individuals as well.
That, my Lords, is a very brief statement of the work of the Royal Commission—independent and, it is hoped, scholarly work, carried out by 16 commissioners and their staff of about 100, a motivated and excellent staff and at the moment rather an anxious staff. I trust that all that I have said may be of some use should the Royal Commission be included in any further of your Lordships' deliberations. Meanwhile, I

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shall warmly support the Second Reading of the Bill in its present form.
5.1 p.m.
Lord Montagu of Beaulieu: My Lords, before I speak to the Bill I should like to add my personal congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd. He could hardly have chosen a better subject to talk about, as his success in administering Leeds Castle has excited the admiration of many in the heritage business, many of whom follow the same principles as he has been enunciating. I hope that he will play an active part in the Committee stage and continue to let us have his advice. Secondly, I should like to apologise to the noble Earl, Lord Avon, and to all Members of the House because, due to a long standing engagement outside London later this afternoon, I am unable to stay for the rest of the debate.
I speak this afternoon from two points of view: first, as one who has been involved in snowing the heritage for over 30 years and as a past president of the Historic Houses Association; and secondly—and here I must declare an interest—as the president of the Museums Association. On behalf of the members, I can formally and, indeed, enthusiastically welcome the Bill, and I think that I can also do so on behalf of the two distinguished directors of the two South Kensington museums. The trustee status will, I believe, at last free them from the constraints on manpower and expenditure and other Civil Service control from which they have suffered in the past five or six years, and will put them on an equal footing with other national museums.
After all, the Victoria and Albert and the Science Museums are not just London museums. I remind noble Lords that these two famous museums developed from the Great Exhibition of 1851, and from the start, significantly, were given specific educational roles. From 1855 to 1878 the Victoria and Albert circulated loans and travelling exhibitions to educational establishments and provincial museums, and from 1882 it has administered the Government grant-in-aid towards the purchase of objects by local museums. The Science Museum has had similar responsibilities since the 1960s. These grants have been sympathetically and effectively administered and have provided a vital link between the pre-eminence of our great national museums and the rest of the country. The association is anxious that these pastoral responsibilities, partially abandoned in recent years due to cuts, should, when practical, be reinstated by their new trustees who will by then have a more flexible control over their spending. I am sure that this House would not wish to tie down the future trustees too strictly, but I should like to see recognition in the Bill as to their educational and pastoral functions. I know that my noble friend Lord Sandford will be speaking about education in more detail later.
Another important area where the association is concerned is that the staff in the national museums should not lose their status and links with the Civil Service. Here I support my noble friend Lady Birk in what she had to say. I therefore welcome the clause in the Bill which safeguards the position of the present staff and their entitlements.
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It is clear that all will be well on "Day 1", but the staff have naturally expressed anxiety that these undertakings should continue for new staff taken on after the change in status. There is no doubt that museum grades defined within the Civil Service do provide an essential framework and guide for the employment of museum staff. It is important that this structure should be protected.
The part of the Bill referring to museums is quite small in content and does not enter into detail about projections of future development of the museums. I hope, therefore, that this rare opportunity for Parliament to legislate for museums will not inhibit future legislation, as I feel it is important before too long to implement some of the far-reaching recommendations contained in the Drew Report on museums and galleries, which dealt with the relationship between Government, the national museums and the leading provincial centres.
Above all, there is the question of the future role of the Museums Commission. I confess, also, that there is considerable unease that the new trustee boards of the two museums may continue to be drawn from the "great and the good", appointed by the Prime Minister, and will have very wide powers in running these museums. I know that strong views are held on both sides on whether the board should be thus constituted or should be representative of various groups. However, I know that my noble friend Lord Eccles, whose experience and knowledge in this field are paramount, will be putting forward alternative proposals. But in the meantime I should like to draw your Lordships' attention to the more satisfactory wording in Schedule 3, paragraph 3, in which it is laid down that the Secretary of State shall have regard, when appointing people to the Heritage Commission, to the person's knowledge in a wide range of fields—from archaeology to architecture, conservation, tourism and commerce—which I think is most appropriate in this day and age.
On the future financing of the museums the Bill is somewhat vague. May we hope that this Government's record in maintaining levels of support for the arts will be continued? I hope that the preamble of the Bill, which states rather negatively that the Bill will not give rise to additional expenditure, can be more positively interpreted as being that the present level of funding for these great institutions will not be affected adversely by their change of status. I welcome the ability of the trustees to raise revenue, including by admission charges, where and when they think fit, but in my view it is essential that any money so raised should be retained and spent for the benefit of the museums, without affecting their Government grants.
As a founder of a technical museum which is one of the largest tourist attractions in England, I feel I cannot agree to the somewhat extraordinary distinction set out in the Bill between the intended functions of the Victoria and Albert and the Science Museums. It would appear that a deliberate omission has been made in defining the functions of the Science Museum, compared with the Victoria and Albert, the Armouries and the Royal Botanical Gardens, for the latter three have been urged to promote the public enjoyment of those institutions. However, the promotion of such enjoyment is not being imposed as

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a duty on future trustees of the Science Museum. Is enjoyment to be denied to those interested in science and technology? I can assure your Lordships that members of the public thoroughly enjoy my museum, as they do the Science Museum and its splendid outstation, the National Railway Museum. I think that our 19th century museum directors spoke much more correctly in talking about "educational enjoyment". I certainly intend to move an amendment to ensure that enjoyment should be part of the Science Museum's future policy.
I now turn to the heritage section of the Bill, and I think I reflect the views of most of those concerned when I give it a very warm welcome, for the time for change is overdue. I remind your Lordships that before the last war the majority of buildings open to the public were under Government control and, inevitably, a pattern of administration and a policy towards public access slowly evolved and became entrenched as Government policy.
Although the buildings were hardly excitingly presented and rarely promoted, nevertheless a high standard of scholarship and conservation was established, although few attempts were made to provide imaginative interpretation and only in recent years were any efforts made to provide an education service. Certainly there was no brief for them to be commercially active. I always liked the story of some years ago when the Tower of London wanted to open a new souvenir shop to extract more money from its millions of visitors. The Treasury gave permission for the souvenir shop to be built out of capital, but when asked for money to pay the staff to run it, that was refused, and so the souvenir shop was never built.
But one of the most remarkable phenomena since the war is how the heritage—in particular our historic houses, ancient monuments and other historic sites—has become one of our major tourist attractions, not only for our own people on a day out, but also for millions of overseas tourists. As a result, our tourist authorities have been more than active and helpful in publicising our heritage abroad.
But this new boom in heritage interest was spearheaded by the private owners who, for reasons with which Members of this House will be only too familiar, had little choice but to surrender their privacy and act as unpaid curators, and thus save their houses for the nation. With notable exceptions, such as the Tower of London and Stonehenge, the household names in this extensive stately home business, now belong to the private sector and some run by the National Trust. I believe that the owners have shown enterprise, imagination and flair, and have brought into the heritage world elements like the need to provide a good day out for the whole family, education, marketing and entertainment.
However, it would be ungrateful not to acknowledge the increasing support given by successive Governments to the heritage, in particular to private owners. Grants, expertly and sympathetically administered by the Historic Buildings Council and the Department of the Environment, and various tax concessions have saved our houses for the pleasure and enlightenment of future generations. But the 30 years' experience of the Historic Buildings Council must not be lost, and indeed the committee system which has been mentioned must continue. I am sure that we look
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forward with great interest to the speech of the noble Duke, the Duke of Grafton, who has had so much experience of the Historic Buildings Council over that period.
In the meantime, buildings under the Department of the Environment have been struggling against increasing competition from the private sector and restriction by the severe straitjacket which Government control and all it entails has imposed. Happily now, the Bill gives powers to a commission, independent of day-to-day Government control, to develop and enhance their heritage buildings and land under their control, and adopt a creative policy of conservation and public access.
This single agency will be able to embrace those now separate bodies, many of whose functions at present overlap. It can act as an adviser to Government on heritage matters and, most important, can build up over the years a permanent and expert staff outside the sometimes restrictive practices of the Civil Service. There are, however, in my opinion, two serious omissions to the structure and responsibilities of this new body.
The first, I am sorry to say to my noble friend Lord Adeane, is the non-inclusion of the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, whose work is very much admired by all concerned. I personally believe that it should be integrated into the new commission. I can see no good reasons for leaving it out on a limb. Why continue fragmentation when, clearly, one strong authority is desirable? I cannot see why its continuing authority need be affected.
Secondly, there is the omission of the unoccupied Royal palaces. To leave out places such as the Tower of London and Hampton Court is, in my opinion, undesirable and will certainly weaken the ability of the new commission to create a national policy. If the commission is to do its job efficiently, it must coordinate all the marketing, publishing, souvenir-buying and other activities under one directorate. I hope that amendments will be moved at the Committee stage, but if the Government feel that it is important not to include the Royal Commission and the Royal palaces at this stage, I hope that there will be enabling clauses, as the noble Baroness has suggested. I also regret the non-inclusion of Scotland and Wales, but that is up to them.
Turning now to financial matters, I would be failing my duty if I did not express considerable concern about the ability of the new commission to function with the greatest possible financial freedom to manage its properties in the best manner for the benefit of the state. I very much hope that the commission will not only be given a generous capital sum at the outset to pay for all the extra expenses of setting up the new commission, but also will be allowed to work on at least a three-year advance budget.
The commission's ability to plan ahead will be restricted if it has to negotiate its grant from Government from year to year. The commission must be able to carry forward at least a proportion of its grant unspent in the financial year, and this applies particularly to grants for historic houses, where major works can be delayed or protracted by factors outside the owner's control. The commission must not be penalised for being successful, and if it increases its income from public opening or other commercial

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activities, its grant from central Government should not be reduced correspondingly. Above all, the commission must take risks and be allowed to make mistakes, for, from these mistakes, it may well learn much. I am glad to see that the commission will be allowed to acquire property and sell it when necessary, and perhaps we can look forward to a revolving scheme for heritage buildings, like that so successfully set up by the National Trust for Scotland.
The plight of some of our more remote historic monuments is becoming an increasingly serious one. Although devotedly wardened and maintained, there can be little hope under the present system for the sites to be presented in an interesting or educational manner. Of course, this needs staff, but I believe there is an enormous reserve of voluntary labour in the amenity societies throughout the land just waiting to be tapped. They could adopt a local site, raise money for it, care for it—indeed, love it—so that it becomes an important part of the community and gives people a sense of belonging to something worthwhile. Thus, I welcome the clause which establishes the right for the commission to receive voluntary contributions, but perhaps at the Committee stage we could add too the words "voluntary services".
I particularly welcome the inclusion of gardens of interest in Schedule 4—a long sought-after addition by the Historic Buildings Council—but I hope that we can include gardens of scientific interest as well. 1 believe that the commission should be responsible for the wider area of landscape management.
Finally, may I say that I believe that this Bill provides the most exciting challenge, and I should like to congratulate the Secretary of State on his bold approach. But all will fail unless historic buildings are promoted, presented, interpreted and used educationally in the correct way. To succeed, the most modern methods of marketing must be used in order to realise the full potential in co-operation with the tourist authorities and local authorities. It is in the interest of all those concerned with the heritage to make quite sure that this commission works. Above all, let us remember the interests of the future generations of this country and of many people all over the world. It is for their benefit that museums, historic sites, buildings and gardens must have sufficient resources and should be administered and preserved with imagination, dedication and skill—qualities which we as a nation claim to have pride in possessing.
5.18 p.m.
Lord Annan: My Lords, I should like to add my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd. I hardly knew which to admire most—the expertise, the eloquence or the charm. I am interested in the debate today because the day before yesterday we had an extremely good example of good Government consultation: we had the Hunt Report published; we then had a debate on that report in this House; and presumably that will be followed either by a White Paper or by a Bill. In the case of the Rayner Report, we have gone straight to a Bill and I imagine that it is parliamentary time which did not enable a separate debate to take place actually on that report. That is rather a pity, because there are one or two
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points which could have come out and which I should like to ask whether the Government have considered.
First, let me say how much I welcome the Bill and, for instance, how much I welcome that the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Science Museum will get a freedom which they have long deserved. But the point I want to raise first is that the name of Sir Derek Rayner is synonymous with expert managerial skill, and it is this particular quality which I am wondering whether we shall find expressed as strongly as it should be by setting up boards of trustees. This is a matter which I know that the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, will talk about, and nobody is better entitled to do that because it was he who, when he was a Minister, set up an entirely new kind of public body—a board of directors in the British Library—which did not follow the usual pattern of the boards of trustees of museums and galleries.
Perhaps I might interpolate here that I am speaking entirely in a personal capacity and not at all in my capacity as the chairman of the National Gallery Trustees, who have never heard these views. They spring from my experience there and also 15 years as a trustee of the British Museum. At present the trustees of museums and galleries have no specific managerial function. Indeed, I have known them to be viewed with some suspicion by the staffs of museums and galleries if they attempt to intervene in matters of policy which the director and his staff think are solely their business.
That is perfectly understandable, but the trouble is that so much business in museums and galleries today has become so complex: the design of rooms; the design of cabinets; the display of objects; the presentation of rare objects; the responsibility for overseeing at all stages the erection of new buildings; the plans for a new display; the management of shops and of publications; of security; of fund raising; of the proper funding of different departments within museums and galleries; the shift of resources from one to another; the work of departments of conservation and scientific research; the appointment of staff; the time available for members of the curatorial staff to make contributions to learning, and to keep catalogues up to date; and, above all, the obligation of museums and galleries—and this often conflicts with other objectives—to the public, and their relations with the public.
These are matters which call for a multitude of skills and which, at any rate so it seems to me, need the active participation in management of trustees, some of whom will undoubtedly have been chosen by the Prime Minister for their special skills. By special skills I do not mean the skills which the curatorial staff already have. I do not mean, for instance, art historians for collections of paintings. I mean the skills that the curatorial staff cannot be expected necessarily to have. It does not seem to me that you will get good management unless you also take the skills of the leading members of the staff themselves into consultation with the trustees. They should sit on the same body.
At present—and I know that this varies from gallery to gallery—certainly in museums and galleries of which I have had experience, it is usually the custom for the director and his deputy alone to be present at

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trustee meetings. It seems to me that here again some, at least, of the senior lieutenants of the various departments—and I do not mean here all the curatorial departments necessarily—should be members of the board, so that they feel themselves to be part of the decision-taking process and not merely confronted by the decisions of what they may regard as rather a remote body of trustees.
Let no one deduce from this and from these remarks that I am dissatisfied with affairs at the National Gallery. I knew Sir Michael Levey long before I became a trustee there and was one of his many admirers. I am all the more his admirer since I became chairman of the trustees. His sagacity is vast, and he is a fine example of a director who has won the loyalty and the devotion of his staff in a way which I have rarely, if ever, seen equalled. Or again, I think again of Sir John Pope-Hennessy at the British Museum; a remarkable director who transformed quite a number of things that needed transforming. Or again his exceedingly able successor, Dr. David Wilson. So nothing I am saying is reflecting on the experience of those directors of whom I have had particularly personal experience. However, I think that the present system places an enormous weight upon the relationship of the chairman of the trustee body and the director. I happen to have had good fortune, but there have been quite a number of cases in the past where the chairman of trustees and his director have not seen eye to eye, or where the staff have been out of sympathy with their director and either they feel that they have no means of airing their grievances or they resort to intrigue with individual trustees.
My Lords, no system is foolproof. A board of directors in business can be rent with faction and seething with intrigue just as much as an unhappy university or a museum can be. But in every walk of public life we are at last being urged to improve our managerial expertise. Certainly the universities need to do so. The councils in our universities, which are their governing bodies, have atrophied—or perhaps I should use the word have been "vulcanised" into being rubber stamps. That is not the kind of thing that a governing body should be. All I want to urge is this point. If the Victoria and Albert and the Science Museum are to change their constitutions, I wonder whether the Government could give reasons why they prefer to follow the trustee museum and gallery pattern rather than the pattern of the board of the British Library.
May I turn to the proposed Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings? I will not long delay your Lordships, because most of the points I wanted to make have been made admirably already today. The desiderata, of course, as has been mentioned, are that the commission should receive at the outset a dowry as the National Heritage Fund did; that the annual grant, as with the purchase grant of trustee galleries and museums, should be rolled on from one financial year to the next; that any donations and earnings through charitable subsidiaries should not be forfeited to the Exchequer; that donations should be allocated for specific purposes, because we cannot expect benefactors merely to subsidise the recurrent grant direct; and fifthly, and this is important, that all commercial undertakings should
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keep accounts which are of use to management and which identify, for example, cash flow and monthly outgoings. Otherwise some undertakings can easily fall into large deficit quickly and it is difficult then to turn that round. Lastly, the commission should be able, within its financial powers, to acquire further buildings and further monuments. It needs to be able to acquire and dispose of property, and to initiate conservation schemes with local authorities and other local bodies.
May I apologise to your Lordships, and to the noble Earl in particular, that I too, like the noble Lord, Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, have an engagement out of London this evening which I must keep—I do not believe that it is the same engagement—and I cannot therefore be here at the end of your Lordships' debate.
5.28 p.m.
Viscount Eccles: My Lords, I, too, should like to congratulate my old and noble friend Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd. We have waited a long time, eight or nine years, to hear a man with a very distinguished political record. I first knew him as a Minister 41 years ago. It is a long time. He has held many offices, but I do not believe that when the story of his life comes to be written he will have done many things of greater advantage to this country than to have looked after Leeds Castle and made it the most glorious place in the South of England. We hope very much that the noble Lord will talk to us again on these subjects.
Mr. Paul Channon, as noble Lords have said, has done a great service in wresting from the clutches of Whitehall the national institutions that are named in the Bill. I congratulate him on doing something which I tried to do but which at that time was not agreeable to some of the institutions concerned. The question arises, however, as to what sort of management structure we should give to, say, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the most famous museum of the decorative arts in the whole world. I shall concentrate on that and follow what the noble Lord, Lord Annan, said. Nobody will criticise the splendid record of the Victoria and Albert or the Science Museum. In fact, it is that record which should make us take the most careful look at the form of management that is most likely to further their success for the rest of this century and beyond.
The Bill provides for a repeat of the well-worn system of trustees which has been a feature of British museums for over 200 years. It would be astonishing if that system did not require some improvement in the light of our changing society. In fact, the trustee model is out of date. It has been out of date at least since the passing of the Education Act 1944, and I say that not as an outside observer; I was for six years the Minister responsible for the Victoria and Albert, after which I was chairman of the British Museum, then chairman of the British Library, so I have seen these institutions from the inside.
These great national collections are centre-pieces in the development of our culture. How they are managed shapes the contribution they can make to those shared values which hold our society together. The trustee system, when it started, reflected the view that aesthetic and intellectual values were restricted to a limited élite. It was a gentlemanly form of control exercised by a body of distinguished amateurs,

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meeting perhaps 10 times a year to hear a short report from the director. Often collectors themselves, often keen rivals in scholarship, the trustees felt it was distasteful for them to think of anything except the collections and the care and increase of what was in the museum.
One learns something about them by recalling that the first trustees of the British Museum instructed their director not to admit more than six visitors a day. Time passed and the departments and staff grew and grew, but the directors saw no need for a lengthy or complicated agenda for trustees' meetings. They knew very well that the trustees were so fascinated with new acquisitions that that item, placed at the end of the agenda, ensured that all the business before it had a rapid passage, and everything ended happily with a glass of sherry or even a buffet lunch.
The director ran the museum. He was more powerful than the headmaster of a public school, and often, as I remember, there was no time to discuss important areas of the museum or important projects for the future. One reason for that hit-and-miss form of control—a reason we must put right in this Bill—is that the staff had no official channel of communication with the board except through the director. Their ideas were not always given a chance, and that is a deliberate under-statement. It may not have mattered much when the museum was small and homogeneous and had comparatively few patrons, but it will not do today, when national museums are big business, with big, eight-figure budgets and very big responsibilities to a wide public.
Another defect in the Bill is that it maintains the old rule that the director shall not be a member of the board. On paper, of course, the trustees considered the director to be their servant, but if he was cunning, and he usually was, he became their master. That can be very dangerous, because directors, like schoolmasters, can have their favourites; it may be one area of the museum in which they served themselves, it may be the work of one artist for whom they have a passion, or it may be one period in history. Such preferences and special knowledge have resulted in brilliant additions to the collections (I think of Antonio Panizzi, for instance, and many others whom your Lordships know) but today there is much more to do than collect, so that the responsibilities—varied and conflicting, as I shall show they are bound to be—require to be carried on broader shoulders than the old trustee system.
What, then, is the alternative? It is, as the noble Lord, Lord Annan, said, a board of management, because that brings the knowledge and experience of part-time members together with the operations of the museum as represented by the director and two or three of his colleagues sitting on the board as full-time members. I must make two observations in passing. The first is that the Bill does not even say what sort of people the Prime Minister should look for to become the trustees, and that is a very serious omission. The second is that it does not provide for the part-time directors to have any form of remuneration except their travelling expenses. The noble Baroness, Lady Birk, said that that did not matter because there were so many volunteers who would come forward. I regret
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to say I do not think that is true. Nowadays we are not all rich amateurs, and there are many men and women with special experience, perhaps of the maintained schools or adult education—
Baroness Birk: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Viscount to tell him that I was talking about the committees attached to the commission? I was not talking about the commission or the trustees but about people who probably had less onus on them.
Viscount Eccles: I am grateful for that intervention, my Lords, because I had not realised that the noble Lady was talking only about committee members, and I shall comment on committees shortly. The people I have been describing are not always in a position to serve and do the amount of work which is now required without some modest remuneration, and I think that power should be taken.
The point of having the director and some of his senior colleagues on the board is to be in a position to settle financial and policy questions against a discussion which involves the whole of the operations of the museum and to be in a position to assure the staff that their departmental claims have been fairly represented. I was up against that problem time and again. Your Lordships might care to consider some of these claims, which could be divided into the internal and external services. The internal services comprise everything connected with the collections—all of those services for which the museum was originally founded—and they must come first. I think everybody would agree with that.
Since the war the external services have grown, and they should grow considerably more. In what direction the external services should grow is today a crucial aspect. Remembering that now the museums have not the department at their back, all this must be settled by the trustees. For instance, there would be the question of how many books and journals ought the library to buy—today they are tremendously expensive—and who should have access to them, either on the spot or on loan? How many scholarly and popular publications should the board commission and with what degree of subsidy? How many travelling exhibitions, broadcasts, lectures, seminars and so on should find a place in the budget? What should be the relations with the tourist industry; and, most important of all, what should be the relations with the whole range of the education system?
That brings up this kind of question: should the museum shut one day of the week to provide funds for any of the new external services? That is a dreadfully difficult question to decide, and I cannot believe that a board of unpaid trustees, advised just by the director, could discharge those responsibilities as well as could a board of management such as I have described. Here I should add a word about committees. The kind of problems that I have been talking about can be investigated, but not settled, by committees. Since they all require money, they must all be brought together, to be dealt with by a strong board.
I wish to make one more point. The form of management which we should establish must be influenced by how far we think culture, in particular the intellectual and aesthetic values that stem from a

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museum, can be spread across the whole population. Some of the most distinguished lovers of art do not think that museum culture can be shared much beyond the museum itself. Here is a sentence from the recent book of the noble Lord, Lord Clark, entitled Moments of Vision. The noble Lord, Lord Clark, was once director of the National Gallery, and he is a great authority, to whom I am sure we all listen with respect. But what can we make of the following quotation?
"I am not sure that museum art and a museological approach, however extended and well contrived, will bring art and society into a healthy relationship. It is too deeply rooted in cultural values which only a small minority can acquire".
If your Lordships agree with that, then stick to the old-fashioned trustees. There they are, in the Bill, a charming group of amateurs, well suited to the lucky few who can appreciate Lord Clark's cultural values.
But there is another aspect of culture, one in which I passionately believe and which I commend to your Lordships. When the National Health Service was introduced we uncovered what Nye Bevan called the inarticulate demand for teeth and spectacles. As soon as the supply was assured, the demand exceeded all forecasts, and we had to have large supplementary estimates. Today there is an inarticulate demand for adult education. The vast extent of the demand will be uncovered only as the supply is created. Are we going to multiply the opportunities for the enjoyment and study of history, art, and science? In that field the national museums are central distributors of the achievements of man, so essential to the understanding of the present and the future.
Finally, my Lords, you will have seen that I am in no way criticising the record of the museums. I want Parliament to offer them the best means for future development, now that the hand of Whitehall is to be removed. I want to see outside experience, and the administrative experience of the executives in the museum, brought together in a strong managing board. Therefore at the Committee stage I shall ask your Lordships to insert in the Bill a management structure which matches the breadth and the importance of the responsibilities which we expect the museums themselves will want to discharge. I hope that your Lordships will support the amendments and that the Government will accept them. To refuse them, to stick to the old trustee system, would, in my judgment, show a lack of knowledge of modern administrative requirements and a lack of faith in the spread of culture across the whole population.
5.45 p.m.
The Duke of Grafton: My Lords, I take it as a good omen—if my memory serves me aright—that the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, when he was Minister of Works, launched the Historic Buildings Council, about which, if I may, I shall say a few words. I must begin my speech by apologising to your Lordships for having to start with a brief historical reminder of the reasons for this important Bill which we are discussing today and the various steps over nearly 30 years which I believe have led to the necessity for it. I must also apologise for having to quote myself so constantly, but I am the only remaining member of the original Historic Buildings Council for England. I am speaking entirely on the Bill as it affects the responsibilities
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hitherto carried out by the Historic Buildings Council for England, founded in 1953 as a result of Sir Ernest Gowers' excellent report on the state of the country houses, the condition of which was then causing everybody so much anxiety.
Therefore I have sat on the council—which had the great good fortune to start under the exceptionally able chairmanship of Sir Alan Lascelles—for nearly 30 years. So during that period I have been in a unique position to see the truly extraordinary progress made in the whole field of the care of our historic buildings. In grants alone we have expanded from being allowed to recommend grants of a quarter of a million pounds a year to £ 12½ million a year. We have developed from a body originally concerned with the rescue of individual houses, such as Blenheim and Castle Howard, to dealing with whole towns and areas of towns, such as Bath, on which we have been working since about 1956. It might be worth mentioning that the council is now dealing with some 150 town schemes, under which we contribute 25 per cent, towards a fixed figure, provided that the town in question provides an equal amount.
I hope that perhaps some of your Lordships may have seen work carried out on the town schemes, on the rehabilitation of towns as diverse as York, Ludlow, and, for instance, Liverpool. As well as the town schemes, we have recommended grants for literally every type of building, from a tide mill on the Suffolk coast to buildings at the Ironbridge Museum at Telford—vital buildings, which were built at the time of the birth of the Industrial Revolution.
I believe that all of that has come about through a complete change in public opinion over the 30 years. I think that people have simply become not prepared to lose their heritage of well-loved buildings, which before 1953 were disappearing at a most alarming rate. For almost 30 years I have been chairman of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, now 105 years old, and founded by that great man William Morris, who I am sure would have been delighted by the most recent of our activities, which is that of being enabled to recommend grants for the repair of all buildings in ecclesiastical use which qualify architecturally and historically. I happen to be chairman of the sub-committee administering grants for these churches. Cathedrals are now the only buildings which do not qualify for grant aid. As a matter of interest, the total number of grants which we have recommended is 15,548 and total expenditure is £41.5 million.
That briefly is the background of the Bill we are now discussing. I believe, however, with the present Government that the time has now been reached when conservation interests could be more effectively developed by an agency operating independently of Whitehall departments. I see an agency, properly financed and constituted, as being able to adopt a more authoritative and independent stance on conservation issues; with a more creative and flexible approach to the expenditure required to preserve buildings and areas, and, indeed, making more efficient use of financial and professional resources.
The Historic Buildings Council has welcomed in principle the creation of a new agency, but only on condition that the administrative and financial arrangements for it will genuinely create an indepen-

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dent and viable organisation. I feel bound to say that the Bill, as now printed, leaves grave doubt as to whether this will be so. I should, therefore, be grateful for clarification on a few fundamental questions.
As my noble friend Lady Birk said, the financial arrangements will be crucial. The silence of the Bill on most of these important questions seems ominous. Will the budget of the new agency draw a clear distinction between operating costs and the grants available for actual preservation of monuments, historic buildings and conservation areas? Unless this distinction and true overhead costs are properly established at the beginning there is a real danger that the funds available for conservation work will become less rather than more.
'What provision will there be for the commission to carry forward unspent funds from one financial year to the next? This was promised in the Government's White Paper published last summer. There is a precedent in the purchase grants for the trustee galleries and museums. Without some such arrangement there will be difficulties in effective management of the long-term grant and repair programmes which are by far the most effective way of conserving whole historic areas and the more important of our historic buildings.
What arrangements will be made to give private donors confidence that gifts will be treated as income additional to the annual grant in aid from the Government? Without these, the chances of the agency attracting private support—one of the Government's main objectives—seem to me non-existent. Again, there is a precedent in the British Museum's trust funds which are, I believe, subject to Charity Commission but not Treasury control.
What arrangements will be made for receipts from retailing and opening of monuments owned by the Government to be reinvested in repairs and better facilities for the public? An incentive of this sort is surely essential both for efficient management, as the Rayner Committee on Museums pointed out, and for the generation of additional funds. The White Paper I have already referred to recognised that longer-term planning will be of particular importance if the commission is to keep the benefits of its success in increasing the overall level of receipts. I understand that again there is a precedent in the disposal of funds from retail sales by the trustee galleries. What provision is to be made for the commission to invest any surpluses?
Will the Government consider making available to the commission—this has been mentioned previously by noble Lords—an initial capital sum which would provide essential long-term resources and above all flexibility similar to the capital sum which inaugurated the National Heritage Memorial Fund? This, I am sure, is one of the reasons for the immediate and startling success of this fund.
The advisory role of the agency in relation to those functions which remain with the Secretary of State are also important. The Bill as presently drafted does not cover the range of advice which the Historic Buildings Council currently gives to the Secretary of State. Can we be reassured that it is intended that the agency will continue to advise on all matters which are currently
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the responsibility of the HBC—in particular on the eligibility of listed buildings and associated land and contents for relief from capital taxes? This is a new but important aspect of our work? Also, can we be reassured that it will have the power to advise the Secretary of State on the treatment of historic buildings which remain in the Government's care, such as groups of buildings at Woolwich and Chatham? In this context, I would also like to see the possibility left open in the Bill for eventual transfer to the agency of responsibility for the fabric of the Royal palaces no longer lived in by the Royal Family. The proposed split of responsibility between the maintenance of the fabric of a palace such as Hampton Court and commercial activities operating in it does not appear likely to be efficient. As a matter of interest the income from the Tower of London and Hampton Court is more than twice that of all the other monuments held by the department.
Duplication of staff resources between the agency and department is a real danger which must be avoided if the limited resources available for conservation are not to be consumed in unnecessary staff costs. The conditions laid down in relation to the annual payment of grant will be critical in this context and are not defined in Clause 31. A major effort is also required on the part of the Government to jettison detailed controls which seem likely to cover the day-today activities of the agency. There can be no advantage in setting up a separate body unless it is really free of the red tape which now inhibits conservation work within Government. Is it really necessary, for instance, for the Secretary of State to consent to the acquisition of property by the agency, particularly where this is only a temporary or holding operation such as at Heveningham Hall, in Suffolk? In this context, the transfer to the agency of full power to approve conservation areas might also be usefully considered.
There is one further important matter which has also been touched on. There is no mention in the Bill of the word "research", although this was mentioned in The Way Forward, the second of the consultative documents published this summer. I see the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments as being an essential component of this new commission. I cannot see that the Royal Commission need lose its identity as part of the new body. I should have thought it would be an essential part of it.
In conclusion, I feel that the Bill gives an opportunity for a great step forward in the care of our heritage, but I cannot help feeling that it leaves a great many questions unanswered, in particular on the financial aspect. I very much hope that the noble Lord will be able to give satisfactory assurances on some of the questions I have raised.
6 p.m.
Lord Hutchinson of Lullington: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Earl for introducing this Bill, as he did, with such clarity and to say that on this Bench we wholeheartedly welcome it. I should like, if I may, to congratulate the Minister for the Arts on yet another fine achievement. May I also make an apology on behalf of my noble friend Lord Donaldson, who, of course, should be taking this Bill for my party. He is overseas at the moment. And also for my noble friend

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Lord Kennet, who also is abroad, and who knows so much about the subject matter of this Bill. My only justification for being second substitute, or 13th man, is that as chairman of the trustees of the Tate Gallery, and recently vice-chairman of the Arts Council, I am familiar with some of the problems which are dealt with in this Bill.
It is a great personal pleasure to me to welcome into the fold of the "great devolved" the V & A and its outstanding director, who give the greatest satisfaction also to my noble friend Lord Donaldson, because, as I know, when he was in office he pressed very hard that the V & A should attain this status, and at the time the staff were very concerned that they would lose out on such a change. But I think that all noble Lords would agree when studying this Bill that their interests are really guaranteed under the schedule.
In the Arts freedom and independence is everything and political control of aesthetic judgment and applied scholarship is usually a disaster. The intensely professional expertise of the director and the curatorial staff of a national museum must be allowed the maximum degree of non-interference by Government departments. That is why, in my humble opinion, the buffer of a board of independent, disinterested, non-expert trustees representing the public is as healthy a way of guaranteeing accountability and independence in a democracy as can be devised.
The noble Lord, Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, referred to the commission and to the qualifications which are set out for the commissioners. The commission has a completely different job to do from the role of the trustees in a museum. Of course, they have specific expertise and an active managerial role in the job they have to do—indeed, it is indicated that provision has been made for their removal if they are unable to attend for more than a certain amount of time. That is a very different situation from the trustees of the museum; and might I say, with the greatest of respect to the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, that it is a very different situation from the trustees of the British Library, who have a much more managerial role to fulfil in that situation.
The noble Lord, Lord Annan, has said—and I totally agree with him—that the board of trustees must utilise the skills of the different trustees and, as far as the Tate Gallery is concerned (unlike, as I understand it, some of the other museums), the individual keepers and the director always sit in on the meetings of the board of trustees.
I must say that I am a little nervous about the proposals which were being put forward by the noble Viscount. He speaks of a board of management rather than a board of trustees. I must say that I should like to know from him what is the constitutional position which he envisages for this board of management. I rather suspect that it has a commercial background, a commercial pattern, and the transformation of the board of trustees into a board of directors with a managing director managing the museums. If that is the situation, I must say that I look upon it with a good deal of alarm; because, surely, the whole purpose of a board of trustees is that they do not fulfil a role similar to that of a board of directors; they do not involve
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themselves in the day-to-day management of the museum.
The whole joy, I should have thought, of a board of independent trustees with no axe to grind whatever is that they fulfil this role of a buffer between the running of the museum—with the enormous amount of expertise, and specialist expertise, which is necessary for that job—and those who provide most of the finance for it. The thought that the trustees should turn into directors and that their relationship with the director should be that of the directors of a business and managing director, as I say, is one which fills me with alarm and I do not think it is the solution to bringing boards of trustees up into the latter part of the 20th century. The matters which were raised by the noble Lord, Lord Annan, and by the noble Viscount, can be solved by appointing the right type of person, by making the trawl for trustees of these great museums far broader and far deeper than it is, and the chairman of the trustees ensuring that the matters which were raised by the noble Lord, Lord Annan, are in fact dealt with. It does not seem to me that there is any problem at all in a board of independent, reasonably intelligent people being able to survey the work of a highly skilled director and a highly skilled staff of curators—a bookshop, a library and all the other things that now go to make a national museum—to keep an eye on the general policy being pursued, to keep an eye on the financial arrangements, to keep an eye on the general way that the museum is being run, and to let it be run day to day by those who have the expertise to do it.
This Bill spells out at remarkable length the functions of the board of trustees—four pages of Schedule 1 in relation to the V & A alone. The only mention of the person who really matters in the running of a great museum, the director, is in one and a half lines in paragraph 4(2) of Schedule 1:
"The Director shall be responsible to the Board for the general exercise of the Board's functions".
Nowhere else in the Bill is that person mentioned. It is important (is it not?) that the separate roles of the director and of the trustees should be clear at the inception of independence. Certainly I am not quite sure that this is made clear in the Bill as drafted. I imagine, although there is no mention of it, that the director will succeed the permanent secretary as the accounting officer. I imagine that the director will run the museum, free from any interference by the trustees, although ultimately responsible, of course, to them; but that he it is who will be answerable to the Public Accounts Committee for the proper accounting of the money voted by Parliament. I should be grateful if the Minister will confirm in due course whether that will be the position. I presume also that the museum will receive an annual purchase grant, or will it receive only one grant? If it receives a purchase grant, that of course will be the direct responsibility of the trustees, for it is in them under Clause 3 that the property and the museum objects will vest.
I should like to ask the Minister—and this has been referred to by other speakers—whether any surplus, whether any underspend, at the end of the year from the grant will be retainable, and whether any surplus on the vote will also be retainable, or whether there will be a difference between the two.

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The only other points that I should like to make on the museum part of the Bill are these. I wonder whether the 5 years referred to in paragraph 3(3) of Schedule 1 is long enough for a trustee of the Victoria and Albert Museum. The scope and breadth of its activities are enormous. Its out-stations are many and scattered. The extent of its research, its scholarship, its direct service to the public on identification and advice, its crucial conservation departments, the mounting of special exhibitions and the search for private and commercial sponsorship, all require considerable time for a busy trustee to absorb and understand. I should have thought that seven years, as is the position at the National Gallery and the Tate Gallery, would be of greater value to that museum.
Lord Annan: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord a question? Is it not a fact that at the Tate and National Galleries the seven-year period terminates a trustee's career, whereas in the Bill there is provision for extension for a further five years? That is the reason why this term may be different.
Lord Hutchinson of Lullington: My Lords, the noble Lord is quite right, if I may say so. As he has raised this subject, I should like to say a word about reappointment. I should have thought that there was great advantage in not having the power to re-appoint trustees immediately. If you have the power to reappoint trustees immediately, it arouses expectation in the trustees and it attracts a certain amount of pressure upon the chairman, and indeed, upon the staff and the director, to re-appoint this trustee or that trustee. It is very much easier and healthier for the term of the trustee's period to come to an end without any question and for that trustee to be able to be reappointed after a certain period has elapsed.
I notice also that under the appointments of the trustees in paragraph 3(2), it is proposed that the chairman should be appointed by the Prime Minister. I should have thought, with the greatest of respect, that the Prime Minister might be relieved of another chore, and for the trustees themselves to appoint their own chairman. The trustees know their colleagues; they know which of their colleagues would make a chairman. I should have thought that it was quite unnecessary for yet another duty to be put upon the Prime Minister of choosing a chairman. Indeed, it is a great mistake that a chairman of a great national museum should ever be appointed as a matter of prestige.
Under Clause 2(2), I notice that the board is given power to enter into contracts. This would appear to be a most welcome provision. May I ask whether this means that the board may employ outside contractors to do building maintenance, electrical work, and such things, rather than having to rely on the PSA? Under Clause 2(3) the board may,
"do such things (including requiring payment for admission) as they think necessary or expedient".
I do not know why that particular matter is spelt out in the Bill unless it is a marker to encourage the reactivation of the controversy over admission charges. The Minister for the Arts is on record as saying that this Government had no intention whatever of imposing admission charges on the
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national museums. It would surely be a fatal mistake for the main national museums and galleries to have different policies on admission charges to their permanent collections? The public would be confused and it would give rise to endless pressure and controversy on directors, trustees and curatorial staff to charge or not to charge. I should like to know from the noble Earl whether the Minister, having expressed this view, really wishes each institution to "go it alone" on this particular matter.
The last point on finance: when you remove after 130 years a great museum from under the umbrella of the department, there are bound to be substantial additional expenses. Running expenses of all sorts have to be taken on and presumably there will have to be additional administrative capacity. The museum one knows is about to open the Henry Cole Wing. There is a backlog of conservation about which the Rayner Report expressed the view that it should have priority over virtually all of its other activities. This museum, I would suggest, will most certainly require some substantial extra sum of money for its launching. I hope that the Minister will be able to give some assurance under that head.
Turning very shortly to the commission, I should like to congratulate the Minister on his conversion to the view that the quango is an essential element in our democratic system. On these Benches we are particularly encouraged in our welcome to the creation of the commission by the knowledge that our friend and colleague Mrs. Jennifer Jenkins, the present chairman of the Historic Buildings Council, is in general agreement with the new arrangements.
My only comment is one which has already been made before on Clause 30: it is extremely difficult for any ordinary person to discover what are the functions of this new body. It says in the clause:
"The commission shall have the functions conferred on them by any enactment."
To find out what that means we go to Schedule 4 and there we find 20 pages of incomprehensible cat's cradle of amendments to existing legislation. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Birk, that for any ordinary person to discover what the functions of this commission are is a task quite beyond even an expert. On behalf of my colleagues here I should like to ask some of the questions which have already been asked: What is the division between the commission and the Secretary of State under the planning law? Have the commission a part in the exercise of any of the Secretary of State's powers? What is the relation between the commission and local planning authorities? Do the commission have any privileged right to advise local authorities? Is the commission to own or administer any of the royal palaces—in particular the Tower of London?
I have not been able to discover that. Quite obviously, we shall have to examine these 20 pages in extenso between now and the Committee stage. It would be very difficult for the commission to work efficiently on a system of annual votes. It will be entering into all sorts of important contracts and undertakings, as has already been pointed out. It will suffer, as has the Arts Council of Great Britain and its clients, not only from frustration but from the results of an unwanted, unthought of, unsought and

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undeserved inefficiency and waste by trying to run any arts organisation on the basis of an annual vote. It is really on the grounds of inefficiency that one once again implores the Government and the Ministry somehow either to let the arts organisations know at a much earlier stage what amount of money they will receive in the following year or in some way to make arrangements to go back to the system of the rolling triennial grant. Those are all the observations I wish to make upon the Bill at this stage and, apart from the few comments and reservations I have made, we on these Benches warmly welcome the Bill and wish it well on its way.
6.21 p.m.
Lord Gibson: My Lords, I should like to add my own welcome to this Bill in principle and to the idea behind it, namely, that conservation and related matters is a field in which the direct responsibility of Government can sensibly be reduced. I think in this field the job can probably be done better by independent boards, whether of trustees or of managements, leaving aside their controversy for the moment, because they can be given a degree of flexibility which is greater than that which is feasible for any integral part of Government service. One has only to recall the straitjacket in which the Director of the Victoria and Albert Museum found himself not long ago when there were cuts in Civil Service manpower imposed by the Treasury. If he had had the authority to impose equivalent cuts in general expenditure at his own discretion he would have secured much better results, in terms of the museum's capacity to serve the public, and at no greater expense to the public purse. So the question to ask about this or any other exercise in dis-establishment is whether we shall get greater flexibility without greater cost.
I should like to say something about two parts of the Bill which cover matters of which I have had some acquaintance. One is the dis-establishment of the V & A, of whose advisory council I was chairman for several years up to about 10 years ago; the other part concerns the proposed commission, which will of course directly affect the National Trust, of which I am currently the chairman.
May I take the commission first. The need for greater flexibility applies to the commission exactly as it does in the case of museums, but in the case of the commission there is an additional reason for welcoming the Bill, namely, that those who work for conservation in the arts now covered by the Department of the Environment will be given an opportunity to devote the whole of their careers to this work if they wish, instead of having to be available for posting anywhere in the Civil Service. However efficiently and sympathetically the staff of the Department of the Environment carry out their duties in conservation at the present time—and I should like to pay tribute to their high quality and dedication in all the matters with which the National Trust has had to deal—the fact remains that this is a sector which ought to be served by people who make their whole career dealing with matters of conservation. It requires a sympathy with the subject which is indeed not seldom found in the Civil Service, but I believe we shall develop a service still more effectively if we set up a
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devolved commission, because it will become specialised, and those who become specialised will remain in it permanently.
What the Service does now and what the commission will have to do is to record our architectural heritage, to inspect, maintain, manage and present them—that is the parts of it that are not covered by other bodies—and to use the formidable authority (I was very glad to see this in the Bill) that it should develop to encourage greater understanding of our heritage among the public, and particularly, I hope, to develop a love of architecture and an understanding of it among children in schools. It is worth mentioning that the Heritage Education Trust and the Heritage Education Group are already active in this field. I hope the opportunity will be taken to make the maximum use of them within the commission.
In addition to all this, of course, as has been said by a number of noble Lords, there is the need to exploit for the public benefit the commercial opportunities which the management and presentation of our architectural heritage provide. Here, too, if it is set up properly to do so, the commission will benefit from the flexibility and the freedom from normal civil service controls which is going to be needed if the opportunity is to be made the most of.
So I would put the advantages of flexibility and the power to operate an appropriate and attractive career structure as the principal reasons for supporting this Bill. But if these objectives are to be achieved, then the quasi-independent bodies which are to be established must have sufficient authority, which means sufficient independence, which in turn means sufficient control of their own staff and their own budget. To set them free with one hand and claw back control with the other would be to negate the whole purpose of the Bill.
I must say—and it has been the tune which nearly all noble Lords have sung this afternoon—that I think in its present form the Bill will fall short of what is needed to achieve its own objectives. It has been said, and I can only emphasise this once more, that there is nothing in the financial provisions enabling the Commission to carry forward money unspent at the end of the year, and in the context of the commission, particularly, this is really not sensible. It makes no sense in terms of planning.
Some years ago, when I was chairman of the Arts Council, we had a small allowance which we were allowed to roll over, though the rolling triennium, which it once had and which was negotiated by my predecessor, some people believe is the minimum basic necessity, But it was terminated in the financial crisis of 1972–73 and has never been revived. Fortunately, this financial guillotine, if I might call it that, is not applied to the recently established and very successful National Heritage Memorial Fund, and I think that is part of the reason for its success. The commission proposed by this Bill certainly ought not to be any more tightly controlled than that of the Heritage Fund.
I would not myself think it unreasonable if money voted to defray administrative costs was subject to this annual clawback; but much more flexibility for the grant-making side of the commission and for all its expenditure on its own historic properties is essential for its success. The changeability of the weather, the

1023
availability of building supplies and other such factors mean that maintenance and restoration projects cannot always be phased to suit the annual cut-off date. Some restoration schemes are planned to take place over years, and the commission must be able to undertake forward commitments which must not be liable to interruption by the removal of money, simply because it has not been spent. It has also been pointed out that there is nothing in the Bill at the moment enabling the commission to retain receipts from trading or from admissions to its properties, and it is hard to see what incentive there is to induce an entrepreneurial spirit. I am sure it must be intended for the commission to be able to keep monies of that kind. I think we shall hear that from the Government and I very much look forward to that assurance.
Since the Commissison is to assume the Historic Buildings Council's functions, I welcome its power to endow properties acquired for the National Trust. The only difficulties the trust has ever had in connection with the Historic Buildings Council relate to the funding of deficits on certain properties which the trust agreed to take over through the Government, on the basis that the annual deficit would be funded by the Department of the Environment on the advice of the council. The power to endow provides a potential solution to an unsatisfactory situation, which currently requires an annual argument with the HBC and the department, which I am sure both sides wish to avoid. This Bill abolishes the HBC, and I should like to pay tribute to them for the way they have done their work all these years. Their understanding and helpfulness to the National Trust has been outstanding, and in latter years their administration has been impeccable as well. I hope that their function will be similarly performed by the commission, and that the commission will prevail on as many of the present members of the council as possible to advise them on their grant-making functions.
I regard the financial provisions as fundamental to the success of the commission. If they are to be weakened by an undue measure of Treasury control, we had much better leave it to the DoE to carry on the work as they do now. They do it very well and the only point of removing it from them is to give the commission greater flexibility than can be given to a Government department.
A similar point arises in the matter of staff, and I feel very strongly about this. Naturally and properly, the intention is to secure for those civil servants who move to the commission the same terms now, and in the future, as they enjoy at present. The Bill envisages that the commission should take on whomsoever of his present staff the Secretary of State shall tell them to. I think that that is the best and probably, in any case, the only way to start. But what alarms me is that the Treasury are to control all appointments and remuneration of the commission.
In my time as chairman of the Arts Council, I recall what acute frustration this control caused and what bad results it had. Below a certain grade, we were allowed to establish posts and make our own appointments without consent. In the upper grades, consent had to be obtained and was usually a very long time coming, and sometimes never came at all. The
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result was an in-built incentive to get the work done by creating two jobs at the lower end of the scale, when often what was really needed was one job at the upper end. It is a pernicious practice and it derives from the refusal, when a quasi-autonomous body has been created, to face the proper consequences and trust it to be the best judge of how to manage its own affairs. Call it to public account, of course; even prescribe, if you like, what percentage of its resources can be devoted to administrative costs. But give it the freedom to manage its own affairs with efficiency, give it responsibility, monitor its performance and call it to account, if and when it fails.
With regard to the part of the Bill affecting the Victoria and Albert Museum, I have already emphasised the need for flexibility so as to get the best results at the least cost. But here there is a special need to consider the cost of giving the museum the greater independence envisaged for it. This Bill lays upon the museum in its devolved state the function of administration, establishment matters and so on, which have for over a century been carried out by the department. The museum will need the money to do these things themselves. They are certainly going to need a better launch than the 4·7 per cent, increase, which is currently spoken of as likely for the arts next year. Of course, degrees of financial provision are a matter for another place, but the importance of a proper initial funding for a museum starting out on its own independent life ought to be enunciated clearly in your Lordships' House, and I hope that it will be accepted by Ministers.
I should like to suggest that there should be some provision on the new board of trustees—or of management, if that is the way the Bill ultimately goes—for a few persons nominated from outside, and nominated from other bodies with which the museum has strong links. I know that my own council of the National Trust has been greatly strengthened by the presence of such nominated persons and by the formal links which they represent. I believe that there may be value in such official links for the V & A—links with such bodies as the Royal College of Art and, indeed, the National Trust, on whose council the V & A itself is now to be represented.
Finally, I note the reference in the Bill to the director's responsibility to the board for the general exercise of their functions. I find myself sympathetic to, but not wholly convinced by, the views of the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, about a board of management. What I think is important is, as the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson, said, that it should be made clear what are the functions of the director, and what are the functions of the trustees, or of whatever board it is that guides him. I say this with special feeling, because I think that for him to get buried in committee work would be the worst result of all.
I have noticed with admiration, as a member of the executive of the National Arts Collection Fund, the speed with which the director of the V & A can work, when, for example, something is to be acquired by a provincial gallery, and it would be a great pity if decisions of that sort had to be submitted to committees of boards of management or of trustees. I hope that that system will operate very much as it does now. I have heard it suggested that the grant-making to

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provincial galleries might be removed from the V & A. I hope that this will not be done. I believe that the curatorial expertise of the V & A is essential in the exercise of this function. I also believe, from what I have seen, that local authorities, who often contribute part of the balance of the purchase price for a work of art, have a deep respect for that expertise, and I am sure that that influences very greatly their readiness to contribute.
To conclude, I believe in the objectives, as I understand them, which this Bill seeks to achieve. But I believe that it should spell out much more clearly than it does now the freedoms which these quasi-autonomous bodies will need, if those objectives are to be obtained. Otherwise, truly, it will turn out to be little more than an exercise in calling civil servants by another name. With that proviso, I greatly welcome the Bill and may I please apologise to your Lordships for the fact that I have an engagement which I feel I ought not to break, so I cannot remain to the end. I particularly apologise to the noble Earl, Lord Avon, but 1 shall read Hansard tomorrow with the greatest attention.
6.37 p.m.
Lord Mowbray and Stourton: My Lords, I, too, should like to congratulate my noble friend Lord Avon on the way in which he has introduced this admirable Bill to your Lordships today. Needless to say, I should also like to congratulate my noble friend Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd on his admirable maiden speech. I should like to explain why I support this Bill's central issue, which is the preservation of our nation's heritage, whether the exhibits in our most famous museum institutions, or the ancient monuments which are all that remain of our most distant past, or the historic buildings with which our land is so richly endowed.
Because of my previous links with the Department of the Environment, I should like to welcome now the preservation work which lies before the new Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings for England. The heritage concerns us all and is an ever-present reminder of our past. We all want to feel in touch with the past, to learn how people lived, where they lived and what they did. Throughout history, people have wanted to explore their history in order to illuminate the present and give guidance for the future.
We in this country have a particularly rich inheritance of ancient and historic monuments that have come down to us in a more or less well preserved state throughout their life. I am sure that we have all visited a good cross-section of the great historic sites in the country, many of which are the responsibility of the Government. The more industrious and well-informed of us may well have gone in search of the less well-known field sites, which, nonetheless, have much to tell the discerning eye. These are usually scheduled monuments. Obviously, we should like to see our children having the same opportunities as we have to study their history on the ground.
Monuments which may have taken decades to build and which have lasted many centuries can only too easily be lost. Neglect can result in irretrievable decay. Insensitive alterations or repairs can totally alter the character and appearance of a building. Ploughing can
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remove all traces of prehistoric earthworks or burial sites. The very marks of progress, essential to our modern life—such as road building or house building—pose a threat to archeological sites, which may be destroyed before anyone has a chance to investigate what they might tell us. Developers, eager for profit, will sometimes demolish a building which stands on valuable land.
We cannot stand still and freeze the past unchangeably for our descendants. The heritage that we have is the result of all sorts of gradual, and not so gradual, changes and sensitive preservation takes account of that process. We are contributing now to the making of history when we build at all, or when we list 20th century buildings as of historical or architectural interest, alongside their older brothers. I want to ensure that we have a legacy which we shall be proud of.
It is because so many of us share this view—that preservation is too important a job to be left to chance—that there was apprehension when the proposals for a new heritage agency, now embodied in the Bill, were put forward for discussion by the Government. There was a lot of worry that this was Government's business and should not be delegated. I sympathise with the thinking behind these fears, which spring from a feeling that what has been achieved so far is too good to lose and nothing must be done to risk that.
We have achieved much. It is a century since the passing of the Ancient Monuments Protection Act 1882. In that time we in this country have built up a network of legislation and organisations for the protection of ancient monuments and historic buildings and a tradition which is envied throughout the world. The steady development of professionally staffed bodies, dedicated to particular aspects of the heritage, has produced the high standards of restoration and conservation that we see whenever we visit a major national monument, whether it be the Government's, the National Trust's, or whoever. It is easy to take high standards for granted, but there is no doubt that the approach we have in this country—of respect for the past—is not universal and has only been achieved by the concerted action of many interested people and organisations.
I am glad that the Government have successfully responded to the fears which were expressed. They are not going to abandon all that has been done, nor do they intend to stand aside. I am reassured by the pledge that both the Government's and the new commission's first priority will be preservation and protection. I am reassured by the flat statement that parliamentary answerability and accountability will still remain. I believe that assurances such as these have done much to allay fears.
Part of the reason for setting up the new commission is to produce a more coherent approach than we have at the moment. It is to be welcomed. Another part of the reason is to improve the management and presentation of the monuments. That also must be welcomed. The preservation of the heritage for the future does not and must not rule out its enjoyment and appreciation by the present generation. We need exhibitions, guide books, better labelling of monuments, souvenir shops. These ought to be well run, to the benefit of the monuments themselves.

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It is also clear that the Government do not intend the new commission to be a hidden means of cost cutting. The Secretary of State has amply demonstrated his commitment to the heritage—for example, through pressing ahead with revising the list of outstanding historic buildings as quickly as possible. He wants to see that it gets its share of resources. The commission must have this if it is to operate effectively in both the public and the private area of the heritage, including the vital giving of grants to those who own historic buildings.
The new commission will take over much of the work now done in the Department of the Environment, together with the work of the Historic Buildings Council and the Ancient Monuments Board. These organisations have earned a reputation for work of the highest quality. I believe that the idea of an independent body bringing together these organisations is in itself a tribute to what has been done and a sign of what can be done. Greater coherence is precisely what is needed to press this work forward.
I should now like to turn to some of the proposals relating to the Victoria and Albert Museum. Many of the points which I was going to make have already been made. The noble Lord, Lord Gibson, suggested that the National Trust and the Royal College of Art might well be allowed to nominate a trustee to the board of the Victoria and Albert Museum. Bearing in mind the very close links which the National Trust and the Royal College of Art have with the Victoria and Albert Museum, this is a very reasonable suggestion which might well be considered in Committee and at the Report stage. I do not see why there should not be a few nominations to the board. I can see every argument for the nomination of a few people by interested bodies. I believe it would be helpful.
The noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson of Lullington, referring to the first schedule, said that the role of the directors must be defined. The Victoria and Albert Museum is admired throughout the world for its activities and for its ability to organise exhibitions quickly, efficiently and speedily. It would be regrettable if the director were to be handicapped by the millstone of a management body around his neck. Therefore, I should like it to be understood that the director will still be responsible for the functions of the board. I suspect that this is the view of most of the people concerned with the work of that great museum.
The noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson of Lullington, also mentioned that while the Victoria and Albert Museum is to be allowed greater freedom it will also have to carry out some functions which previously it did not carry out. I do not think the noble Lord mentioned the Department of Education and Science. It is no use giving a museum devolved status without the modest extra finance and staff which are necessary to carry out their new administrative responsibilities. This is not a very big point, but it is one which we shall need to look at in order to make sure that the museum's operations will.not be handicapped.
I am grateful that the noble Earl confirmed that after devolution the conditions of service of the staff will be no different, either now or in the future. I think that this will help to allay the fears which have been expressed by both unions and management.
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The noble Baroness, Lady Birk, welcomed, as I do, the fact that the Armouries are to have greater national recognition. They are all too little known. We in this country have had armourers of the utmost distinction. The present Armourer is of as high a calibre as there has ever been. Wearing my hat as a trustee of the College of Arms Trust, I have a small interest, as has the noble Lord, Lord Charteris of Amisfield, in the success of the College of Arms museum which can be approached only through the eastern section of the Armouries. What is good for the Armouries must be good for the College of Arms museum and shop.
Both the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson of Lullington, and the noble Baroness, Lady Birk, complained about the schedules being difficult to understand. All of us in this House have complained in the past about schedules being difficult to understand. The noble Baroness, Lady Birk, suggested that, as has been previous practice, there should be a keeling over. But so many Acts are involved that it would jump up the price of this Bill, which now costs £4·65, to over £25. That would be the result if we put into the Bill the hundred and one schedules of previous Acts. This, therefore, may be an unrealistic suggestion.
I have spoken for long enough. I had some comments to make about the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew and Wakehurst Place. However, as my noble friend Lord Craigton is to speak, and as he is a far greater expert on that subject than I, I shall leave him to deal with it, and before sitting down will merely say that I welcome the Bill in its entirety.
6.49 p.m.
Lord Jenkins of Putney: My Lords, the noble Earl, Lord Avon, has been somewhat overworked today. When I saw his name on the annunciator I believed that he was winding up the previous Bill, only to discover that he had already launched on this one. Therefore I arrived in the Chamber having missed his first few sentences. I apologise for that, especially as I think that the Bill was introduced in an exceptionally competent fashion, leading me to believe that if the noble Earl had not been a victim of the curious hereditary principle he would probably be here under his own steam—if not in this place, at least in another.
It saves a great deal of research in politics to have a few infallible rules. One I have always found to be reliable in the past few years is the maxim, "Rayner is always wrong". The Government recognised the validity of this principle in relation to museum charges. When Rayner recommended the introduction of museum charges the Government quite rightly, acting upon my principle, rejected the proposal. I hope that the noble Earl will reinforce that decision and will assure the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson of Lullington, that he need have no fears; that this proposal is out of the window once and for all and has no chance of creeping back in again.
Since the first part of this Bill carries out a Rayner recommendation—that control of the Victoria and Albert and Science Museums be devolved from the Ministry of Arts and Libraries to boards of trustees—it follows that this proposal must be mistaken and should be resisted. This conclusion is reinforced from my ministerial days. The idea did surface at that time, but it was quickly put down on the grounds that the

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existing set-up worked very well. It offered a useful check on how the trustees and other boards were performing and it was handy in other ways; for example, in respect of the responsibility of these two museums to the provincial museums—and I am sorry to say that those responsibilities are no longer fulfilled in the full manner in which they used to be, simply because of lack of funds. And it was handy to have a couple of major institutions under the departmental eye.
Although strongly committed myself to the arm's length principle in relation to the arts, it did not seem to me that the same considerations applied to museums, where matters of artistic freedom and independence of information were not so much to the fore. Furthermore, the staff of the two museums at that time valued their Civil Service status and were for the most part opposed to the suggested change. I am told, however, that the situation has undergone a sea change under the present Government. I suppose one can well understand the feeling that no one who was not soft in the head or touched with masochism would see being a civil servant under Thatcherism as being la vie en rose. But Thatcherism will not last forever—or at least one trusts it will not—and in any event, one does not escape that dreaded blight by acquiring trustee status. The terrible thing about the disease of monetarism is that those suffering from it seem to delight in inflicting it upon others. Nevertheless, I am not entirely convinced and I hope to probe the matter by amendments at a later stage of the Bill.
There is no provision in the Bill for the introduction of accountability or democracy. Apparently, no member of the board of trustees is to be elected or nominated by any authority or any outside body, and there is scope for amendment there. I am encouraged in this thought by the fact that it is being echoed in different ways by the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, and the noble Lord, Lord Gibson. I shall look at the amendments they are going to put forward with the question in my mind, "To what extent do these amendments provide the possibility of introducing a long overdue element of accountability or democracy into the organisation and running of these two great institutions?" I hope, when the noble Viscount and noble Lord come to frame these amendments, that they will do so with this point in mind, and with the idea that there might be some spread of responsibility and control; that other organisations interested in this area—not excluding even trade unions representative of the staff—might have the right to put forward names for the consideration of the responsible body, be it the board or trustees.
Are the promises to preserve the future pay and status of the employees of the museums strong enough? There has not been the enormous flood of paper which came to us a couple of days ago in relation to cable television from employers in that area. I sometimes think that the trade unions and societies for employees are not in the same street when it comes to protecting their members' interests as employing organisations and firms. They do not shower us with the floods of advice which we receive from any employing organisation whenever the interests of their members are touched. Perhaps the employees' organisations might have something to learn in that
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respect from other organisations.
There is a chance that there may be scope for something to be done here. I see that in respect of the effects of the Bill on public service manpower, the Bill is expected to reduce the number of staff working in Government departments by about 3,000. I assume this does not mean that there will be 3,000 fewer people working in the area. I suppose it means that these 3,000 people will be transferred from the Civil Service to the employment of the trustees or boards, and that it is not suggested that there will be 3,000 fewer people employed. I hope that is the meaning; that it is not meant to suggest that 3,000 people will be on the dole as a result of this proposal, but only that the status of those people will be changed. In the museum area it is not a question of surplus manpower because there is a shortage of manpower. I have found this to be true wherever I have turned in this area. There is no question of over-staffing that I myself have come across.
The opportunity does not seem to have been taken in this Bill to remove doubts about the restitution of objects which belong to other countries. Perhaps there ought to be a clause making it clear, when the time comes for the Elgin Marbles to go back to Athens, or for other treasures to be returned to their countries of origin, that any existing legislation which would seek to prevent that happening is removed. The question of when it is appropriate for exchanges to be carried out, and for some objects which are of special historical interest to some countries to be returned, could then be determined by the trustees in discussion and association with international museum organisations. If there are legislative barriers to that happening, there might be an opportunity to introduce an amendment to this Bill to make it clear that those legislative barriers will no longer exist. There is no provision either for an elected museums council. If anyone says that it ill becomes an appointed Peer to talk about democracy, I would reply that this Chamber should be elected too, in my opinion.
I have another political rule: that the recommendations of those people who are actually engaged in any sphere of activity should be taken seriously. Why then is the Drew Report of 1978 not implemented in this Bill? That recommendation was made after close examination by authoritative and distinguished people, all of whom are engaged in museum work. The report's recommendations for the establishment of a commission and a museums council appear to have been forgotten in favour of the present recommendations. It seems to me that the Government are implementing the wrong report. They prefer the naivety of Rayner to the knowledge of Drew. Incidentally, the establishment of a museums council is also Labour Party policy and it is none the worse for that.
Appointments are still to be made by the Government. I believe, along with the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson of Lullington, that they ought to be made by the Minister for the Arts and not by the Prime Minister, or even by a Secretaiy of State. In my view an amendment devolving that responsibility upon the Minister for the Arts should be made to the Bill.
For the first time since I have had the honour of being a Member of your Lordships' House, I am proposing to leave before the end of a debate in which

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I have taken part. My reason for doing so is that some time before I knew that this debate was to be held tonight, I had arranged to celebrate Thanksgiving with some American friends. As next week I shall be somewhat critical of American nuclear weapons, I want to assure my American friends that it is their weapons that I am opposed to and not them personally. Therefore, I hope your Lordships will agree that it would be appropriate for me to be with them tonight to celebrate Thanksgiving, and I hope that you will forgive me for committing an offence which I have not committed previously and which I hope not to commit again.
Finally, in spite of the flaws to which I have referred and the others which have been pointed out by other noble Lords, I believe that the Bill deserves a Second Reading, but that it might need quite drastic improvements at later stages.
7.2 p.m.
Lord Charteris of Amisfield: My Lords, first I should like to add my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd, on his maiden speech in your Lordships' House. Now that his floodgates have been so joyously opened, I hope that we may hear from him on many other occasions. I have the privilege to sit under his chairmanship on the Leeds Castle Foundation and I know what an outstanding job he has done, not only for the preservation of that particular piece of Britain's heritage but also in making it profitable.
I am venturing to address your Lordships this evening in my capacity as chairman of the National Heritage Memorial Fund—a body which, as noble Lords will know, has now been in existence for two years and eight months and which looks forward to a close and, in so far as the heritage is concerned, effective relationship with the new boards of trustees and the new commission which the Bill proposes should be established. The trustees foresee that their relationships with the new boards of trustees will be no different from those which exist now with the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Science Museum, the Armouries and the Royal Botanic Gardens—that is to say, we shall be ready to assist them to acquire objects of outstanding importance to the heritage. We have, indeed, already been able to assist the Victoria and Albert and the Science Museums in this way. We made an effort to assist the Armouries to buy a marvellous peice of armour, but unfortunately the price proved too high. So far we have had no requests for help from the Royal Botanic Gardens and I find it difficult to see what they could possible ask us for, but I should be delighted if they would do so.
Our future relationship with the new commission may not be quite so simple and may require some clarification. At present we enjoy good relations of co-operation and consultation with the Historic Buildings Council. We have had fewer dealings with the Ancient Monuments Board but that is only because we are more concerned with histroic buildings than we are with ancient monuments. However, we would expect the same relationship to continue with the new commission. We would not expect the new commission to come to us for financial assistance, although there may, of course, be occasions when we shall co-operate with it on a specific project, as we have
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done already once with the Historic Buildings Council and are in the process of doing in another instance. I believe it is important to emphasise at this early stage that the commission must be given adequate resources to fulfil its responsibilities.
It is proposed in the Bill that the new boards of trustees should have the right only under certain very strict criteria to dispose of their property. The presumption is clearly against disposal. I should perhaps add that any assistance given by the National Heritage Memorial Fund is always given on the condition that the object acquired should never be disposed of.
I should be grateful if I may ask the Minister for clarification on one point. Will the commission actually own the properties it administers? If so, will it have any powers of disposal? I ask this because there is at least a hint of this possibility in the Bill as drafted, where the commission is permitted to borrow by way of overdrafts. This would presumably imply providing some security which, if it is of any value at all, must be capable of being realised. The trustees of the National Heritage Memorial Fund were very' fortunate in being given by Parliament great freedom to use the resources of the fund as they considered best. This has proved invaluable as it has enabled them to act with speed and flexibility when the need arose. I hope very much that the new boards of trustees and the new commission will be given the same real independence. The trustees of the National Heritage Memorial Fund support the purposes of the Bill and look forward to enjoying agreeable and fruitful relations with the new bodies.
7.8 p.m.
Baroness Airey of Abingdon: My Lords, I welcome this Bill and I should like strongly to support the speech of my noble friend Lord Charteris, who is, as your Lordships know, chairman of the National Heritage Memorial Fund, of which I am also a trustee. He has mentioned many subjects upon which I would have spoken and I totally agree with what he has said. Therefore, I should like to associate myself very closely with what he said. I should also like very much to congratulate my noble friend Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd on his absolutely splendid maiden speech. There is no one who could have made a better speech on a more perfect subject. He is what one might call the guardian of that queen of castles, the castle of Leeds. It has I believe been called "the ladies' castle". I would very much agree with that, because anybody who has visited that beautiful castle, whether on business or pleasure, or both together, has an overwhelming feeling of enjoyment, whatever his occupation may be. The fact that the noble Lord was able to tell us that, added to this great pleasure, he has a very good record of profit, was a matter for great congratulations from all of us.
If we should call Leeds Castle a jewel, I should like to turn for a moment to more humble jewels, often in a beautiful setting but, alas! sometimes showing signs of dilapidation. I speak, of course, of the smaller manor houses, and particularly of those which have been cared for and in many cases lived in for generations by the same family. Together, the family and the houses make up the very fabric of this country. In many cases those families have lived in those houses, loved them and often fought for them over the

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generations. That is frequently shown by pictures or objects, sometimes not of the first quality but of importance to the house in which they are shown.
I am thinking of a different case, a much more important case. It is, in fact, the wooden Anglesey leg which I just happen to have seen. When I was thinking about this I thought particularly about the mention made by several of your Lordships of education, which comes into this Bill. Many children know about the famous story of the brave Marquess of Anglesey, riding beside the Duke of Wellington, who as his leg was struck off by a bullet is said to have mentioned to the Duke, "By God, Sir! I've lost my leg", to which the Duke said, "By God. Sir! So you have". Young people see something like this and it elucidates history for them. This is enormously important and also happens in the smaller manor houses as well as in the larger ones, such as the one I am speaking about and which happens to be in the care of the National Trust, although the family is still there.
When I thought about this leg I thought of my brother, who limps round his house (which is not in the hands of the National Trust) showing people round it with great pleasure. In fact, he lost his leg at Cassino, and I have never thought to ask him whether he actually has an Anglesey leg. I am told that they are still obtainable on special request. This illustration serves to link history and these houses, which is so very important.
Therefore, I hope that the new commission, which I very much welcome, may be able to take responsibility for some of these smaller houses and be as sympathetic as possible to owners of these manor houses where families may be facing financial difficulties—or very shortly may—and do not have the resources required by the National Trust to maintain the house in perpetuity, which is necessary if they are to give their house over into the care of the National Trust. In some cases I wonder whether some sort of agreement of guardianship with the family could be considered by the new commission, so that they could have some form of charge in these houses and there could be some arrangement for the future. From a purely practical point of view, while maintaining the attraction for which this country is famous, it could prove much cheaper than some other schemes where the family is indigenous to the house, particularly the smaller manor house. Therefore, I should like to put this forward for your Lordships' attention when you come to consider the Bill in greater detail.
7.13 p.m.
The Earl of Perth: My Lords, like every other speaker in the Second Reading debate today, I welcome the Government's introduction of this Bill in principle and the admirable way in which the noble Earl, Lord Avon, introduced it. There is no doubt in my mind that it is right that museums should be outwith the control of Government in the way that has been happening to date in the two with which we are particularly concerned tonight.
One of the most important points that have arisen this afternoon is the question of the role to be played, be it by the trustees or the board of management. We have heard this debated and I am inclined to think that
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we are worrying too much about a name. Is it to be a board of management or is it to be a board of trustees? I think it is important that, whichever name is adopted, the functions to be carried out are made quite clear. For example, the trustees or the management must determine policy. They must determine policy clearly together with the executive of the museum. Therefore, I think it follows that members of the executive must not only be present but probably, as in the case of the director, actually be ex officio members of the board or the trustees.
Thirdly, their function is to ensure that what has been decided as policy is, in fact, carried out. If those functions are clearly defined, I do not think that the question whether it is a board of management or a board of trustees is too important. What is important is the way in which the members are appointed. Under the Bill the 12 up to 20—and I am talking particularly of the Victoria and Albert Museum—are to be appointed by the Prime Minister. That may be the correct procedure at the start, because one has to start somewhere, but after that is it essential, not necessarily when people come up for re-election but when new members are needed, for the Prime Minister to be consulted? It may be that the answer is that the Prime Minister has to decide who is to be appointed. Is this really right? If that is right, then a practice should be followed which was our experience in the Crown Estates.
the commissioners are appointed by the Prime Minister through the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Certainly in the 15 years when I was First Crown Estates Commissioner whenever there was question of any new appointment to the commissioners I used to put forward one, two or three names to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and he and I would discuss which ones were best. Then to all intents and purposes it would go forward as a formality, and the Prime Minister would approve. I think that something like that is a very necessary part of the operation. I see no reason why something like that could not be provided in the Bill.
Apart from the question of appointment by the Prime Minister, a very important point is that there should be one or two ex officio members. I find it very difficult to imagine that you should have members without the National Trust being by right one of them. The relationship between them and the new Victoria and Albert has always been very close and I think that the same should probably happen with the Royal College of Arts, as others have said.
The other question in relation to these boards of management or trustees is whether or not they should be paid. It is admitted that they should be allowed expenses, but in this day and age I think that one has to give them some degree of remuneration over and above that purely of expense. Again, if I may quote the case of the Crown Estates, what happens there is that the first commissioner gets something; it is not very much and it is certainly not what he would get in the market place. The same is true of the other commissioners. They are also allowed their expenses. It is a pity if one does not allow these people to receive pay because it narrows the choice of people you may get as members of the board or as trustees.
For a moment I just want to touch on the question of the commission which is being set up. Its exact title

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is the Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings for England. Here I feel, very much with other noble Lords, that the financial case is a worrying one. It is not sufficiently clear what are to be the moneys devoted to this commission. It must be spelt out and not just left in the vague form it is at the present time.
As many of your Lordships have asked, are they going to be allowed to roll over money from one year to another? I do not see how they can operate efficiently without that facility. Again in their case I feel some degree of certainty in saying that planning three years ahead, or five years ahead, must be allowed. You could have some minimal perhaps triennial grant, or quinquennial grant, and then you could add to it, but to give no certainty about what they are to do when they are dealing with this sort of thing seems to me to be a mistake.
Now one small point about Scotland. I know that this is a Bill for England, but when I look at Schedule 4, paragraph 2(5) I see that regarding the Historic Buildings Council for Scotland it says:
"The Secretary of State may out of moneys provided by Parliament pay to the chairman of the said Council such remuneration and allowances as the Secretary of State may . . . determine."
But so far as the other members of the council are concerned, all they are to be allowed is an expense account. Why is Scotland to be different from England? If we are going to be allowed to pay the English members some money, other than the chairman, the same should be true for Scotland.
I assume, as the noble Duke, the Duke of Grafton, said that the commission will have a real role to play in advising on what I call private historic houses; advising which ones should be chosen and what should be the policy in relation to them. That is to me a role which has been well carried out up to the moment, and clearly they are the suitable body to do it. I must finish by saying that I, too, must apologise for not staying to the end of the debate. I have to "sing for my supper" shortly. I am sorry for those concerned, but I am also sorry not to hear the noble Earl wind up this evening.
7.23 p.m.
Lord Sandford: My Lords, I must start by apologising for not having been here at the beginning, but to assure my noble friend that I shall be here at the end, and to thank him for letting me see the speech he made so that I can follow his remarks reasonably well. I want to confine myself to the new commission and to the range of functions which are comprised in the overall care of our heritage. Some of these functions will fall to be carried out by the new commission. Other functions are being carried out by other bodies. It is inevitable that when the new commission takes over the role from two existing bodies, the Ancient Monuments Board and the Historic Buildings Council, we are landed with the cat's cradle, to use Lord Hutchinson's phrase, which we find in Schedules 3 and 4. But that is no reason for not clearly setting out care of the heritage on the front of the Bill, the functions involved in Clauses 29 and 30. The general tenor of this debate is that this is something which is not adequately done at the moment and that we ought to try to put it right.
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In that context I turn to the business of recording the heritage because this, after all, is the fundamental thing lying behind the overall care of it. We must start by knowing of what the heritage consists, and the most important characteristics of the buildings that comprise it. As the noble Lord, Lord Adeane, was saying at the beginning of the debate, what happens in this field goes on under the auspices of the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, and it was very useful for us to hear from him how that goes on at the moment. But the Bill is entirely silent on how these two commissions are to co-operate.
It may be right not to incorporate the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments in the Heritage Commission at this stage, but we really do not know for what reason it has not been incorporated so far. I should like to put it to your Lordships that it cannot possibly be right for the Bill to say nothing at all about the relationships between the two bodies, or to make no provision either for incorporation or for a working relationship either now or at any time in the future. That is something which we really must look into a little later.
I turn to a second essential function, which I think has not been mentioned so far in the debate, that must be conferred on any heritage commission worthy of the name, or at least a power to get this function discharged. I refer to inspection. There must be a proper, comprehensive system whereby at least a selection of the best elements of our heritage are inspected on a regular basis. I speak in this debate as a Church Commissioner, a member of the board of governors, and responsible to them for their redundant churches. I speak as a clergyman, and I speak as a member of the board of the Ecclesiastical Insurance Office which insures the greater bulk of the ecclesiastical buildings, and not a few of the other buildings, that make up the heritage.
Anybody who has had anything to do with the Churches knows that the scheme of quinquennial architects' inspections which have now been in force for 37 years has conferred enormous benefits on the Church of England. Incidentally, the Church of England has had demolition control since 1252 and Archdeacons' inspections since 1604. This is surely the moment to make provision in the Bill for the progressive and selective introduction of regular professional inspection of a selection of our secular heritage buildings. I hope that we shall have that function added somewhere appropriate at the Committee stage.
I turn now to the advisory functions of the new commission. This is not specifically mentioned, as it were, on the front of the Bill in Clause 30; and only by reference to schedules, at Schedule 4, paragraph 4, there is an advisory function to advise the Secretary of State in general matters and to advise anybody in relation to ancient monuments. But I think that that needs to be stated on the front of the Bill and made more comprehensive. I should have thought, for instance, that it was important for the new commission to have the power to advise much more broadly and comprehensively; to give advice to applicants when they come to them for grant for historical buildings in private hands. It is not satisfactory just to give advice on the repairs that ought to be carried out, or on the conditions of access for the public. It would

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be far better for the advisory function to be stated in broad terms so that advice over a full range of matters could be given to private owners on the overall management of their historic properties.
I turn now to promotion and marketing. I need not say much because all I want to say reinforces what has already been said by the noble Lord, Lord Montagu. There was, rightly, criticism in the consultation papers of the ineffective marketing and promotion of our ancient monuments. That is not surpirsing when one considers that up to now less has been spent on promoting all the properties, all the ancient monuments in the hands of the Department of the Environment, than the city of Bristol spends on promoting its zoo. The Bill is quite silent on this important point, and that cannot be right. I do not think that those who fear hoards of trippers and hundreds of children scampering round these precious buildings need be alarmed, because good promotion, good management of visitors, good behaviour by visitors, higher income from takings and a deeper appreciation of the heritage, all go hand in hand. There is no reason to suppose that better promotion will not lead to better behaviour.
I come to the educational function, and I speak now as a member of the Heritage Education Trust, with the noble Lord, Lord Gibson, and others, and president of the Society for the Interpretation of the British Heritage. The consultation papers used the entirely satisfactory word "presentation", and I should like to see that reappear among the functions of the new commission on the front of the Bill, being understood to include the technique of interpretation, which is now used to such good effect on so many sites. We should not want to see the commission necessarily exercising this function itself, but to have a responsibility for seeing that it is done by others.
It is not appropriate to confer on the commission the function of providing education itself, as is stated in Clause 30(2). The provision of education is the function of teachers, headmasters and education authorities. The commission's role is that of providing, or causing to be provided, at historic properties and ancient monuments services and facilities for educational purposes, and that is quite a different thing. The distinction is more significant than at first appears. There is, indeed, a need for the Department of Education to undertake more research in this important field of education, but that is not something we need have in the Bill.
I come, finally, to the value of the voluntary services, a point also mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Montagu. One need only think of the contribution of NADFAS, the National Association of Decorative and Fine Art Societies, of the National Trust and their Acorn camps, of the local amenity societies and conservation areas, of voluntary guides in many private historic houses, of the local history societies, of cathedral camps, the friends of various distinguished buildings, and the local voluntary care and affection that people put into the care of chapels, churches and cathedrals, to realise what a huge dimension is missing in the care of the state-run ancient monuments. All this can be changed, but there must be a clear reference to this dimension on the face of the Bill. I join with others in welcoming the Bill. It
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is a good measure, but it needs a number of amendments before we can say that we really look forward to its being on the statute book.
7.33 p.m.
Lord Craigton: My Lords, I wish to add my congratulations to those of other noble Lords to my noble friend Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd for a sparkling and instructive speech. This is quite an unusual occasion, because when I became a Member of Parliament in 1950, he was already an old hand of 20 years' standing. He had made his first speech, his maiden speech, in moving the Address on the first day of the 1931 Parliament. Your Lordships are used to occasions, but that really is quite something to record in Hansard.
I have been asked, as chairman of CoEnCo, by the Council for British Archaeology to tell your Lordships that they support the provisions in the Bill. However, they feel that the title, the Commission for Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings for England, is rather a mouthful. Indeed, they do not like the name at all and would prefer the Heritage Conservancy Council, in parallel with the Nature Conservancy Council, which has a more or less parallel function.
I rise really to welcome the Bill on behalf of the Royal Botanic Gardens, about which nobody has spoken at any length. There are five good reasons for this welcome. The change ends a long-standing anomaly in which MAAF is primarily responsible for United Kingdom agriculture, whereas Kew is responsible on a worldwide basis for botany, with particular interest in the tropics. Furthermore, the new board will provide knowledgeable trustees and, as my noble friend said in moving the measure, they will support and guide the director and provide him with specialist expertise and experience in administration. It will bring him in closer contact with related bodies such as the British Museum (Natural History) and the Agricultural Research Council.
The new, slightly more independent, status will also give the Gardens greater freedom in their relations with world institutions with similar interests than is possible for them as part of a Government department. It will enable them to respond more freely to the present-day need to provide a quick-reacting centre of information on the world's plants and their economic uses. Finally, it will enable Kew Gardens to extend its role as an international co-ordinating centre for the conservation of plant life. It is that last point that gives me a reason, which I will disclose at the end of my short speech, to tell your Lordships something more about Kew's conservation activities.
Some noble Lords will have attended on Wednesday a week ago a meeting of the All-Party Conservation Committee of both Houses of Parliament. It was addressed on the subject of Kew's conservation activities by Professor Arthur Bell, the director, and Mr. Glen Lucas, deputy keeper of the herbarium, chairman of the Threatened Plants Committee of IUCN—the International Union for the Conservation of Nature—and head of the conservation unit at Kew, which co-ordinates its conservation activities. Based on the herbarium, and acting alongside the conservation unit, is the IUCN's Threatened Plant Committee with its secretariat and very expensive Wang

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computer, all funded largely by the World Wildlife Fund.
It is here that the known flowering plants are recorded. One-quarter of a million are recorded, and if only we could prevent the rain forests from being pulled down, the figure might be nearer half a million, but that may be past praying for. Of those quarter of a million known plants, about 10 per cent., 25,000, are threatened with extinction. This information is, from here, made available to the world through the Red Data Books, of which a second volume is in preparation. Here also is the source of scientific advice and information on the plants that are, or ought to be, in the appendices of CITES, the Convention for International Trade in Endangered Species. Kew has the statutory obligation here to act as the scientific authority for CITES under the Endangered Species (Import and Export) Act 1976.
This world leadership and world participation is further enhanced by two factors. The Threatened Plants Committee acts as secretariat for the coordinating body of the World's Botanic Gardens, a body formed at Kew's second conservation conference. The major incentive is, as with the world's zoos, to make up collections by purchase and exchange from other gardens, rather than to rob specimens from the wild. But also there is a constant interchange of information, not only with the world's zoos but also with a network of some 500 corresponding botanists, and the two networks are welded together by the Threatened Plants Committee's Newsletter.
Finally, a comment on what Kew is doing about conservation here at home, conservation about which they can provide information from a fabulous source; that is, the largest herbarium in the world, with over 5 million specimens.
Furthermore, Kew maintains its own nature reserve at the Loder Valley, attached to its country estate—its "Whipsnade"—at Wakenhurst Place. It is at Wakenhurst Place that is established its perhaps least spectacular and most vitally important operation—the seed bank. Mankind's food production depends more and more on strains developed from naturally evolved plants. If the seeds and the genes of these original wild plants are not preserved, the risk is one of total loss, or slower development. But the seed bank has more "bank accounts" than those for food. Everything is preserved that, now or in the future, can have possible use for the well being and adequate standard of living of mankind. So to food must be added the seeds of natural plants with such qualities as those of soil conservation and medicine, and, as I said, even unknown qualities that may one day be needed by mankind. So the long-term storage at Kew of genetic resources is a heavy responsibility of vital importance to the whole world.
I wanted to tell your Lordships something about the work of Kew Gardens, as it will now become the responsibility of the Board of Trustees. Your Lordships will, I hope, now better appreciate how essential it is that this board should represent the whole wide range of knowledge in this field. As drafted, the Bill puts the appointment of 11 of the 12 trustees in the hands of the Minister of Agriculture. That is satisfactory. His Ministry has done a good job over the years. But not all the knowledge, not all the
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contacts, can reside in one Ministry, and in Committee I shall seek to add on the Minister an obligation to consult others, not necessarily named, before making appointments. I shall move my amendment on the lines laid down in Schedule 3 of the Bill, relating to appointments to the Commission for Ancient Monuments. It is a modest request that I am sure will create confidence. As a second point I should like to ensure that Kew's statutory reports cover not only its own operations but also something that it can give better than can anyone else—that is the latest information and advice on the world plant situation.
7.43 p.m.
Viscount Hampden: My Lords, when I arrived in your noble Lordships' House earlier this afternoon and saw my name at the bottom of the list of speakers, I was rather reminded of being back at school, because then my name always appeared at the bottom of every list, usually with the words "twelfth man", and the word "scorer" in brackets afterwards. In the same way as a scorer is always enabled to watch every ball of a particular innings of his more illustrious colleagues, as the last speaker I have been able to listen to the excellent and most interesting speeches of your Lordships who know far more than I do about the heritage. My own interest in the heritage is based on the fact that I live in a grade I listed historic house, which is situated at the edge of a SSSI, in an area of outstanding natural beauty, and sometimes I feel that if I sneeze too suddenly, I shall do irreparable damage to the heritage.
I was most interested to listen to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd, about the success story of Leeds Castle. I should like to draw his attention, and that of the rest of your Lordships, to another castle which does not really fall within the scope of the Bill, since it is situated in Wales rather than in England. But I feel that if the Bill is a success for England, it might be possible to persuade Wales to go a similar way. I was lucky enough to be brought up in one of the most beautiful valleys in South West Wales, the Towy Valley, in what I call Carmarthenshire, but which I believe is now called Dyfed. In that valley is a twelfth century castle.
As a boy I was able to walk around the ramparts and the battlements, throw stones into the dungeons, and really enjoy myself. Now, unfortunately, no one can do that because the entrance is barred up with an iron gate, preventing anybody from getting in, since the fabric is in such a dangerous, dilapidated state. From the castle one gets one of the most tremendous views in Wales, down the valley towards Carmarthen and the sea, and up the valley towards the Black Mountains and the wild country—at least it was wild, but I am not sure whether the Forestry Commission has not tamed it a little—where, as a boy, I used to roam looking for Twm Shwm Catti's cave.
Not only is it an area of great beauty; it is one of the most important castles in Wales. It is one of the few castles where one can go round and—assuming that it is not an unparliamentary expression—put up two fingers to the English. It was the seat of the great Lord Rhys, who fought the Normans so very successfully in the twelfth century, and where, some 300 years later, his descendant marched with Henry Tudor to the

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battle of Bosworth Field. The noble Baroness, Lady Airey of Abingdon, mentioned the Anglesey leg. When I was a boy my grandfather had in his hall the stirrups that Rhys ap Thomas wore at the Battle of Bosworth Field. I am not quite sure where they now are.
Recently there was an article in one of the Welsh papers about the castle and the very sad state that it is in. The person who wrote the article blamed the Welsh Office for neglect. This is not the time to talk about the Welsh Office, and I have not sufficient information to accuse it of anything. However I should like to draw the attention of your Lordships to Castle Dynevor, because I think that it is a wonderful place; and what the noble Lord has done so successfully for Leeds, perhaps someone can do equally successfully at Dynevor, in the Towy Valley. That is why I support the Bill, and welcome it.
7.46 p.m.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, we have come to the end of what I think has been a most notable and outstanding debate and I should like to join with other noble Lords in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd, on his outstanding maiden speech. As we know, he has proved an admirable chairman of the trustees of Leeds Castle, which has already been described so well by the noble Baroness, Lady Airey of Abingdon, as a jewel of southern England. As the noble Lord has said, it is an example of what I believe can be done for the future of our heritage.
I should like in my speech—and I hope not to take long—to concentrate on that part of the Bill that relates to the museums, since I think that most of the other parts have been dealt with by my noble friend Lady Birk. In company with other noble Lords, I should like to give a general welcome to the Bill. I shall not deal with the commission. As I said, my noble friend has dealt with that, but I should like to say how much I agree with the last two speeches, including the speech of the noble Viscount, Lord Hampden, who spoke about the smaller castles such as Dynevor, and the noble Baroness, Lady Airey, who spoke about the preservation of smaller manor houses. I know particularly one that she had in mind which has been in the possession of the same family since the 14th century and where, as the noble Baroness knows, I had the privilege sometimes to stay as a young man, and of which I retain very happy memories.
I think it is important that the smaller manor houses should be preserved because they are bound up with our history and tradition and they have always had a special place in my heart, speaking in particular as one who—if I may give a similar example from France—prefers the small manor houses of the Dordogne to the châteaux of the Loire.
As has been said, this is really two Bills. I cannot help regretting that the Government decided to run the two Bills together, particularly as they emanate from different departments. If I may say so, I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, did not get it quite right when he said that the Secretary of State for the Environment was producing too many Bills. The trouble with this Bill is that it is not yet another environment Bill; it is a Bill which comes from the Environment Department, the Education
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Department, the Ministry of Defence and many other departments, which I think has made it difficult to handle in debate. However, I should like to congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Avon, on the way in which he introduced it to your Lordships.
I warmly support the intention to detach the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Science Museum from what the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, called the clutches of the departments and to put them under separate trustees. The Government have wisely implemented this proposal from the Burrett Report and thankfully they have jettisoned much else from that largely ill-conceived document which was so widely criticised when it appeared last summer and which I think was mangled by the Select Committee of another place when it considered it.
I welcome, too, the proposals for the Armouries and the Royal Botanic Gardens and also the news, the very good news, announced today by the noble Earl, Lord Avon, that the National Army Museum, which is one of my favourite museums and I think one of the most interesting museums in London, is to be transferred from the Ministry of Defence to independent trustees.
Certainly, as the noble Lord, Lord Gibson, said, the devolved institutions will need extra finance and staff for their new administrative responsibilities. This is particularly important. They will no longer have the benefit of the many functions at present carried out by the departments. Some people estimate that an 11 per cent. increase in the grant may be needed for the Victoria and Albert and Science Museums to stay as they are. The museums will also probably need a float as a contingency after the handover. In view of what the noble Earl, Lord Avon, said, that we must expect certain austerities to continue in finance, I hope this extra money will be forthcoming from the Treasury so that the independent museums can get off to a good start.
I think the clauses allowing the trustees to charge for admission if they wish have a rather ominous ring. We have been through this course before and I hope we do not have to go through it again. Does this refer only to the charging for special exhibitions, about which there is no dispute, or do the Government plan to introduce admission charges of a more general nature? I hope not. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson of Lullington. I hope the Treasury will not bring pressure to bear on the trustees to introduce charges when this may be against their wishes. If charges are introduced for entering the museum, what would be the position of the Victoria and Albert Library? This is probably the finest art library in the whole world. Would people have to pay an entrance charge to use it?
I welcome the part of Schedule 1 which guarantees the employment and pension conditions for the board's staff. Certainly the unions have been concerned about the loss of Civil Service status. I hope the Bill will reassure them in this respect. We are grateful to the Government for the trouble they have taken over this. But what is to be the position of the new staff who are not Civil Servants but who will be joining in the future? Further assurances will be needed here. I hope that when he replies the noble Earl will go some way to allay fears that have been rightly expressed on the staff side.
What is to be the position of the three out-stations

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for which the Victoria and Albert is responsible—the Wellington Museum at Apsley House, which was also a generous gift of the late Duke, Ham House and Osterly, which was also a generous gift of the late Lord Jersey? The Burrett Report said that the aim must be to make them self-supporting financially, otherwise every effort must be made to reduce the commitment. In the light of the Bill, will the Government tell the House, perhaps at a later stage of the Bill, what their policy is towards these three out-stations and, indeed, about the remaining recommendations of the Rayner scrutiny? Many of those recommendations were so insensitive and ill-conceived that it is not surprising that they had a very bad reception, particularly from the press. I do not blame the author of the report. He was given an impossible task. The trouble stems from the fact that departmental museums are not a suitable area for Rayner scrutiny. Fortunately, the Government seem to have accepted this. I congratulate them for allowing the Theatre Museum project, which is part of the Victoria and Albert, to go ahead, which was against Rayner who tried to stop it, and also in saving the enchanting Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green, which Rayner wanted to close down.
I now wish to say a brief word about the proposals concerning trustees, detailed in Schedule 1 and which have been touched on before. I am sure the Government will take careful note of what the noble Lord, Lord Annan, said about trustees and their relationship with the director. I agree that the trustees should be appointed by the Prime Minister of the day. But is it right—here I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson of Lullington—that the chairman should also be appointed by the Prime Minister? There is probably a case for the first chairman being so appointed, but after that it would be better, in my view, to follow the practice at the National Gallery and the Tate, whereby the board of trustees elect their own chairman. That would avoid the need for paragraph (5) of Schedule 1 which reads like a pure piece of Gertrude Stein:
"If a chairman ceases to be a trustee he shall also cease to be chairman; and if a chairman ceases to be chairman he shall also cease to be a trustee.".
I have no particular quarrel with the proposal about reappointment, except to say that I hope the Government will try to cast the net a little wider so that it is not always the same people who seem to be appointed. This is a lazy way of appointing people. One thinks of those who have already done the job as trustees and then also gives them the job as trustee at another museum, and so we go on, endlessly. As has been said about the so-called list of the "great and the good", we want sometimes the "not so great and the better". There must also be a halfway house between the existing system which has its defects—here, I agree with the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles—and what the noble Viscount wants to have, which is something quite different, as has been said, and more akin to a board of management.
I think there is a case also, as the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, implied, for appointing a trustee to represent the interests of those working in the museum. This is very important. There is a strong feeling, too, as has been said today, that the Royal
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College of Art, with which the V & A has close links and which occupies part of the building, should have the right to nominate a trustee to the board. Moreover, the director and two or three other heads of key departments, like publications and so on, should be on the board. In this way one would have greater participation without having a structured board of management.
I am glad that the Government have not followed the Rayner recommendations about disposals. The idea was that these could be used to finance new purchases. That is a most dangerous policy. It has been carried out by one museum in America with disastrous consequences. The Burrett Report exhorts the V & A to live dangerously—its own rather naive words. But if museums had been encouraged to dispose of unfashionable objects between the wars I doubt whether there would have been many Victorian paintings, which are now so much admired, left in the national collections. The disposal clauses follow the lines of the British Museum Act 1963 and, I submit, are acceptable.
May I ask whether Clause 5 covers the V. & A. Library, since Burrett recommended the disposal of bibliographical material which the report thought, in its own words, to be of passing or minor interest? In fact, much of this so-called minor material is often of the greatest importance in art historical research. This is something the Burret Report seemed unable to grasp.
Finally, may I deal briefly with Clause 33 and Schedule 5 to which it is related. Schedule 5 is headed:
"Minor and Consequential Amendments".
When one sees that in legislation, in my experience one will always find that it effects some fairly major changes. In this case I was not wrong. As a matter of fact, the amendments to the National Gallery and Tate Gallery Act 1954 are quite far-reaching. The first, which is Schedule 5(1)(a), seeks to delete Section 3(4) of that Act. This was originally inserted in the 1954 Act to allow the state to accept gifts and bequests where no destination is specified but are left to the nation.
A list of these, which comprise most of the national museums and galleries, is given in Schedule 1 to the 1954 Act. As your Lordships know, they comprise most of the national museums in the United Kingdom. If the Treasury want to add to the list, then they have to lay an order before Parliament at present explaining why they think a bequest to the nation should be diverted elsewhere. The present Bill seeks to delete that requirement. By doing this, the Government are taking open-ended powers and are apparently trying to short-circuit Parliament. If the Government have other institutions in mind which are not necessarily national institutions, why cannot these be specified in the present Bill?
Then, Section 4(2) of the National Gallery and Tate Gallery Act is also to be deleted. The Act stipulates that if the trustees agree to lend a painting painted before the year 1700, the permission of Parliament must be obtained by means of a Statutory Instrument. I remember the 1954 Act well when it was going through this House and played some part in getting this requirement written into the Bill. Indeed, I inflicted my maiden speech on your Lordships on that Bill.

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My Lords, it is not a 19th century legacy, as the noble Earl, Lord Avon. said. There was concern at the time—that is, in 1954—that pressure might be brought to bear on the trustees by Government to lend particularly important early paintings for diplomatic and other reasons. Many of these, particularly those from the early Renaissance period, are rather fragile and unsuitable to travel. Now, some 30 years later, I think that we can say that no single request has been turned down by Parliament and that the trustees of the National Gallery can be left to exercise their own judgment, particularly since nowadays, thank goodness! the fashion for lending supreme masterpieces around the world is ending due to security restrictions and other dangers.
I am not so happy about the third proposal which is contained in Paragraph 1(c) of Schedule 5. The subsection which we are being asked to delete was inserted as an impediment to any disproportionate increase in the number of paintings removed from ready public access by being lent to official buildings such as Government offices or embassies for furnishing purposes. I hope that some of those which have been abroad for some years will soon be coming back. The upper limits are fixed at 5 per cent, of the National Gallery's holdings and 10 per cent, of the Tate's—which is fairly modest. Any changes which the Treasury want to make to increase or decrease—but, presumably, to increase—these figures will have to be approved by Parliament, where, disproportionate increases can be challenged. Now, there is to be no parliamentary control at all. This, I suggest, is a proposal that we should examine in detail in Committee.
My Lords, may I say in conclusion with regard to the V & A that I hope that, like the other trustee museums, it will no longer have to close one day a week. I do not know why it is that the departmental museums always seem to be closed either on one day or never fully open at one time—and I have in mind, particularly the V & A, the Science Museum and the National Army Museum—while those under independent trustees seem to be open all the time.
I hope, too, that the splendid new wing which I had the privilege of seeing will be in use soon. At present, due to the departmental cuts, it is planned, I gather, to have a special, rather grand opening of the rooms next year and that on the following day, after the opening, they will be closed again. I hope that, with independence, the departmental museums therefore will be given in future the support and facilities that they deserve.
8.4 p.m.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, many noble Lords have mentioned that this is, in fact, two Bills in one. May I say, as the person who has to wind up, that I feel that it is two Bills in one, if not four in one? I should like to start by joining other noble Lords in paying a tribute to my noble friend Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd for his excellent maiden speech and for telling us of his success story. I hope that the fact that he has made his splendid speech today will augur equally well for this Bill and that all parts of it will have an equal success story.
The noble Baroness, Lady Birk, started her remarks,
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I think, about Schedule 4 of the Bill, and the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson, and my noble friend Lord Mowbray all spoke to this particular schedule. I will look at the suggestions that the noble Baroness has made and tie them in with what the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson, has said and see whether there is any possibility of helping in this way. The noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, made some remarks about the Army Museum which were much appreciated. As to my noble friend Lord Montagu, I appreciated the generous welcome from this authoritative source to the Bill. We shall look into his points about staff recruitment in the future, and its grades—something which was also mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi. We had excellent contributions from the noble Lord, Lord Adeane, my noble friend Lord Grafton, the noble Lord, Lord Gibson and the noble Lord, Lord Charteris, from their own specific points of view, all of which the Government welcome. Also, perhaps in the same breath, I can mention my noble friend Lady Airey, who also hung her hat slightly on the National Heritage Memorial Fund. The noble Lord, Lord Gibson, was particularly kind to make remarks about the Department of the Environment staff for which I should like to thank him.
The noble Lords, Lord Hutchinson and Lord Annan, representing their two galleries, I was glad to see crossed swords a little, which shows that we can have different points of view from all parts of the Chamber. We are particularly glad to see here my noble friend Lord Mowbray who, I gather, spent the morning in the Palace getting well awarded for having stood at this Dispatch Box doing this job some years previously. I am also grateful to my noble friend Lord Eccles for his stimulating remarks, which I shall come to later, and my noble friend Lord Sandford who made some very intriguing remarks about inspections, about functions and, in particular, about the advice on the functions of the commission and also the presentation of education. Latterly, my noble friend Lord Craigton spoke on the Royal Botanic Gardens. I had thought that they were going to be missed out and I was delighted to have such an erudite contribution from him. Then, just when I thought that we were going to get no mention of Wales, my noble friend Lord Hampden took us on a little tour of that country.
I think that we have covered almost everything, and in answering some of the questions I hope to give a degree of reassurance on some of the points which were raised. The noble Baroness, Lady Birk, and another noble Lord spoke about the principle of arm's length. Perhaps I can clarify that a little. The Government have been at pains to stress that they do not want, through these proposals, to distance themselves from heritage work. These proposals will not reduce in any way the Government's ultimate responsibility for the preservation of the nation's heritage. There is no intention of relinquishing these responsibilities. Ministers will remain very closely concerned with the overall direction of policy and will have control over the major part of the commission's overall financial resources. But within that strategic framework, the Government believe that delegation of day-to-day executive responsibility to the commission will improve the management of our heritage operations, without in any way affecting ministerial and parlia-

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mentary accountability. The commission will not be constrained by some of the restrictions which are, rightly, imposed on them by Government departments. They will be answerable for their activities to the Secretary of State and, through him, to Parliament.
The Government's first priority is to preserve and protect monuments for future generations. This will also be the commission's first priority. There is no question of neglecting sites where receipts are less than costs or of endangering popular sites by encouraging over visiting. Clearly, relatively few DoE sites can be financially viable; and simple financial viability is not a test that can be, or should be, applied to protection of the national heritage. But there are ways of improving the public's enjoyment of heritage sites and, at the same time, increasing the revenue to be obtained from them without in any way introducing any insensitive or undesirable element or detracting from the historical or cultural interest of the monuments themselves. Here again my noble friend Lord Geoffrey-Lloyd made an excellent example.
The noble Baroness, Lady Birk, asked particularly about the future of rescue archaeology. The establishment of a commission does not mean any decrease in the importance placed on rescue archaeology, or in the likely level of funding for it. The work carried out at present by the DoE through the Inspectorate, the Ancient Monuments Laboratory and the Central Excavation Unit, will continue within the commission, as will the important and complementary roles of local archaeological units and other expert local bodies. The commission will be better able, as the central focus of heritage work, to co-ordinate these activities.
I think virtually all noble Lords referred to the financial relationship, and particularly the noble Baroness. Lady Birk, and the noble Duke, the Duke of Grafton. There was a plea by the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi. The financial relationship between the Government and the new body is, of course, of crucial importance. Some of this relationship in terms of a power for the Secretary of State to pay grant and the arrangement for account audit and report are spelt out in the Bill. But a great deal is not usually included in legislation. Some of the specific questions raised by noble Lords fall in this latter category. They are questions which are very much in the Government's mind. Indeed, they are the subject of current discussions within Government. Until these discussions have been completed I cannot give noble Lords any categoric answers. But I can say that the arguments put forward to support separate treatment of private donations—that none will materialise if they are seen merely to reduce Government grant—are well taken. The similar incentive argument in respect of ploughing back into the heritage profits from trading generated by the new body is also fully understood.
The Government see the force in the aims of those who press these cases. I have noted, too, the view that the commission should be provided with an initial fund, and the analogy drawn with the National Heritage Memorial Fund. The fund and the commission have rather different roles to play, the commission being more concerned with executive
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management. On all these issues more will be said during the later stages of the Bill, and the comments made today have been most helpful. I am well aware that the House will want a positive assurance at the Committee stage.
Much was said about the carry forward. It has been stressed that the commission should have the ability to carry forward unspent money from one financial year to the next. Reference has been made to the passage in The Way Forward which mentions that appropriate arrangements should be made for some unspent money to be so carried forward. That passage did not mean that there should be a complete carry forward, as in the case of the museum purchase grants. Those grants are, in the Government's view, different from the executive operations of the commission. However, a degree of carry forward is normal to any grant-in-aid. How far can the Government go? We shall be guided by this debate. I have noted the pleas for both triennial and quinquennial grants.
The change to trustee status for the V & A and Science Museums should not of itself give rise to additional expenditure or alternatively lead to adverse financial consequences for the two museums. The Bill is neutral in this respect but the Government will continue to pay careful attention to the needs of the two museums, just as they do to existing trustee museums, within the framework of the overall financial resources. The noble Baroness, Lady Birk, made the point that the commission should have the benefit of advice from experts on high-powered committees. We fully agree. The provision in the Bill enabling the commission to appoint advisory committees recognises the need to have involved in their work the widest range of expertise, such as is currently offered by the Historic Buildings Council and the Ancient Monuments Board.
The noble Baroness, Lady Birk, the noble Lord, Lord Montagu and the noble Duke, the Duke of Grafton, spoke about Royal palaces and parks. May I describe the Government's thinking here? The Government have decided for the moment against giving the new commission a major executive role, either at the Royal palaces or in the Royal parks. These Royal properties are sensitive and highly important to the British people; Ministers must, in the Government's judgment, retain direct control. However, the commission will contain valuable expertise, both on archaeological and historic matters, and also on the development of tourist potential and educational issues for heritage properties generally. The commission's expertise in these areas will be available to the Department of the Environment in its maintenance of these vitally important properties and its appropriate management of those which are open to the public. The precise mechanics of their involvement remains to be worked out. I have noted the suggestion of the noble Baroness, Lady Birk.
I should like to say a word on the Royal Commission for Historical Monuments. Much thought has gone into the issue as to whether or not the Royal Commission in England should be brought within the new commission. The advantages of a single organisational grouping are balanced by the advantages on the other side of retaining a scholarly and independent body to record monuments and compile an inventory. The Government have not yet

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reached a conclusion on this matter but will reflect on the remarks made today, especially the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Adeane. I do not believe that we could have had a better introduction to the subject.
If I may now refer to trustee status and executive boards of management, a subject which exercised the House most after the financial particulars, the choice of system of government for institutions of the kind covered by this Bill is one which of course ought to be decided on the merits of each case. On one hand, the trustee system is prima facie well suited to the needs of national institutions, like the four covered by the first Part of the Bill. It is after all a system that has proved itself at the other national museums and galleries. It was interesting here that the noble Lord, Lord Annan, appeared to be saying one thing and the noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson, saying the other—both leading two of our more famous galleries.
There is much to be said at the outset for putting these four institutions on the same footing. Most particularly, however, the trustee system combines the wisdom and experience of a group of distinguished lay trustees with the professionally authoritative role of the instituion's director who acts within general lines of policy determined by the trustees upon whom rests the ultimate responsibility for the institution. The executive board model, on the other hand, we believe is better suited to institutions having extensive executive functions. The members of such bodies are usually salaried on a full-time or part-time basis, and possess particular management responsibilities which place them in a different relationship to the director or his equivalent. Executive boards therefore represent a more substantial executive and management structure at the head of an organisation. Having said that, I look forward very much to the proposals of my noble friend Lord Eccles, and to see what we shall be debating at the Committee stage. I enjoyed every word he said and agreed with virtually every word he said, particularly about the adult education of our heritage, and, with the exception of the method, I am entirely with him.
My noble friend the Duke of Grafton raised a number of points. He asked about administrative expenditure. The administrative and programme expenditure of the commission—as I term it—should be kept separate. This is a point on which I can reassure the noble Lord. As indicated in The Way Forward, it is likely that separately identified parts of the grant will include the grants themselves, the maintenance of ancient monuments and administration. I can assure noble Lords that the advisory role of the commission, to which the Government attach great importance, will be fully as wide as it is now in the present-day context. It is a central part of its role to be a strong and coherent focus for conservation.
So far as the capital transfer tax cases are concerned, the commission will continue the present role of the Historic Buildings Council in advising the Government on exemptions of historic buildings and associated land from capital transfer tax and capital gains tax. I can confirm, as annex C of The Way Forward made clear, that the Government will indeed in future look to the commission for this advice. Regarding research, I very much acknowledge the importance of well-directed research into conservation matters. This
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again was reflected in The Way Forward. The Government will consider how best to reflect this important function in the Bill.
The noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, and the noble Lord, Lord Gibson, spoke about provincial museums. For some years the Victoria and Albert Museum have operated a fund to assist provincial museums and art galleries to purchase objects for their collections. Grant in aid provision (in a separate estimate subhead) for this fund amounted to £1 million last year and this year. A similar, though smaller, sum is operated by the Science Museum. Last year in connection with changes in the functions of the Museum and Galleries Commission, it was proposed that the commission should take over responsibility for the funds. This met with vocal opposition and the proposal was left in abeyance pending the outcome of the Rayner Scrutiny of the two museums. I hesitate to mention the Rayner Scrutiny in this House, especially with the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, sitting opposite me. The Rayner report briefly discussed this issue in the general context of the scope of the museums' responsibility towards provincial institutions and in the light of its main recommendations that they should cease to be departmental museums. It acknowledged the museums' own reluctance to disturb the existing arrangement and to give up responsibility for the funds, and made no firm recommendation on the matter.
The consultation following the report has so far yielded no clear consensus on this issue. The Office of Arts and Libraries is still considering the remaining Rayner recommendations which have not yet been the subject of announced decisions in the light of the views expressed in the consultations. The Minister for the Arts hopes to make a further announcement on this fairly soon.
The noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson, asked specifically about the contracting-out of building work. The trustees will be able to use the services of the Property Services Agency, or outside contractors under PSA direction, where the buildings are owned by the Crown, as in the case of the Science and of the V & A Museums. Where the buildings are the property of the trustees, they will be free to do as they wish. including making use of the PSA.
He also asked about charging, as did the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi. The provision in the Bill relating to the V & A and the Science Museum are intended to enable the trustees to charge for admission if they wish. The reference is made to put beyond doubt that the trustees will have that power at their disposal. The Government have no intention of imposing a charging policy for admission to the main collections, either on all national collections or on the two covered in the Bill. Existing trustee and galleries already have power to charge and this will now be extended to the V & A and Science Museums. In practice, the trustees would normally consult the Government before making charges and the Government would not wish to prejudge the outcome.
The noble Lord, Lord Hutchinson, also commented on finance and accountability. It is envisaged that the Board of Trustees will be accountable to Parliament for their Votes, just as for existing national trustee museums. It is also envisaged that there will be a separate Vote for each institution, within which there

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will be a separate grant-in-aid for purchases. These are the arrangements operating at the other trustee museums and galleries, and I believe are well known to the noble Lord.
The noble Lord, Lord Charteris, asked specifically about the commission and borrowing against their money. The commission might need to use heritage property as security for their borrowing. That is not the intention. The temporary borrowing power is intended only to cover short-term cash-flow problems which would not need to be secured in that way; and I can confirm that the commission would be able to acquiring property with the Secretary of State's consent.
Baroness Birk: My Lords, before the noble Earl leaves that point—because he is going through this list extremely well, answering us all—may I say that I do not expect an answer immediately, but if he is talking about whether the commission may be short of money, would he take back the thought that it is going to be essential for this agency to be able to employ a director at a pretty high salary when it leaves the umbrella of the Civil Service? Would he take this into account when he is discussing the administrative cost as, for example, when he answered the points put by the noble Duke, the Duke of Grafton?
The Earl of Avon: My Lords. I will make sure that the noble Baroness's suggestion, or indeed warning, is borne in mind. There was some discussion about the term of office of trustees. The length of term of office varies among existing national trustee museums and galleries, and the period of not more than five years in this Bill broadly reflects the average in other institutions and allows greater flexibility than a longer fixed term. There is, of course, provision for reappointment.
We had some discussion on the appointment of the chairman. The Bill's provision for the appointment of a chairman of trustees by the Prime Minister we believe should be specially helpful at the outset; and I think most people were of that mind. When the new trustees would not know one another well enough to find it easy to choose the most appropriate candidate among their number, the chairman will have a key role, so that it is important to choose the right person. But as time goes on and the new board members settle into their roles, the Prime Minister will no doubt pay particular regard to the trustees' own recommendation when new chairmen come to be appointed. It may well be that the Prime Minister would normally expect to appoint a person recommended by the trustees.
There was some comment about the Drew Report. It contained a number of wide-ranging comments and recommendations; by no means all of them addressed directly to central Government. Some of the recommendations have significant financial resource implications and, however desirable they might be on their own merits, progress on them must clearly be constrained by the availability of funds within the framework of the Government's overall policies. The Government will continue to bear in mind all the points referred to in the Drew Report with a view to proceeding wherever desirable and practical. Meanwhile, the present Bill is not intended to be a comprehensive framework for the future development
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of the museum services as a whole, local, provincial, national or even international.
The noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, picked up in his usual way the point made in Schedule 5. First, may I say that by removing the requirement to seek an affirmative resolution of each House it simplifies the procedure for adding new institutions to the list of national museums and galleries in Schedule 1 of the Act. The list contains those institutions to which works of art may appropriately be transferred. An affirmative resolution will no longer be specified: nor will it be necessary for the Secretary of State to lay an order before Parliament. Secondly, it will now be possible for works of art executed by foreign artists before 1700 to be lent outside the United Kingdom, without recourse to Parliament for approval. Thirdly, there will no longer be a requirement for an affirmative resolution of each House before an alteration can be made to the proportion of works of art which may be on loan from galleries to public buildings and official residences. The repeals will place the boards of the National and Tate Galleries on an equal footing with those of other existing national museums and galleries, as well as with the boards envisaged in this Bill in this respect.
I did find out details of statutory instruments made under the sections of the Act which we propose to amend in the Bill. Under Section 3(3) there was only one order made in 1962. Under Section 4(2) there were 25 orders in total, and under Section 4(3) no orders appear to have been made.
I have now gone on for quite a long time and although I have one or two answers here I think I sense the will of the House that it might be better for me to answer the remaining points in writing. However, before closing I should like to pay tribute to the staffs of the V & A and the Science Museums, without whose dedicated contributions the museums would not have obtained their present standing. I believe that this Bill will offer them a renewed opportunity to devote their valued services to those institutions, and I express the Government's profound gratitude also to the members of the museums' advisory councils, which will be superseded when the new trustee bodies are appointed, for all they have done to assist the development of the museums.
I believe that the clear line which has come out through our Second Reading debate tonight has been the need for more freedom for the commission and I will take that suggestion back with me. Many particular points which I have not answered I shall hope, as I say, to answer in writing in the near future. May I end by thanking all noble Lords for their constructive contributions to this debate. I commend this Bill to the House and move that it be now read a second time.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
House adjourned at twenty-eight minutes past eight o'clock.

  SCOTTISH CRIMINAL TRIALS: REDUCED PLEAS
  SCOTTISH CRIMINAL TRIALS: REDUCED PLEAS
  SCOTTISH CRIMINAL TRIALS: CROWN PRECOGNITIONS
  SCOTTISH CRIMINAL TRIALS: CROWN PRECOGNITIONS
  SCOTLAND: MURDER STATISTICS
  SCOTLAND: MURDER STATISTICS
  HOUSING: CAPITAL AND EXPENDITURE
  HOUSING: CAPITAL AND EXPENDITURE